De locis theologicis

DE TOTIUS OPERIS PARTITIONE

Since I am about to give a continuous treatment of the theological loci, I have decided at once to divide the whole work into fourteen books. The first of these will briefly enumerate the loci from which suitable arguments may be drawn, whether the theologian wishes to prove his own conclusions or to refute opposing ones. The ten that follow will teach more fully and accurately what force each of the loci contains—that is, from which ones certain arguments may be drawn, and from which only probable ones. In the twelfth and thirteenth books it will be discussed what use such loci have both in scholastic disputation and in the exposition of Sacred Scripture. For it is certainly not difficult to say what use they have in popular preaching; nevertheless, this must be passed over, lest the treatment seem foreign to the purpose of the school. Finally, the last book, since not all loci suit every disputation, will show individually which arguments the theologian should use to conduct a disputation specifically against heretics, which particularly against Jews and Saracens, and which, finally, against pagans, whenever he must contend with them in defense of the Catholic faith. When, with God's favor, I have completed these matters more fully, my treatment of the theological loci will be suitable and complete in every respect, fulfilled in all its proper parts and divisions.

ON THE TWO KINDS OF ARGUMENT BY WHICH EVERY DISPUTATION IS CONDUCTED

Before I enumerate the theological loci, as the first part of this disputation promises to do, we must establish that every argument is drawn either from reason or from authority. For by these two means we give assent to whatever matter comes into controversy. While in all the other disciplines reason holds first place and authority the last, theology alone is such that in disputation one must seek not so much the force of reason as that of authority. Indeed, it has claimed the argument from authority as peculiarly its own, so that it either receives reasons as guests and strangers, or even enlists them in its service as things fetched from far away. For it rests chiefly on faith, which, unless it proceeds from authority, cannot merely fail to be faith; it cannot even be understood. For faith, as the Apostle teaches, is the evidence of things not seen, as though you wished to establish certain things by a certain reason: with reason, you would surely be out of your mind. Therefore, among the faithful as among theologians, authority holds the leading place. Reason follows afterward, like a handmaid.

The Apostle seems to signify this when he says that a teacher in the Church must hold fast to the faithful word that accords with the teaching, so that he may be able to exhort with sound doctrine and refute those who contradict it. Whoever would be a teacher in the Christian school must first, necessarily, grasp the word of faith; but unless he soon applies the reasoning of doctrine, he may indeed be faithful, but he will not be able to be a teacher of the faithful. For even people who are highly experienced cannot, as St. Thomas rightly infers from Aristotle, dispute with their adversaries unless the reasoning of an art is added to experience. Both, then, are necessary for a theologian—authority and reason—yet in such a way that authority takes the first parts in theology, while reason has the last. Thus what was the foundation of the first part has been splendidly laid. For the loci from which arguments are drawn have indeed been handed down as twofold: some derive from authority, others from reason; yet nearly all theological arguments flow from that former source. The index that follows will show this, as well as the number and order of the loci.

ON THE NUMBER AND ORDER OF THE THEOLOGICAL LOCI

Cicero teaches what Plato and Aristotle had earlier handed down: every instruction undertaken on any subject must begin with a definition, so that one may understand what the subject under discussion is. I certainly could not neglect this principle in the disputation I am about to undertake on the theological loci: I should explain first of all what a theological locus is, unless it were so readily apparent from what we have said that the matter needed no explanation. For in this work we did not promise to discuss common topics, which are usually treated as general subjects, or headings of notable matters that are now also called common loci, such as justification, grace, sin, faith, and others of this kind. Many of our own writers have done so, and among the Lutherans not only Philip but Calvin too—men of no little eloquence, yet impious, as one can recognize in Luther's disciples. Rather, just as Aristotle in the Topics set out common loci as seats and markers of arguments, from which every argument for every disputation might be found, so we set out certain special loci of theology, as dwellings of all theological arguments, from which all theologians will find their arguments, whether for confirming or refuting. Accordingly, since the definition of a theological locus was already before our eyes from what was said in the prooemium, we did not need to explain it more carefully here. Instead, we had to take up at once what was obscure and indicate a definite and fixed number of such loci. We therefore include the catalogue of theological loci in the number ten, not unaware that some will reduce these same loci to a smaller number and others will want there to be more. But there is no need to dwell on the form of the enumeration, provided that no locus at all is counted when it is superfluous or omitted when necessary. The first locus, then, is the authority of Sacred Scripture, which is contained in the canonical books. The second is the authority of the traditions of Christ and the apostles, which, since they were not written down but have come to us from ear to ear, may most rightly be called oracles of the living voice. The third is the authority of the Catholic Church. The fourth is the authority of Councils, especially general ones, in which the authority of the Catholic Church resides. The fifth is the authority of the Roman Church, which by divine privilege both is and is called Apostolic. The sixth is

the authority of the holy Fathers. The seventh is the authority of scholastic theologians, to whom we should also add experts in pontifical law. For the teaching of this law corresponds, as it were, from the other side to scholastic theology. The eighth is natural reason, which extends very widely through all the sciences discovered by the natural light. The ninth is the authority of philosophers who follow nature as their guide; among them, without doubt, are the imperial jurists, who, as a jurist says, themselves profess true philosophy. Finally, the last is the authority of human history, whether written by authors worthy of belief or handed down from nation to nation—not superstitiously and like old wives' tales, but on serious and consistent grounds. These, then, are the ten loci in which all theological arguments lie hidden, to be brought to light with this distinction: those drawn from the first seven loci are proper, so to speak, to this faculty, whereas those drawn from the last three are extrinsic and, as it were, begged from another's store. For, as I said above, there are two kinds of argumentation, one by authority and the other by reason; since the former belongs properly to the theologian and the latter to the philosopher, the theologian must resort to the latter if he is not permitted to use the former. Although sometimes it is permitted to employ both kinds of argument together, as we shall show in its proper place. This, then, is enough about the first part of the work, since, as we said at the outset, it did not require a long discussion.