What Does “Heresy” Mean in the Bible?
Knowingly denying a truth of the Catholic faith. A person who does this is called a heretic.
It can mean
- Heretic: someone who, after being baptized, stubbornly denies a truth of the faith, or stubbornly doubts it.
- Two other words: “apostasy” is giving up the Christian faith completely. “Schism” is breaking away from the Pope or from the communion of the Church.
- The first ones: in the first centuries some people denied that Jesus was truly a man. The Church taught that the Son of God came in the flesh.
Where it appears in the Bible
John 1:14
What the Bible says
John 1:14
And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we saw his glory, the glory as it were of the only begotten of the Father,) full of grace and truth.
Douay-Rheims Bible (Challoner revision), public domain.
Source: Catechism 2089 and 465; Code of Canon Law, canon 751