The Protestant Gospel
Bible truth is synonymous with hope. Truth and hope are mutually inclusive. This is why Luther's Pro… pic.twitter.com/BOKzk01VB9
— Paul M. Dohse (@PaulMDohse) May 27, 2015
The Protestant Tree
The Protestant tree: Plato is the roots; Augustine is the trunk; Catholicism is the branches, and Protestantism the poisonous fruit.
— Paul M. Dohse (@PaulMDohse) May 26, 2015
Susan Dohse on Plato, Augustine, Calvin, and the Reformation
TANC 2013 Conference on Gospel Discernment and Spiritual Tyranny
Transcript: Susan D. Dohse MEd.
Plato
I’m Susan Dohse. I’m married to Paul Dohse for two years, and it has been an adventure. My role in this year’s conference has changed. This year I became Paul’s research assistant. The pay stinks, but the fringe benefits are really nice. Unlike last year when I spoke from personal experience, which though difficult and emotional at times, was easier than this year’s assignment. This year I was asked to step outside my preschool box and share what I’ve learned through not personal experience but personal study and research. And I am thankful for the World Wide Web, computers, and the Internet even though I fuss and say unkind things to the computer, I am thankful that the Lord created those on the eighth day. If I had to find answers to the questions that I had in the old-fashioned way, by using the card catalog and the Dewey Decimal system, I wouldn’t be here this morning. I would still be at the library roaming the stacks. My role in this year’s conference is to share my research. My goal though is to provoke you to think. What I want to share is only an introduction. It’s not even a scratch on the surface of what there is to know about these historical figures. It’s up to you though to continue the research project. So you do have an assignment. I want you to think of me as just a grain of sand, an irritant in the oyster that over time though yields a pearl.
Matthew 7:24-27, Jesus is speaking here. “Therefore, whosoever hears these sayings of mine and does them, I will liken him unto a wise man who built his house upon a rock. And when the rains descended and the floods came and the winds blew and beat upon that house, it fell not, for it was founded upon a rock. And everyone that hears these sayings of mine and does them not shall be likened then to a foolish man who built his house upon the sand, and the rains descended and the floods came and the winds blew and beat upon that house, and great was the fall of it.”
The foundation of thought that I want to illustrate is built upon a historical figure that I just knew initially in a Jeopardy quiz show fashion, you know. Student of Socrates, Greek philosopher, The Republic. Who is Plato? Well, if I were to ask you to tell me something that you know or you’ve been taught about this man, I’m certain I would get classic textbook answers. Greek philosopher, student of Socrates, established the first university called The Academy, wrote The Republic, I would give you credit for being correct. For over 2,500 years, Plato has been studied, admired, modified, personalized, and deified. He has been described as a great thinker, lover of wisdom, a crusader against error, and an enemy of falsehood. Well, after reading hundreds of pages about him, I cannot help but agree that he was a man of great intelligence. He was a mathematical genius, an advocate of education. In your list of trivia facts, would you also include pagan, polytheist, crusader against individuality, founder of communistic, socialistic, and Darwinian evolutionary thought, enemy of God, hero of the reformers?
Born in 427 BC, the son of noble and wealthy Athenian parents with the blood of ancient kings of Attica flowing through his veins. It was this status in life that gave him the way and the means to pursue his quests. Unlike others of his day, he didn’t have to earn a living and go to school at night or hold two jobs to pay for his education. He was of the ruling class of Athens, a privileged elite.
At the age of 20, Plato came to Socrates and asked to be his pupil. And Socrates saw before him a handsome youth, broad shoulders of an athlete, a noble brow of a philosopher, the limpid eyes of a poet. Those aren’t my descriptive terms. This is how Socrates described him. Socrates accepted him as a student, and this became the beginning of a tender and an intimate relationship that lasted until Socrates’ death. The respect and admiration of the student for his teacher was profound and lasting.
Well, after Socrates was executed, Plato and the other disciples of Socrates took to the world, and they traveled the ancient world. Now whether of fear that they would be arrested and also executed because of their association with Socrates or because they wanted to be foreign exchange students is not really well documented. Plato went to Cyrene where Theodorus instructed him in mathematics. He went to southern Italy where he studied the science of numbers under three of the most learned doctors of the Pythagorean mathematical system of his day, went to Egypt to receive instruction from those learned doctors and priests of that ancient land. Some records say he visited Persia, Babylonia, and even India. So he returns to Athens and establishes his Academy, the first university in Europe where he taught until the age of 81.
So up until his return to Athens, we can say letter P for professional student, P for pagan polytheist. Plato regarded the sun, moon, stars, and planets as the visible gods. These heavenly bodies do not come into beings and then pass away. Plato attributed divine souls to the sun, moon, stars, and planets because they followed that intelligible course through the sky. He also held [SOUNDS LIKE] the invisible gods, the gods of the civilized life where the king was Zeus. These gods care about humans. They’re aware of whether we are good or evil. Though invisible, they can reveal them themselves when they want to. They are not standards of justice, beauty, truth, and goodness, but they were living beings who have the perfect knowledge of those standards. Plato wrote, “I do believe that there are gods, and that in a far higher sense than that which any of my accusers believe in them.”
P for platonic wisdom which unites with methodology. P for philosopher ruler. Plato referred to himself as a philosopher ruler. He stressed the importance of living the life of a philosopher by worshipping ideas. The search of ideas, the appreciation of ideas, the participation of the ideas—that’s the life of a philosopher, and that’s what he taught, and that’s what he believed. So the life of Plato was a tireless quest for those ideas. His life is a sustained effort to live by those ideas and to teach others to do so.
P, political scientist, his political philosophy was explained in his writing The Republic. The ideal state, he says, should be divided into three classes of citizens, and each class has its own particular duty to be performed and a special virtue to be developed. The lower class, the laborers and the artisans, their immediate task, acquire skill. The second class, that’s the warriors, and they’re given the opportunity to develop courage and fortitude at their stage of evolution. And the ruling class, those are those men who have learned how to govern themselves and are therefore fit to govern others. I quote from Plato, “Unless philosophers become rulers or rulers become true and thorough students of philosophy, there will be no end to the troubles of the state and humanity.” When each state concentrates upon its own duty and virtue, there will be a well-balanced and harmonious state in which all of the citizens will work, but not for the interest of self but for the common good of the whole. The state will be in charge of production and that sphere of physical goods and life. (more…)
Cowardly Husbands and the Protestant Super-Cult: Elder Authority Over the Family Unit
I have written some articles recently about elder authority. Where is it? When it gets right down to it, the gift of eldership (no, it is NOT an “office”) is specifically spoken of in the New Testament four times, five if you want to argue for Hebrews 13:17 regarding “leaders” which assumes eldership.
Furthermore, where tradition assumes “church discipline” is a ministry tool for the express use of elders, they are not even mentioned in Matthew 18 nor is there anything in the chapter that lends any notion towards an argument for such an idea. Moreover, where do we even find “church discipline” in the Bible to begin with? Where is the idea in Matthew 18 or anywhere else in Scripture?
In books of correction and apologetics, as well as major doctrinal statements on justification such as the book of Romans, elders are not even mentioned.
Also, ministries traditionally attributed to elders such as counseling are specifically earmarked for congregants at large and the Scriptures specifically call on them to fulfill those ministries as a matter of obedience.
This brings us to the supposed authority of elders in the home. Ephesians 5:22-6:4 and 1Peter 3:1-7 speak specifically to
authority in the home and guess who are totally absent from the conversation? Right, the big bad elders.
How have those of such little relevance in the Bible come to rule over the church with a spiritual iron fist?
This brings me to yet more drama going on in the institutional church. At Matt Chandler’s church, a well-known Neo-Calvinist, the elders have brought a wife under church discipline for divorcing her husband who was caught with child porn. If she goes to Chandler’s church, she has heard often about how people cannot change save their perception of just how sinful they really are leading to an increased “gratitude” for “what Jesus has done, not anything we do.”
You do the math. Unless the wife is mentally catatonic, she has to figure she is married to a man that is infatuated sexually with little children, but cannot change. But trust me, she has something going on upstairs because she asked the elders in essence, “Who gave you the authority to tell me I can’t divorce my husband?” Good question, and the answer is… “nobody.” Also, redemptive church discipline proffers the idea that the elders have the authority to “declare her an unbeliever.” How do we get from the aforementioned biblical facts to a bunch of guys who have authority over your salvation? Have we totally lost our minds? In addition, preventing someone from performing a lawful act under threat of public defamation is a felony in most states. It just so happens that the practice of redemptive church discipline is technically a serious crime.
And let’s talk about the tragedy of Chandler’s teachings and how they created the situation to begin with. The Bible makes it clear that anyone can be inflicted with “sinful desires” of all sorts. This is an affliction and the source is sin. The source is also the old self that was crucified with Christ which means that the desire has no power over the believer—the believer is able to say “no” to that desire, and if he/she doesn’t, it will bring death in one way or another.
The blood of the situation is totally on the hands of Chandler and his elders due to errant teachings on sanctification, and the divorce is merely part of the death process that her husband is now experiencing. In this case, the death of a marriage along with whatever else is he is going through.
It is amazing to see how husbands are relinquishing their families to these doctors of death. This return to authentic Protestantism will continue to implode more and more until something gives. The destruction of families is ongoing and incalculable. As I have mentioned in other articles, I continue to get testimonies that family situations are greatly improved by virtue of the fact that the families simply leave the institutional church.
Cultism will never make a situation better, only worse.
paul
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