The Argument that Will Make Wes Huff Catholic

[00:00:00]This is Wes Huff. If you don't know Wes, he's a reformed Baptist apologist, probably the internet's favorite defender of the Bible right now. He went viral on Joe Rogan, showing that the New Testament is the best preserved book of the ancient world. And honestly, like he's 100% right about that. The manuscripts are incredible. I have zero interest in fighting Wes on manuscripts.

[00:00:21]But two months ago, Wes released a video called Six Reasons Why I'm Not Roman Catholic. It's got almost a million views and some great Catholic responses are already out there going point by point through his six reasons. I'll link a few of those below, but I'm not going to do that today. Today, I want to hand Wes one question back because there is one page in Wes's Bible that no manuscript on earth can defend. This page, the table of contents, every book behind this page claims to be inspired by God. This page, however, doesn't. No apostle wrote it and it took Christians over 300 years of open disputes to finalize it. By the end of this video, you'll be able to state in four lines why this one page forces every Protestant, Wes included, into a choice that nobody wants to make. Either stop trusting your New Testament or stop being a Protestant. Now, if you think that you've heard this argument before that that I'm going to make in this video, you've got to think again. Okay, this new argument comes from a very recently published essay that's packed with primary source material from the first few centuries of Christian history. At the end of the video, I'll reveal where you can find it. This argument is definitely not the canon argument that you've heard before.

[00:01:29]You've heard Catholics say, "You need an infallible church to know the canon."

[00:01:33]You've heard the classic Protestant comeback to that RC Sproul's famous line that the canon is quote a fallible collection of infallible books. Okay, fine. Today, infallibility is actually off of the table. We're not going to use it. This argument needs something much weaker and therefore much much stronger.

[00:01:51]Something every Protestant already believes that your New Testament is reliable. That these 27 books are the right 27 books. In other words, so nothing snuck in, nothing inspired was left out. Wes says that he's Protestant because of his study of scripture and church history. That's actually a really great starting point. Scripture and church history are the only two things that we'll use in this video. So, keep your eye on one word throughout this video, reliable, because this whole video turns on it. So, who decided which books go in the New Testament? Well, let me tell you a story. The New Testament didn't fall out of heaven leatherbound in the first few centuries of Christianity. These books circulated separately around the Roman world along with a lot of others. Okay? Some were written by apostles. Some claimed to be and weren't. Some named no author at all. And no apostle ever left behind a list. Okay. The early church had to sort this out. And that took centuries. How do we know? We have a witness. His name is Ucius. Think of Ucius as the first great historian of Christianity. A bishop writing around the year 320 who collected everything he could find about the church's first three centuries into a book called the church history. It's one of our most valuable windows into the early church. Protestant and Catholic scholars alike both lean on it constantly because he block quoted from earlier works now lost to history. Wes quotes.

[00:03:22]Everybody quotes Ucius. Andius does something very helpful. He sorts the Christian books of his day into bins.

[00:03:30]Recognized. Everyone accepts these the four gospels, Acts, Paul's letters. Then he's got rejected heretical stuff like the so-called Gospel of Thomas. Nobody's crying over those. And then disputed, still being argued about in the year 3:20 in the 4th century. Now, here's the uncomfortable part. Seven books from your New Testament, everybody's New Testament are sitting in the disputed bin. Okay? James, Jude, second Peter, 2 John, Third John, Hebrews, Revelation.

[00:04:01]That's more than 200 years after the apostles, the last apostle, died. And Christians are still arguing about whether these books belong in the Bible in the first place. And the doubters weren't cranks. Okay, listen to you CBS on James, the letter of the Lord's own stepbrother. quote, "Its authenticity is doubted since not many of the early writers quote it." On second Peter, he's even bluntter speaking of the his phrase so-called second epistle of Peter. He writes, quote, "We have not regarded as canonical." Just sit with that for a moment. Okay. The most important historian of the early church didn't personally count second Peter and neither did many Orthodox Christians before him. Or take another example, Hebrews. Okay, simple question. who wrote Hebrews origin. A scholar of the early church writing around the year 2:30 notices the Polish Greek doesn't look like Paul's weighs every theory and lands on this famous verdict. Quote, "But who wrote the epistle? Only God knows." Only God knows. Ucceius tells us that the church at Rome denied Paul wrote it at all. Others guessed Luke or Clement or Barnabas. Nobody knew. Okay.

[00:05:13]So, how can we know 2,000 years later?

[00:05:16]But the wildest case by far is Revelation. Uceius's report, quote, "As to the Revelation, opinions are evenly divided." Think about that. Evenly divided. On the book of Revelation, it was basically back then a coin flip. And it gets even crazier. Dianicius the great patriarch of Alexandria in the mid-200s, one of the most respected bishops of his generation tells us some earlier Christians rejected the book completely tearing it apart quote chapter by chapter as unintelligible, illogical. They even claimed that its true author was quote neither an apostle nor saint nor even church member but serinthus. Serinthus was a heretic. So let that land the these were faithful orthodox Christians in the early church who believed the book of revelation was a heretical forgery. And the doubt did not fade quietly. Okay. Around the year 350, Sirill, the bishop of Jerusalem, a canonized saint, hands his students the official reading list of scripture and revelation isn't on it. So how do you know who wrote it? How do you know that the early Christians who doubted it were wrong? Okay, so books that are in your Bible currently were doubted for centuries. Now, let's flip it because there were also books that early Christians treated as scripture that are not in your Bibles today. This is CodeCatus, the oldest complete New Testament in existence, copied in the 4th century. Now, if you've watched West, you've heard of it before, okay?

[00:06:42]It's the crown jewel of the manuscript world. But now, let's look at the back of it. Bound right in with the New Testament sits two more books. The Epistle of Barnabas, a work early Christians like Clement of Alexandria, attributed to the Apostle Barnabas, Paul's missionary partner from the book of Acts, and a hugely popular book of visions called the Shepherd of Hermas.

[00:07:03]Supposedly written by the Hermas, Paul mentioned, whoever produced the oldest Bible we own, put those inside of the New Testament. And this is no just it's not a random fluke. All right? Irenaeus, a second century bishop who learned the faith from Polycarp, who in turn learned it from the Apostle John himself, treated the shepherd of Hermas as scripture. Origin called it quote very useful and in my opinion divinely inspired. And Clement of Alexandria repeatedly quoted the Epistle of Barnabas as the work of an apostle who quote who in person preached the word along with the Apostle Paul in the ministry of the Gentiles. All right, one more and this one is super interesting.

[00:07:44]a letter called First Clement written from the church of Rome in the first century while the Apostle John was actually still alive. The early church said its author Clement was ordained by Peter and identified him with the Clement that Paul name checks as his c-orker in Philippians 4:3. Ucceius says this letter was quote read publicly in many churches in worship for generations. And in 8380, a list of the New Testament cannon includes first clement. And a century after sanaticus in the fifth century, another great ancient Bible CEC Alexandrinus still has first clement bound inside of it. For 400 years then, many Orthodox Christians regarded first clement as highly authoritative as the work of a companion of Paul, the bishop of Rome, and the possible author of Hebrews. Okay, so let's slow way down. All right. So, let's let's freeze the clock at the year 350 and just sort of look around. Okay.

[00:08:39]Seven books in your New Testament were disputed. Multiple books not in your New Testament read as scripture by saints and martyrs. Nobody on earth at this point in time has your table of contents in your Bible. Not one church, not one bishop, not one list. Somebody had to settle the matter. So who did it? The year is 367. The first person in recorded history to list exactly your an hour my 27 books no more no less is a bishop named St. Athanasius. Okay, if you don't know that name you got to learn it. Patriarch of Alexandria, hero of the council of Nika. The man who defended the deity of Christ when half the empire was sliding into the Aryan heresy. Protestants love Athanasius.

[00:09:29]Okay. In his Easter letter 367, he hands his churches a New Testament list. Your 27 books, first time ever, 300 years after Jesus. But from a historical perspective, one bishop's letter did not end a 300-year-old argument. Plenty of bishops still disagreed with him. Okay.

[00:09:48]St. Gregory of Nazanzis, the great archbishop of Constantinople, doctor of the church and contemporary of Athanasius, for example, omitted revelation from his list and doubts persisted in the east for centuries.

[00:10:02]Councils of bishops in the west ratified the 27 book cannon you see in your Bible today. 382 bishops meet at Rome under Pope Damsus and issue a canon list with the same 27. Then in 393, the Senate of Hippo in North Africa, same 27. 397 The Council of Carthage, Augustine's World, confirms it again. And catch this detail because it comes back later. All right.

[00:10:24]Carthage closes by saying the list should be checked with quote the church beyond the sea. The church beyond the sea, if you're standing in North Africa, is Rome. They sent the canon of the New Testament to the the the Pope for confirmation, and Rome gave it. Pope Innocent the confirmed the same 27 book list in the early 400s. And after that, the argument dissolves. The doubts about Hebrews, about Revelation, Second Peter, gone. Barnabas, the Shepherd, First Clement, out permanently. Not because a new manuscript surfaced. Not because somebody found an apostle's signature on one of these documents, because bishops made the call with the impremature of the most prominent church and bishop, the Holy Roman Catholic Church under the Pope. Over time the east came around and at the council of Florence the unified church accepted the western cannon of these early councils. Then in response to the protestant schism the council of Trent dogmatically define the very same list that these earlier councils made binding untouched 1100 years later.

[00:11:25]There is no other pipeline of how this happened historically. Checkpoint two and this is basically the sentence that this whole video turns on. All right.

[00:11:33]The paper trail for your New Testament and the paper trail for the Catholic Church are the same documents which reads as the only question that really matters here. Can you trust those men, the mostly Western bishops who settled the early and entrenched disputes in favor of our 27 book New Testament canon? Because here's the thing, we we know what else these men these same men that decided the New Testament, we we know what else they believed. All right, start with our star witness, Athanasius, the man with the first correct list, right? Remember that he calls Mary, quote, "Mary ever virgin." That's the perpetual virginity of Mary, a doctrine most Protestants today reject as a later corruption. And remember his famous list. Okay, let's look closer at it. In the very same Easter letter, he leaves out Esther. He he leaves it out of the cannon, a book that's in every Protestant Bible. And he counts Baroo with the Old Testament, a book Protestants reject. The Protestants's favorite church father makes what Protestants have to call canon mistakes twice on the very list that they cite.

[00:12:37]Oh, and when Athanasius got in trouble, he appealed his case to the Pope. So, Protestants can't appeal to Athanasius as a reliable discerner of true doctrine. Now, zoom out. Okay, Rome, Hippo, and Carthage, the councils and popes that locked in your New Testament.

[00:12:52]We've already discussed them. Those same councils affirmed the longer old testament. Tobit, Judith, wisdom, sierak, the Mcabes, the seven books that Catholics have and Protestants called the Apocrypha. These were the same meetings, the same bishops, the same documents, same Bible the Council of Trent later defined. In the church these men led, priests heard confession and absolved sins. Clerical celibacy was becoming law in the West. They baptized infants, which West as a reformed Baptist, you'd have to call that an error, too. and they treated the chair of Peter in Rome as the final court of appeal. Remember, Carthage mailed its Bible list to the pope for signoff. In other words, teachings that Protestants call accretions, corruptions bolted on later, were believed by the very men handing them their New Testament at the very moment that they were handing it to them. On the Protestant's own account, these men were unreliable, badly unreliable. wrong about Mary, wrong about the church and bishop of Rome, wrong about confession, wrong about the canon of scripture itself. The list goes on and on. These are the referees who made every close call on your table of contents. And Protestants have to imagine that they ran the table resolving correctly every dispute against Christians who lived closer to the apostles. And your position is that these referees were basically blind and somehow got it right. So here it is.

[00:14:15]Okay. the Protestant dilemma. One, the Catholic bishops who settled the New Testament cannon were either reliable guides to the apostolic faith or they weren't. Two, if they weren't reliable, you can't trust that your 27 book New Testament is the right 27 because they're the ones who settled it. I.e. your New Testament is therefore unreliable. Three, if they were reliable, then the faith that they taught, the papacy, confession, Mary, deserves your trust, too. And therefore, you shouldn't be Protestant. Four, so either your New Testament isn't trustworthy, or you shouldn't be Protestant. This is a dilemma. So, there are two doors. Door one, the bishops were unreliable. Fine, but then you just saw it off the branch that your New Testament is sitting on. The doubts about those seven books were real. They lasted centuries and the only thing that ended them was the judgment of the very men you say can't be trusted. So which book do you want to reopen first? Second Peter, maybe Revelation, maybe Hebrews?

[00:15:16]Have you looked in all the reasons early Christians had to doubt the seven disputed books? Or do you just take it for granted that the pope in the church of Rome got it right and the council convened 300 years after the apostles?

[00:15:28]Door two, the bishops were reliable.

[00:15:31]Wonderful. then take them seriously when they teach the papacy and Mary and confession and the Catholic cannon, all of it. But then why are you Protestant?

[00:15:41]And if you want some numbers on this, like you know that I like numbers, um just count the genuinely contested calls. Okay, seven disputed books were ruled in, four popular books were ruled out. So there were basically 7 + 4, 11 calls. Now, let's be generous. Say unreliable bishops still get things right maybe 80% of the time. Okay, even that's not enough to be like reliable if you would you really trust a GPS that got you to the wrong destination like 20% of the time. So the odds that they go 11 for 111 anyway assuming that they're you know 80% reliable it's under 9% roughly 1 in 12 because we know that these bishops from Athanasius to the Pope included and excluded books that are in the Protestant cannon. So Protestants are already committed to their being prone to being unreliable in this very context. The Protestant position needs these men to be nearly hopeless on doctrine and absolutely flawless on the New Testament cannon. It just doesn't it doesn't add up. Wes, brother, this is my one question for you. Your whole ministry shows people that the New Testament text is reliable and I do I thank God for it. But manuscripts can only take you so far.

[00:16:50]Okay. Textual criticism can prove that the words of Hebrews were copied faithfully. Cannot prove that Hebrews belongs in the book when it was doubted for centuries and we still don't know who wrote it. Okay, this page isn't a manuscript question. It's an authority question and every road on that question runs through Rome. Now, I like to steal man on this channel. So, let's take the three best responses headon. Objection one, scripture is self- authenticating.

[00:17:18]The Holy Spirit confirms the books from within. The problem with this one is that early Christians had that exact inner witness about the wrong books.

[00:17:26]Okay. Irenaeus taught by a disciple of the apostle John cites the shepherd of Hermas as scripture. A different Clement Clement of Alexandria famous teacher in Egypt says God spoke to Hermas by revelation. The early church uniformly thought the apostle Barnabas wrote the epistle of Barnabas, a first century writing that include that was included in some early cannons. And first clement like Mark, Luke, and Acts was written by a companion of an apostle who says himself that the work is from God and may well have written another work that made it into the canon. Hebrews, a test that certifies books you reject in saints far closer to the apostles than you or me cannot be your guarantee of the right ones. Objection two, God providentially guided fallible men to the right cannon. Now, I actually love this objection because it's about 2 in from Catholicism. But notice this is not an argument. It's an assertion that God worked an invisible miracle through men you would otherwise call unreliable, precisely where your theology needs it and nowhere else. And worse, the same providence, the same at the same councils, handed you the Catholic Old Testament. You can't cash your check and then dispute the signature. Objection three. We never claimed an infallible list. Look, I know this. Neither does this argument. Go back and check.

[00:18:44]Infallibility never came up. It doesn't rely on it. All it needs is the word reliable. And those bishops weren't reliable is exactly the thing the Protestantism, the Protestants are forced to say. But that's not my trap.

[00:18:58]That's yours. When you condemn belief after belief as accretions, how do you know that an accretion didn't make it into the 27 book table of contents? The Catholic answer here is is just one sentence. Christ founded a church. Upon this rock, I will build my church and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. And that church can be trusted to settle exactly this kind of dispute. So when I trust my New Testament, I'm not betting on a lucky streak by men I think were wrong about everything else. I'm trusting the church that Christ promised to preserve. We didn't get a Bible that produced a church. We got a church that gave us the Bible after a long process of disputes by people in a better position than Wes to discern whether this or that writing is scripture. You can't call the referee blind and trust him to keep the score.

[00:19:46]Wes, brother, if you ever see this and genuinely I would love to hear your answer and the invitation to come on, talk about it. No gotchas is always open. Now, as promised, this argument comes from a fantastic essay on a new Substack called Ecclesia Antiqua linked below with every primary source cited.

[00:20:03]So, go subscribe to him and check out his other great content there about the early church. Videos like this one are available early to channel members and Patreon members. And that if this video gave you something to think about, make sure to share it with your favorite Protestant.