Apologeticae sive Theologiae Fundamentalis, Tomus II (Pars Altera): Demonstratio Catholica

Some Catholics, in order to solve more readily the difficulties raised against sacred Scripture, contended that certain things, or sentences or propositions, of sacred Scripture are not inspired. Holden, a Sorbonne professor († 1665), noted that inspiration extends "only to those things which are either purely doctrinal or have some proximate or necessary relation to doctrinal matters."¹ Rohling confines inspiration to matters of faith and morals.² Lenormant, a layman and an orientalist, restricts it to supernatural doctrines.³ Cardinal Newman thinks that "obiter dicta" are exempt from inspiration, i.e. statements which neither pertain to faith and morals nor cohere with them, e.g. that Nabuchodonosor was king of Nineveh,⁴ that Paul left his cloak at Troas,⁵ etc.⁶

Nevertheless, it must on the contrary be altogether maintained that inspiration extends to all the things or sentences which were written by the hagiographers.

Proof: 1. Christ and the apostles indiscriminately adduce any text whatsoever of the sacred books, and even the very smallest matters, under the solemn formula: "It is written; Scripture says." And indeed "under one and the same most solemn formula the books of sacred Scripture are cited, both legal and historical and poetic and didactic; not only are testimonies and sentences of the religious and doctrinal order cited, but also those of the historical order and those which, being wholly profane in themselves, enter into no connection with religion." Therefore all sentences of the sacred books indiscriminately are sacred Scripture, and therefore all are inspired.

2. The Fathers and the theologians profess by testimonies both theoretical and practical that all the particular passages of sacred Scripture are inspired. We have already reported several theoretical testimonies. Recall the words of Irenaeus, Clement of Alexandria, Gregory of Nyssa, Ambrose, Jerome, Bonaventure."⁷ In practice, however, they manifest their faith by the manner in which they cite, defend, and interpret Scripture. For they cite as arguments texts of every kind, whether they pertain to matters of faith and morals, or to the historical and profane order, or even to "obiter dicta".⁸ They defend and protect with the greatest zeal⁹ whatever texts are attacked by adversaries. They interpret and treat exegetically all and each of the very smallest sentences of Scripture, everywhere seeking the divine sense. But all these things suppose that the Fathers and the theologians extended inspiration to all the sentences of the sacred books.

3. The councils and the popes, by the very decrees by which they explicitly teach the existence of inspiration, seem also implicitly to teach that the whole of Scripture is inspired.¹⁰ This holds above all for the decrees of the Councils of Trent and of the Vatican, professing that "the books themselves, entire, with all their parts" are canonical and sacred and therefore inspired. These words indeed refer proximately to the Latin Vulgate, but by the name of "parts" there are designated rather the larger segments than the single and very smallest particular passages of the books. Therefore they do not define peremptorily whether all the particular passages of the original Scripture are inspired. Nevertheless they most certainly exclude the adverse opinions of those who restrict inspiration either to "purely doctrinal matters" or "to matters of faith and morals" or "to supernatural doctrines", and thereby exempt from inspiration a great, or rather by far the greater, part of the sacred books. Indeed, the aforementioned decrees seem to exclude also the opinion of those who exempt "obiter dicta" or other very small matters from inspiration, since, once such a norm has been admitted, innumerable texts of Scripture are exposed to the subjective judgment of men and consequently Scripture is altogether imperiled.

Finally, Leo XIII forbade every restriction of real inspiration in the encyclical letter "Providentissimus",¹¹ in which we read: "It will be altogether unlawful to confine inspiration to only some parts of Scripture." And although that letter is not an infallible decree ex cathedra, nevertheless it gravely obliges all Catholics in conscience, as Pope Leo XIII himself expressly established.¹² Therefore no further question can arise among the faithful concerning the real inspiration of all the sentences of sacred Scripture. It remains for us to discuss verbal inspiration.