Word.ws English Dictionary

sola scriptura

sola scriptura noun: the Protestant Christian doctrine that the Bible is the supreme authority in all matters of doctrine and practice.

Noun

sola scriptura (uncountable)

  1. The Protestant Christian doctrine that the Bible is the supreme authority in all matters of doctrine and practice.
    • In spite of the difficulties arising from this character of the Wittenberg Doctor, early orthodox Lutheranism taught that he had set up the “sola scriptura” as the “formal principle” of the new doctrine.1913, E. M. Lamond, transl., edited by C. L. Dessoulavy, Luther, volume 4, translation of original by Hartmann Grisar

Origin of sola scriptura

Borrowed from Latin sōlā scrīptūrā (“by scripture alone”) (ablative).

Questions about sola scriptura

What does sola scriptura mean?
Sola scriptura means the Protestant Christian doctrine that the Bible is the supreme authority in all matters of doctrine and practice.
What part of speech is sola scriptura?
Sola scriptura is a noun.

Words near sola scriptura in the dictionary

  1. Sol.
  2. Sol. Song
  3. sola
  4. sola ecclesia
  5. sola gratia
  6. sola scriptura
  7. sola topee
  8. sola topees
  9. sola topi
  10. solabegron
  11. solace

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: sola scriptura (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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