Across time and space, authority has shifted from one perceived power to another. Who or what was able to make authoritative statements to which there was no greater appeal? Let’s look at how authority has changed hands over time and see how we as Christians should handle authority.

Might Makes Right

Throughout history we have seen world powers demand compliance because of the might of their armies. From the Assyrians, to the Babylonians, to the Persians, to the Greeks, to the Romans…those with the mightiest armies have said what is right.

In the midst of these world powers, we have records of the Hittites, the Huns, the Mongolians, and the Turks kill people who disagreed with them.

Should a soldier in a Roman army force you to carry their gear 1 mile, there was no recourse or appeal. If the Roman centurion came into your village and told you to join the legion as a soldier, you were conscripted. Whatever they said had authority because of the might of their arms

Authoritative statements were proclaimed by the kings and commanders of those armies. There was no appeal higher than those with the most might

Roman Catholic Church Magisterium

Power shifted from armies to theologians as the Roman Empire was both consumed by its own depravity and picked apart by barbarians. Authoritative power began to be condensed within the walls of the Vatican and its sister in Byzantium. Proclamations from the bishops of those ecumenical ivory towers carried the greatest weight. Peasants and princes alike fell into step when pushed by the papacies. Christianity was established as the dominant ideology throughout western civilization. Amidst this shift from military power to the church, the seeds of the scientific revolution were planted. As that unchecked authoritative power grew, so did the corruption among the bishops. Indulgences, worldliness, and idolatry weakened the power in Rome…while the militant barbarism of the Muslims crushed the power of Byzantium/Constantinople in the East. Anyone (like Martin Luther, Jan Hus, William Tyndale and others) who questioned the authority of the Roman Catholics was met with swift and brutal retribution. Luther escaped death, but the others were killed for questioning the authority of the Papacy. Until the Reformation, there was no appeal for justice or truth higher than the Papacy.

Scientism

As the scientific revolution matured, it began to grow in influence, the authoritative power of the Roman Catholic church waned. What scientists said carried unquestioned authority. Anyone who dissented from what scientists said were summarily and ruthlessly expelled from academia. You hear this authority being expressed even today as “the science says…” and “the science is settled” and “it’s been peer-reviewed”. The priesthood garments of the Roman Catholic’s authority shifted to the white lab coats of the scientists. Anyone wearing a white lab coat was seen as having unquestioned authority in claims about truth. The hierarchy of the Roman Catholic bishops, priests, and deacons were similarly transformed to the peer-review journals and accompanying gatekeepers. Those, who wished to produce “sacred” texts into the peer-review journals must swear “fealty to Saint Charles Darwin”. Anyone, who questions the “most holiest” of ideologies in scientism (natural selection acting on random mutations produced all biodiversity) were viewed as heretics and denied entrance. As with those, who questioned the authority of the Papacy from the previous era, anyone, who makes the slightest inquiry about evolution, is swiftly and prejudiciously expelled from academia by the gatekeepers of scientism.

Statism

Governments in the 20th century began to take power from the scientists in matters of authority. From the monumentally destructive policies of Woodrow Wilson and Franklin Roosevelt, the federal government metastasized far beyond its intended borders. It wasn’t a complete transfer of authoritative power from the scientists to the state, but with the military and financial power of the American government, scientists began subjecting themselves to the funding and judicial authority of the state. Funding subservience is evident in the way that scientists have requested grant money and structured their requests from the public funds. We also see that many scientists have capitulated to the narrative of global warming. Public funding for scientific solutions for energy problems went almost completely to “green energy”, so the authority was logically in the hands of those holding the purse strings (the state) rather than the scientists. Judicial subservience was highlighted most obviously in the Dover trial of 2005. When the evidence for scientific advancement was strongly favoring the intelligent design movement, the scientific gatekeepers appealed to what they viewed was a higher authority: the state. In the trial, it was determined by a rogue judge that intelligent design was not a scientific theory, so he denied educators from questioning the theory of evolution.

Experts and Artificial Intelligence

Statism devolved rather quickly to the belief that “experts” have the greatest authority to which there was no higher appeal. In the 21st century, authoritative power began to be accumulated in the hands of experts. The power of the “experts” reared its ugly head in 2020 when they told the world that a bio-engineered virus was simply a natural pathogen that got into the food supply from a market in China. They told the world that this most deadly of human contagions could be solved by shutting down all businesses, wearing a thin cloth mask, and standing 6 feet apart. None of those things were true yet the “experts” retained their power over the government and the populace. Experts were interviewed by the media for issues like the epidemics, economy, climate, health/medicine, philanthropy, politics, and the environment. Sadly, “expert” isn’t an objective measure by having so many expertise points or expertise units…it’s a completely subjective title – and many so-called experts have shown themselves to be unqualified as paper-tigers. With the advent of artificial intelligence, everyone with a phone can now be an “expert”. Authority in the information space is now manifest in the gargantuan processing power of super computers (and the programmers that have built the response algorithms.) If you’ve spent time making searches and questions of AI apps, you’re sure to recognize the biases that have gone into their “authoritative” responses. As artificial intelligence is still in its infancy, it has yet to be determined how large an impact AI will have on culture, the economy, politics, industry, and humanity itself.

As Christians, what should we view as our ultimate authority?

The Bible

Over and over in the Bible, we read “Thus says the LORD…” and “The LORD said…” and “Jesus said, Truly I say to you…”

The Bible records the very words and expectations of the Creator. What the omniscient omnipotent God has said cannot fail to be correct. All of the Bible has been inspired by the word of the Holy Spirit. Worldly authorities like armies, ecclesiastical fiefdoms, nations, and experts can claim to have the standard of truth, but only God’s eternal Word “will not pass away…remains forever…will stand forever…endures forever…”

Jesus claims to be “the Truth” and that if you hold to the teaching of Jesus as his disciple, “you will know the Truth and the Truth will set you free.” As Christians we should believe what Jesus has said in his eternal word: our ultimate authority. Now before anyone accuses me of being a bibliolater, we worship God alone (not the Bible), and we trust the revelation of God in his written word.

In the early 21st century there are competing authorities vying for the title of magisterial. The aforementioned Roman Catholic Church claims to be the only authoritative entity from which all truth resides. Sadly, they have proven to be a false authority with their false teachings of Mariology and the prevalent breaking of the 2nd commandment. The RCC disqualified itself as the authority for truth by fabricating the sale of indulgences to substitute money/works in place of time in purgatory. Scientism, has corrupted itself with bias and self-indulgence. While the scientific method is good and works because Christianity is true, scientism is a self-defeating ideological assumption. The State continues to demand obeisance in matters of right/wrong even though states are frequently the most corrupt and wicked entities. Experts are biased and can ignore the truth when it suits them. Other competing authorities are “the science“, culture and autonomous reasoning. Each of these claim to be proven truth or the “right side of history” or “just common sense”. But in every case, they fall short of Truth as revealed by God. In some cases, these counterfeit authorities want the facade of the Bible to hide their deficient epistemology, so they try to inject their teachings into the Bible, so that their advocates can say:

• “Look, the Bible supports evolution!“
• “Look, the Bible supports homosexuality!”
• “Look, the Bible supports socialism!”
• or if you’re a Catholic: “Look, only the bishops should read the Bible…and only in Latin! They’ll tell you what to believe.”

None of that is true, and in each instance, language must be destroyed for them to say that the Bible supports their special interest.

False authorities come and go, but the Word of our God remains forever!