More Dumb Charges & Accusations Dept.
The Anonymous One (TAO) has chimed in with a remark that utterly distorts what I was doing in my post:
"In an act of hypocrisy, Dave Armstrong has taken the opportunity to accuse James White of deficient research for relying on secondary sources after recently defending Steve Ray's reliance on secondary sources (link [to my post above])".
http://turretinfan.blogspot.com/...vs-
michuta.html
Needless to say, I did no such thing. It's yet another of TAO's many lapses in elementary logic.
All I wrote was " James White's Deficient Research" and "Bishop Jame White has miscalculated a bit concerning his description of a vote at the Council of Trent with regard to the canon of Holy Scripture". That's it! I wrote not a word about secondary sources or Metzger.
Obviously I wouldn't attack reliance on secondary sources per se, since I just wrote a lengthy defense of that very tactic, over against James Swan's mantra of "ad fontes". I have no qualms, however, about critiquing lousy research conclusions (i.e., false ones). Therefore:
1) I didn't make this argument in writing.
2) I didn't even have it in my mind at all; quite the contrary.
3) Thus I am not guilty of the hypocrisy that TAO accuses me of.
But it was fun to again have the opportunity to expose the shoddy logic and analytical skills of TAO. The man never quits.
TAO wants to continue, getting himself deeper into the logical hole he's dug for himself:
"DA has now claimed in his own combox that he was not criticizing James White for using secondary sources, and clearly his post doesn't use the words "secondary sources." Since Metzger (the secondary source) clearly gives the same information White does, and since the page DA links to mentions that fact ... readers may draw their own conclusions about DA."
[same post, now updated]
One truly marvels at such mental blindness. Again: to criticize someone for deficient research in this one instance (which happened to rely on secondary sources) is not to criticize all use of secondary sources as in and of themselves improper. Is this not self-evident? It is TAO's buddy James Swan who virtually argues the latter position, when it comes to Luther research. I do not at all, and have defended the use of secondary sources from actual historians:
http://socrates58.blogspot.com/2...ll-
primary.html
TAO's reasoning in this instance is simply dumb and dense. Here is how it proceeds:
1) Dave sez White botched his calculations about the vote at Trent.
2) White relied on info. from Bruce Metzger.
3) Metzger is a secondary source.
4) Therefore, Dave eschewed the use of secondary sources in research, which makes him a hypocrite because he just got through protesting the same thing when James Swan argued it.
[shaking head]
By the same "reasoning" I could also prove:
1) Dave sez St. Thomas Aquinas botched the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception.
2) St. Thomas Aquinas is a Doctor of the Church.
3) Therefore, Dave dissents from all Doctors of the Church and considers them unreliable sources, that shouldn't be used in good research on Catholic historical theology.
It is taking one single instance of a false conclusion and acting as if dissent on that one thing implies massive dissent against whole categories of people or types of sources.
It just ain't so. One either comprehends this rather basic rule or "law" of introductory logic or they do not.
Metzger simply made a mistake. We don't have to accuse our opponents of dishonesty because we recognize that human beings (even great scholars) make mistakes. One would think that Protestants: the great opponents of papal and conciliar infallibility, would understand this, but TAO, for some reason, doesn't grasp these elementary matters, I guess.
Readers may draw their own conclusions about TAO.
I almost missed this post, have you considered bumping it?
I want the Big Debate to be pinned on top till it is done. There is still Big Stuff to come. So new things are under those two for now. This came about because The Anonymous One childishly insisted on "exposing" our paper before we had completed it. Therefore I keep adding to it as we finish new avenues of research.
Not sure what happened to my initial post, but this would be one of those occasions when James Swan was doing the type of shoddy research that he accused Steve Ray of, he got the quote from this wikipedia article:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dev...t_canon#_ref-
17
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dev..._canon#_note-
17
Oh boy..i shouldn't be laughing, but the irony is just killing me
http://www.handsonapologetics.co...com/
metzger.jpg
Its not like Bruce Metzger didn't write his book in English, why is this quote out of its context?
I am enjoying reading this article whilst reading my copy of the "The Apocrypha KJV: Study the Apocrypha in the Poetry of the King James Verse" which is a reprinting of the deuterocanical books that were included in the original 1611 KJV but excluded from later editions.
B TW~If Protestants actually believe in the notion of "Private Judgment" in discerning God's Word, why doesn't each Protestant have the freedom to exercise that judgment and decide for themselves which books belong in the Bible? And where does people like Mr. Swan or Mr. White derive their authority to determine what books are in the Bible and what books are excluded? Since they don't believe in the infallible authority of the Church to set the canon, could one of our Protestant friends provide the verse from Scripture where one may read the divinely inspired table of contents?
Now the TAO and James White know that Metzger was 'incomplete', will they correct the claims in their research?
That marks where truly deficient research begins.
Hey, if their reasoning faculties were operating correctly, they wouldn't be anti-Catholics, would they now? :-D
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