De locis theologicis

WHERE THE ARGUMENTS OF CHAPTER TWO ARE REFUTED

Response to the first argument. There is no single, simple response among theologians to the first argument. Some piously and earnestly insist that Abraham did not lie. For, they say, he did not speak contrary to what he had in mind: he believed that his son would immediately be raised up, as the Apostle seems to say in these words: “By faith Abraham offered Isaac when he was tested, and was offering his only son, he who had received the promises, reasoning that God was able to raise him even from the dead.” Others, by contrast—and I strongly agree with them—admit that Abraham lied in the sense that he spoke contrary to his mind in order to conceal his intention; but they say he prophesied because he spoke the truth, which at that time he did not know. This is what Ambrose's words indicate. Enough, then, about the first argument. Next, as we had proposed, let us speak about the others as well. Response to the second argument. Some theologians of no little distinction reply to the second argument that Jacob did indeed lie, but at his mother's advice, not by divine revelation. But we, whose intention is to defend the views of the saints as far as we are able, must answer quite differently. Augustine, in his Quaestionibus super Genesim, excuses Jacob from lying; he adduces the fact that Scripture called him a simple man, that is, guileless and without deceit, as the Seventy translated it. Thus he was without guile, though he seems to have practiced deceit. Therefore, as Augustine says, we are compelled to understand a spiritual mystery in that passage. And in book 16 of De civit. Dei he says: “What is the guile of the simple man, what is the deception of one who does not lie, if not a profound mystery of truth?” Chrysostom too, in hom. 6. In epist. ad Coloss. and hom. 53 In Gen., excuses Jacob from lying, just as he excuses Abraham and Phinehas from murder, because he believes God cooperated with them. Ambrose also excuses him in book 2 of De Iacob et vita beata, chs. 2 and 3; Innocent, De divort., ch. “Gaudemus”; the Master of the Sentences, III, dist. 38; Gratian, 22, q. 2, ch. “Quaeritur”; Alexander of Hales, part 2, q. 139, mem. 6; and St. Thomas, II–II, q. 110, a. 3, ad 3. Nor should we listen to those who thought Jacob was excused by revelation not from having lied, but from having sinned by lying. They say that such a lie can sometimes rightly be called so by the familiar counsel of the Holy Spirit. I would not only refute these authors but also show by very many arguments how seriously mistaken they are, were it not that St. Augustine labored carefully on this very question against the Priscillianists and discussed it so fully that, if we took up the same work again, we would merely be doing what had already been done, contrary to the old proverb. Let us therefore leave these writers with their theology, since the holy doctors not only deny that Jacob sinned but also maintain that he spoke the truth and prophesied in those words. On this point I observe that our predecessors could not have missed what was clear and established: Jacob's words, in their proper sense, were a lie, though it is not absurd for even a very just man to lie once or twice. Since they firmly maintained that Jacob had not lied, we should think that they had special and weighty reasons for being led to this opinion. Further, just as by legitimate allegorical reasoning a just man is a figure of the just and an unjust man of the unjust, so too what is false cannot absurdly be taken as a type of truth. I know what can be said against this. I have read the commentaries of St. Gregory, in which he does not bind his exposition by this rule; I have also read Jerome, who, after turning an evil spirit into a good one by tropology in Habakkuk 1, says, “Tropology is free and bounded only by these laws: that it follow the piety of the interpretation.”

But this is a longer battle, and the limits of the present work do not allow it. I would not wish to abuse this freedom; rather, I would prescribe certain limits and lines for mystical senses. For just as a metaphor, so too a figure or image of things ought to be drawn only from things that are near and similar; for a thing that is the figure of another must bear a likeness to it. Solomon was not a type of Christ in his sins, but in his peace; nor was Jephthah a type of God in his impiety toward his daughter, but in his zeal. But St. Thomas, II–II, q. 88, a. 2, ad 2, seems to disagree. I have already said, however, that I am not dealing here with free allegories, but with those established by a definite method and reason. Neither Jerome nor Thomas spoke in that sense. For what fellowship has light with darkness? What has Christ to do with Belial, so that through a mystical sense we should make light a figure of darkness and Christ a figure of Belial? But more on this at a more suitable place. Now, to return to the point, we must treat Sacred Scripture according to a definite rule; we shall not make an unjust person a type of the just in the very respect in which he is unjust, nor a liar a type of the just or truthful in the very respect in which he is a liar. Since, then, it is established that Jacob, when he also took his brother's blessing in advance, prefigured the faith of the Gentiles, it follows that by God's special providence all those things said and done had the character of an image of the future truth, and therefore were not lies. What, then? Is it true: “I am your firstborn, Esau”? It is indeed true. For he was firstborn both according to the flesh and according to right. The Apostle expresses two kinds of offspring when he says: “Not all who are of Israel are Israelites, nor are all the children of Abraham his offspring; rather, the children of the promise are reckoned as offspring.” And immediately after: “Not only this, but Rebecca also conceived children by one man,” and so on. And, “The elder shall serve the younger,” and so on. Paul therefore calls the people of the Gentiles the offspring of Abraham, and calls that same people the younger brother whom the elder was to serve. Thus, just as this people, without lying, could already say in faith and inheritance in place of the Jews, “I am the offspring of Abraham,” so too Jacob, since by right he held the firstborn status into which he had been substituted by God's authority, truly said, “I am your firstborn, Esau.” What of the fact that John the Baptist was called Elijah by the Lord—not by nature, but by his office as forerunner? Could Jacob, who succeeded to his brother's inheritance by right, not likewise assert without falsehood that he was Esau? But you ask: How did Jacob understand that this right belonged to him? Certainly either by God's revelation or by instruction from his mother, who is said in Genesis 25 to have received God's familiar counsel. We have said enough in refutation of the second argument. Response to the third argument. St. Thomas, II–II, q. 171, a. 6, ad 2, refutes the third argument brought against us from Isaiah's testimony. Since his refutation is lengthy and we are aiming at brevity, it should not be inserted here. A shorter answer can also be given: such prophecies are threats; the Scholastics call them comminatory prophecies. Since the prophets understood this—for understanding is necessary in prophecy—they were not deceived. Rather, although they faithfully performed their ministry, they believed that threats could be changed if people's conduct changed. For this reason Jonah did not want to foretell the overthrow of Nineveh, because he thought that divine mercy would be moved by the Ninevites' repentance. Accordingly, with simple announcements of this kind, the nature of things and ordinary usage lead us to supply an unspoken condition.

A striking example of this is found in Genesis 20, where the Lord rebukes King Abimelech in these words: “You shall die because of the woman you took.” But after Abimelech excused himself, the Lord spoke in this way: “Now return the wife to her husband, and he will pray for you, and you shall live. But if you do not return her, know that you shall surely die.” You see how in the first pronouncement he shakes Abimelech's mind more forcefully, directing him toward making amends; in the second he clearly states his own will, by which, in announcing a punishment, he means nothing other than to warn those whom he wishes to spare—except that he does not spell out syllable by syllable what is nevertheless easy to understand. This, then, is the response to the third argument. Response to the fourth argument. The fourth argument is easily answered: a word of command does not always carry with it either a precept or advice, but sometimes also permission, as in John's Gospel: “What you are doing, do quickly”; and elsewhere the Lord says to Balaam, “If these men have come to call you, rise and go with them.” Yet afterward the angel said to him, “I have come to oppose you, because your way is perverse.” St. Thomas, De malo, q. 3, a. 1, ad 17. Thus it was said, “Go forth and do so,” and God is said to have put a lying spirit in the mouth of all the prophets by permitting it, not by commanding it. This is also the sense of “Do not lead us into temptation,” and perhaps of “You are king of kings, and the God of heaven has given you the kingdom and dominion,” and “You would have no power over me unless it had been given to you from above,” and finally of the statement that the Father delivered the Son into the hands of the wicked. Since, however, the divine permission itself— for we must return to the point—by which a person is led into error or guilt is carried out not by good ministers but by evil ones, Augustine therefore asserted that God sometimes deceives through evil ministers. Let this suffice for the refutation of the fourth argument; later we shall perhaps refute that latter argument by a clearer method and reasoning. Response to the fifth argument. I answer the argument placed fifth as follows: God did not command the children of Israel to defraud the Egyptians, but to ask them for vessels of silver and gold as a loan. Later, however, he commanded that the vessels they had received not be returned. He could rightfully do this for various reasons, and especially for these. One was that the Egyptians had not paid the Jews for their labor. As Exodus 1 relates, they had oppressed them with harsh work in clay and brick and every kind of servitude. Thus they could lawfully take their due wages by force, even in peacetime, since there was no other way to recover what was owed. Another reason was that in a just war they could take the property of their enemies by right of victory. Epiphanius explained and taught this in the Ancoratus, and Clement of Alexandria had taught it earlier in Stromat.. Certainly both reasons can be gathered from Wisdom 10: the first in “He repaid the righteous for the wages of their labors,” and the second in “Therefore the righteous took the spoils of the ungodly.” The Master of the Sentences, in III, dist. 37, maintains that the Jews were excellent men and did not sin at all; but that the weaker ones, who deceived the Egyptians out of a certain greed, were permitted to do so rather than commanded. For what Augustine said—that the Israelites were commanded to deceive the enemy—he corrected in precisely the same passage and question, saying, “It happened that God commanded—or rather, permitted it on account of their greed.” It pertains to justice and truth that one who deserves to be deceived should be deceived, with God permitting it and an evil human or angelic agent carrying it out. Although God may bring forward the ministers of his justice quite severely to exact vengeance, he is not thereby the cause of their wicked deed. For if someone asks a usurer for money and takes advantage of that wicked man's fault, he does not thereby become the author of usury.

Nor will it seem difficult to attribute the same deed to God and Satan, if, in one and the same event, we distinguish actions and sufferings that are quite different. For these two things make the account of divine and diabolical action in such cases very different. In his calamity Job recognizes the work not only of the demon but also of God, whom he says took away what had been seized by the Chaldeans at Satan's instigation and urging. Since the suffering was good and just, and God's plan was excellent and his purpose most holy, it was clear to the man of God that God's action was blameless, even where the wickedness of human beings and Satan revealed itself through its evil action. I see that, though I wished to speak briefly, I have spoken somewhat obscurely; but I shall try to explain it more clearly, if I can. In that evil deed there was both guilt and punishment, and an evil action joined to a just suffering. God, then, was not inactive there: he was wholly the author of what was good in the deed, but was separate from what was evil in it. Thus God did indeed take the camels from the holy man, but justly and kindly; Satan took them too, but cruelly and even wickedly; the Chaldeans also took them, both greedily and unjustly. There is therefore nothing absurd in attributing the same deed to God insofar as it is punishment, and to Satan insofar as it is guilt: Satan acts both in the guilt and in the punishment, while God acts in the punishment but does not act in the guilt—he permits it. Response to the sixth argument. The same response refutes the sixth argument as well. God does not deceive by causing the deception itself, but by permitting it to occur. For the same reason he is said both to blind and to harden hearts, as Gregory, Moralia XIII, ch. 16, and Thomas, Adversus Gentes, ch. 162, have taught. Clement of Alexandria also says in Strom. 1, explaining Matthew 13, “That is why I speak to them in parables,” and so on: “The Lord does not bring about ignorance—for to think this would be impious—but prophetically rebukes the ignorance that was already there.” So too God delivers people over to a reprobate mind and to dishonorable passions: “I let them go,” he says, “according to the desires of their hearts; they will follow their own inventions.” The remaining testimonies must likewise be understood in this sense. Augustine himself taught in De praedestinatione et gratia, ch. 4, how we should understand Augustine's words. “God,” he says, “does not produce hardness of heart itself in a person, but he is said to harden the one whom he has not wished to soften; likewise, to blind the one whom he has not wished to enlighten, and to repel the one whom he has not wished to call.” So far Augustine. In De articulis sibi falso per Pelagianos impositis, art. 10, he also detests the opinion of those who believe that God is the author of anyone's evil will or action, whether by stirring up, persuading, or impelling the desires of sinners. For God tempts no one. And again: “Do not say, ‘He deceived me.’” And again: “Your destruction, Israel, is from yourself; in me alone is your help.” And elsewhere: “You love all things that exist, and hate nothing of what you have made.” But God hates blindness of heart, error, and obstinacy, since both the ungodly person and his ungodliness are hateful to God. God, then, does none of these things in a proper sense in a human being, but permits them by judgment alone. For obstinacy, error of mind, and blindness are sins, which, if we wish to follow the proper sense of the word, God in no way produces in human beings. Unless one prefers the folly of Melanchthon, who says that Judas's betrayal is as much God's proper work as Paul's calling. But this error is clearly refuted not only by scriptural testimonies but also by arguments from nature. First, Augustine's argument is straightforward: no one becomes worse through the agency of a wise person. For such guilt is so great that it could not befall any wise human being. Much less, then, will a human being become worse with God as author,

since God is superior to any wise human being. Augustine's other argument is not slight: whatever is done through me as its author must be done with my will, either by my persuasion, advice, or command. But no just and right judgment of God concerning sins would be possible if people sinned by God's will, persuasion, advice, or command. Plato, moreover, says in book 2 of The Republic that one must fight in every way to prevent God, who is good, from being called the cause of evils; otherwise God would be at war with himself, having commanded by his laws that the opposite be done. He therefore orders those who speak those wicked words—which are harmful to us, as he says, and ill-suited to themselves—to be expelled from the city. But refuting this madness or insanity belongs to another place and time. Let us now pursue the remaining matters. For in refuting them the testimonies in this sixth argument will be explained more clearly. Response to the seventh argument. When it is objected in the seventh place that God is the cause of all punishments, we certainly deny this; he is truly and properly the cause of those that are punishments alone, not sins. Sometimes, as the Apostle teaches in Romans and Thessalonians, one sin is the punishment for another. In such a case, the ungodly person incurs punishment because God abandons him, not because God causes it. But Cajetan, commenting on “Behold, I will raise up evil against you from your own house,” says: “The passage concerns not the evil of sin but the evil of punishment. For God is not the author of sin as such, but of the punishment of the sinner or of another.” So far Cajetan. On the words “The Lord commanded him to curse David,” he acknowledges, he says, that the curse, insofar as it was punitive, proceeded from God. For God brought about that curse through Shimei not insofar as it was a sin, but insofar as it was a punishment for David. As he had also said earlier through Nathan's mouth, “I will raise up evil against you from your own house,” not insofar as it was the evil of sin, but of punishment. So far Cajetan as well. This latter position can be defended more easily if we recall the distinction made in refuting the fifth argument: in one and the same deed, both action and suffering are to be considered. When temporal things, health, and life are taken away, the suffering is not only just on God's part but also good on the part of the person who suffers. I do not mean useful to the sufferer—for who would doubt that?—but honorable and meritorious if borne with equanimity and patience. Since suffering, insofar as it is suffering, is punishment, God may rightly, unless I am mistaken, be called the author of an evil deed not insofar as it is the evil of sin, but insofar as it is the evil of punishment. Since for Aristotle action and suffering are the same motion, this is equivalent to saying that God is the author not of an evil action but of a good suffering. But when one sin is the punishment for another, the matter cannot be resolved so easily. For then neither the action nor the suffering is honorable; the one who is punished sins both by acting and by suffering. For example, when the nations dishonored their own bodies and, abandoning natural use, practiced a shameful act contrary to nature, receiving within themselves the due reward for their error, we can distinguish absolutely nothing in this case for which we can claim God as the cause. Whether they acted or suffered, they altogether sinned in both respects: because they acted and because they suffered. Therefore God was in no way the author of such actions or sufferings. What Cajetan says first, then, seems too weak to stand in true theology; I do not know whether it admits such formally subtle quibbles. For if God is the author of sin insofar as it is punishment for the sinner, he will be the absolute cause of all punishments, even when the later sin is punishment for an earlier sin. Thus he will be the cause of hardening, blindness, error, and those passions that one cannot even name And since a moral cause, which is what we are now discussing, acts only by moving the will, these sins that befall people as punishment for earlier ones will surely arise with God willing—and even commanding, persuading, or instigating them. All of these things are clearly false in themselves and strongly contradict one another.

for shame. I understand Augustine in book 5 cont. Iulian. to argue at length that sins are not merely a matter of divine permission or patience, but also of divine power, since earlier sins are punished by later ones. In support of this he adduces not only the testimonies we used in the arguments, but also these: “The Lord mixed a spirit of dizziness in its midst, and they made Egypt err as if it were drunk.” And: “It was the Lord's judgment that their hearts should be hardened and that they should not merit any mercy, as the Lord had commanded Moses.” And: “The king did not listen to the people, because the Lord had turned him away in order to bring about his word,” and so on. In place of the words our translation has, “because the Lord had turned him away,” the Seventy translated, οτι ήν μεταστροφή παρά κυρίου. Augustine rendered these words, “because the change was from the Lord.” And rightly so, for μεταστρέΦω properly means “I turn.” This is also similar: “He turned their heart to hate his people and to deal deceitfully with his servants.” Finally Augustine adds a passage that seems alone to secure his case: “For this very purpose I raised you up, that I might show my power in you”; and immediately after: “He hardens whom he wills.” God therefore hardens willingly; and later: “But if God, willing to show his wrath and make his patience known,” and so on. Such sins, then, belong to divine power; therefore in them God acts, and does not merely permit. This is confirmed above all by the fact that, when David rebuked Abishai, who wanted to cut off Shimei's head, he said, “Leave him, for the Lord commanded him to curse David”; and a little later, “Leave him, he says, to curse according to the Lord's command.” I have unwillingly fallen into the very question that I was trying with all my might, as the saying goes, to avoid. It is so closely joined to the present question that I could not separate it from this one, although I have labored long and hard over it. When I consider what the plan of this work demands, I avoid controversies that arise along the way and those that follow as best I can, especially those I see as deserving fuller treatment and more careful explanation. On the one hand, I dislike a large volume; on the other, I am distressed to examine matters of the greatest importance less carefully than their magnitude requires. This must happen in the question now at hand. For although much will be said, many things will still have to be passed over that would be very necessary to settle this argument completely. The ancient Fathers, so as not to open a window for the impious to attribute their hardening, blindness, errors, and sins to God, recognize only permission in expressions of this kind, which seem to signify God's action. I embrace this restraint, but I judge it not at all dangerous if we add something to permission: that the action is not properly God's, but neither is it permission alone. In this way, I think, we shall preserve a genuine, sound, and clear understanding of Sacred Scripture. First, however, we must understand that the force and energy of Scripture in such passages cannot be adequately explained by negation. For if God blinds the one whom he does not enlighten and hardens the one whom he does not soften, then certainly all who are dead in sin have been blinded and hardened by God. Neither Scripture nor reason allows this.

For we read that some people in particular were blinded and hardened by God, in whom the Lord displayed his anger, justice, and power through a striking and singular act of vengeance. Next, let this also be certain and settled for us: God does not properly blind, harden, or deceive, turn human hearts to hatred, or do those things he is said to do on the surface of the text. All these things, as we established earlier, are contrary to God's nature. They are therefore attributed to God improperly and figuratively, in three ways, as I understand it. First, when his light is taken away and nothing but darkness and blindness remain; when his spirit of sweetness is withdrawn and our hearts grow hard as stone; when his direction ceases and they are twisted into crookedness, he is said to blind, harden, or lead into error those from whom he takes away the ability to see, to soften, and to walk on the straight path toward truth. For those who take this light from our eyes, and those who remove the pillar on which a building is supported and stands, would rightly and truly be said to darken our eyes and demolish the building. When we say that God takes away the ability to see, and similar things, this must not be understood as if a human being were deprived of the faculty of free choice and could therefore neither see, soften, nor walk rightly by himself. It must instead be understood this way: because a person cannot see without light, be softened without the gentle oil of the spirit, or walk rightly without God's direction, the one who takes these things away from people by a just judgment is therefore said, in a way, to take away their ability to carry them out as well. The second explanation, which seems closer to the proper meaning of the words, is that God uses Satan as his minister to carry out his judgments and is therefore said to do what his minister accomplishes with authority from him. In the same way, we understand that what a judge's minister does while carrying out the judge's just sentence is also done, in a certain way, by the judge. Jerome gave a third explanation to Hedibia. Just as there is one heat of the sun, which, according to the substances subject to it, liquefies some things, hardens others, dissolves some, and binds others—wax melts while clay hardens, though the nature of the heat is not different—so God is said by the very same light to blind the ill-disposed and enlighten the well-disposed; by the very same gift to harden one and soften another. Israel was softened by the same miracles while Pharaoh grew hard; the Apostles saw by the same light of doctrine while the Pharisees were made blind. For divine light is given in itself so that we may see; but, as an occasion, it brings about blindness in one whose eyes are ill-disposed, and hardness in one whose mind is ill-disposed. This is also like the case of those who are said to mislead and deceive someone by showing him obscurity through ambiguous or unclear speech. In this way the Lord, speaking to the crowds in parables, is said to have blinded them. Jeremiah too says, “You have seduced me, Lord, and I was seduced.” At first he had heard, “I have appointed you a prophet to the nations,” and again, “Behold, I have set you over nations and kingdoms.” He thought he would speak not against the Jewish people but against the various surrounding nations, and so he gladly accepted the prophecy. But when he saw that things had happened differently from what he had expected, he complained that he had been deceived by the Lord—not deceived by falsehood, but by ambiguity. It makes no difference whether Jeremiah was seduced in that way, as Jerome says, or rather by these words: “Do not fear them, for I am with you to deliver you,” and so on. By these three explanations, not only are the passages cited earlier explained, but we also understand that God now threatens to summon the ministers of his anger with a whistle, and now that they will be like a razor to him for shaving his head and all his beard, and now

a net and trap for ensnaring the wicked; now a hammer for striking them; finally, a rod, an axe, and a saw, which he may raise, cut with, and draw. For as to what is read in 2 Reg. 16, that Shimei cursed King David at the Lord's command, it is enough to show by a great argument that this was used figuratively: Ecclesiasticus 15 says, “He commanded no one to act impiously.” Indeed, it is contrary to right reason for a person to sin by doing what God commands. But Shimei undoubtedly sinned by cursing. In Sacred Scripture, therefore, “command” is sometimes understood as law and ordinance, whether it is a law binding by command, permission, a prescribed punishment, or even an order established by nature. Thus what Matthew 19 says, “He permitted you because of the hardness of your hearts,” is expressed in Mark 10 as, “He wrote this commandment for you.” So too in Lamentations 3: “Who is this who said that something should happen when the Lord did not command it?” Others translate this passage: “Who said that something should happen which the Lord did not command?” And again: “He established them forever and for all ages; he set forth a command,” and so on. Whatever, then, takes place according to the order of divine justice is said to take place by divine command. I had already forgotten Paul's words, “He hardens whom he wills.” First, however, theologians also speak of a will of permission. Hence Augustine says in the Enchiridion, ch. 25: “Nothing happens unless the Almighty wills it to happen, either by allowing it to happen or by doing it himself.” Second, things are said to happen with someone's will when they happen without his opposition. Thus a father is said willingly to beget a son. Enough has been said about the seventh argument. Response to the eighth. The eighth argument will be refuted very briefly. We must understand that there are two kinds of causes, natural and moral. Someone who commands, advises, persuades, or impels is called the moral cause of the thing that happens through his command, advice, persuasion, or impulse. God is indeed the natural cause of all motions, for by a general and natural concurrence he works with all active causes; but he is the moral cause neither of error nor of any perverse action. An act that is a sin, if considered in the order of natural things, is to be referred only to natural causes; but if considered in the moral order of things, it would be foolish and absurd to refer it to naturally acting causes. A fool, for example, would be one who attributed his own or another's faults to the intelligences that move the heavens. Accordingly, although all things and actions, insofar as they are effects of nature, have God as their author, when sins are at issue—since the term “sin” immediately signifies a free and moral act—we would be most foolish if we covered our errors and sins with God. As we have said, he does not act in the manner of a moral cause to move anyone to error or any other perverse action; that is, he does not lie at all, nor does he persuade or command evil. By these and similar means he would properly deceive and be held the cause of sins. But this division of causes has been explained more fully in the Relection on the Sacraments in General. We have now said enough in explaining the eighth argument. Response to the ninth. The last argument is easily refuted. For I deny the point asserted first, on which that whole argument rests in its attempt to persuade us. A lie is by nature so evil that no one can justly lie for any reason; Aristotle teaches this in Ethics IV, and Augustine demonstrates it in De mendacio. As for the first argument, which tries to persuade us of the contrary, some reply that Joseph really did lie, but as a joke. If you object that every perjury is a mortal sin, they answer subtly that Joseph did not swear absolutely that they were spies, but only on this condition:

“Send one of you from among yourselves, and let him bring him back, until it is proved whether what you have said is true or false; otherwise, by Pharaoh's life, you are spies.” But St. Augustine, in his Questions on Genesis, entirely frees Joseph from the charge of lying, taking the word “are” to mean “will be considered.” This use of the word is not unusual. For in 3 Kings 18, Elijah says, “Let the one who answers by fire be God,” that is, “be considered God.” St. Bonaventure adopted the same view and added that Joseph spoke those words without lying, by testing them and, as judges do, making an inquiry. In court, statements are used in place of questions. Those who ask questions do not lie, for they are not considered to assert anything, but to test things so that they may elicit the truth. Such was the question, “Do you not know that no one is like me in skill at divination?” Gratian nevertheless teaches that it was said as a joke, and should therefore not be considered a lie, since it was not spoken with the intention to deceive. To the second argument I reply that the prophet speaks figuratively, either to express the very great certainty of the matter or to explain a vehement desire that those evils might not occur, if that were possible. It is commonly said without blame by Spaniards: “May God grant that I be mistaken.” Let this be the response to the third argument: Aristotle there takes irony to mean a certain shameful mockery, disguised and artfully contrived to deceive. For the Greek verb έιρωνεΰομαι sometimes means to deceive mockingly. Yet Socrates, who feigned ignorance in every speech and whom the Greeks called είρωνα, was not only without fault but even praised. For among the Latins too, irony, mockery, or derision is a figure of speech in which no lie is present. All the arguments, then, that we set out at the beginning of this controversy have been refuted in this way. But learned and educated people may raise an objection: do we seem to act prudently enough when, although at the beginning of this work we taught that the truth of God, on which faith rests, is the first principle of theology, we now seem to establish our teaching quite differently, since we call divine truth into question and try to confirm it with philosophical arguments as well? It is absurd, as Aristotle teaches, to wish to dispute with anyone about the principles of a given discipline. Basil says in Psalm 115: “In any field of study that proceeds in due order toward its end, it is impossible to seek demonstrations of the first subjects. Rather, the principles of all the arts that rely on proof must be posited without investigation or reasoning, and the rest that follow must then be shown by reasoning.” So too the mystery of theology, built upon faith, seeks no proof by arguments. So far Basil. Hilary too says in his book To the Emperor Constantius: “Faith is not a matter for philosophical inquiry, but of the teaching of the Gospel.” Since theology and faith alike rest on this as their highest principle—that everything revealed by God in Scripture is true—it seems foolish either to call this into doubt or to try to settle it with philosophical arguments, as if faith were a matter of philosophical questions and the learner ought not to believe, especially in this discipline, just as in other disciplines. Indeed, just as the first principles of philosophy are impressed beforehand on the minds of all who are not wholly devoid of reason and would be questioned only most absurdly, so all Christians have this anticipation or foreknowledge, as if inscribed in their minds without any argument: that God is truthful by nature and that no one can therefore be deceived by him. Accordingly, as was said, even learned men can accuse us of imprudence for raising a controversy about a matter that should not be controversial and establishing the first foundation of faith and theology not only by testimony but also by reasoning. ^{1 2}

I would wish that they understood our position well enough. For we are not among those whose minds wander in error and never have anything to follow. What kind of theology—or rather, what kind of discipline—would it be if the rationale for its principles were removed? The whole discipline would be destroyed if its principles, like its conclusions, could be brought into controversy. Since I sometimes seem to be speaking not with perfect theologians and those fully wise, but with people for whom things are going very well if they have even the semblance of theology, I move a few stones that I would not move if I did not fear the imprudence of certain people. They read younger theologians indiscriminately and without judgment, and fall into opinions that, as it seems, must be refuted, so that we may lay the foundations of theology for learned and unlearned alike. We must therefore be allowed to discuss some points beyond the usual art of discourse for the sake of the unlearned. We should not demand prudence where a teacher is all the more prudent the more he adapts himself to the minds and inexperience of the unlearned. But, to answer learned men somewhat as well, the principles of disciplines do not all have the same character. Some are so well known and clear that those who call them into question should not be wearied with the words, arguments, and disputation of philosophers, but with blows, chains, and prison: for example, that every whole is greater than its part. Other principles are such that they can sometimes be denied through ignorance and can also be proved by more illuminating arguments. Aristotle taught that Dialectic and Metaphysics refute those who deny the principles of other disciplines; he himself also often uses evident effects to persuade us of less evident causes, even though those causes contain the principles of philosophy. It is also well established that every discipline has two parts: one in which we posit, establish, and confirm its principles as foundations; another in which, with the principles established, we proceed to what follows from them. In this latter part, if someone denies the principles assumed in the science, one should not contend with him in an argumentative disputation. For if someone denies the existence of God to a theologian who wishes to draw his conclusions from his principles, he would be foolish to undertake a theological disputation against such a person. In the former part, however, one may not only illuminate obscure matters by what is clear, but also demonstrate less familiar principles from things better known to us. It often happens that the causes of things, which are clear by their own nature, are obscure to us. Just as the sun's rays are darkness to the eyes of a night-owl, so if a wise man were told that God does not exist, although this is the first principle of theology, he would nevertheless strive to establish by some method and reasoning that God exists. No one, then, should be surprised if in this very book, where we treat the firmness of theological principles, we not only explain the principles themselves but also establish them. An enemy shakes the foundations of a city in one way when trying to overthrow it; an architect acts in another way when striving not only to lay the foundations but also to strengthen them. But let us now set these points aside and hurry to those that press more closely and forcefully. The first battering ram was not so well equipped that a longer or sharper discussion was needed to dislodge it. But we must apply ourselves with greater effort and sharper force of disputation to the other one, which our adversaries have equipped with greater skill and strength.