Told Ya So

Well, the Crimson ambulance chaser has unceremoniously declined my generous offer to get past his absurd obsession with an Orthodox priest and to move into the ramifications of his paranoid charge of “heresy” against me and other evangelicals regarding our view of Cyril, Ephesus and Nicaea—much of which charge consists of outright lies about our view (makes me wonder what kind of lawyer Prejean is; I can venture a good guess). Prejean used to be somewhat of a reasonable voice amid the chaos of Roman Catholic fundamentalists; but since his recent pummeling by Steve Hays and Jason Engwer (the latter of which he now calls “boy”—a painfully obvious tell-tale sign that he knows he got clobbered and is now desperately trying to salvage some modicum of his lost manhood, due to losing a fight he himself started, by belittling his opponent), he has retreated to hyper-fundamentalism that screams “HERESY!!!” everywhere it looks.

Since Prejean does not want to venture into the ramifications of this (who could blame him?), let me frankly state the reasons he does not want to take it to the next level:

1. Prejean has locked himself into a very specific and very narrow Cyrillene definition of the person and natures of Christ, and senses a need to be just as bombastic about it as “Saint” Cyril himself. Indeed, once you’ve locked yourself into it, no other view—no matter how subtly different—can be allowed to stand. For if there’s a possibility the other view is right, then by extension there is a possibility that your view is (GASP!) wrong! If he can quickly write us off (Presto Chango) as non-Christians, bombastically dismiss us, and degrade us in the eyes of his onlookers, maybe—just maybe—they won’t notice that he’s doing all this in a desperate attempt to take the spotlight off the fact that he was completely demolished recently by those who think more clearly on this issue, and thereby remove himself from the quagmire he’s gotten himself into.

As an aside, it is simply hilarious to watch how Gnostic little Timmy Enloe has become in his agreeing with Prejean about the legitimacy of all his Cyrillene “beaming of propositions back and forth between minds.” I guess “the enemy of my enemy” and all that : )

2. Prejean can now judge whether a view of Christ is heretical only one the basis of his Cyrillene Christology, leaving him absolutely no recourse to Scripture--which is probably better for him since he founders on Scripture. Hence, his charge of heresy is based not on the rock-solid foundation of God’s revelation to man, but rather on highly speculative Neo-Platonist-drenched philosophical musings about who Christ is that go far beyond the biblical record. Prejean’s “authority” for labeling us “heretics” amounts to the “authority” of the Jewish Sanhedrin that opposed the apostles and its own Messiah. Scripture is the sole ultimate authority on this matter; how could it be otherwise? As I have repeatedly pointed out, no one on earth knows how the person and natures of Christ come together. No one.

3. Even if Prejean had not locked himself in to his position, he would never want to allow this issue to venture into the area of biblical revelation. Why? As I've already mentioned, Prejean does not know Scripture. He is incompetent with it. He is afraid to evaluate this issue by that standard because he knows his views would easily be put down. I found it amusing to read at least one of Prejean’s recent cronies actually admit that the reason he became Roman Catholic is because all of this Christology stuff was just to confusing to sort out for himself! Imagine that! “I can’t sort out; and I can’t tell which position is the right one; But amazingly enough, I can somehow tell you which entity believes the right view. So I’ll just take a blind leap in the dark and let this entity figure it out for me. Never mind that I could never be sure whether the entity to which I’ve entrusted my soul is any less confused about it!" That, my friends, is precisely the reason why we cannot follow philosophical speculations about God that go beyond Scripture. If the poor soul I just referenced would have limited his speculation to what the biblical writers actually tell us, then concerns about which view is right would never have entered his mind in the first place.

4. Everyone should be aware that Prejean is being spoon-fed the points he is making from one of his cronies. Prejean himself has no background in this area, no training in it; and as I mentioned in my last post, until six months ago he was not even aware that most patristic scholars believe Cyril was a closet Monophysite, that Nestorius was orthodox by Chalcedonian standards, and that Ephesus and Chalcedon advanced different Christological views. Here’s how Prejean responded:

Nope. I admitted that it was ‘somewhat doubtful’ whether Nestorius personally was Nestorian and that some scholars have made the argument (albeit pretty convincingly discredited by recent scholarship) that St. Cyril was a monophysite.

Yes this is what he admitted; but only after he had charged Nestorius with heresy and only after I had to correct him! Read the interaction yourself in the side bar of this blog (see under Historical Theology). I had to correct him on his uninformed view several times, and he wrote the statement above as a measure to save face and not to appear as uninformed as he actually is on this issue! He knew nothing about this issue just six months ago. And now he is running around the Internet pretending to be a well-informed patristic scholar. How someone accomplishes that in just six months is beyond me. Well, not really; as I said, he’s being spoon fed this information, and he's been arguing someone else’s views, not his own. I rather doubt that Prejean even understands half the points he makes—which explains why he has had to retreat so many times in his encounters with evangelicals with whom he picks fights. Frankly, he’s just not that bright.

Steve Hays’ latest blog entry is well worth reading in this regard.