50 Key Concepts in Theology

Tradition
The inherited beliefs and practices of the Church.
In theology, the word ‘tradition’ is used specifically to refer to the
inherited beliefs and practices of the Church. The idea of a tradition, which
must be treasured and handed down, originates in the New Testament. St Paul
refers to what he ‘received from the Lord and delivers to’ the churches.
According to the conservative interpretation of the word ‘tradition’, it
refers to the body of doctrine that has allegedly been handed down from Jesus
via the apostles to the present day. According to the liberal interpretation,
there is not one tradition but many, and traditions must be interpreted every
bit as carefully as sacred texts.
More radical theological voices have actively challenged the traditions of
the Church, subjecting all inherited teaching and practice to a so-called
‘hermeneutic of suspicion’ which actively suspects the tradition of being
oppressive to women and other excluded groups. ‘Tradition’ is regarded as a
tool of ecclesiastical control and power.
The idea that the traditions of the Church can be an authoritative guide to
present Christian life depends upon the view that the Church itself is the
vehicle for God’s revelation. So the traditions of the Church are regarded not
simply as the accumulation of its habits and attitudes, but as the expression of
the will of God. Thus, conservatives argue that the lack of precedent for
women bishops is an argument against them.
The difficulty with this rigid view of tradition is that nothing can change,
thus locking God up in the cage of the existing habits of the Church and
denying him the opportunity to do anything new. By contrast with the static
view of traditions, liberals and modernisers argue that tradition is organic, and
that through the dynamic processes of tradition God can bring about new
beliefs and practices.
The Roman Catholic and Orthodox churches have laid much greater
stress upon the importance of tradition than the Protestant churches, who
regard Scripture itself as the overriding authority in all things.
The Anglican Church has affirmed the importance of reason, Scripture
and tradition as the three principal sources of religious truth: Scripture is read
in the light of tradition and reason; reason in the light of Scripture and
tradition; and tradition in the light of reason and Scripture.
The Anglican approach is attributed to the seventeenth-century

---

theologian Richard Hooker, who argued that ‘what Scripture doth plainly
deliver, to that first place both of credit and obedience is due; the next
whereunto is whatsoever any man can necessarily conclude by force of
reason; after these the voice of the Church succeedeth. That which the Church
by her ecclesiastical authority shall probably think and define to be true or
good, must in congruity of reason over-rule all other inferior judgments
whatsoever’ (Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity).
THINKERS
John Milbank (1952– ) has argued that there needs to be a recovery of the
pre-modern traditions of Christianity. The way to find an authentic
Christianity, argues Milbank, is to enact the traditions.
IDEAS
Apostolic succession: the belief, precious to the Roman Catholic Church,
that all authentic bishops are direct successors of the first apostles and can
trace their lineage right back to Jesus himself.
Paradosis: the New Testament Greek word for ‘tradition’, meaning ‘what
is transmitted’.
The magisterium (or the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith) has
the task of defining and protecting the traditional doctrines and practices of
the Roman Catholic Church.
Detraditionalisation: the contemporary ‘individualistic’ attitude that
regards no corporate traditions as sacred, but subjects all traditions to critique,
or simply ignores them.
BOOKS
Yves Congar, The Meaning of Tradition (Ignatius Press, 2004)
Nicholas Lash, Paul Heelas and Paul Morris (eds.), Detraditionalisation: