Scotus Academicus, Tomus sextus: De Legibus Divinis et Humanis

There were various heretics who asserted that the old law was opposed to salvation as being evil, and instituted from a perverse principle; this the holy Epiphanius and Augustine in his book De Haeresibus affirm especially of the Cerdonians, Marcionites, and Manichaeans: and they strove to persuade this from the fact that the old law is said in the New Testament for the most part to be imperfect and weak. But it must be known that something can be called perfect in two ways, namely either absolutely and positively; or negatively and comparatively. In the former way that is called perfect which of itself is not ordered to another thing as its complement, but consists in all its own excellencies, and is integrated by its perfections. In the latter way, however, something is called perfect when it has of itself all things that befit it according to its state, nevertheless while it is compared with another thing it is called imperfect or less perfect; wherefore it is ordered to that other as to what is more excellent, and when the more excellent arrives and shines upon it, it ceases to be perfect: thus the light of dawn, although perfect in itself, yet comparatively can be denied to be perfect with respect to the sun of day, because it is lesser than the light of the sun, and ceases when that shines upon it.

Note 2. The law of Moses can be considered with respect to three laws, which the Apostle distinguishes: namely the law of nature, the law of concupiscence or of the fomes, and the law of the Gospel or of grace; according to which respects the Mosaic law can be considered to involve a triple necessity and dispensation: since it seems to have been given in aid of the law of nature from the mercy of God, for the correction and emendation of the law of sin or of the fomes from the ordination of divine justice: for the designation of the law of grace, and its preparation and leading into it, from the precept and counsel of divine wisdom.

Note 3. Something may be said to conduce to salvation in two ways: namely insofar as it is inductive to good, and recallative from evil — when it would remove man, whether per se or occasionally, from performing those things which would stand in the way of attaining salvation. Now it is certain that the old law was ordered to the salvation of men in both of these ways; since it was inductive to the good which it commands, and recallative from the evil which it prohibits; wherefore the Apostle says to the Romans: The law is holy and just, and the commandment holy, and just and good. The gloss weighs these words thus: the law is unto life, and it bids goods, and forbids evils, and makes sin known, whence it is called Holy, that is, soundly teaching: the commandment just, that is, justifying the sinner: and good, that is, acquiring useful life.

The old law was given to the Jews on account of Christians, as St. Augustine expressly expounds in book 4 Contra Faustum, who, answering the objection of Faustus contending that that law was prescribed to the Jews alone and must be cast aside by Christians, says:

That promises of temporal things are contained in the Old Testament, and are therefore called the old Testament, none of us doubts; and that eternal life, the kingdoms of heaven, belong to the new Testament. But that in those temporal things there were figures of things to come which were fulfilled in us, upon whom the ends of the world are come, my suspicion was not, but apostolic understanding, Paul saying, when he spoke of such things: all these things happened to them as figures of ours. And again: all these things happened to them in figure; but they are written for our sake, upon whom the ends of the world are come. Therefore we do not receive the old Testament for attaining those promises, but for understanding in them the announcements of the new Testament: for the witness of the old conciliates faith to the new.

There remains therefore only here to determine: First, whether truly the old law is to be called imperfect positively and absolutely, or negatively and respectively: Second, for what ends it was instituted.

First Conclusion. — The old law was imperfect, not absolutely, but respectively. This Conclusion embraces two parts, the first of which was sufficiently proved in the prior Conclusion of the preceding Question.

But the latter part is proved, namely that the Mosaic law was imperfect, not positively, but comparatively with respect to the Evangelical law. It is proved, I say: that law must be called imperfect comparatively which did not confer justifying grace, in which perfection and efficacy for attaining eternal salvation consist: but such was the old law, and henceforth it was negatively and comparatively imperfect. The major stands. But the minor is proved. First from holy Scripture, for in John it is said: The law was given by Moses; grace and truth were made by Jesus. Whence the Apostle says to the Romans 8.: What was impossible to the law, in that it was weakened through the flesh, God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and of sin condemned sin in the flesh, that the justification of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh, but according to the spirit. Wherefore to the Hebrews 7. he affirms: That there is a disannulling of the preceding commandment because of its weakness and unprofitableness, for the law brought nothing to perfection. Hence he often says that righteousness is not from the law, but through Christ; thus to the Galatians 2.: If righteousness be by the law, then Christ died in vain.

Proof 2. This same minor from the holy Fathers: First indeed from St. Augustine book 1. to Boniface, who speaks thus of Christ: It is written, Proverbs 3., according to the Seventy Interpreters: he carries law and mercy in his tongue: Law wherewith he may terrify,

mercy wherewith he may succour: Law through a servant, mercy through himself: Law as in a staff, which Eliseus sent to the son of the widow to raise him, and he rose again. For if a law had been given which could justify, doubtless righteousness would indeed be by the law. Mercy truly as in Eliseus himself, who bearing the figure of Christ, by raising the dead was joined to a great Sacrament, as it were by the signification of the Old Testament.

He has similar things in Sermon 2. De Verbis Apostoli, chapters 8. and 9., and also in many other places.

Saint Fulgentius subscribes to this in book 2 of De Veritate praedestinationis, c. 19. The law without grace can show sickness but cannot heal it: it displays wounds but does not supply remedies; but that the precept of the law may be fulfilled, grace ministers help, and thus the law reveals guilt, grace bestows pardon. It belongs therefore to the law that we know sins; to grace, that we avoid them. He adds in book 1, c. 7: The distance, then, between the letter commanding and the spirit quickening, that is, between the law and grace, is this: because the law shakes, grace converts the will of man. That one cries out, this one gives: the good we will, that one cries aloud, this bestows. By the law there strikes upon man's pleasure the terror of divine justice; by grace mercy infuses charity: by the law the will received the spirit of bondage unto fear; by grace it receives the spirit of adoption of sons, wherein we cry: Abba, Father.

Saint Augustine, in his exposition of the Epistle to the Romans, distinguishes a fourfold state of men: namely, before the Mosaic law, under the law itself, under the grace of Christ, and in the peace of eternal beatitude. Before the law, he says, we follow the concupiscence of the flesh; under the law we are drawn by it; under grace we neither follow it nor are drawn by it; in peace there is no concupiscence of the flesh. Before the law, therefore, we do not fight, because we not only desire and sin, but also approve of sins; under the law we fight, but are overcome; for we confess that the things we do are evil, but because grace is not yet present, we are overcome.

Saint Prosper assents with sententia 32, saying: He who gave the law, himself also gave grace: but he sent the law through a servant, whereas with grace he himself descended: so that, since the law shows sins but does not take them away, those who wish to fulfill the law by their own strength and cannot are compelled toward grace, whereby it takes away both the disease of impossibility and the guilt of disobedience.

You will say: The Patriarchs and Prophets, and very many others, were just and most perfect in the state of the old law: therefore perfect justice existed in the old law. And on this account the old law must not be called imperfect.

I answer: First indeed, that very few were just and most perfect under the old law, as Saint Augustine teaches in the book De catechizandis rudibus c. 22, and in the book against Adimantus, c. 17.

I say 2, that if any men were just in the Old Testament, they belonged not to that old Testament, but to the law of Grace and of the Gospel, as Saint Augustine teaches in the book De Spiritu et littera, cc. 25 and 26, and in book 3 to Boniface, c. 4, saying:

Then the men of God, according to the distribution of times, are shown to be dispensers and bearers of the other Testament indeed, but heirs of the new. But shall we deny that he belongs to the New Testament who says: Create a clean heart in me, O God, and renew a right spirit within my bowels? Or him who says: He set my feet upon a rock, and directed my steps, and put into my mouth a new canticle, a hymn to our God? Or him before the old Testament, which is from mount Sinai,

the father of the faithful, of whom the Apostle says: Brethren, I speak according to man, yet no man makes void the testament of a man, etc.? This sufficiently shows that he belongs to our faith, which is assuredly of the new Testament, which God gave to Abraham by promise. Hence Saint Augustine concludes: Therefore whether Abraham, or the just before him, or after him even to Moses himself, through whom was given the Testament from mount Sinai generating unto bondage, or the other Prophets after him and holy men of God even to John the Baptist, they are sons of the promise, and of grace; according to Isaac, the son of the free woman, not of the law, but of the promise, heirs of God, and coheirs of Christ. For far be it from us to deny that Noë the just, and the just men of the former age, and whoever could be just, whether conspicuous or hidden, from him even to Abraham, belong to the Jerusalem above, which is our Mother. Although they are found to be of an earlier time than Sara, who bore the figure and prophecy of that free mother. How much more evidently then after Abraham? for to whomever the promise itself was so declared that he might be called the father of many nations, all who pleased God are to be held sons of the promise; for not a truer generation of Abraham and of the just thereafter is repeated, but a clearer prophecy. But to the old Testament, which is from mount Sinai generating unto bondage, which is Agar, belong those who, when they have received the law that is just, holy, and good, think that the letter can suffice them for life. And therefore, that they may become doers of the law, they seek not the divine mercy, but, ignorant of the justice of God and wishing to establish their own justice, they are not subject to the justice of God. And afterward: this plainly is the great difference: that these men placed under the law do what they do either from desire of attaining earthly happiness, or from fear of losing it, and therefore they do not truly do it, since carnal cupidity, by which sin is increased, is not healed by another cupidity. Thus to the old Testament belongs what generates unto bondage, because carnal fear and cupidity make its followers servants; but Evangelical faith, hope, and charity make them free. But those placed under grace, whom the Spirit vivifies, and who by that faith do the things which work through love, in hope of goods not carnal but spiritual: not earthly but heavenly: not temporal but eternal; believing especially in the Mediator, through whom they doubt not that the spirit of grace is supplied to them, so that they can do these things well and obtain pardon when they sin. These belong to the Testament of the New, sons of the promise and of regeneration, from God the Father, and the free mother; of which family were all the ancient just, and Moses himself, minister of the Old Testament, heir of the New: because by the faith by which we live, one and the same they lived, believing the incarnation, passion, and resurrection of Christ to come, which we believe already done, etc.

Second Conclusion. — Even though the Mosaic law was imperfect, nevertheless it was wisely ordained and prescribed by God for various ends.

First indeed, that it might make known to man his own infirmity, insofar as knowing it he might seek the Savior; for the Apostle says, Rom. 7: I knew not sin except through the law. Saint Augustine elegantly declares this very cause for prescribing the law in many places, but especially in sermon 13 De Verbis Apostoli, c. 2. The law was given, he says, not that the disease might be healed, but that, the disease increasing, the physician might be sought. If therefore the law had been given which could vivify, righteousness would be entirely of the law. If therefore the law was not given which could vivify, why was it given? He follows on and shows why it was given: because even so it was given as an aid, lest you should think yourself sound. Or as he says in Epistle 11: By teaching and commanding what cannot be fulfilled without grace, the law demonstrates to man his infirmity, that the infirmity being demonstrated he may seek the Savior, by whom the will once healed can do what, while infirm, it could not: the law therefore leads to faith, faith obtains the more abundant spirit, and pours forth the charity of the Spirit, charity fulfills the law. Therefore the law is called the Pedagogue, beneath whose most threatening severity, whoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. But how shall they call on him in whom they have not believed? Moreover, although man without the old law could know that many things had the character of the dishonest, namely by the natural law and the dictate of reason, yet by the divine positive law it is made manifest to man that those things which natural reason judges dishonest are also sins and offenses against God, who forbids them and most severely punishes sinners. Add that since the natural law has been in us greatly vitiated through original sin, so that many things no longer seem to us to have the character of sin, which nevertheless are truly sins, therefore another law was needed, which should plainly expound the foulness and gravity of sin.

Second, the law was given in order to break and blunt man's pride: namely, insofar as man might come to know that he was utterly unequal, and insufficient by his own powers, to avoid sins. This indeed Saint Augustine declares thus in Epistle 157:

The law therefore had to be given, he says, which would more plainly show man to himself, lest the proud human spirit think that it could be just of itself, and, ignoring the justice of God, that is, that justice which comes to man from God, and wishing to constitute its own, that is, as it were one wrought by its own powers, should not become subject to the justice of God. It was necessary therefore that, upon the addition of the commandment whose voice is, Thou shalt not covet, the crime of transgression should accrue even to the proud sinner, and thus that grace as medicine might be sought not by an infirmity healed through the law, but by one convicted.

Or as he says in Sermon 13 On the Words of the Apostle chapter 4:

The law was laid down for the sake of transgression, whence the neck of many was humbled, of those who attributed to themselves, who arrogated so much to their own will alone, that they thought their free will sufficient for justice; which, when it was whole in its liberty, that is, in Paradise, showed its powers, showed how much they could do, but toward falling, not toward rising.

But in what manner the prescription of the law broke man's pride, the same Saint Augustine teaches in several places, namely that the law, once laid down, became the motive and occasion why concupiscence was stirred up the more, and rose up more sharply against the law that resisted it: for, says the Apostle to the Romans 7, Sin, taking occasion by the commandment, wrought in me all manner of concupiscence. Where by the name of sin he understands concupiscence, which is called sin because it comes from sin, inclines toward sin, and itself becomes sin if consent be given to it. Hence Saint Augustine, book 3 to Boniface chapter 2, expounding these words of the Apostle to the Corinthians 13, The letter killeth: for the sting of death is sin, and the strength of sin is the law, says: forbidding indeed increases the desire of sin, and thence it kills, unless grace come to the rescue by making satisfaction. And book On the Spirit and the Letter chapter 1, where without the Spirit the Spirit is not at work, inspiring in place of evil concupiscence a good concupiscence, that is, pouring charity into our hearts: truly that law, although good, increases the evil desire by forbidding it: just as the rush of waters, if it does not cease in that direction, becomes more violent when an obstruction is placed, from whose mass when it has burst forth, precipitated with a greater heap, it is hurled more violently down the slopes. For I know not by what means this very thing that is coveted becomes more pleasant while it is forbidden, according to that saying of the Poet: We ever strive toward what is forbidden, and desire what is denied.

Third, the old law was given that it might deter the Jewish people, otherwise rude and imperfect, from evil by fear of punishments: and thus might still show them that they must flee to the aid of divine grace, as the Apostle teaches, writing to the Galatians 3: The law was our pedagogue in Christ: for that pedagogue is he under whose ferule and rods the boy handed over to be instructed. Weighing this passage Saint Thomas says: By the law the Jews, as weak children, were withdrawn from evil through fear of punishment, and were promoted to good by love and the promise of temporal things. This doctrine indeed he had drawn from Saint Augustine, Epistle 114. The law cited above is called a pedagogue, under whose most threatening servitude, whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. Book On Nature and Grace chapter 1. He who understands that this justice of God was constituted not in the precept of the law, whereby fear is struck, but in the aid of the grace of Christ, unto which alone the fear of the law, as of a pedagogue, usefully leads, himself understands why he is a Christian. Book 3 to Boniface chapter 3. Unto which grace the law leads by terrifying on account of transgression, as a pedagogue, that thus there might be conferred upon man what it itself could not confer. Book On the Perfection of Justice chapter 3. This law commanded that, when man should fail in fulfilling these things, pride swollen should not exalt itself, but that, wearied, he should flee to grace for refuge, and thus the law by terrifying should lead him, by the office of a pedagogue, to loving Christ. And chapter 19 he says: By the fear of the law, made humble as it were by a pedagogue, to lead man to faith and grace. Lest indeed anyone think that we attribute some beginning of salvation to nature, while we maintain that the Old Law was given for this purpose, that it might show man his infirmity, which, once acknowledged, he might seek a physician, that it might break his pride; since by its occasion concupiscence is increased both in number and in gravity: that it may convince him of the gravity of his disease, lest he contemn it as lighter: that finally it may terrify him, and by fear of punishments withdraw him from evil — thus we will that sin be known through the law, that we may feel through grace that the physician is sought. But we say that pride is broken through the law only insofar as the sinner feels himself unequal to the law imposed upon him to be kept, unless he be aided through grace, since so far is it from taking away sin that rather, concupiscence having been increased by occasion, it increases it both in number and in gravity. He sees therefore that it does not suffice him to know the law, because, the law being known, sin is not taken away, nor diminished, but increased: thus he sees himself unequal to keeping the law. But vain for salvation is such a breaking of pride, unless the sinner is humbled before God through grace. — The same teaches Saint Jerome on that passage of the Galatians 3, The law was our pedagogue in Christ. A pedagogue, he says, is assigned to little ones, that the more wanton age may be restrained, and hearts prone to vices be held, while the tender child is trained in studies: and by fear of punishment coerced he is prepared for greater disciplines. Therefore also to the wanton the Old Law was applied in the manner of a stricter pedagogue, that it might guard them, and prepare them for the faith to come.

A threefold other utility of the old law Alexander of Hales sets forth, member 1, article 1, with respect to a threefold law; namely, of nature, of concupiscence, and of the Gospel.

For it is given, he says, in aid of the law of nature; and according to this it runs according to the mode of mercy. It is given also for the correction of the law of sin or of the fomes; and according to this it runs according to the reason of justice. Likewise it is given as a sign, and signification, of the law of grace, and direction toward it; and according to this it runs according to the reason of wisdom. Of the first there is had upon that passage: The law slipped in, the gloss says: The law was given in aid of human nature: that because seeds of justice are in a certain way uncertain in that nature itself, the law might be added, by whose authority and teaching the natural intellect might profit toward producing the fruit of justice: and this is the first utility of the giving of the law. — But the second utility of it is for the correction of the law of sin or of the fomes: and of this there is had: The law was made for transgressors etc., the gloss: The law was laid down that transgression might be restrained, that is, that men at least through fear should cease from transgressing, that at some time they might do it by will. It was given therefore, that it might instruct the people of God under the fear of God, that he might become worthy to receive the promise, which is Christ. — The third utility was for figuring the law of grace or of the Gospel, and direction toward it: whence Psalm 18, The law of the Lord is unspotted, converting souls. Gloss: Converting souls, that is, correcting by its distinction, and sending toward the grace of Christ. And thus it is clear that it is for coercing sins, and for the direction and figuring of the law of grace. According to this it is said Romans 5, The law entered etc. Gloss: There were in that people three kinds of men, namely the hard, beginners, and the perfect: therefore the law was given to all: but to the hard it is given as a scourge, to beginners as a pedagogue; it is given to the just as a sign, namely of the grace to come through Christ. And to the Galatians 3, For transgressors, etc., Gloss. The law was given as a sign of things to come, that things to come might be attested by figures. And according to this there were three things in the law: namely moral precepts, which were for elucidating the law of nature; and ceremonial, which were for figuring the law of grace; because the figures were figures of things to come; and according to this it was to the just as a sign.