Ordinatio

[Diverse Heresies] – There are on this question innumerable heresies that condemn Sacred Scripture, the whole or parts of it, as is clear from the books of Augustine and Damascene On Heresies. Some heretics accept nothing of Scripture. Some reject the Old Testament in particular, like the Manicheans who, as is clear in Augustine’s book On the Utility of Believing ch.2 n.4, say that the Old Testament is from the bad principle. Some accept only the Old Testament, like the Jews. Some, like the Saracens, accept something of both, with which impure Mohammed mixed innumerable other impurities. But some accept something said in the New Testament, to wit diverse heretics who, holding for their foundations diverse judgments of Scripture badly understood, have neglected others; for example Romans 14.2: “He who is weak, let him eat herbs,” and the like. Again James 5.16: “Confess your sins one to another,” if from this may arise error about the sacrament of penance, that it can be dispensed by any non-priest, – and by relying on these sorts of authorities, badly understood, of Sacred Scripture.

[Various Ways of Convicting Heretics] – Against all these together there are eight ways of rationally convicting them, which are: prophetic foretelling, the agreement of the Scriptures, the authority of the writers, the diligence of the recipients, the reasonableness of the contents and the unreasonableness of individual errors, the stability of the Church, the clearness of miracles.

[On Prophetic Foretelling] – About the first it is plain. Since only God naturally foresees future contingents with certitude and not from someone else, therefore only he, or someone instructed by him, can predict them with certitude. Now of such things many, foretold in Scripture, have been fulfilled (it is clear to him who considers the prophetical books), from which “there is no doubt but that the few that remain shall follow,” according to Gregory in a certain homily On the Advent of the Lord. [40 Homilies on the Gospels I hom.1 n.1]. The same way is touched on by Augustine City of God XII ch.10: “That things past are true he shows from the future things he foretold when these with so much truth are fulfilled.”

[On the Agreement of the Scriptures] – On the second, namely the agreement of the Scriptures, it is clear thus: in things that are not evident from the terms, nor have principles thus evident from the terms, many people do not agree firmly and infallibly when diversely disposed unless they receive inclination to assent from a cause superior to the intellect; but the writers of the Sacred Canon, being variously disposed and existing at different times, were on such inevident things altogether in agreement. This way Augustine treats of in City of God XVIII ch.42 n.1: “Our authors needed to be few so that they not be cheapened by their great number; nor are they so few that their agreement is not to be wondered at; for neither in a great number of philosophers would one easily find those among whom all they thought agrees,” and this Augustine proves there by examples. For the assumed major premise is not only proved by the example of the philosophers, as Augustine seems to prove it, but also by reason; because since the intellect is of a nature, as concerns consent, to be moved by an object evident in itself or in another, nothing other than the object seems able to cause such assent unless it virtually includes the evidence of the object; for if nothing of this sort moves the intellect, theology will remain neutral for it. Now there is nothing of this sort about things not evident from the terms save an intellect superior to our own; but nothing intelligent superior to man can effectively teach man save God.

If it be said here that later writers, although differently disposed than the earlier ones and existing at different times, did yet have the doctrine of their predecessors in their writings and acquiesced in believing them, as disciples acquiesce in the teaching of their masters, and in this way wrote nothing that was dissonant from earlier writers, although God did not teach either the latter or the former, – against this Augustine seems to object against this in the above place when he says about the philosophers: “they left in their literary labor memorials of their doctrines,” which memorials their disciples read, and although in some things they, as disciples, were assenting to their predecessors, yet other things they rejected. The thing is clear in the same place [of Augustine] about Aristippus and Antisthenes, who were both Socratics, yet in some things they contradicted each other; and sometimes disciples have even contradicted their master, as Aristotle did Plato. How then did our later writers not contradict earlier ones in some things if they had not had a common teacher inclining their intellect to the same inevident things?

Response: because the earlier writers handed on inevident things, therefore the later ones were not able to reject them by reason, and they did not wish to disbelieve them unless they were able to get a cogent reason for themselves, reverencing them as truthful masters; but a philosopher’s disciples were able by reason to reject their masters, because the matter about which they were disputing was capable of having reasons taken from the terms. – An example: a disciple in historiography does not contradict his master in historiography as a philosopher contradicts a philosopher, because histories are not capable of being evident about the past so as to turn a disciple from the master, in the way philosophical reasons can. Contrary to this at least is Ezekiel prophesying in Babylon at the time that Jeremiah prophesied in Judea.¹ Since they both said not only the things that they could have had from Moses as it were their common master, but also many other things, they could in them have disagreed, since they were not evident from the terms, unless they had had some common teacher superior to the human intellect.

[On the Authority of the Writers] – On the third, namely the authority of the writers, it is plain thus: either the books of Scripture belong to the authors whose books they are said to be or they do not. If they do, since they condemn lying, especially in faith or morals, how likely is it that they would have lied saying ‘thus saith the Lord’ if the Lord had not spoken? Or if you say they were deceived, not lying, or that they wanted to lie for the sake of gain, – to the contrary, and first against the first, namely that they were not deceived. For the Blessed Apostle Paul says, 2 Corinthians 12.2: “I know a man in Christ above fourteen years ago etc.,’ and he adds there that he heard, v.4: “unspeakable words, which it is not lawful for a man to utter.” Which assertions do not seem to have been without lie if in asserting he was not certain, because to assert a doubtful thing as if it were a certain truth is a lie, or not far from a lie. From this revelation of Paul, and from many others made to diverse saints, the conclusion is drawn that their intellect could not have been induced to assent, as firmly as they did assent, to things of which they could not have had knowledge by their natural powers, unless by a supernatural agent. – Against the second, namely that they lied for the sake of gain; because they endured the greatest tribulations on behalf of the things they wanted to induce men to believe.

If the books are not theirs but others’, this seems an unacceptabe thing to say, because in this way any book at all will be denied to be the author’s whose book it is said to be. For why have these books alone been falsely ascribed to authors whose books they were not? – Besides, either those who ascribed the books to them were Christians or they were not. If they were not, it does not seem that their wish was to write down such books and ascribe them to others and magnify a sect whose contrary they maintained. If they were Christians, how then did those Christians deceitfully ascribe such books to them since their law condemns lying, as said before [n.105]? And for the same reason, how do they assert that God said the many things that are there narrated, and this to the persons to whom the books are attributed, if such things did not happen to such persons? How too would these books have thus been authentic and widely published as belonging to such authors unless they had in fact been theirs and the authors had been authentic? On this point Richard [of St. Victor] says On the Trinity bk.1 ch.2: “By men of the greatest sanctity have they been delivered to us.” Again, Augustine City of God XI ch.3, speaking of Christ, says: “Having spoken first through the prophets, then through himself, afterwards through the apostles, as much as he judged sufficient, he established a Scripture, which is named canonical, of the most eminent authority.” This in that place. And in his first epistle to Jerome [Epist. 40 ch.3 n.3] (and it is contained in On Consecration [Gratian, Decretum p.1 d.9 ch.7]) Augustine writes: “If into the Sacred Scriptures have been admitted even useful lies, what in them will remain of authority?” And the same to the same in the same epistle [Epist. 82 ch.1 n.3]: “Only in those books of the Scriptures, etc.” (and Henry of Ghent, Summa a.7 q.7 in corp.).

[The Carefulness of the Recipients] – About the fourth, namely the carefulness of the recipients, it is plain thus: either you do not believe anyone about a contingent thing you have not seen, and so you do not believe that the world was made before you, nor that there is a place in the world where you have not been, nor that this man is your father and that woman your mother; and this refusal to believe destroys the whole of political life. If then you wish to believe someone about a contingent thing that is not and was not evident to you, you should most of all believe the community, or those things that the whole community approves, and especially the things that a noteworthy and reputable community has bidden with the greatest care as needing to be approved. Such is the Canon of Scripture. For so great was the care of the Jews for the books needing to be kept in the Canon, and so great was the care of the Christians for the books needing to be received as authentic, that so great care about any writing needing to be held authentic has not been found, especially since such solemn communities have cared for those Scriptures as for things containing what is necessary for salvation. About this Augustine City of God XVIII ch.38 says: “How is it that the writing of Enoch, of which Jude makes mention in his epistle, is not contained in the Canon, nor many other writings of which mention is made in the books of Kings?”, where he indicates that only that writing was received in the Canon that the authors, not as men, but as prophets, wrote by divine inspiration. And in the same place ch.41 n.3 he says: “The Israelites to whom were entrusted the sayings of God did not in any way confound the false prophets with the true prophets in equality of knowledge, but they are in agreement among themselves and dissent in nothing; they recognized and held the authors of the Sacred Letters to be truthful.”

[On the Rationality of the Contents] – On the fifth, namely the rationality of the contents, it is plain as follows: what is more rational than that God as ultimate end “should be loved above all things, and one’s neighbor as oneself”? – that is, ‘as to what [one loves for oneself]’ according to Blessed Gregory [40 Homilies on the Gospels, 2 hom.27 n.1]; “on these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets,” Matthew 22.40. Again Matthew 7.12: “this do ye to others etc.” From these practical principles, as it were, follow other practical principles handed down in the Scriptures, principles honorable and consonant with reason, just as, concerning their rationality, it can be plain to anybody individually who goes through the precepts, the counsels, and the sacraments; because in all of these there seems to be, as it were, a sort of explication of the law of nature, which “is written in our hearts” [Romans 2.15]. This as to morals. On this point Augustine says, City of God II ch.28: “Nothing base or shameful is proposed for consideration and imitation when either the True God’s precepts are insinuated or his miracles narrated or his gifts praised or his benefits requested.” About things for belief it is plain that we believe nothing about God which imports any imperfection; rather, if there is anything we believe to be true, it attests more to the divine perfection than to the opposite. The thing is plain about the Trinity of persons, about the incarnation of the Word, and the like. For we believe nothing incredible, because then it would be incredible that the world believes them, as Augustine concludes in City of God XXII ch.5; yet that the world believes them is not incredible, because we see it. This law and integrity of Christians are clear in Augustine On the Utility of Believing ch.17 n.35: “A crowd of males and females, etc.”²

[The Irrationality of Errors] – On the sixth, namely the irrationality of the separate errors, the thing is plain thus. What will the pagans adduce on behalf of their idolatry in worshipping the works of their own hands, wherein there is nothing of the divine, as is shown sufficiently by philosophers [e.g. Aristotle Metaphysics 12.8.1084a38-b10]? What will the Saracens, disciples of that most worthless swine Mohammed, allege for their scriptures, expecting for beatitude what befits swine and asses, namely gullet and coitus [e.g. Koran, sura 36 vv.54-56 et al.]? Despising this promise, Avicenna, who was partly of that sect [Metaphysics IX ch.7 106vb], and setting down another end as more perfect and more fitting to man, he says: “Our law, which Mohammed gave us, displays the disposition for a happiness and a misery that are in accord with the body, and there is another promise that is apprehended by the intellect.” And there follows there: “The passion of the wise was much more to obtain this felicity than that of bodies, which, although it were given them, yet did they not attend to it, nor did they value it in comparison with the felicity that is conjoined to the first truth.” What of the Jews who condemn the New Testament, which is promised in their Old Testament as the Apostle shows in his epistle to the Hebrews? And how tasteless are their ceremonies without Christ [Hebrews 9.1-28]! Again, that Christ has come and that thus the New Testament promulgated by him as authentic would be something needing to be accepted is shown by their prophecies: “The scepter,” says Jacob, “shall not depart from Judah…and for him shall the Gentiles wait” Genesis 49.10; likewise the verse of Daniel 9.24: “When the Holy of holies has come, your anointing will cease.”³ – What too the asinine Manicheans who invent the fable of an ‘evil first principle’, although even they themselves, while not a ‘first’, were yet very evil! Surely they saw that every being, insofar as it is, is good? Surely too they could have seen in the New Testament that the Old Testament is authentic and approved?

What the other individual heretics who have understood one word of Scripture badly, according to Augustine 83 Questions q.69 n.1: “An error cloaked under the Christian name cannot arise except from Scriptures badly understood;” and for this reason, that they did not bring together the antecedents and the consequents. Hence in the same place [q.69 n.2] Augustine says: “A circumstance in the Scriptures is wont to illuminate the meaning.” Nor too did they bring together the other places of Scripture. Hence by isolated reading have heresies arisen that by conferring are repulsed, because those who confer adduced diverse sentences that, as to how they were to be understood, was capable of being discovered from their mutual interconnection. Against them is the word of Augustine in his book Against the Letter of Fundamentus ch.5 n.6: “I would not believe the Gospel,” he says, “save because I believe the Catholic Church.” Therefore, it is irrational to accept one part of the Canon and not another, since the Catholic Church, by believing in which I receive the Canon, receives the whole as equally certain. – Again, the doctrines of the philosophers contain something irrational, as Aristotle proves in Politics bk. 2 about diverse polities arranged by diverse philosophers. But even his own polity too is in certain things irrational, as is clear from the solution of the previous question [n.67].⁴

[On the Stability of the Church] – On the seventh, namely the stability of the Church, the thing is clear as to the Head from the remark of Augustine On the Utility of Believing ch.17 n.35: “Will we doubt to trust to the bosom of the same Church which, in the constant confession of the human race from the Apostolic See through a succession of bishops, the heretics barking round it in vain, has obtained the summit of authority?” And a little later: “What else is displeasing to the face of God than to want to resist with so much effort his proclaimed authority?” Hence Gamaliel said, Acts 5.38-39: “If this counsel or this work be of men, it will come to nought; but if it be of God, ye cannot overthrow it; lest haply ye be found even to fight against God.” And in Luke 22.32 the Lord says to Peter: “I have prayed for thee, that thy faith fail not; and when thou are converted, strengthen thy brethren.” – The firmness of the Church in its members is plain from the remark of Augustine On the Utility of Believing ch.17 n.35: “A crowd of males and females, etc.” [v. n.108]. Augustine states a like opinion in Against the Letter of Fundamentus ch.4 n.5.⁵ For what save God might induce so great a multitude, prone to sin, to keep a law contrary to flesh and blood?

There is confirmation in that the sect of the Jews does not remain in vigor, as Augustine objects against them in the sermon [Ps.-Augustine, Sermon against Jews, Pagans, and Arians ch.11]: “You, I say, I convene, O Jews!” If an objection be made about the permanence of the sect of Mohammed, I reply: that sect began more than six hundred years after the law of Christ, and in a short time, if the Lord will, it shall end, because it was much weakened in the 1300th year of Christ, and many of its worshippers are dead and very many put to flight; and a prophecy is said to exist among them that their sect must be ended.⁶

[On the Lucidity of Miracles] – On the eighth, namely the clearness or lucidity of miracles, it is plain thus: God cannot be a false witness; but God himself, invoked by one preaching Scripture to show that its doctrine was true, has done a work proper to himself, and thereby borne witness that what he preached was true. There is a confirmation from Richard [of St. Victor] in On the Trinity I ch.2: “Lord, if it is an error, we have been by you deceived, for your deeds have been confirmed by signs so great that they can only have been done by you.”

But if it be said that miracles have not been performed, or also that they do not testify to the truth, because even Antichrist will perform miracles, – against the first point can be stated the opinion of Augustine City of God XXII ch.5: “If they do not believe that these miracles were done, this one great miracle is sufficient for us, that now without any miracles the whole world believes.” Note well the miracle and the chapter, because if what we believe is said to be incredible, no less incredible, he says, is that “men ignoble and of lowest rank, small in numbers, unskilled, have been able so effectively to persuade the world, and even the learned in that world, of a thing so incredible,” so that the world believe it, as now we see it has believed [cf. n.108], unless some miracles were done by those men, whereby the world was induced to believe. Hence he there subjoins: “For this reason did the world believe a tiny number of ignoble, low-ranked, unskilled men, because in such contemptible witnesses did divinity more marvelously itself persuade them.” For what is more incredible than that a few teachers, poor and uneducated, should convert many powerful and wise men to a law contrary to flesh and blood? Which fact is especially clear in the case of the many very prudent men, first warring against the faith, afterwards converts: as about Paul, first a persecutor, afterwards teacher of the Gentiles; about Augustine, first in some way seduced by the Manicheans, afterwards a Catholic doctor; of Dionysius, first a philosopher, afterwards a disciple of Paul; of Cyprian, first a magician, afterwards a most Christian bishop, and innumerable others. Against the same can be said, second, the remark of Augustine The City of God X ch.18: “Or will someone say that these miracles were not done? He can also say that the gods care nothing for mortal things etc.”⁷ And in the same place on the same point, “If they believe magical or theurgical books, why do they refuse to trust the Writings which say that these things were done, to which…?”⁸ Against the same, third, is that some of the things done cannot be denied save by the most shameless, as are the miracles performed by Sylvester in the presence of Constantine, both in curing his leprosy and afterwards in his disputation against the Jews, which deeds, as being famous, have not been hid from the world.

Against the second point it can be said that if anyone, after being summoned as a witness, should permit some customary sign of bearing witness to be adduced and, although present, should not contradict it, such silence does not cohere with perfect truthfulness; but a miracle is such a sign of God as witness; therefore if he permit miracles to be performed by demons, not contradicting them, namely by announcing that they are not his testimonies, he does not seem to be perfectly truthful, which is impossible. And hereby to what is said of Antichrist, because God predicted that the miracles to be done were not testimonies of the truth, as is clear in Matthew 24.24 and 2 Thessalonians 2.8-9. Again, against the same point is the difference in the miracles performed by God and those performed by the devil, which difference Augustine treats of in his book On the Utility of Believing ch.16 n.34: “I call a miracle,” he says, “anything that appears difficult beyond the hope or capacity of the one who marvels; some marvels cause admiration alone, others unite great grace and goodwill,” of which sort were the miracles of Christ; and he deals with the matter there extensively.

Again, against both points it can be said that there are some miracles, performed in the Christian law, wherein there can be no deceit whether they have been performed, nor that they are testimonies of truth, because done by God: as the rapture of Paul and the revelation of future contingents. The first claim is clear: because it is impossible for anyone to be deceived about his seeing the essence of God, therefore it was impossible for Paul to believe he saw the divine essence unless he did see it; but this he asserts of himself in 2 Corinthians 12.2-4, according to the exposition of the saints;⁹ therefore it happened truly and not apparently only. The proof of the first antecedent is that no one can be deceived about some first principle, by believing he understands although he do not understand such a principle, which would not be clear from the apprehended terms that it was a principle and that it was not;¹⁰ therefore much more can one not be deceived about seeing God. The consequence is plain, because the vision of God is more distant from the understanding of any object at all, even as to the perception of the intellect of the wayfarer, than the understanding of a propositional principle is distant from the understanding of any non-principle. Again, how would the intellect believe it was at rest if it was not at rest [cf. 1 d.2 p.2 q.2 n.31]? Surely, it would be able to recognize its inclination to a truth that it does not see? If it believes it sees God, it believes it is at rest in God; if it does not see, it is not at rest. “Nothing more stupid,” says Augustine, “can be said than that a soul with a false opinion is blessed,” City of God XI ch.4 n.2. A second point, namely that this could only be done by God, is manifest, because no creature can beatify the soul, either simply or for a time [cf. 1 d. 35 q. un. n.13].

The second claim [n.116, miracles as testimonies of truth, like the revelation of future contingents] is plain from many prophecies in both Testaments [n.101] Hence against the false miracles of Antichrist an objection, at least as to these two miracles, can be made to him in this way: if you are God, make me to see bare the divine essence, and to have, after the vision, a sure memory of the vision and a certitude that it was the vision of the divine essence bare, and then I will believe you; again, if you are God, tell me what I will do or what I will think or desire on such a day or at such an hour. And the efficacy of this sort of way, the way of miracles, is indicated by the Savior in John 5. 36: “The works that I do bear witness of me,” 10.38: “if you do not wish to believe me, believe the works.”

[On the Testimony of Non-believers] – In ninth place too can be adduced the testimony of those who are outside [sc. the Church]. Josephus in Antiquities of the Jews XVIII ch.4 n.3 sets down a very beautiful testimony about Christ, where among other things written about Christ he says: “This man was Christ;” where Josephus also confesses his true doctrine and resurrection from the dead.¹¹ Again, about the prophecy of the Sibyl; it is noted in Augustine City of God XVIII ch.23 n .1. Again, Against the Letter of Fundamentus ch.4 n.5, note how individual heretics, when asked about Catholics, send them not to their own people, but to true Catholics, as though they alone too are by everyone called Catholics, even by heretics.

[On the Efficacy of Promises] – Tenth and last can be added that God is not lacking to those who seek salvation with all their heart. For many most diligently inquiring after salvation have been converted to this sect [the Catholic]; and the more fervent they have become in inquiring, the more confirmed they are in this sect and, the more suddenly therein repenting, they have been changed from malice to goodness of life; third, too, many have in great exultation of spirit suffered sorrows on its behalf. Which things do not seem probable did not God singularly approve this sect, resting as it does on Sacred Scripture, and ordain it for salvation.