Continuing with William Whitaker’s “Disutation . . . against the Papists,” Whitaker takes up Calvin’s arguments against “The impiety of believing that the credibility of scripture depends on the judgement of the church” [Institutes of the Christian Religion, Book 1 Chapter 7].
Calvin’s first argument . . . is this: If the canon of scripture depend upon the determination of the church, then the authority, verity, of all the promises of salvation and eternal life contained in scripture depend upon a human judgment; because we believe those promises on accpount of the canonical authority of the scriptures in which they are contained. But it is absurd, that the promises of God should depend upon man, because then our consciences can have no confidence, no security. Therefore the canon of scripture does not depend upon the determination of the church.
. . . Stapleton . . . says, that the church does not make the contents of scripture true, yet does cause them to be believed by us as true. From which statement it is apparent that Calvin’s objection is just, that in this way our whole faith depends upon the authority and human judgment of the church. But scripture teaches us far otherwise and better. For thus we read, 1 John v. 10, “He who believeth not God, makes him a liar.” He therefore no no otherwise believes God promising, but on account of the authority of some one else, believes that other person more than God, and so makes God a liar. Besides, in this way, the church would be mistress of our faith, which is repugnant to that saying of Paul, 2 Cor. i. 24 . . . We stand, indeed, by faith, and that is the gift of the Holy Ghost, not of the church. We see, therefore, that it is not on the church’s, but on the Holy Spirit’s authority, that we persevere constant and stable in the faith, and fall not from divine grace.
—William Whitaker, Disputations on the Holy Scriptures (Soli Deo Gloria, 2005), 340–342
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