4 Questions to Ask When Talking About Heresy

One of the concerns that I have had recently is how easily people throw around the heresy label. It seems that if a Christian overemphasizes or underemphasizes something more than we do, they are a heretic. Some Christians are very uncomfortable with differences of opinions and varieties of theological interpretation. If a group is different from us, it must be a heresy.

Having said that, there are legitimate heresies out there and there have been since the beginning of the Church. We should be concerned about heresy and theological error. We find these topics in Paul’s letters, as well as 1 John.

So how do we take heresy seriously without giving in to an emotional reaction to a position we don’t like? Here are four questions we should be asking when we hear that a group or an individual is heretical. This list is not exhaustive but it is a good place to start.

1. Do they deny the Trinity? Orthodox Christianity believes in one God in three persons. There is no room for negotiation on this.
2. What do they say about the nature of Jesus? Christians are followers of Jesus, but what Jesus? The Jesus of the Bible is the incarnate Son of God. Anything less than fully God and fully human is heresy.
3. What do they say about the resurrection? The death of Jesus on the cross is a historical fact. But some are uncomfortable with a miraculous resurrection of the dead and instead interpret the event symbolically or allegorically. Paul tells us that if Jesus did not bodily rise from the dead that our faith is in vain.
4. How does one become right with God? Christianity teaches that Jesus paid the price for our sins and that we receive that forgiveness through faith alone. Any attempts to earn salvation are theologically incorrect.

This is not to say that everyone who is correct on these questions is orthodox in every way. But if a supposed heretic (i.e. the person we don’t like) is orthodox in these areas, then we should be very careful with the labels we put on them.

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