What is needed is not a retreat to Rome or Constantinople, but a retrieval of the Protestant tradition that predated the individualism and heart religion that came from the Great Awakenings. Protestantism is the solution, not the problem.

Fr. Josiah Trenham is one of the top online personalities influencing people to convert to Eastern Orthodoxy.^[1] Trenham has done a particularly effective job at reaching young men through his various teachings on a return to tradition, masculinity, marriage, and the like. Indeed, there is much to admire about the man. But perhaps his most influential resource is his 2015 book Rock & Sand: An Orthodox Appraisal of the Protestant Reformers and Their Teachings.^[2] In it, Trenham gives an overview and critique of the Protestant tradition and its major theologians.

Perhaps Trenham’s most notable criticism is against sola scriptura, the idea that Scripture alone is the only ultimate authority (as opposed to Eastern Orthodoxy’s claim that tradition is the life of the Holy Spirit within the church, in which the Scriptures are included). Indeed, he says, “From this fountain [sola scriptura] do the other major Protestant mistakes, errors, and heresies flow.”^[3] He continues, “The Protestant Reformers threw the proverbial baby out with the bathwater. They rejected the innovations of the papacy by becoming even greater innovators. They rejected the pope and each Reformer made himself a pope.”^[4]

Trenham argues three main points in criticism against sola scriptura. First, he argues that Scripture itself does not teach sola scriptura. How are Protestants, he asks, able to justify sola scriptura when the doctrine itself is not present in the Scriptures? Second, he argues that the New Testament itself teaches apostolic authority as the ultimate authority. Finally, he argues that the fruit of Protestantism, fragmentation, is evidence that sola scriptura fails.

While Trenham’s critique is rhetorically forceful, it rests on a misidentified target, selective exegesis, and an argument that undermines his own position. My goal is to offer a brief good-faith response that clarifies the Protestant position, answers Trenham’s central claims, and invites both Protestants and Orthodox to examine the issue with greater precision and charity.

Misidentifying the Protestant Position

Trenham starts by defining sola scriptura as the “doctrine that the Bible alone is the only infallible rule for faith and practice, and that the Bible alone contains all the knowledge that is necessary for salvation.”^[5] The first clause of this definition is a good start.^[6] The key term here is “infallible.” Unfortunately, what Trenham says after betrays the very definition he laid out by refuting something different. A few sentences later, he says this:

The scriptura itself does not teach that it is sola. Scripture is the foundational authority in the Church, being itself the very words of the living God, the inspired and infallible truth, quoted supremely by Councils and Holy Fathers to establish doctrine, and read in depth and explained in every Orthodox liturgy, and in every Orthodox home by prescription of the Fathers. It is just this traditional biblicism that has always led the Orthodox Church to reject the heresy of sola scriptura, for the Bible itself clearly teaches that it is not a stand-alone authority.^[7]

Then he gives the clincher, “Why do Lutheran, Calvinistic, Zwinglian, and Anabaptist creeds all differ on fundamental points if the Bible alone is the only authority of the Reformers?”^[8]

While the diversity of the Protestant traditions will be addressed later, it’s simply false to say that the Protestant Reformers believed the Bible was the sole authority, and that the Bible alone is the only authority of the Reformers. The Reformers, as well as those who came after them, have always affirmed the contingent authority of church tradition, creeds, confessions, elders, priests, councils, and even reason. But these lesser authorities are all properly subordinate to holy, infallible Scriptures. The reformers regularly appealed to these authorities in their refutations of Rome, as well as within their own discourses among each other. The Augsburg Confession, for example, written by Philip Melanchthon, appeals to the church fathers, ancient creeds, and councils dozens of times as authoritative references.^[9] The Second Helvetic Confession plainly affirms the Apostles’, Nicene, and Athanasian creeds.^[10] The Westminster Assembly frequently cited patristic sources during debates.^[11] Virtually all of the major Protestant Reformers appealed to the early church. John Calvin famously said in his address to King Francis I in Institutes of the Christian Religion, “If the contest were to be determined by patristic authority, the tide of victory—to put it very modestly—would turn to our side. Now, these fathers have written many wise and excellent things.”^[12] Hundreds of pages could be filled with examples like this. The point is, those in the Protestant tradition appealed to sources outside of the Scriptures as authoritative. These sources held real weight. The only distinction is that they held the Scriptures as the primary authority. It’s simply wrong to say that Protestants believe that the Bible is a stand-alone authority. Note well the Protestant position: The Bible is the only supreme authority, but it is not the only authority.

Second, Trenham’s view wrongly assumes that the Protestant position depends on Scripture explicitly declaring itself the sole authority. He says, “Neither Jesus nor His Apostles ever passed on to the Church the teaching that the Bible alone is the authority for Christians.”^[13] Protestants agree with Trenham that the Bible does not contain a verse outlining the exhaustive doctrine of sola scriptura, but he’s wrong to say that this idea is a Protestant distinctive. Protestants have a category for constructing theology based on a host of scriptures, as the Westminster Confession of Faith summarizes,

The whole counsel of God concerning all things necessary for His own glory, man’s salvation, faith and life, is either expressly set down in Scripture, or by good and necessary consequence may be deduced from Scripture: unto which nothing at any time is to be added, whether by new revelations of the Spirit or traditions of men.^[14]

So, according to one of the primary confessions of the Protestant tradition, doctrine need not be formulated through explicit Scriptural references, but from good and necessary consequences, that is, conclusions that follow necessarily and logically from what Scripture explicitly states. Therefore, there is no basis for Trenham to criticize Protestants for affirming something they do not affirm. It’s telling that Trenham doesn’t quote a single Protestant theologian by name here. A critique that doesn’t reckon with the best defended version is insufficient in its understanding of the classical Protestant position.

In regard to the classic Protestant doctrine of Scripture, individual passages speak of the uniqueness of Scripture in a way that accords with sola scriptura. No other writing is said to be breathed out by God himself (2 Tim 3:16). While human beings apart from God are darkened in their understanding (Eph. 4:18) and thus prone to error, the inspired biblical authors were carried along by the Holy Spirit as they wrote (2 Pet. 1:21). And because God does not lie (Titus 1:2), we know that his words are true (Ps. 19:7)—Scripture cannot be broken (John 10:35). Eastern Orthodoxy may affirm these truths above while decrying the ability to rightly interpret Scripture: how do we know which interpretation is correct? The apostle Paul’s Spirit-inspired words to Timothy in 2 Timothy 2:7 are telling: When faced with the challenge of interpreting apostolic writ, Paul says, “Think over what I say…”. Why? Because of this promise: “…for the Lord will give you understanding in everything.” The right interpretation of apostolic writ comes by thinking about words, the context, the grammar, and the logic of the passage. This is only a small snapshot of a Protestant theology of Scripture, but it becomes quickly apparent that what God says about his Word leads to a sola scriptura position.^[15]

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