Clement of Alexandria’s Timeless Challenge

When the earliest Christians spoke of truth, they did not look to institutions or to men who claimed special authority. They looked to Christ, the eternal Word (Logos) of God. Clement of Alexandria, writing in the late 2nd century, offers one of the clearest testimonies to this truth. For him, Christ the Logos is the true Light, the perfect Instructor, and the sole infallible authority.

It is important to remember the time in which Clement wrote. This was long before Rome made Christianity the official religion of the empire, long before bishops were drawn into the machinery of politics, and long before titles like “pope” carried imperial weight. The church of Clement’s day was scattered, often persecuted, and entirely dependent on Christ Himself as its authority. Believers clung to the Word, not to a man-made office.

Later, when Rome absorbed the faith into its imperial structure, authority became increasingly centralized. Bishops of major cities gained political clout, and eventually the bishop of Rome claimed supremacy. What had once been a living fellowship of believers under the Logos was gradually reshaped into an institution ruled by hierarchy. In this way, Rome “hijacked” the faith to hold its empire together, turning what Clement had described as a direct reliance on Christ into dependence on an office.

This historical shift exposes the illogicality of later claims — particularly the doctrine of papal infallibility. If Christ Himself is the Word, the eternal Logos, then no man can claim infallible interpretation of that Word without placing himself above Christ. Clement’s writings make this point again and again.

Clement begins by echoing Habakkuk: “What profiteth the graven image that he has graven it — a lying image? Woe to him that saith to the stone, Awake; and to the wood, Arise” (Habakkuk 2:19). Even pagan poets glimpsed the same truth. Archilochus declared, “The evil-doer evil shall endure.” Euripides observed, “The wicked and proud man’s prosperity is based on sand: his race abideth not.” Sophocles warned, “If ills you do, ills also you must bear.”

If even pagans saw that idols and injustice collapse, how much more should Christians flee false gods? Yet Clement laments that men worship what is made instead of the Maker:

“What else is gold, or silver, or steel, or iron, or brass, or ivory, or precious stones? Are they not earth, and of the earth? Why, then, foolish and silly men, have you dragged religion to the ground by fashioning to yourselves gods of earth, and by going after those created objects, instead of the uncreated Deity, and so sunk into deepest darkness?”

The warning applies today. Our “gods” may not be statues but institutions, titles, wealth, celebrity, or even church offices. Anything exalted above Christ is idolatry.

From Ignorance to the Word

Clement pierces the heart: “For, in the name of truth, what man in his senses turns his back on good, and attaches himself to evil? Who, that may become a son of God, prefers to be in bondage?”

He urges us to turn: “Let us therefore repent, and pass from ignorance to knowledge, from foolishness to wisdom, from unrighteousness to righteousness, from godlessness to God.”

Repentance does not mean submission to a hierarchy of men who deify themselves. It means turning to Christ the Logos, who is “purer than the sun, sweeter than life here below.”

Worldly riches fade, but Clement reminds us: “There is an inheritance for those who serve the Lord.” This inheritance is not gold or silver “which the moth assails” (Matthew 6:19–20). It is the treasure of salvation, given to those who become lovers of the Word.

“From the Word praise-worthy works descend to us, and fly with us on the wing of truth. This is the inheritance with which the eternal covenant of God invests us, conveying the everlasting gift of grace; and thus our loving Father — the true Father — ceases not to exhort, admonish, train, love us.”

Clement says that the Word (Christ) is the true Image of God, and that humanity is the image of the Word: “For the image of God is His Word… and the image of the Word is the true man… made in the image and likeness of God.” That gives us a simple order: God → the Word → humanity (Genesis 1:27; John 1:1; Colossians 1:15; Hebrews 1:3).

From that order, one principle follows: only the Word Himself can be infallible. Why? Because the Word does not just have truth—He is the truth and perfectly shows the Father. Humanity, by contrast, receives light from the Word. So any human authority, at its best, serves the Word. It does not become the Word.

If this is the case, then the idea of an infallible human office collapses. It confuses the order that Clement laid down. Instead of remaining a receiver of light, it tries to make itself the source of light. Instead of serving as a witness to the Word, it claims to be the standard of the Word. In doing so, it shifts authority away from Christ speaking directly through His Spirit and His Word, and places it in the hands of a man-made office that now claims to stand above correction. Yet in reality, any servant of the Word can only speak with authority so long as it faithfully reflects what the Word already is and has already revealed (2 Timothy 3:16–17; John 16:13).

To create doctrines that the Word itself does not teach is not humility but pride. It means taking authority to speak where God Himself has chosen silence, and it sets human invention beside divine revelation as though they were equals. But if, as Scripture says, “the faith was once for all delivered to the saints” (Jude 1:3), then the Word already contains everything necessary for salvation. Nothing is lacking in Christ. Nothing is unfinished in His gospel.

Why then would anyone add? If the Word is complete, then additions cannot be for the sake of salvation, because salvation is already secured in Christ. Nor can they be for the sake of truth, because truth has already come in the Word made flesh. The only motive that remains is power. By introducing new doctrines not found in the Word, a religious authority makes itself indispensable; positioning itself as the sole interpreter of mysteries that God never revealed. In this way, control is maintained: the faithful are told they cannot rest in Christ alone, but must depend on an office that claims to unlock what Christ supposedly left hidden.

This is the true tragedy. For if Christ Himself is the eternal Word, the Light of light, then every addition is not only unnecessary but insulting. It suggests the Word was not enough, that the Light did not shine brightly enough, that Christ Himself somehow left His people dependent on another authority to finish what He began. But Clement’s logic will not allow this: the Word is sufficient, self-sustaining, and final. To add to Him is not to honor Him but to dethrone Him.

Some reply: “The office doesn’t replace the Word; it only guarantees the right interpretation.” That sounds safe, but it merely shifts the problem. Either the office adds meaning the Word did not clearly give, or it doesn’t. If it adds, then it silently declares the Word insufficient as the standard; contradicting the claim that the Word is the archetypal, self-sufficient Light. If it doesn’t add, then the Word remains the full standard and the office is not infallible but servant; helpful, yes, but not the rule.

There is also the question of mediation. Scripture says there is one mediator between God and men; Christ Jesus (1 Timothy 2:5). Clement’s order presumes exactly that: the Father shines in the Word; the Word enlightens humanity; humanity reflects the Word. If you install an infallible human mediator over the meaning of the Word, you have effectively created a second mediation at the level of the rule of faith. The church would then know the Word’s authority by permission of an office, not by the Word Himself. That inverts Clement’s order and undermines the Word’s immediacy.

If Christ the Word is the archetypal Light, then the church’s unity and certainty come from sharing in that Light; the Spirit illuminating the Scriptures; not from promoting any human seat into an untouchable source. Teachers matter; oversight matters; order is good. But their authority is always derivative and accountable, never creator of new, irreformable norms (Psalm 119:130). Crossing that line turns a gift of order into a rival of the Word.

So, by Clement’s own logic, the conclusion is clear: Christ, the Word, is the perfect Image and the immediate standard of truth; humanity; layman, bishop, emperor, or pope; bears only the image of the Word. The church does not need a second light to secure the first. The Divine Light secures Himself.

Scripture Above Tradition

Clement warns his readers not to be enslaved by “ancestral customs” that keep the mind from truth. He mocks the absurdity of deifying Alexander the Great, who was hailed as the “thirteenth god,” yet whose corpse was still laid in the ground. The lesson is plain: tradition, however ancient or widely practiced, cannot save. The weight of culture, the honor of kings, or the continuity of custom is powerless against death. Only the Word of God gives life.

If Christ is the Logos; the eternal Word of God; and if Scripture is the Spirit-breathed witness to that Logos, then Scripture necessarily stands above all tradition. It is the standard by which tradition must be judged, not the other way around. Tradition may serve as a witness; it may preserve memory; it may even guide. But when it is made equal to, or greater than, Scripture, it ceases to serve Christ and begins to obscure Him.

This is precisely what happens when the pope is declared infallible in matters of faith and morals. In that claim, tradition is enthroned over revelation, and human office is placed over the Logos Himself. It is a subtle but devastating inversion: instead of Scripture standing as the unchanging measure of tradition, tradition now presumes to measure Scripture. Instead of the pope bowing before the Word, the Word is made to bow before the pope.

The absurdity of this is clear when we follow Clement’s line of reasoning. If Alexander, though crowned with divine honors by men, still lay powerless in his grave, then what hope is there in any man-made institution to guarantee divine truth? Authority rooted in tradition and human office is as mortal as its makers. But the Word of God is eternal, unchanging, and living. To bind consciences by tradition rather than by the Word is to exchange light for shadows and to place human power where only Christ belongs.

If the Logos is supreme, then Scripture; His voice; must be supreme. To give infallibility to a pope is not merely an error in doctrine; it is a denial in practice that Christ, the Word, is sufficient. It is to prefer “ancestral customs” to the living voice of God.

The Insanity of Material Obsession

Clement does not soften his words. A life consumed with material things, bound to superstition and empty ritual, he calls “nothing else than full of insanity.” Why insanity? Because such a life treats the created as if it were the Creator, placing trust in what perishes instead of in Him who gives life. The idol carved from wood, gold or stone cannot speak, cannot move, cannot save. To worship it is madness.

Yet Clement is generous enough to say that ignorance may excuse those who never heard the truth. If they have never encountered the Word, their error is at least understandable. But for those who have been instructed; who have heard the Word of God and still reject it—there is no excuse left. Their own understanding condemns them. They know better, yet they choose worse. They see the Light, yet they prefer darkness.

How much more irrational is it to insist that a man can speak with divine certainty, when Christ; the eternal Logos; has already spoken? To cling to material idols is madness, but to exalt a man as if his words could never err, when the Word of God has already given perfect revelation, is madness doubled. It is to act as if the Logos is insufficient, as if His light must be supplemented by another lamp. But Clement insists the Logos is “the archetypal Light of Light”; pure, self-sufficient, and eternal. To insert an "infallible" man between Christ and His people is not simply error; it is a return to the same insanity as idolatry, dressed now in religious garments rather than pagan ones.

And beyond insanity, how insulting is such a claim to the Spirit-filled believer? Scripture tells us the Holy Spirit indwells every Christian and leads them into all truth (John 16:13). Yet papal infallibility implies that believers, having the Spirit Himself, are still too simple to hear and discern the Word without a supreme earthly interpreter. Teachers are necessary, yes—pastors, elders, shepherds who guide and instruct. But a supreme teacher? A man whose word cannot be questioned? That is not biblical leadership; it is spiritual usurpation.

Worse still, the one who claims this role cannot even keep his own priests in order. Scandals of corruption, greed, and lust continually stain the very institution that presumes to declare itself above error. If the head of a church cannot discipline his own clergy, how can he presume to sit above the Spirit Herself, who dwells in every believer? The arrogance of this claim is staggering. It diminishes Christ as Word, it insults the Spirit as Teacher, and it belittles the believer as though the Spirit within them were insufficient.

Scripture tells us that the indwelling Spirit sanctifies the believer and leads them away from sin (Romans 8:13–14; Galatians 5:16). If someone truly has the Spirit, they cannot persist in a life of wickedness. So what are we to say of priests exposed as predators, caught in patterns of pedophilia and abuse? If the Spirit restrains those who truly belong to Christ, then such men reveal by their actions that the Spirit is not in them. They may perform sacraments, they may wear robes and bear titles, but sacraments without faith in Christ and the gospel do not give the Spirit. Only belief in Christ the Word does.

This exposes the hollowness of the system. If the Spirit Himself is not present in the lives of those who claim to mediate His grace, then the entire structure collapses. It proves that salvation and sanctification do not come through clerical power, sacraments, penance or institutional rites, but through Christ Himself; the eternal Logos, received by faith, who gives His Spirit to dwell in every true believer.

In this way, Clement’s warning rings out across the centuries. Lives consumed by matter, ritual, and human authority fall into confusion and death. But those who cling to the Word—the eternal Logos; the Divine light, find clarity, sanity, and life.

The Shepherd of the Soul

Clement insists: “Without a shepherd, neither can sheep nor any other animal live, nor children without a tutor.” The point is obvious in nature; sheep wander into danger without guidance, and children cannot grow without instruction. Spiritually, the same truth applies: humanity needs a Shepherd and a Tutor. But Clement is not pointing to a man or to an office; he is pointing to Christ Himself. Christ is the Shepherd of the soul, the true Instructor. He is the one who heals the passions that enslave us, who drives away destruction, and who raises up the temple of God within us. His care is not partial, not limited, not confined to one people or place; He shepherds the entire Church, across all times and nations.

If this is so, why should anyone look to a man as infallible? At most, pastors and teachers are under-shepherds. They guide, they feed, they correct; but always as servants of the Chief Shepherd. To exalt one man as the supreme, errorless shepherd is to confuse the servant with the Master. It suggests that Christ’s own shepherding is insufficient, that His Spirit is not able to lead His flock into all truth (John 16:13), and that the church must depend on a human voice to guarantee what Christ Himself has already promised.

Christ shepherds by indwelling the believer with His Spirit, Divine Wisdom, leading each one to repentance, faith, and holiness. The pope, however exalted his office, can only act outwardly; speaking words, declaring decrees, enforcing rule. One shepherds by transforming the heart; the other by commanding from outside. Which is greater? Which is infallible?

Clement’s answer is clear: It is Christ who cures the soul; not a man who stands before crowds to announce that he has made someone a ‘saint,’ when in truth all believers in Christ are already saints. Nor is it the task of a shepherd of souls to issue speeches about Gaza, farming, or the climate, as though political commentary could heal sin. None of this brings the divine light that transforms the heart. Only the Logos Himself, the true Shepherd, can cure the soul. Why then should we submit to a man who claims infallibility in interpreting the Word of God; a claim that across history has fueled bloodshed and persecution; yet now uses his position to pronounce on every worldly cause? This is not the care of souls; it is political manipulation. Christ declared, ‘My kingdom is not of this world’ (John 18:36), and Scripture warns that ‘friendship with the world is enmity with God’ (James 4:4). If that is so, then a man who entangles himself in worldly power and politics shows himself not as a shepherd of Christ’s flock, but as an enemy of God.

Thus the contrast becomes sharp. To honor pastors as shepherds under Christ is biblical; to enthrone one man as Shepherd in Christ’s place is blasphemous. The Logos does not share His role. He is the one Shepherd, the one Instructor, the one High Priest. Any claim to infallibility in a man is not pastoral care but a usurpation of the very role that belongs only to Christ.

The Light That Shines

Clement cries out: “Hail, O Light! For in us, buried in darkness, shut up in the shadow of death, light has shone forth from heaven, purer than the sun, sweeter than life here below. That light is eternal life; and whatever partakes of it lives.”

This Light is not the created sun that rises and sets, nor any material flame. It is the uncreated, divine Light—the eternal Logos Himself. Unlike the sun, which fades into darkness, the Light of Christ never dims and never fails. It is the source of life, immortality, and truth itself.

And His invitation is direct: “Come to Me… For I want to impart to you this grace, bestowing on you the perfect boon of immortality; and I confer on you both the Word and the knowledge of God, My complete self.” This is not the voice of a hierarchy, not the command of an office, but the personal call of Christ Himself, the Logos who shines on every soul who believes.

How different this is from the spectacle of men in pomp robes parading a monstrance shaped like the sun, surrounded by the faces of dead popes. What is this, if not an attempt to cloak Christ’s uncreated light in the imagery of the created sun; and worse, to exalt men as though they themselves were worthy of worship? Clement mocked the Greeks for treating Alexander the Great as a god, though death proved him to be only a man. Is it any less idolatrous when an institution decorates its ceremonies with symbols that suggest its leaders stand as divine mediators of light?

The Illogicality of Papal Infallibility

Clement’s theology leaves no space for papal infallibility. To claim that any man can speak without error in matters of faith is to displace Christ the Logos and to confuse the creature with the Creator. The Word is perfect; man is not (Romans 3:23). The Word is universally given, shining as light to every believer, while papal infallibility narrows truth to the declarations of one office. The Word is eternal, unchanging from the beginning, while the doctrine of papal infallibility was not even defined until 1870; a late innovation that exposes its human origin.

Placed side by side, the contrast is devastating. Christ the Logos, uncreated and eternal, is the living standard of truth. The pope is just a finite man who will return to dust like the rest of us. To elevate his voice to the level of Christ’s Word is not merely unbiblical but illogical. How can a finite man presume to make another man or woman a “saint”? Scripture already declares that all who believe in Christ are saints, set apart by the Spirit and sanctified by the Word (1 Corinthians 1:2; Ephesians 1:1). To exalt the dead by decree, as if holiness were conferred by papal proclamation, is not Christianity but a thinly veiled return to the old Roman paganism that exalted emperors after death as gods.

By doing so, the papacy imitates the very idolatry Clement ridiculed; the deification of Alexander the Great, who, despite being canonized as divine by men, still lay in his grave as proof of his mortality. To “make saints” by human authority is to step into the same error: pretending that divine status can be bestowed by an earthly ruler. But sainthood is not earned by papal approval; it is given by Christ alone, the true Light, who sanctifies all who belong to Him.

Do what you will; preach your own opinions, invent your own rituals, follow your own traditions. God has given man free will, and if you choose to build on sand, the ruin will be your own. But do not dare to do these things under the name of Christ. For to call pagan practices “Christianity” is not only hypocrisy—it is blasphemy.

What is truly Christian comes from Christ Himself: the Word once for all delivered, the Spirit who indwells, the cross that redeems, the resurrection that gives life. What masquerades as Christian yet springs from human pride, from political ambition, from the old Roman instinct to deify men and exalt the dead; this is not Christianity, it is paganism in borrowed robes. To canonize the dead as if man could bestow sainthood, to parade sun-shaped idols as if the uncreated Light must be represented by created gold, to enthrone one man as infallible as if he were the Logos Himself; this is not the gospel of Christ. It is the very idolatry Clement ridiculed when he mocked the Greeks for hailing Alexander the Great as a god while his body lay lifeless in the grave.

The believer indwelt by the Spirit knows the difference. He knows the Shepherd’s voice, and he knows when a stranger’s voice speaks in its place. He knows that to belong to Christ is to follow the Word, not the inventions of men. And he knows that to call pagan practices “Christianity” is an insult both to Christ who bought us and to the Spirit who dwells within us.

The Choice Before Us

Clement closes with a challenge that still resounds with force: “Why do we delay? Why do we not shun the punishment? Why do we not receive the free gift? Why do we not choose the better part, God instead of the evil one, wisdom instead of idolatry, life instead of death?” It is a question of allegiance, a dividing line that cannot be blurred. Neutrality is impossible. To cling to idols; whether carved of wood, fashioned of gold, or dressed in robes of authority; is to choose death. To embrace the Word is to embrace life itself.

The trumpet has already sounded. “The trumpet of Christ is His Gospel. He hath blown it, and we have heard. Let us array ourselves in the armour of peace… the breastplate of righteousness… the shield of faith… and the sword of the Spirit, which is the Word of God” (Ephesians 6:14–17). The Word is not far off, hidden behind councils or offices; it has already gone forth across the world. The only question is whether we will clothe ourselves with it or turn away from it.

This means the choice is stark. Will we trust in men, in traditions, in offices that exalt themselves above the Word? Or will we entrust ourselves wholly to Christ, the eternal Logos, who alone is Light, Life, and Truth? Papal infallibility offers the illusion of security, but Clement reminds us that it is nothing but idolatry in new dress: an attempt to replace the uncreated with the created, the eternal with the temporary, the Logos with a voice of dust.

But Christ is no idol. He is the eternal Light that shines from heaven, purer than the sun, sweeter than life below. He is the Shepherd who heals the soul, the Word who instructs the heart, the Truth who never fails. To Him belongs all authority. To Him we must listen.

Clement’s voice joins with the voice of Scripture in this final word: “Fear God and keep His commandments, for this is the whole duty of man” (Ecclesiastes 12:13). The rest is distraction. The rest is pride. The rest is shadows. But the Word is light, and to receive Him is life everlasting.