Authority, but which?

In “The Bible in the Time of the Reformation,” Stanko Jambrek discusses three common forms of authority found in Christian circles.

• Theological authority – doctrinal beliefs or “creeds” as the sources of faith and life.
• Ecclesial authority – the church, with the Pope as the head, holds ultimate authority in all standards of faith and life. 
• Canonical authority – the Bible or Scripture as God’s authoritative revelation. The Bible is the inspired, inerrable, and ultimate in authority in all the standards of the faith and life. 

Jambrek concludes “the Scriptures (canonical authority) as the inerrable Word of God [are] above any human’s opinion or conclusions (theological authority) and the church tradition (ecclesial authority).”

Stanko Jambrek, “The Bible in the Time of the Reformation,” Biblijski institut, Zagreb. 2010, p. 108. Jambrek is a professor at the Bible Institute in Zagreb, Croatia, as well as the founder and editor of Kairos: Evangelical Journal of Theology. This periodical is published biannually, in both the Croatian and English languages.