Private Judgement Analysis

The right of Private Judgement
Challenging the Roman Catholic Church's claims of being the 'protector of the Bible' and the 'official interpreter of scripture', the Reformer's advocated the right of private judgement. Samuel (1994, p6) places private judgement on a par with the "authority of scripture" (sola Scriptura) and "justification by faith" (sola fide), explaining at length the complexities of this principle. He explains how the Reformers understood Scripture to have an "objective truth" that remains independent of man's interpretation (p9) and placed importance on the need to search Scripture to "prove all things", ie. whether an interpretation or understanding contained God's truth or not (p13). One thing the Reformers insisted on is that "a man must have the illumination of the Holy Spirit in order to be able to interpret Scripture aright." (Samuel, p13).
Samuel rightly concludes that, "Private judgment should play just as vital a part today in our understanding and appreciation of Christian faith as it has done in the past." (p20). Of importance, the crux of Samuel's message is that the right to private judgement does not
Establishment of the Reformations' key principles that made the Scriptures accessible to individuals was not without struggle. Fulton & Webster (1995) identify the constant "political and intellectual flux"(p?) that demanded the authority of Scripture stand intellectually against the established authorities, ie., the Fathers, Church, and Councils (p6). A "vacuum of authority" created an exaggeration of Biblical infallibility (Ferguson, 1982, p456); this, teamed with an over emphasis on "Scripture alone", led to "dangerous Radicalism" (Fulton & Webster, p3). Anabaptists and other radical Reformers rejected "core doctrines of the Trinity and the divinity of Christ" along with infant