The Gift of Prophecy

Chapter 15 — Sola Scriptura and Ellen G. White: Historical Reflections

Alberto R. Timm

Seventh-day Adventists have always subscribed to the Protestant principle of sola Scriptura (by Scripture alone). ¹ As early as 1847 James White stated that the Bible is “a perfect, and complete revelation” and “our only rule of faith and practice.” ² Statement 3 of the 1872 A Declaration of the Fundamental Principles Taught and Practiced by the Seventh-day Adventists affirmed that “the Holy Scriptures, of the Old and New Testaments, were given by inspiration of God, contain a full revelation of his will to man, and are the only infallible rule of faith and practice.” ³ And in 1884 Ellen White added, “But God will have a people upon the earth to maintain the Bible, and the Bible only, as the standard of all doctrines and the basis of all reforms.” ⁴ GOP 289.1

At the same time, Seventh-day Adventists also accept the writings of Ellen White as an end-time manifestation of the true gift of prophecy. But some critics argue that the acceptance of those writings undermines the Seventh-day Adventist claim of strict adherence to the sola Scriptura principle. D. M. Canright, a longtime critic of Adventism, went so far as to claim that Seventh-day Adventists have “another Bible”—Ellen White’s writing—and “they have to read our old Bible in the light of this new Bible.” ⁵ Dale Ratzlaff, another vociferous critic, stated that Seventh-day Adventists have two equal “sources of authority, two sources of truth: the Bible and the writings of Ellen G. White.” ⁶ Some helpful studies have responded to these criticisms, ⁷ but there is room to further assess the relationship between the sola Scriptura principle and the writings of Ellen G. White from a broader historical perspective. GOP 289.2

The present article surveys basic concepts related to (1) the Roman Catholic claim to being the only true interpreter of Scripture; (2) the Protestant response through the sola Scriptura principle; (3) new hermeneutical alternatives that undermine that principle; (4) Ellen White’s reemphasis of the sola Scriptura principle; and (5) how she uses it in her expositions of Scripture. Such concepts can provide a useful framework for understanding Ellen White’s crucial end-time role in uplifting the sola Scriptura principle. GOP 290.1