How Tradition Makes Void the Word
By W. A. S.
WE go to the world with a message that is founded on the unchanging Scriptures of truth. It can all be stated in the plain terms of the written Word. For every religious practise we can say, “Jesus Christ did this as our example; where he walked, by his grace we will walk.” There is safety and security in holding to the sure foundation of Holy Scripture. Christ is the one foundation; and he, the living Word, is revealed in the Book. It was his desire that even the disciples, who knew him by his bodily presence, should know him chief of all by the revelation of the Word. That evening on the way to Emmaus, the eyes of the two disciples were “holden that they should not know him,” evidently in order that before ever their attention should be absorbed by the view of his bodily presence, they should see him in the written Word, as, “beginning at Moses and all the prophets, he expounded unto them in all the Scriptures the things concerning himself.” His bodily presence was soon to be removed from their sight; but once they saw him in the Scriptures, they had the lasting view, ever to be with them, and to be passed on to others by the preaching of the Word. All the history of the church, ancient and modern, shows how persistently the enemy of truth has worked to undermine the sure foundations. In the days of Christ the Jewish teachers had set the traditions of the elders before the Word of God. This was not at all as an attack upon the Scriptures, or with the idea of setting them aside. They professed to revere the Word, and read and expounded it to the people; but it was the Word as interpreted by the elders. To justify their course, and give the force of divine authority to their traditions, they had developed the theory of— They held that when Moses was called into the mount to receive the instruction which he wrote in the “book of the law,” he had also committed to him important teaching concerning the law, which was not written. This he transmitted to Joshua, and Joshua in turn to the elders, and they passed it down to the men of the Great Synagogue, the doctors of the law. By this theory the rabbis claimed divine sanction for the oral traditions which had accumulated from generation to generation. By degrees these traditions were given equal place with the Scriptures, and by the time of Christ they had displaced the Word of God. Thus the scribes and doctors of the law were able to claim to be the sole guardians of truth, and the people were not supposed to know the Scriptures, except as the priests taught them. “This people who knoweth not the law are cursed,” said the Pharisees when the common people gladly heard the gospel. The Jews had reached the point of apostasy which the Lord rebuked through Isaiah, saying, They “have removed their heart far from me, and their fear toward me is taught by the precept of men.” Isa. 29:13. For this Christ repeatedly reproved the scribes and teachers. The main ground of their opposition was that he did not follow tradition and the teachings of the fathers. He taught the people what the Word of the Lord said. When the Pharisees complained to him that his disciples transgressed the tradition of the elders, he replied: “Why do ye also transgress the commandment of God by your tradition?” “Full well ye reject the commandment of God, that ye may keep your own tradition.” The Same Thing Over Again
Since the days of Christ we have had an exact parallel to this history. Again the religious world is following many practises received by tradition and not founded on the Word. The Spirit of God, the Author of all truth, declared by the apostle that the Holy Scriptures are able to make the man of God “perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works.” 2 Tim. 3:17. Yet when doctrine and practise are tested by the Word, and found wanting, the reply is13that these things are established by the common usage or interpretation of the church from earliest times. And regardless of the Word of God, the easier road of tradition is followed. In order to give authority to its whole system of unscriptural practises, the Catholic Church has invented the theory of apostolic tradition. The apostles, it is said, received instruction which is not recorded, which they passed to their successors; and so it has come on down through the centuries. True to its very nature, tradition makes void the Word, and hence the people are taught not to follow the Word but to come to the teachers who are able to interpret it by the aid of the traditions of men. And not Roman Catholics alone, but the greater part of the professedly Protestant peoples, in some particulars, cling tenaciously to doctrines and practises which are unknown to the Scriptures. In the matter of Sunday observance, almost the whole of Christendom follows the path of tradition, which fully makes void the Sabbath commandment. It is often said that this is one of the things that Christ said, the which, if they were written, “the world itself could not contain the books that should be written.” One grave Protestant bishop has said that Christ instructed the disciples to change the day, and for some wise reason told them not to say anything about it. It is the old tradition of Moses and Joshua and the elders over again; and again it is shown that the Catholic rule of faith, “The Bible and tradition,” inevitably becomes, “Tradition instead of the Bible.” The Lord is a jealous God. He admits no rival. As he only hath immortality, so also his Book alone is the infallible rule of life and doctrine. This Word is the lamp to our feet and the light unto our path. The advent message is God’s last call to men to take their stand on the everlasting foundation of his Holy Word.