Tractatus de divina traditione et Scriptura

On the way in which the consensus of the schools can exhibit divine Tradition.

« From the monuments which immediately exhibit the authentic judgment or the agreeing doctrine of the apostolic succession must be distinguished the documents of private authority, which can mediately lead to the knowledge of the doctrine handed down in the Church. Hence it must be asserted that the unanimous and constant opinion of the theologians of the school concerning some doctrine as pertaining to faith mediately exhibits the very testimony of the apostolic succession, and thus is a legitimate witness of divine Tradition. Nor do certain theological opinions, which are said to have at some time subsequently become obsolete among theologians generally, detract anything from this assertion. »

I. Monuments of doctrine can have proceeded from the very guardians of the deposit, insofar as, whether in Councils or outside Councils, they discharge the office of witnesses of Tradition and of authentic teachers, so that in those same monuments there is exhibited either a solemn judgment or in another way a sufficient consensus for proposing a doctrine of faith authentically to the whole Church. It is manifest that in monuments of this kind there is immediately presented the testimony of the apostolic succession (whether in the unity of the body of the guardians of the deposit with its head, or in the head for preserving the unity of faith in the body) under that aspect and condition under which the « sure charism of truth » was promised by Christ (th. VIII. IX. XIII. XIV.). There is therefore in them a divine-human testimony, namely the testimony of the Holy Spirit assisting and preserving from error through the pastors and teachers divinely appointed.

But whatever the consensus in the documents of those who do not belong to the witnesses preordained by God (Acts X. 41.), in those documents considered in themselves and according to their own authority there is not contained testimony authentic in the sense stated. Yet they exhibit sufficient testimony concerning the very doctrine of the Church, so that, if the necessary conditions are present, from them we come to the knowledge of the mind of the authentic guardians and of the whole Church; and thus testimonies which in themselves and immediately do not exceed human or historical authority mediately present to us a human-divine authority. In nearly this way Augustine, Against Julian bk I. n. 34; bk II. nn. 33. 36., distinguishes the testimony of Jerome the priest from the testimonies of the Bishops, and stresses the point that Jerome, most learned, knew best the faith of the Churches of east and west. After enumerating the unanimous opinions of the Bishops, he adds: « nor should you think St Jerome to be despised because he was a priest... who read all or nearly all who before him had written anything from either part of the world concerning ecclesiastical doctrine, and held and brought forth no other opinion on this matter » ¹

From these principles it is now clear what is and what is not the authority of the agreeing schools and of Catholic theologians.

1°. The Catholic schools from the twelfth century down to the middle of the eighteenth century, taken universally, and much more the theological schools of which we treat, were under the guardianship and solicitous providence of the Church. I speak advisedly of the older schools, because in them the relations of which I am about to speak are more evident as to right and fact; in the more recent ones, however, although the fundamental right cannot be changed, the fact has nevertheless not always and everywhere shone with equal evidence, on account of the violation of right by which the civil power strove to tear even the theological schools away from the authority of the Church and from intimate union with her. Whatever therefore be the case concerning the consensus of these most recent schools, their ecclesiastical character, and their kinship with the Catholic understanding of the Church herself; the older Academies were all certainly legitimate and esteemed legitimate by no other than the authority of the Apostolic See. Erected and fortified by the diploma of the Pontiff, placed under the continual vigilance of the Apostolic See itself, they derived all their right, their privileges, their authority in teaching from the Church. Further, in accordance with this intimate connection and relation with the Church, the theological schools and the whole colleges of doctors had as their fixed aim the sincere exposition, explanation, and defense of the very doctrine and discipline of the Church. If any of the doctors seemed to decline toward dangerous opinions, they were at once restrained, whether by the Academies themselves with as it were subdelegated authority through the proscription of propositions and learned censures, or by the proper authority of the Bishops, and finally by the supreme magisterium of the Pontiff himself. Conversely, from the schools thus constituted as from fostering mothers there came forth at least the greatest part of the Bishops themselves and all the chief men in the whole Clergy, for whom certainly the formation received in the schools was the human element for the understanding of the doctrine and discipline by which they instructed and ruled the Christian people. Moreover, those same Bishops both singly, and the Pontiffs themselves, and the Councils, in declaring and defining doctrine employed the Academies and the doctors of the schools as counselors, so that the common doctrine of the schools was as it were a certain preparation for the authentic definition of the Pontiffs and Councils ².

These things being posited — namely the principles by which the Catholic schools are governed and their relation and connection with the supreme pastors and with the whole Church being considered, the aim and the whole scientific and moral character of the doctors being considered if they are taken universally and in the complex, the authority with which their common doctrine is held among Bishops, Pontiffs, in Councils and in the whole Church being considered — it evidently appears that the head of doctrine on which all the schools agree with a ratified and constant opinion as on a doctrine of faith is doctrine comprehended in the « Catholic understanding » and in the « conscience of the common faith » of the apostolic succession itself and of the whole Church. This is what the Supreme Pontiff Pius IX. taught in his letter to the Archbishop of Munich (21 Dec. 1863.). « Even if it were a question of that subjection which is to be rendered by an act of divine faith, it would nevertheless have to be limited not to those things which have been defined by the express decrees of the ecumenical Councils or of the Roman Pontiffs and of this Apostolic See; but to be extended also to those things which are handed down by the ordinary magisterium of the whole Church dispersed throughout the world as divinely revealed, and therefore by universal and constant consensus are held by Catholic theologians to pertain to faith. » Although therefore the schools and the theologians of the schools are not the organ instituted by Christ for preserving revealed doctrine under the assistance of the Spirit of truth, yet from their unanimous and constant opinion in matters of faith, when they teach something not only as true but as to be believed with Catholic faith, we are led to the knowledge of the Catholic understanding and doctrine which the apostolic succession itself, as authentic guardian and interpreter of revelation, preserves and hands down ³.

2°. I have distinguished the unanimous opinion of the school concerning something as of faith, and the opinion concerning a thing as true; from the former we are led to certain knowledge of the doctrine of the whole Church, as has been said; in the latter we concede there to be that authority from which, on account of that connection of the school with the teaching Church of which we have spoken, the gravest weight accrues, nor is it lawful to depart from such common and constant doctrine.

The whole school must namely be regarded nearly in the way in which above, th. XII., we demonstrated the Christian people or the learning Church is to be regarded; for, as regards doctrine, the whole theological school (as long as it remains truly theological and in due subordination to the teaching Church) is a distinguished part of the learning Church. Hence further must be distinguished the supernatural element or charism of truth and the human element. The charism of truth and infallibility is not promised to the school immediately in itself; but through the successors of the Apostles « who with the succession of the episcopate received the sure charism of truth, » the integrity of the doctrine of faith is preserved in the school taken universally. Insofar therefore as it unanimously agrees on some doctrine as to be believed with faith, just as the Christian people so the whole theological school does not err from a supernatural cause, because the Holy Spirit through the ministry and magisterium of the apostolic succession, to which it adheres and is subjected through the obedience of faith, preserves in it the integrity of faith ⁴.

But when the doctors of the school by inquiry, human study, and human learning propose their opinions concerning revealed doctrine, and their deductions from the sources of revelation as true by unanimous consensus, yet not as believed with Catholic faith by the Church and to be believed; an authority from the principles posited above is indeed to be acknowledged as grave, which no one may dare contradict without at least the note of temerity; indeed this consensus of the schools is a certain preparation and human element of which the infallible magisterium itself always takes account, and which under the direction of the Holy Spirit it is wont to use and be aided by for authentic declarations and definitions. Yet we cannot say that the school itself in its inquiry and its human study is immediately under the infallible assistance of the Holy Spirit, by which it would come about that under the hypothesis of consensus it could not err; for this assistance in the manner declared above is promised immediately to the successors of the Apostles alone considered in unity and agreement, and to the origin of unity, the successor of Peter, by Christ. Hence grave doctors everywhere affirm theological opinions even deduced solely from revealed principles to be certain on account of the consensus of all the Scholastics, yet deny that the same are of faith; and accordingly they say that to fight against such unanimous opinion would be at least temerarious, yet not heretical. So e.g. Vasquez in 3. q. 6. disp. 41. teaches « that in Christ there is habitual grace and charity (namely infused habits) and that this is to be asserted without doubt according to the common opinion of the Scholastics, and cannot be denied without the note of temerity. » At the same time, however, he contends against Suarez that this doctrine, although without any controversy common among the Scholastics, does not pertain to faith in such a way that its denial could be called an error in faith. De Lugo, Maeratius and others agree with Vasquez. Suarez himself speaks in nearly the same way concerning the doctrine common in all the schools asserting the beatific vision of the soul of Christ from the beginning of its existence. « You will ask with what certitude this doctrine is to be held. Some think it is simply of faith. But it does not seem so, because the testimonies of Scripture are not so express but that they can be explained in other ways; and there is also no definition of the Church on this matter, nor is Tradition sufficiently open; for although the theologians agree in asserting this truth, yet they do not affirm it as a dogma of faith, and the holy Fathers speak nearly in the same way; and therefore others say only that it is an opinion so true that to hold the contrary would be temerarious. And this is the mildest censure of all that can be given; for I judge the contrary opinion to be even erroneous » ⁵ Suarez in 3. q. 9. disp. 25. sect. 1. cf. Cano bk XII. c. 7. precept 8. In nearly the same way must we judge, and the Scholastics themselves judge, as regards the common and theologically certain doctrine concerning the procession of the Word and of the Holy Spirit by the formal ratio of intellect and love, of which we have treated at length in the Treatise on the Trinity th. XXVI.

3°. But where a constant and agreeing doctrine does not obtain but grave theologians go off into diverse views, and much more where they propose a matter not with ratified opinion but in the manner of opining, there authority is indeed not at once null; but the dissent itself shows that the matter cannot be settled by authority, but we must stand by reasons, so that we embrace what seems more consonant with the analogy of faith, namely with the doctrine of Scripture, the explanations of the Fathers, ecclesiastical preaching, the sense and consensus of the Church (for we speak of opinions truly theological, not of mere opinions of philosophy). This inquiry is necessary for a truly theological treatment not only in such ambiguous matters but everywhere, so that it may be established not only whether the doctrine in question pertains to the deposit of revelation, but also how it is contained in it and pertains to it. But once this examination is rightly undertaken, it will become clear that the doctrine of the princes of the school — of Lombard, of Alexander of Hales, of St Bonaventure and above all of St Thomas — in their constant and common opinions is nothing but a compendium and sum of the doctrine of the Fathers ⁶, and of ecclesiastical preaching; and then that even in those heads which are more ambiguous and posited in opinion, a more or less close agreement and connection with that same ecclesiastical preaching is not lacking. At the same time it will then become plain that among those great masters of the school, free from party zeal, there is indeed diversity, yet rarely in matters of greater moment strife and dissent properly so called. On account of this intimate connection with the doctrine of the Fathers and with the Catholic understanding universally, the authority of the princes of the school and above the rest of St Thomas, taken by itself alone, is indeed not irrefragable, yet venerable and among private doctors preeminent. Further, a fruit never to be regretted of that examination of which we spoke will also be this, that we better attain the genuine sense of the masters of the school, and understand more distinctly not only what they teach, but also the reasons why they so teach and why it is so to be taught. Nor yet is it therefore lawful in such matters, where grave and learned men opine diversely, so to insist on the opinions of one way, as they say, and on those things which seem to you true or more probable, as if by the authority of the whole school, indeed even of the whole Church, those things were proved true, or because you have named some one of the great Scholastics, all dissent from your opinion were already intolerable. « The testimony of scholastic theologians, says Melchior Cano, even of many, if other learned men fight on the contrary side, avails no more for producing faith than either their reason or even graver authority shall have confirmed. Namely in scholastic disputation the authority of the greater number ought not to overwhelm the theologian, but if he has with him a few men provided they be grave (namely resting on grave reasons), he can certainly stand against very many; for these things are judged not by number but by weight... In which place those Scholastics are indeed to be blamed who from prejudices of the opinions they received in the school brand other Catholic men with graver notes, and with such facility that they are deservedly laughed at... Other are the opinions of the school, of which we shall speak presently (those namely in which there is a constant and unanimous consensus, as has been declared by us a little above), other are the precepts of a party, of which we now speak. Things dissenting from the former have a note; things dissenting from the latter have none. For it is not the case that if anything is contrary to what either Scotists or Thomists have pronounced, it is at once an error » Cano bk VIII. c. 4. concl. 1.

Of all the things we have so far disputed, this is the sum. a) From the writings of the scholastic theologians it can be certainly established concerning the revelation of some doctrine and divine Tradition, when with unanimous and constant opinion there is found in them doctrine proposed as pertaining to Catholic faith, because from the agreeing testimony it is certainly established concerning the Catholic understanding of the apostolic succession itself and of the whole Church. b) Where the proposition and deduction of some theological doctrine in those same writings of theologians is proposed with ratified and unanimous opinion as true and legitimate, it is not lawful to dissent from it without at least the note of temerity or even of error, because such agreeing authority both is in itself most grave, and by the Church herself the common doctrine of theologians both in Councils and universally outside Councils is highly esteemed, and is considered as a certain element of preparation for solemn definitions. These things, however, are to be so taken that they hold of the very truth of doctrine, but not of the manner of explaining and proving it; of doctrines truly theological pertaining to matters of faith and morals, but not of merely philosophical opinions ⁷; of ratified and firm opinions cohering with the doctrine of Scripture or of the holy Fathers, but not of theorems proposed in the manner of opining; of the consensus not of one age much less of one or another school, but of the constant and common consensus of grave theologians which with the progress of time has not ceased. It certainly is not repugnant that some opinion for some time common among theologians should afterwards, with arguments and documents better understood, cease to be common, or even become obsolete. Such a change is itself an argument that that antecedent agreement was not a ratified and firm opinion resting on secure and immutable foundations, but only an opinion probable for the antecedent state of the question. « That opinion, says Cardinal de Lugo, which in this age is most frequent in the schools and is defended by nearly all, in the next age, with the matter better examined and new foundations appearing, will be retained by few. It is therefore not repugnant that for some time the greater part of the Scholastics should embrace some opinion as more probable which in reality is false » Lugo On Faith disp. 20. sect. 3. n. 128. c) When there is diversity of sentences and opinions among grave theologians, certitude cannot be had from their authority; but with the weightier authority pondered, and much more with reasons deduced from the sources of theology, it must be determined what is true or liker the truth.

Finally, if it is necessary, I warn that in this whole declaration of ours there is question solely of the authority of the school considered in itself. For if the reasons by which they confirm doctrine be considered, it is easily plain that these, even when proposed by few, can be such as to demonstrate doctrine either to pertain to the deposit of revealed faith, or at least to be theologically certain.

II. It remains to satisfy the difficulty which can be moved against the declared authority of the theologians of the school, and indeed is wont to be moved by certain recent writers. The Scholastics, they say, taught with common consensus several opinions which are now held by theologians to be either false or less probable. So e.g. from their opinions one would have to believe the minor Orders to be sacraments, which doctrine is now by a nearly equally common consensus rejected as false. Likewise they unanimously taught that the matter in the sacrament of Order is the handing over of the instruments, which now, after the inquiries of Morinus, Martène and others into the ancient monuments, is denied without temerity by not a few, indeed by perhaps the greater part of theologians. With similar agreement they are said to have taught that the sinner already justified by contrition must approach the sacrament of penance, and that the power of the keys does not extend to absolving from guilt; but that God immediately apart from the ministry of the priest remits guilt to the penitent, and the priest absolves only from punishment; concerning the falsity of which doctrine at least after the Council of Trent there is agreement.

It is not our purpose to examine the genuine opinion of the individual Scholastics concerning these heads of doctrine; only now we deny that the consensus concerning them, whatever it was, bears those characters under which we said the authority of the Scholastics holds for the full demonstration of a doctrine of faith or of theological certitude. For a) in none of the heads mentioned did there ever exist a consensus of the schools as on a doctrine believed and to be believed with Catholic faith, nor even as on a doctrine to be held among Catholic doctors as certain and without controversy; but the consensus, if any existed, was a certain common opinion. That I say nothing of the others, this is manifest from this very fact, that b) the consensus was not universal; but doctors of great authority, once these questions were moved and somewhat aired, went off into diverse opinions, without therefore being judged to contradict either the common faith or certain doctrine in a matter of such weight, and without ever being accused of the crime of violated faith or of grave error. c) If a consensus for some time could be demonstrated, certainly it was not constant, which we said is itself an argument that the preceding consensus, if there was one, was not of a firm and ratified opinion but of opinion. Certainly already in the time of St Thomas, when after the first beginnings the genius, doctrine, glory of the school received its increase, as regards the first two heads we mentioned there was diversity of opinions; as regards the last, at least that doctrine began to be more common which in a later age, more lucidly explained in the schools, obtained confirmation in the Council of Trent itself.

1°. As regards the minor Orders, that they were not instituted by Christ but in process of time « the Church constituted them for herself, » Hugh of St Victor, Lombard, Gratian already taught before the age of St Thomas; from which ecclesiastical institution it follows that they are not sacraments in the true sense. After the times of St Thomas, long before the inquiries of Morinus, Durandus, Cajetan, Navarrus, Dominic Soto expressly affirmed and undertook to prove that the minor Orders are not sacraments; the latter of whom conjectures that St Thomas, had he in the Summa reached this place, would have changed the opinion handed down in 4. dist. 24., and would have denied to these Orders the character of sacrament. Which conjecture shows nothing else than that in the time of Soto (one of the theologians of the Council of Trent) it was established that among the old Scholastics this whole matter was posited not as a settled judgment, but as opinion, and disputed back and forth ⁸. Concerning these doctors see Vasquez in 3rd Part disp. 237. c. 2. From the sixteenth century this denying opinion began to become most frequent and more common among doctors. Concerning the diverse opinions whether the episcopate is an Order and a sacrament, see Vasquez ib. disp. 240.

2°. I come to what is said concerning the matter of the sacrament of Order. In this head the case is nearly the same as in the preceding; different men opined diversely. By far the more common opinion was certainly, and still now is that of many, that which in practice and use is always to be held, namely that the handing over of the instruments is in the Latin Church a necessary part of the matter of the sacrament. St Bonaventure, however, defended that in the sacred Orders the essential matter is the imposition of hands alone: « just as every instrument or armor is in the power of the hand, so also through the imposition of hands, where such (instruments) are lacking, they can be signed; whence.... in the imposition of hands in the primitive Church the other Orders were implied » 4. dist. 24. P. 2. a. 1. q. 4. St Thomas indeed held « that through the imposition of hands is given the fullness of grace by which they may be fit for great offices... in the very giving of the chalice under a determinate form of words the sacerdotal character is imprinted » 4. dist. 24. q. 2. a. 3. Others explained the matter in another way, so that it is manifest that all indeed held that in practice the whole rite is to be accurately observed, but in the theoretical determination of the essential matter and form there was no universal consensus in one opinion either as to be believed with faith or as theologically certain without controversy (Vasquez l.c. disp. 239.).

3°. As to the last point concerning the power of the keys for absolving from guilt, those who seem to have denied this power could be so explained that they denied in ministers not ministerial and instrumental power but power as of a principal cause, and in this sense said that God alone and not the priest remits guilt. So certainly St Thomas explained Master Lombard. The doctrine of the Master 4. dist. 18. was this. « Various things are handed down by doctors concerning these matters, and in such great variety what is to be held? This indeed we can say and hold, that God alone dismisses sins and retains; and yet He conferred on the Church the power of binding and loosing. But He Himself looses and binds in one way, the Church in another. For He Himself by Himself alone dismisses sin, because He both cleanses the soul from the interior stain and looses from the debt of eternal death. But this He did not concede to priests, to whom nevertheless He gave the power of loosing and binding, that is, of showing men bound or loosed. » St Thomas on this place 4. dist. 18. q. 1. a. 3. sol. 1. ad 1. thus comments. « As the Master says in the letter, to priests is committed the power of remitting sins, not that they remit by their own power, because this is God's; but that they show the operation of God remitting as ministers. But this happens in three ways. In one way so that they show it not present, but promise it future.... thus the sacraments of the old law signified the operation of God.... In another way so that they signify it present, and effect nothing toward it; and thus some say that the sacraments of the new law signify the collation of grace... In a third way so that they signify the divine operation in the remission of guilt as present, and effect something toward it dispositively and instrumentally; and thus according to the other opinion, which is more commonly held, the sacraments of the New Law show the cleansing divinely effected, and in this way also the priest of the New Testament shows men absolved from guilt. » (This doctrine, not indeed concerning dispositive operation, but concerning the true instrumental efficacy of the sacraments, which for his time St Thomas calls more common, was already defined by the Council of Trent sess. VII. can. 6-8; sess. XIV. c. 9. Cf. Treatise on the Sacraments th. X. XI.). More expressly and assertively St Thomas treats of this very remission of guilt through the absolution of the priest as through an instrumental cause in 3. q. 84. a. 3. ad 3. and in Opusc. V. ed. de Rubeis al. XXII. On the Form of Absolution. Richard of St Victor, contemporary of Lombard, in the Treatise on the power of binding and loosing c. 12. thus speaks. « There stands forth, of certain men, concerning the power of binding and loosing, an opinion so frivolous that it seems rather to be laughed at than refuted. For they think and preach that priests do not have the power of binding and loosing, but of showing men to be loosed or bound... They say that apostolic men do not have the power of remitting or retaining sins, when the Lord says this; they say that they have only the power of showing either, when the Lord does not say this. »

Further, whatever the sense of the Master and of some Scholastics of that time may have been, from the very manner in which Lombard speaks, and from the express words of St Thomas and of others, it is established that that doctrine was neither ever common nor of firm opinion but of mere opinion, and already in the time of St Thomas was becoming obsolete, so that with the question clarified the opposite truth is now in the universal agreement and profession of the whole Church. The doctrine of the Scholastics from the twelfth to the seventeenth century on this matter, described in their very words, you have in the dissertation of Charles Du Plessis d'Argentré: « On contrition and the power of the keys, various opinions of the Scholastics » Paris 1712. Cf. Morinus On Penance bk VIII. and On Contrition and Attrition Part I., in which places this author also treats of the opinion of the Scholastics.