Good points. The idea of there existing this "Christendom" divided between Protestants and Roman Catholics I find questionable since the true ecclesia existed before Constantine's time. There were those among the British Isles and other locations who had known the doctrines of the Apostles long before Augustine or any Roman missionary had arrived. The third category: the orthodox bible-believer, bible-observant saints who don't necessarily have anything to do with either Protestantism or Roman Catholicism. The third category I have found to be more rare to find but they do exist and I have witnessed amazing things and much great love among them. However, overall I have found true believers to be scattered throughout a variety of congregations. Technically Baptists might actually be outside of the classification of Protestant. Protestant organizations would be ones that specifically protested against the Roman Catholic Church.Originally Posted by xparte
The idea that Protestantism became a wedge to destroy the integrity of orthodox Christian societies, seems plausible: the doors opened for usury, mammon worship, etc. Thirty Years War, Colonialism, Darkside Occultism using pseudo-gospel as a front door...WWI, WWII, etc. That there were those co-opted the Reformation who had insidious intents, plausible also. A war against the saints de jure: stopping the manifestation of the sons of God on the planet has been a major objective of those who until recently primarily lurked in the shadows.
re: the KJV
I recall someone suggesting that in the KJV was a point made to specifically legitimize a system of clergy-laity. While I don't necessarily take their viewpoing, it might be that I found myself unable to actually find the word 'bishop' in the Greek. There is the role of the elders or an elder in a congregation. The Episcopalians simply kept the word in tact.
To reiterate, I could not in all of my learning find the proper resolve of the word 'bishop' and how it could quite be derived from episcopos except with a bit of creativity. However, at one point I came to learn that the word 'vishap' in Armenian means dragon. The best wikipedia gives on the word 'bishop' is that it is:
The parenthesis appear in the Wikipedia article. Taking a look at etymonline.com even they are flipping through loops to arrive at how episkopos becomes bishop (especially consider that Yeshua becomes Jesus in Greek--but yet somehow with episcopos we find a 'sh' carrying into bishop somehow. 'Episcap'..could make more sense, no?).(seen by many as an interchangeable term with episcopos or overseer)
They're knocking themselves out to try to get to how 'episcopos' become 'bishop'. OK sure, in a way, I could see how something or another could be lost in translation..maybe more like 'bischap' became 'bishap'. But with 'bi' 'epi' is lost in the sense of 'overseer'. That 'vishap' means dragon in Armenian is....hmmmm. Isn't that Grand Vishap or Grand Dragon what members of the KKK are called? Anyways, ya know how languages can be. I've seen words in a RTL language become common words in a LTR language but the only difference they are pronounced and written backwards.
Nonetheless, the word 'bishop' was a generic term for a high priest so it would make sense if in a given locality they used terms with which they were familiar. However, the word 'elder' or 'overseer' would have sufficed.
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Any way you look at it blaming innocent third party with the results of a conflict in which they are not necessarily effectively involved doesn't seem quite right.
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