Protestants agreed that the Word of God was authoritative in matters of faith and that the Bible had unique status, but they did not agree on all interpretations of the Scripture, nor did they unite in a single doctrine of scriptural authority.
As the Protestant reformers worried, both the priesthood and the laity were often ignorant of doctrine and Scripture; Latin was the obvious obstacle to greater participation and spiritual literacy.
Protestant churches have usually viewed their synods or assemblies as competent to "interpret" doctrine under the supreme norm of Scripture and with the guidelines provided by the earlier creeds and confessions that come from the general tradition of the "church universal" or their particular tradition.
Clarke also spurred a vehement and prolonged controversy with his Scripture Doctrine of the Trinity (1712), which led many of his opponents to accuse him of Arianism, the belief that Christ is neither fully man nor fully God.
The Scripture Doctrine of the Trinity begins by collecting all the passages of the New Testament that relate to the Trinity.
Clarke's position in The Scripture Doctrine of the Trinity was labeled by his opponents as "Arian," "Socinian," and "Sabellian".
In 1712, against the advice of his friends, he published The Scripture Doctrine of the Trinity, in which he diverged from what his opponents considered the plain sense of this formulation.
Taoism on the other hand also incorporated Buddhist elements during the Tang period, such as monasteries, vegetarianism, prohibition of alcohol, the doctrine of emptiness, and collecting scripture in tripartite organisation.
"The Inferno," written 700 years ago by the Florentine poet Dante Alighieri, is not a work of Scripture or church doctrine.
"Mary was desexed and dehumanised by a condescending patriarchal hierarchy," he thunders.Yet another answer has been offered by Christian thinkers who take doctrine more seriously than the letter of scripture.
