Tractatus de divina traditione et Scriptura

On the difference between the explication of the deposit of faith before and after the completion of revelation.

« The explication and illustration of revelation up to its completion through Christ and through the Holy Spirit in the Apostles was made by God Himself through new revelations continuously succeeding one another. An instituted comparison, therefore, between the diverse economies, but not between the individual persons in these economies, it must be said that the deposit of faith was the more explicit the nearer to the fullness of time. But what St. Thomas says (2. 2. q. 1. a. 7.), that as to the substance of the articles of faith no increase of them has taken place through the succession of times, but that as to explication the number of articles has grown, is not to be understood in the same sense as when we say that in the Christian Church after the Apostles no objective increase of the deposit, but an explication of the same, can have place. »

I. Without doubt the people of God is one, and in some wider sense one Church of God from the beginning of the human race to the consummation of the world, adhering to God by faith, hope and charity, and attaining to this union with God, and so to eternal salvation, through the merits of Christ the Redeemer, for one state as yet to come, for another state as already present; « for there is no other name under heaven given to men, whereby we must be saved » (Acts IV. 12.). See Gregor. de Valentia Analys. fidei l. VI. c. 2. n. 2. Hence God from the beginning supernaturally revealed Himself, and redemption through Christ (Gen. III. 15.). Now in faith in God and in Christ the Redeemer consists the very (as theologians commonly say) substance of faith, without which the Church of God never existed: « this is eternal life, that they may know Thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom Thou hast sent » (Io. XVII. 3.). Nevertheless the difference is very great between the mode of revelation, the institutions, and the sacraments, as they stood before the advent of Christ, and as they were completed by the incarnate Word in His Church; as the difference is between the promise and preparation and the promised and completed thing itself. Hence the twofold economy of the Old and New Testament is plainly distinct. In the Old economy itself, according to all the things we have enumerated, the difference, though not of the same kind as between the Old and New Testament, is yet great between the peculiar people of God gathered and formed by the ministry of Moses, and the preceding state before Moses, which state for the other nations endured even after the institution of the peculiar people. Hence the other distinction commonly called of the law of nature and the written law, or of the patriarchal economy and the Mosaic economy.

Now if we compare not individual persons but diverse states and economies, it is first clear that the patriarchal revelation, insofar as it was public and to be communicated to others, was conserved or renewed among the Israelites gathered and formed by Moses into a peculiar people of God; but secondly that the same revelation, both as to direct doctrine concerning God and as to other connected truths and as to moral doctrine, but chiefly as to the future Messias, was explicated, illustrated, and more expressly and urgently proposed through Moses, the prophets, and the inspired writers, by new revelations, morally speaking continuously succeeding one another, up to its completion through the advent of the promised and expected Messias. The deposit of revelation was therefore far more explicit and ample in the written law than in the patriarchal economy, and this not by mere explication without new revelations, but by increase of the objective word of God itself.

If each part of the Old economy be considered separately, it is easily clear that there was increase through the succession of times in both. For revelations were not lacking even in the series of the patriarchs, especially from Abraham onward; but chiefly in the Mosaic economy the mission of the prophets and the inspiration of the sacred writers up to the times of the second temple was most illustrious, and from that time, though less discerned by the Jews, yet never in reality ceased ¹. But these new revelations were indeed an increase of the deposit handed down from preceding ages. « Our faith, says St. Thomas, consists principally in two things; first in the knowledge of the true God... secondly in the mystery of the incarnation... If therefore we speak of prophecy, insofar as it is ordered to faith in the Godhead, it grew according to the three distinctions of times, namely before the Law, under the Law, and under grace. For before the Law Abraham and the other Fathers were prophetically instructed in things pertaining to faith in the Godhead. Whence also they are called prophets Ps. CIV. 15... Under the Law, moreover, prophetic revelation was made concerning things pertaining to faith in the Godhead more excellently than before; because now not only special persons or certain families but the whole people had to be instructed concerning this Exod. VI. 2... Afterwards, in the time of grace, the mystery of the Trinity was revealed by the Son of God Himself Matth. XXVIII. 19. In each state, however, the first revelation was the more excellent. The first revelation before the Law was made to Abraham (reckoning the times of the human race as renewed after Noah, and looking to the immediate connection with the people of Israel; as to revelation before the flood the same could be said of Adam which the Angelic Doctor here says of Abraham)... To Isaac a lower revelation was made, as it were founded upon the revelation made to Abraham, whence it was said to him: I am the God of Abraham thy father Gen. XXVI. 24; and likewise to Jacob it was said: I am the God of Abraham thy father and the God of Isaac Gen. XXVIII. 12. And likewise in the state of the Law the first revelation made to Moses was the more excellent, upon which every other revelation of the prophets is founded (as it too is founded upon that made to the preceding patriarchs). So also in the time of grace the whole faith of the Church is founded upon the revelation made to the Apostles concerning the faith of the Unity and Trinity (while the very revelation of Christ and the Holy Spirit through the Apostles is the completion of all preceding revelation). As to faith in the incarnation of Christ, it is manifest that the nearer they were to Christ, whether before or after, the more fully for the most part were they instructed concerning it » St. Th. 2. 2. q. 174. a. 6.

Moreover, lest a difficulty arise concerning nearness to Christ, a) the comparison is to be understood between the threefold state of the economy, not between individual persons; b) it must be noted that the whole New Testament as the last time and the fullness of time is ever equally near to Christ: « and behold I am with you all days even to the consummation of the world ». Hence at least in speaking of the state and the deposit of faith, and prescinding from individual persons, it is indubitable, as St. Gregory the Great eloquently pursues: « This too we must know, that through the increments of times the knowledge of the spiritual Fathers grew. For Moses was more instructed than Abraham, the prophets more than Moses, the Apostles more than the prophets in the knowledge of omnipotent God... because the nearer the world is drawn to its end, the more largely is the approach to eternal knowledge opened to us » in Ezech. l. II. hom. 4. n. 10-12. (al. in Ez. hom. 16.). See Suarez de Fide disp. II. sect. 6; de Lugo de Fide disp. III. sect. 5.

II. St. Thomas 2. 2. q. 1. a. 7. teaches two things, namely that as to the substance of the articles of faith no increase has taken place, and that only as to explication has the number of articles grown. But it is clear both from the very exposition of St. Thomas and from what has hitherto been said by us, that this twofold assertion of the Angelic Doctor is not to be understood in the sense in which we demonstrated above that in the New Testament after the Apostles no increase, but only an explication, of the revealed deposit can have place.

1°. As to the negation of increase of the articles, there must be distinguished the substance of (objective) faith, and the things which accede to the substance and are connected with it. If we consider faith in its completion, Christian faith I mean, its substance is the mystery of the one and triune God and of redemption through the incarnate Word: « the work of the Gospel, the substance of the New Testament, that henceforth the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, three believed, constitute one God... so that now God is known face to face in His proper names and persons, who, though preached of old through the Son and the Holy Spirit, was not understood » Tertull. contr. Prax. c. 31.

Note then that a thing can be believed in two ways, explicitly and in itself, or implicitly in another thing explicitly known. One thing implicit in another can be so again in two ways, in the first way as in a directing principle (a formal principle); thus all things revealed and to be revealed are believed implicitly in the authority of God revealing, and all things at least sufficiently proposed are believed in the faith of the Church. In the other way one truth can be contained in another as in an including principle (a material principle); and this either only objectively and in itself, so that this comprehension can be known by us only through a new revelation; or also logically and as regards us, so that the comprehension is knowable either through analysis and deduction or in another way, e. g. from historical events, without a new revelation (see p. 279. note).

Things which are not contained in revelation otherwise than in a directing principle, or are implicit in an including principle only objectively but not also as regards us, are not in reality revealed to us, although something revealed may exist in which those truths are contained in one or other way as in a principle. But those are revealed in themselves which are contained in an including principle also as regards us, although the comprehension be not yet known.

These things posited, a) there was always something supernaturally known by the faithful in which implicitly were believed all things revealed and to be revealed; namely the formal object of faith, or the authority of God, was known, should it please Him to reveal anything. In the first place, therefore, the virtue or supernatural habit of faith was always of the same kind. For the virtue of faith has its proper species not from the material object which is believed, but from the formal object, on account of which it is believed; it is namely the supernatural virtue by which things revealed by God are believed to be true on account of the authority of God Himself revealing.

b) From the origin of the human race there were some truths explicitly revealed in which at least objectively was implicitly contained the whole substance of our faith, and in which implicitly were contained many other truths which in the progress of time were explicitly revealed. « All the articles (pertaining to faith of themselves, cf. above pp. 278. 279.) are implicitly contained in certain first believables, namely that God be believed to exist and to have providence over the salvation of men, according to Heb. XI. 6: he that cometh to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of them that seek Him. For in the Divine Being are included all things which we believe to exist eternally in God, in which our beatitude consists; in faith in providence are included all things which are temporally dispensed by God for the salvation of men, which are the way to beatitude » St. Th. 2. 2. q. 1. a. 7. There were therefore always some revealed articles of faith which at least implicitly contained the substance of the articles of the whole faith, and in this sense no increase of them took place through the succession of times.

c) But things pertaining to the very substance, the mystery of the Trinity, the incarnation of the Word and the divinity of the Messias, although explicitly known to men specially enlightened by God, were yet not always contained in the public and common revelation so clearly that in the Old Testament all were bound to believe them, or that there would have been no need of illustration through the clear revelation of the New Testament. Many particular truths concerning Christ, concerning the mode and means of sanctification, etc., to say nothing of historical matters, were then revealed in the succession of time so as to have to be said simply not to have been revealed before, since without a new revelation they could not be known as to be believed by faith. Whence it must be said simply that the objective revelation of truths in the Old Testament received increments through the succession of times. And this is the difference in comparison with the New Testament, in which increase of this objective kind, after the completion of the catholic revelation through the Apostles, no longer has place (th. XXII.).

2°. The other proposition of St. Thomas and the rest of the theologians concerned the explication of revelation in the Old Testament. « As to explication the number of articles grew, because certain things were explicitly known by the later which were not explicitly known by the earlier » St. Th. l. c. From the difference between the comprehension of certain truths which objectively were indeed implicit in the not yet completed revelation of the Old Testament, but not so that they could become explicit without a new revelation, and the implicit comprehension of truths which is logical also as regards us in the already completed revelation of the New Testament — from this difference, I say, is understood also the difference between the mode of each explication. The former neither was nor could have been made except by God through revelation of the very truth to be explicated and not yet revealed in itself, whereby continuous new increase accrued to revelation; the latter is nothing but a clearer proposition, through explication of the word of God conserved and handed down in the Church, of a truth long since revealed in itself, which scientific explication is instituted and perfected by human labor and industry also, authoritatively and infallibly through the magisterium of the Church under the assistance of the Holy Spirit, without new revelation.