Scholastica commentaria in Primam Partem Summae Theologicae

IT IS DOUBTED therefore, first: whether it is certain according to the Catholic faith that Sacred Scripture under one letter contains several senses?

To this doubt it is briefly answered, and let this be the first conclusion: it is certain according to the Catholic faith that Sacred Scripture under one letter contains two senses.

It is proved first from the common consensus of the holy Fathers, who, with no one excepted, interpreted the Sacred Letters both in the literal and in the mystical sense.

It is proved second from the testimonies of the same Scripture, in which it is asserted in the literal sense that other passages of the same Scripture are to be understood mystically. Let this be an example: in Jn 19 it is said: «But when they had come to Jesus, they did not break his legs, that the Scripture might be fulfilled which says: You shall not break a bone of him». These words are found originally in Ex 12, and according to the literal sense they contained a legal precept concerning the rite of the sacrifice of the paschal lamb, that its bones should in no way be broken. But since by that paschal lamb Christ to be immolated was signified, therefore John says «that the Scripture might be fulfilled». And indeed it was already formerly fulfilled legally in the literal sense. But nevertheless it had not yet been fulfilled in the mystical sense, until the Lamb of God, who was to be immolated as the Pasch of the New Testament, should die, and his bones should in no way be broken.

Further, Paul in Gal 4 says: «For it is written that Abraham had two sons, one by the free woman and one by the bondwoman, which things are said by allegory. For these are the two testaments, etc.», as if he were saying: by those two sons of Abraham the two testaments were signified; and in 1 Cor 9 he says: «For it is written in the law of Moses: You shall not muzzle the ox that treads out the grain; is God concerned about oxen, or does he say this certainly for our sake?» Behold, the Apostle says that a legal ceremony, which was formerly fulfilled literally by the Jews, signifies the preachers of the Gospel, to whom the things necessary for life must be ministered by the faithful.

Further, the same Apostle in the Epistle to the Hebrews, from chapter 7 through 10, teaches that very many things which were formerly fulfilled literally and historically concerning the Tabernacle, the priesthood, and the sacrifices of the Old Law were a figure of those things which are done in the New Testament; and in 1 Cor 10 he says: «I would not have you ignorant, brethren, that all our fathers were under the cloud, and all passed through the sea, etc.»; and he added: «But these things were done in figure of us». And a little later: «But all these things happened to them in figure». Where the Apostle seems to transfer certain things by figure to the mystical and moral sense.

Further, in 1 Pet 3, the ark of Noah, in which a few souls were saved, is asserted to have been a figure of the Baptism of the New Law. Which, he says, in a like form now saves you, Baptism. And finally Christ the Lord himself, in Jn 3, says: «As Moses lifted up the serpent in the desert, so must the Son of Man be lifted up». Where it is gathered that the serpent raised up in the desert was a figure of Christ. For also formerly in Wis 16 it had been said: «For he who was healed was not healed by what he saw, but by you, the savior of all». And in Mt 12 Christ says». As Jonah was in the belly of the whale three days and three nights, so will the Son of Man be in the heart of the earth, etc.». SECOND conclusion.

It is certain also according to the Catholic faith that all four of the aforesaid senses are found in Sacred Scripture, and were not invented by the holy Fathers: and indeed concerning the literal sense the matter is most fully established. For there are very many histories simply narrated in the Sacred Letters.

There are also dogmas of faith proposed to us in their own words. Concerning the other three senses it is proved: and first concerning the allegorical it is proved from the passage cited from Gal 4: «Which things are said by allegory. For these are the two testaments». Where let the theologian advert in passing that allegory is twofold, as Augustine teaches in bk. 15 On the Trinity, ch. 9, one in words, the other in things. Allegory in words is nothing other than a certain long and continued metaphor. An example is in Rom 13: «It is now the hour for us to rise from sleep, etc.»; and this allegory pertains to the literal sense, as also does parabolic speech, as St. Thomas teaches in the solution to the third. But the other allegory is in the things themselves done and literally signified, when the same thing signified and done again signifies another by divine institution, and an allegory of this sort pertains to the mystical sense.

Nor were there lacking even in our own times those who denied that this allegorical sense is found in the Sacred Scriptures. And when the testimony of the Apostle in Gal 4 was objected to them, asserting «Which things are said by allegory», they answered that the Apostle spoke improperly in that place. And they confirmed this from Chrysostom, who on the same passage says that the Apostle speaks typically. And they thought that the two sons of Abraham were not given to him by God in order to signify the two Testaments, but that the Apostle recalled that history in order to teach the difference between the Old and the New Testament through a certain comparison and allusion.

But a doctrine of this sort I have always judged erroneous, both because it is against the common understanding of the Saints — nor indeed is Chrysostom opposed to us, even if he said that the Apostle spoke typically. For he does not deny that the two sons of Abraham were a figure of the two Testaments. But since the Apostle said «For these are the two testaments», he spoke typically with respect to this, that he took the things figuring for the things figured. But he would not have spoken typically if he had said: these two sons of Abraham were a figure of the two Testaments. But since he said «For these are the two testaments», in this speech he spoke typically and improperly.

Then, when the Apostle recalls from the Old Testament the history of the two sons of Abraham, he surely intends to confirm the new from the Old: otherwise, if he spoke only through a certain allusion, it would be of no moment to recall the history from the Old Testament. Allusions of this sort can also be made from profane histories or fables. Which Leo the Most Holy does elegantly, although through a certain antiphrasis, in sermon 1, on the Nativity of the Apostles Peter and Paul, where he compares Peter and Paul with Remus and Romulus, the founders of the city of Rome. Further, Paul so spoke that what he said, Christ himself, the Holy Spirit himself, spoke through him. Then I ask: if Christ said to us «Abraham had two sons, etc., these are the two testaments», we would all understand that Christ, the author of the Scriptures, understands and teaches in this way, that the two sons of Abraham were instituted by God himself as a figure of the two Testaments. Further, by a similar account those who so opine would say that all the things which Paul recalls in Heb 9 concerning the adornment of the Tabernacle were not formerly instituted by God as a figure of those things which are done in the New Testament, but are certain allusions and comparisons which the Apostle prudently makes between the New and the Old Testament: which indeed to assert I judge not only erroneous but heretical. And he will agree with me who has attentively read what the Apostle teaches in the Epistle to the Hebrews, chs. 8, 9 and 10.

But let us return to that from which we digressed, and let us prove that the anagogical sense is in the Sacred Letters, from the same Epistle to the Hebrews, where the Apostle teaches that that tabernacle made by hand was a copy of the true Tabernacle which God, and not man, pitched, into which Christ entered once by his own Blood, eternal redemption having been found. But this sense we call anagogical, as it were leading the understanding upward.

Concerning the moral sense, however, all agree that it is found in the Sacred Letters, and it is gathered from what Christ said in Jn 3: «As Moses lifted up the serpent in the desert, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life». Where he seems openly to teach that just as those formerly struck by serpents, turned to the bronze serpent, were healed, so we too, turned to Christ crucified, who hung on the cross in the figure of a serpent, that is, of a sinner, although his hypostasis was God the strong, should obtain salvation from the bite of the pestiferous sin. Which was formerly figured, and pertains to our morals, and for that reason the moral sense is said to be contained in that history of the Old Testament, when Moses lifted up the serpent in the desert. Nor indeed are all things which in the Sacred Letters are directed to our morals to be said to be contained under the moral sense, as when Christ said: «Love your enemies» — for this sense is only literal; but the moral sense is then said to be present when the things which pertain to our morals are insinuated to us under the figure of things done. Just as blessed Gregory too, on the history of Job, composed his Moralia quite piously.

It must be observed, however, concerning the aforesaid conclusions, that the distinction of the words by which these four senses are explained is not the same among all the holy Fathers and Doctors, but these names are often confused. The reason for this is that the words themselves — namely allegory, anagogy, tropology — differ little according to their etymology. For allegory is said as it were spoken under another, while anagogy is said as it were a leading under or a leading up, because the mind is borne higher than the words sound; but tropology is the same as figurative speech, or speech under a figure. Wherefore the holy Fathers sometimes signify by these three names every sense other than the literal. Thus too Origen speaks, homily 11 on Numbers, and the ancient Fathers Basil and Gregory Nazianzen. Nay, even St. Augustine, in the book to Honoratus, ch. 3, and in the single incomplete book on Genesis, ch. 2, sets out a fourfold mode of expounding Sacred Scripture, namely historically, when things done are narrated; allegorically, when things figuratively spoken are understood; analogically, when the agreement of the New and Old Testament is demonstrated; and according to etymology, when the cause of the things said or done is given. So he. But do not think that in the fourfold mode of expounding the Sacred Letters he wished to signify the fourfold sense of which we have spoken in the present article, but he made express mention of the literal sense when he said «that Sacred Scripture is expounded historically». But the other three mystical senses, which we have distinguished, he included in this, that he said that the Sacred Letters are expounded allegorically. But in the other two modes, namely the anagogical and the etymological, there is no variation of the aforesaid senses. For that the New Testament be shown not to contradict the Old can be done in the literal sense. But that the cause of the things done and said in the Sacred Letters be given is something extrinsic, nor does it vary the sense of Sacred Scripture. Behold therefore how St. Augustine under the single name of allegory understood the three mystical senses. The same he also teaches in bk. 15 On the Trinity, ch. 9, where, having taught that allegory is twofold, one of words, the other of things, and having set an example of the allegory of words from Is 11: «The wolf shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard with the kid», which is nothing other than a certain metaphor which pertains to the literal sense, otherwise the prophecy would have been false. For it is not otherwise verified, except insofar as wolf and leopard are taken for the fierce nations, which were to be converted to the sheep of Christ. Then by allegory he understood [the case] when the things themselves done or to be done are a sign of other things, namely of Christ, or of the faithful soul, or of glory. Which allegory St. Jerome often in his Commentaries calls tropology, and sometimes anagogy, not distinguishing, as we moderns distinguish, individual words for individual senses. But nevertheless the usage of the scholastics has now prevailed, for the sake of avoiding confusion, that individual words be appropriated to individual mystical senses. And St. Jerome himself favors us in the Epistle to Hedibia, last question, where he divides the sense of Scripture threefold, namely according to history, according to tropology, and according to spiritual understanding. And he says that Scripture is expounded tropologically when whatever was done carnally among the carnal people we interpret according to the moral sense and turn to the profit of our soul. But spiritual understanding or theory he takes for the same as what we call the anagogical sense. An excellent example too favors us in the same St. Jerome, Ezekiel, ch. 16, where he teaches that by the name Jerusalem, according to the literal sense, that earthly city is to be understood; but according to the allegorical sense we understand the Church militant; according to the moral, the soul of a Christian man. And finally according to the anagogical sense, the heavenly fatherland is to be understood. This distinction, therefore, of things and words St. Thomas uses in this article. And concerning these four senses, whether they be signified by these names or by others, we have said that it is certain according to faith that they are found in the Sacred Letters.