Heresy- lesson 5
I.Introduction
A.3 fold use
B.New opinion contrary to other opinions of men Acts 24:14
1.However, I admit that I worship the God of our ancestors as a follower of the Way, which they call a sect. I believe everything that is in accordance with the Law and that is written in the Prophets,
2.Sometimes it is taken for any new and select opinion, contrary to the common and usually-received opinions of other men;
C.Any false opinion whatsoever;
3.Sometimes it is taken for any false opinion whatsoever, wherein a person recedes from any divine truth, and, thereby, creates division, sects, and contentions.
D.Some notorious false opinion (Jude) / overthrowing the form of wholesome words (Paul)
4.But strictly among divines, it is taken for some notorious, false, and perverse opinion, opposing and subverting the faith once delivered to the saints, as Jude says, or overthrowing the form of wholesome words, as Paul says
E.Heresy is an erroneous or false opinion, repugnant unto and subverting the doctrine of faith revealed in the Word as necessary unto salvation; and obstinately maintained and perniciously adhered unto by a professed Christian.
II.Erroneous opinion- heresy
A.Error has be about divine faith: The error must be about faith; matters of divine faith
B.It must be against the faith.
5.Not concordant to truth in scripture
6.Repugnant to the truth necessary to salvation
III.Heresy is dangerous to the church
1.Scriptures charge sin, perniciousness, and damnation who are heretics
2.Works of the flesh –Gal 5:20-21
a.Idolatry, witchcraft, hatred, variance, emulations, wrath, strife, seditions, heresies,Envyings, murders, drunkenness, revellings, and such like: of the which I tell you before, as I have also told you in time past, that they which do such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God.
3.Damnable (peter) 2 Peter 2:1-3
b.But there were false prophets also among the people, even as there shall be false teachers among you, who privily shall bring in damnable heresies, even denying the Lord that bought them, and bring upon themselves swift destruction. And many shall follow their pernicious ways; by reason of whom the way of truth shall be evil spoken of. 3 And through covetousness shall they with feigned words make merchandise of you: whose judgment now of a long time lingereth not, and their damnation slumbereth not.
4.2 Tim 2:17 And their word will eat as doth a canker: of whom is Hymenaeus and Philetus;
5.Mark 8:15 and he charged them, saying, Take heed, beware of the leaven of the Pharisees, and of the leaven of Herod.
6.2 peter 3:17 Therefore, dear friends, since you have been forewarned, be on your guard so that you may not be carried away by the error of the lawless and fall from your secure position.
7.Matthew 7:15“Watch out for false prophets. They come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they are ferocious wolves.
8.Philippians 3:2watch out for those dogs, those evildoers, those mutilators of the flesh.
C.Greatness to the dangerous of heresy
1.Buys a soul or stabs a soul: “Every heretical opinion buys a soul or stabs a soul. Its stabs the soul of him who maintains it, and still trades it on to murder more souls.”
2.Turns the glory of God into a lie
3.what is God without truth? And what is all the goodness of the Gospel without truth? And what is the fabric of man’s salvation without truth?
4.Truth is the knot that ties everything together
5.Like the circle in a pond- one heresy begets another.
6.“what is God without truth? And what is all the goodness of the Gospel without truth? And what is the fabric of man’s salvation without truth? Truth is, as it were, the pin, the clasp, the knot that ties all. And a church is never more close to dying when it gives up the truth. Heresy is like the circles in a pond; one begets another, the smaller to the greater. So one heresy begets another, a lesser to a greater.”
IV.Church had to defend itself against heresy’s
A.Judaism
7.Judaizers came into the church teaching that it was necessary to obey the Law of Moses
B.Ebonites taught that Christ was not always the Son of God, but was adopted by God as Son after he fulfilled the law
C.Ebionism is related to Essenian Judaism for some of its principles have been taken from there
D.Ebionism gave way to Gnosticism- reinterpretation of Judaism
V.Nestorianism
F.Elxai who lived in the first half of the second century. His doctrine is Ebionite, but has a strong Gnostic influence. He claimed he received a revelation from an angel who was ninety-six miles tall, and the angel was the Son of God.
1.Claimed to receive revelation from a angel
2.Mystery religions came from
3.Combination of many religious thoughts
4.Salvation for them consists in the liberation of the spirit, which is enslaved because of its union with material things
5.Salvation is achieved through knowledge
6.Jesus and the Christ 2 different beings
7.World made by seven angels
8.Human’s souls preexisting, salvation comes from recalling preexistence.
9.Eternal principle is the abyss
c.Mind, silence and truth- the gospel of truth.
G.Simon Magnus whom Justin said had a large following,
H.Menander, one of Simon Magnus’ disciples who was a Jewish Gnostic.
I.Cerinthus was the first Gnostic to reinterpret the Christian Gospel and said that Jesus and the Christ were two different beings.
J.Saturnius, a disciple of Menander, said the world was made by seven angels (for God would have nothing to do in creating evil material substance).
E.The school of the Carpocratians was born in Alexandria
1.Neoplatonism dominated their thought and they taught that human souls were pre-existent and salvation is achieved by recalling that preexistence.
K.Vallentius also lived in Alexandria at this time and was expelled by the church in 155 A.D. for Gnostic doctrines.
d.He said the eternal principle of all being is the Abyss.
e.These divine emanations continue for thirty eons and ultimately reach Jesus who is here to free men from material bondage through knowledge.
f.This outline is found in his writings called The Gospel of Truth.
L.Marcion-heretic who taught some ideas that were close to Gnosticism:
g.This god is love.
h.He is not related to this world and is foreign from it.
i.Over an against his god of love is the opposite god who has formed this world and the evil in it. This is basically a primitive from of dualism that he is ascribing.
j.Marcion theology excludes this world from the sphere in which the Supreme God rules. \ there is a secret knowledge of this supreme God in which one can escape the bonds of materialism
k.epistles of Paul and the Gospel of Luke
l.He could not believe that God became man and denied the incarnation, even though he accepted, for the most part, the Gospel of Luke.
VI.Montanus
A.Montanus was a pagan priest who had been converted to Christianity and baptized around 155 A.D.
B.He then declared himself possessed by the Holy Spirit.
C.Two women joined him named Priscilla and Maximilla who also prophesied.
D.This was new revelation given specifically to them by the Holy Spirit, who in turn, was starting a new dispensation of the church.
E.This claim, though, of having new revelation, endangered the finality of revelation given in Christ.
VII.New heresies were emerging, some in the church were struggling over the relationship of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit
2.Monarchianism taught that the Father was the supreme monarch that ruled all, including the Son, since no distinction could be made between their essence.
3.Paul of Samosota began dynamic Monarchianism that taught that the impersonal power of the logos was not the same as the essence of deity.
4.Modalist Monarchianism did not deny the full divinity of Christ, but simply identified it with the Father.
5.In this way the Father suffered on the cross as well (since they are one God). This view is also known as Patripassianism.
F.regula fide, or the rule of faith
1.Given in written form in the Scriptures by Christ and the Apostles
2.Apostolic succession overruled the heretical sects both by the lineage the church, and the doctrines that came from that lineage as seen in the bible
G.Clement of Rome
1.Already appealed to this succession against heresies that were schismatic against the church.
2.New Testament exposition and doctrine, could overthrow the heretical sects that were emerging with truth claims
M.The Apostle’s Creed
3.Demonstrated the basics of the Christian faith over and against the arising heresies.
4.traditio et redditio- bishop taught the symbol or creed to the catechumen coming into the church, and they repeated it as an affirmation.
Heresy- lesson 5Page 1 of 5