Scotus Academicus, Tomus sextus: De Legibus Divinis et Humanis

Note 1. The Mosaic law can be considered according to a threefold difference of time, in which it first lived, secondly died, and thirdly became deadly. It was, I say, first living, and had the power of binding those to whom it was prescribed, namely the Israelites immediately from its constitution and promulgation; whence God through Moses appointed to its observers a most ample reward, but to its transgressors a punishment, as is seen in Deuteronomy 28, whereby He signified that He sincerely wished the observance of this law. Moreover, the vigor of this Mosaic law persevered until the birth of Christ the Lord. For then it began to be weakened and to languish, whence Christ the Lord says in Matthew 11, verse 13: All the prophets and the law prophesied until John, namely the Baptist, who, like the dawn of Christ the Lord, the sun of justice, foretokened the rising and office of the new Legislator of mankind. Finally, however, that vigor was extinguished and wholly dulled in the death of Christ the Lord, when, namely, He fulfilled in very deed all things that were written of Him, the prophecies of the prophets, and voided and extinguished by the bloody sacrifice of His death the utility and efficacy of the sacraments and sacrifices of the Mosaic law. But it began to be deadly when, on account of pseudo-apostles contending that the Mosaic law was to be kept together with the Gospel, the Apostles decreed that the faithful newly converted to Christ ought no longer to attend to the Mosaic precepts, inasmuch as these were now of no avail for salvation. When indeed this was decreed must be determined here.

Note 2. That the Old Law was truly prescribed to the Jews alone, nor were the Gentiles bound to its observance by any reason whatsoever: which certainly is gathered from that passage of Deuteronomy 4: What other nation so illustrious, that hath ceremonies and just judgments? Psalm 75: God is known in Judea: Psalm 147: He hath not done in like manner to every nation, and his judgments he hath not manifested unto them. This same truth the Apostle clearly demonstrates in Romans 3, where, declaring the prerogatives with which the Jews were divinely endowed, he says: What advantage therefore hath the Jew? Much every way; first indeed, because the words of God were committed to them: and under the words of God he comprehends chiefly the law, which was given to the Circumcised alone, and therefore the Gentiles were barred from entrance into the temple and from participation in that law, unless they were circumcised: but the Gentiles were not obliged to be circumcised, rather it was free in their will and choice, as appears in Exodus 12: And if any stranger be willing to sojourn in your colony, and to keep the phase of the Lord, all his male kind shall first be circumcised, and then shall he celebrate it rite: and he shall be as one that is born in the land. But if any man be not circumcised, he shall not eat thereof. Now this special prerogative of the Jewish people above the Gentiles was not granted them by God on account of their merits and their faithful observance of Him, but out of the mere liberality of God specially choosing this people to Himself before others, because Christ was to arise from it; which indeed Moses declared in Deuteronomy 9, where, addressing the Jewish people, he says: Know therefore that the Lord thy God hath not given thee this most excellent land to possess for thy justices, for thou art a very stiff-necked people. Remember and forget not how thou provokedst the Lord thy God to wrath in the wilderness: from the day that thou didst depart out of Egypt until thou camest unto this place, thou hast always strove against the Lord. But it was fitting that that people, from which Christ was to arise, should shine with special holiness and with God's peculiar love... Hence Moses, appealing to the Jewish people in Deuteronomy 4, says: You have heard his words from the midst of the fire, because he loved thy fathers, and chose their seed after them. That seed, I say, that blessed one, namely Christ the Lord, in whom all nations were to be blessed.

Note 3. That although the old law was prescribed to the people of the Jews alone, that they might observe and keep it, nevertheless it looked not to the Jews alone, but chiefly to Christians: for the promises and gifts made in that law are on account of the true Israelites, and sons of Abraham, not those who are born according to the flesh, but those who are sons of Abraham according to faith, as the Apostle proves in many places, especially in Romans and Galatians. Hence St. Augustine notes admirably in book 4 Contra Faustum that the land of Chanaan, granted by God to the Jews, can be taken in two ways: either in itself and as some sensible good, in which way it looked only to those who are Jews according to the flesh; or inasmuch as it is a figure of an invisible good far better and more excellent, and thus it pertains to Christians. That the promises of temporal things are contained in the Old Testament, and therefore it is called the old testament, none of us doubts, he says, and that the promise of eternal life and the kingdom of heaven pertain 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, is not my suspicion, but the Apostolic understanding, Paul saying when he spoke of such things: all these things happened to them in figure: and again: Now all these things happened to them in figures: but they are written for our correction, upon whom the ends of the world are come. Therefore we received the Old Testament not for attaining those promises, but for understanding in them the annunciations of the New Testament: for the significance of the old commends faith to the new. These things being premised, three things remain to be determined: First, whether the obligation and virtue of the old law has truly now ceased. Secondly, when exactly it ceased to be in force. Thirdly, finally, whether as soon as it ceased to be in force, its observance became deadly.

First Conclusion. — THE MOSAIC LAW HAS BEEN ABROGATED IN FACT, AND HAS ALREADY CEASED TO BIND. This is defined by the faith delivered by the Apostles in the Council of Jerusalem convoked that this question might be resolved, as we read in Acts 15, in those words: It hath seemed good to the Holy Ghost and to us, to lay no further burden upon you than these necessary things, etc.

And St. Paul proves this truth in many places in Romans: for in chapter 6 he says to the faithful who have been baptized: For you are not under the law, but under grace. And in chapter 7 he declares this by the example of a wife, who by the death of her husband is freed from his law: whence he concludes: Therefore, my brethren; you also are become dead to the law, by the body of Christ. And to the Galatians he inculcates the same in various ways, chapters 2, 3, and 5, but especially in these words: if you be circumcised, Christ shall profit you nothing.

Hence afterwards: You are deprived of Christ, you who are justified in the law. Which certainly signifies that the grace of Christ the Lord does not profit him who judges circumcision to be necessarily to be kept. Likewise the Apostle says to the Hebrews 7: For the priesthood being translated, it is necessary that a translation also be made of the law: and yet the priesthood of the old law was translated into the priesthood of the new law: for whereas before there was the Aaronic priesthood, there was made the priesthood of Christ, who is called a priest forever according to the order of Melchisedech: therefore also the old law itself passed over into the new, and thus it ceased in fact, and was abrogated.

Proof 2. That law is abrogated and ceases to bind, especially when it no longer prevails with respect to those for whom it was enacted: but the old law ceased to bind the Jews, to whom it was chiefly prescribed: therefore truly it ceased to bind. The major stands: both because to be loosed and to be bound are said with respect to the same thing, otherwise they would not be opposites; and also because it involves a contradiction that some law be judged abrogated, and yet prevail with respect to those to whom it was prescribed. But the minor is proved: First, because the old law was not given for eternity, but only, as the Apostle has it in Galatians 4: Until the fulness of the time should come. Therefore, at the coming of the fulness of time through Christ, who was born in the middle of the ages, the ancient law at once ceased. Secondly, from the same Apostle: The law having a shadow of the good things to come, not the very image of the things: but shadows cease at the rising of the Sun, and cease while truth appears. Hence St. Bernard, homily 1 super Missus est: As the fruit comes forth, the flower falls away, because, the truth appearing in the flesh, the figure has passed away. Or as Jerome says on chapter 1 of Galatians: Before the Gospel of Christ shone forth in the whole world, the legal precepts had their brightness: but after the greater light of Gospel grace shone forth, and the sun of justice showed itself to the whole world, the light of the stars was hidden, and their rays grew dark. Theodoretus has similar things on Philippians 3, where he writes: The lamp is superfluous if the Sun has appeared: the Pedagogue is superfluous for those who have received perfect wisdom: the nurse is useless to those who grow on solid food. The chaff bears the wheat, but after the wheat has been gathered, the chaff is cast out; so the law pointed out Christ, but after He appeared, it is thereafter superfluous.

Proof 3. That law is judged abrogated which was to endure only for a time, and was bound to prevail until the institution and promulgation of another law succeeding it: but the Mosaic law was bound to prevail only until the institution of the Evangelical law: therefore, this latter being instituted, the former ought to have ceased. The major stands. The minor is proved by all those testimonies of sacred Scripture in which God had foretold that a change of the law and of the state of the people was to be made at the advent of the Messias. Thus through Malachy chapter 1: I have no will in you, saith the Lord of hosts: and I will not receive a gift of your hand. For from the rising of the sun even to the going down, my name is great among the Gentiles, and in every place there is sacrifice, and there is offered to my name a clean oblation. By which words it is plainly foretold that that entire cultus of the sacrifices of the old law was to be rejected by God, and changed into another most pure, as the Council of Trent expounds, session 22, chapter 1. Likewise Jeremias signified it, chapter 23, where, having premised the promise of the Messias in these words: Behold the days come, saith the Lord, and I will raise up to David a just branch, etc., he adds: Therefore, behold the days come, saith the Lord, and they shall say no more: The Lord liveth, which brought the children of Israel out of the land of Egypt: but: The Lord liveth, which brought and led the seed of the house of Israel out of the north country, and from all countries: by which words the Prophet signifies that the Gentiles were to come to the Messias and be converted. Finally, this same truth is proved by all those texts of Scripture in which God had once promised that He would give a new law, such as that of Jeremias 31: Behold the days shall come, saith the Lord, and I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel, and with the house of Juda: where by the name of covenant He signifies the law. Hence He subjoins: I will give my law in their bowels. For by these words God signified that He would at some time institute and give a new law which would dissolve the former, as St. Paul gathers most excellently in Hebrews chapter 8, where, having premised the aforementioned texts of the Prophet, he concludes: Now in saying a new covenant, he hath made the former old. And that which decayeth and groweth old is near its end.

You will say 1. A law once enacted and promulgated is not abrogated except by express revocation, or by a later law incompatible with the former: but in the new law enacted by Christ no express revocation of the old law is read, nor are those laws incompatible, but can be observed together: therefore the latter did not revoke the former, especially with respect to that people whom the old law bound.

I answer 1. The major can be denied; for, besides those two ways of abrogating a law, a third is found, namely that a law ceases through a change and succession of times, when it was enacted only for a determined time, and on account of some end which, once posited and attained, it ceases to bind: now such was the old law, for it was prescribed only for a time: and until the seed should come, that is, Christ, as St. Paul says in Galatians 3; for the end of the law was Christ, as the same Apostle teaches in Romans 10; and the same, that time being completed and that end attained, that law ought to have ceased without any other abrogation and revocation. Hence in Luke 16 it is said: The law and the prophets were until John.

I answer 2. Denying the minor, as regards the second part: for although Christ the Lord, in delivering the Evangelical law, did not add any formal words by which He might expressly signify that He was abrogating and revoking the precepts of the old law, nevertheless He truly abrogated that old law by His new law, as Paul signifies in Romans 3: It is excluded, he says, by what law? of works? No, but by the law of faith. And in Ephesians, saying: Making void the law of commandments expressed in decrees: for what he says "in decrees" means the same as by His decrees, or, as St. Chrysostom expounds it, by precepts, or as St. Jerome speaks, by the dogmas of the Gospel. Christ therefore abrogated the old law by His precepts and His new law. Nor was an express revocation necessary, says Suarez, book 9, chapter 10, number 15, because although the works of those laws may not seem formally to conflict, nevertheless the laws themselves fight against each other. First, because the new law is delivered by Christ as per se sufficient for salvation, and necessary: and straightway the obligation and necessity of the former law conflicts with it. Next, the observances of the Mosaic law were only figures and signs of the future mysteries of the Messias; but the Sacraments of the new law, especially Baptism and the Eucharist, signify that redemption through the Messias is no longer to be made, but made already, and accordingly they cannot subsist together with those signs which prefigured a future redemption. Finally, the former law was given to one people alone, that it might be distinguished and segregated from other nations: but the latter was given to all nations, that the Church might be gathered possessing a perfect unity from men.

You will say 2. The Mosaic law is said in the Sacred Letters to endure forever: therefore it ought never to have ceased anywhere. Proof of the antecedent from that passage, Gen. 17, where concerning circumcision God says: It shall be this my covenant in your flesh for an everlasting covenant. Likewise Exodus 12: You shall keep this day... solemn before the Lord in your generations with an everlasting worship. Psalm 101: He established it to Jacob for a precept, and to Israel for an eternal testament. Likewise Baruch 3: This book of the commandments of God, and the law that is forever.

I deny the consequence, and to the antecedent I say the word eternal is taken in the Scriptures in two ways. First indeed improperly, and for a long and longer time, though finite: thus Psalm 75: Thou shining wonderfully from the everlasting mountains. Second truly properly, for a duration which lacks beginning and end. Now the old law is called eternal in the former manner, because namely it was to endure for a very long time, and through many ages: or it is called perpetual and everlasting, because it was prescribed without a determined time, by which reasoning that is usually called perpetual which is prescribed without term, after the manner in which we said above in the first Disputation that laws properly so called ought to be perpetual. Or the old law is called everlasting and perpetual because by its nature it was indissoluble, nor could it be dissolved except through extrinsic causes and the supreme authority of God; after the manner also in which some thing which lasts only for the life of a man is usually called perpetual, as the bond of matrimony, religious profession, etc. Therefore thus the pact of the old law is called an everlasting covenant, because it could not be dissolved until it should be fulfilled: nor was that law to be abrogated except through the institution of the things which it prefigured, and these once instituted it straightway ceased to signify and prefigure. Or finally it can be said that the Mosaic ceremonial law is eternal and perpetual, not by reason of the signs and in itself, but by reason of the things signified and of the truth which was shadowed forth through them. For by this last reason the Mosaic law can be called perpetual, because the evangelical truths and the mysteries of the Christian faith were figured through those things which the Mosaic law contained, and these will persevere unto the end of the world, nay even into eternity, Christ the Lord saying, Matth. 24. v. 35: Heaven and earth shall pass away, but my words shall not pass. By this reason the Apostle, ad Coloss. 2. v. 11, says circumcision was confirmed and ratified through Christ, and the faithful circumcised in him with a circumcision not made by hand, in the stripping of the body of the flesh, but in the circumcision of Christ, buried with him in baptism. And 1. ad Cor. cap. 5. v. 7 he says the Pasch has been propagated through Christ. For, he says, Christ our pasch is immolated.

You will insist. That which is of divine right in itself is likewise unchangeable and perpetual in itself: but the Mosaic law is of divine right in itself, inasmuch as it was dictated and prescribed by God: therefore etc.

I distinguish the major: that which is of natural divine right is perpetual and unchangeable in itself, because it is founded upon divine holiness and equity — I concede; that which is of positive divine right is in itself perpetual and immutable — I deny. For since it is founded upon the sole will of God, which according to its nod and judgment establishes or changes things, this has no other consistency than what is sought from God's good pleasure, and can thereupon be changed according to his ordination, for he who gave the law by his judgment can revoke it. Moreover the Mosaic law, according to its ceremonial sanctions, is not of natural right but only of positive right, inasmuch as it was not prescribed by God through Moses for all men, nor at all times, but only for the Jewish people, and long after the beginning of things.

You will urge: Those things which are established by the divine will ought also to be steadfast and immutable, otherwise the divine will itself would be subject to variation and change. Therefore even though the Mosaic law was established by the divine will, it ought not the less to be unchangeable.

I distinguish the antecedent: If they are established for the purpose that they persevere forever, I concede; if only that they last for some determined time, I deny. Moreover God had prescribed the Mosaic law in those things which are ceremonial only for a determined time, namely until the truth should come, and the mysteries of the Christian faith succeed, of which the heads of that ceremonial law were types, shadowings, and figures. Whence that law was changed by the immutable will of God, who in that change did not begin to will what he willed not, nor did he cease to will what he willed, but fulfilled his eternal decree and counsel concerning the establishment of the law of grace.

You will add: So far is the Mosaic law from having been removed by the advent of Christ, that rather all the prophecies of the prophets promise the restoration of that law through the Messiah, as may be seen, Deuter. 30. v. 2 and 8, and Ezechiel. cap. 37. v. 24 and 10. Therefore the vigor of that law ought even to subsist together with the Evangelical law.

I answer, most of those oracles are to be understood of the restoration of the commonwealth of the Jews after various captivities, and especially after the Babylonian captivity; whence it is no wonder that in those prophetic oracles there is treated of the restoration of the temple, the altar, the sacrifices, and other rites of the Mosaic law. But if anyone wishes to interpret them of the state of the Church under the Messiah, as some few of those prophecies must be taken, I say those expressions are not to be understood literally; for they are symbolical, not proper: typical, not literal: to be expounded spiritually, and not carnally; so that Israel, in being restored, are the faithful to be regenerated through Christ and loosed from the captivity of the devil, and to be restored to the liberty of the sons of God; the city Jerusalem is the Church, which Saint Ioannes, Apoc. 21. v. 2, calls the holy city, the new Jerusalem; the rites, sacrifices and sacraments to be renewed signify the worship of God, and the sacrifice and sacraments to be frequented in the new law. Therefore while the prophets speak of the recall of the Israelites to their fatherland and their restoration, this can be understood partly literally, of the return from captivity, partly mystically and symbolically, and of the constitution of the Church of the New Testament, which is described through legal terms. For that they cannot simply be understood literally, this is sufficiently evident from the fact that these things have neither been fulfilled hitherto, nor can they be fulfilled, the temple once destroyed, Jerusalem laid waste, and the people dispersed.

You will say 3. A good law ought not to have been changed: yet the old law was good: therefore it ought not to have been changed.

I distinguish the major: a law good and perfect, nor ordered per se to another, ought not to have been changed — I concede; a law imperfect, and which was ordered per se to another more perfect — I deny. Such however was the Mosaic law, which was ordered only toward signifying the Evangelical law, which was sometime to be instituted.

From these things it appears that the old law was wholly abrogated as regards the ceremonial and judicial precepts which were prescribed in it, inasmuch as they had been consigned only for a time, namely unto the advent of the Messiah, since in the synagogue there was in figure the economy of the kingdom of Christ or of the Church; whence all those Mosaic sanctions obtain no further vigor among Christians, except insofar as they are conformable to natural right, or have been renewed and set forth anew through Jesus Christ the Lord himself or the constitutions of the Apostles, or through the edicts of the Church or of Christian princes.

As regards the moral precepts of this law, since they are of a twofold kind — some indeed capital and universal, regarding absolutely all men, as being consonant with the natural law, such as the precepts of the Decalogue; others particular and pertaining only to certain private men or to their particular state, as for instance the equity to be observed by judges, the gifts they must shun, etc., the purity and cleanness of body and soul required of priests, especially when they approach the sacred things, and so on with others — it is certain that the moral precepts of both kinds retain their force even among Christians, both because these are conformable to the dictate of reason and to the natural law, and because they were renewed by Christ or by the Apostles or by the Church. Hence St. Leo, sermon 11, De passione Domini, chapter 5, having declared the abrogation of the ceremonial precepts of the Mosaic law, subjoins: In the moral precepts, however, no decrees of the former Testament have been rejected, but many have been enlarged by the teaching of the Gospel.

From this arises especially the error of the Socinians, who contend that Christ the Lord condemned the moral law as imperfect just as He did the ceremonial and judicial law, or corrected it in certain points as less right, as may be seen in their Racovian catechism, chapters 1 and 2, as well as in Ostorod, De institutione religionis christianae, chapter 22, and Volkel, book 1, De vera religione, chapter 21. To these subscribe the Anabaptists and the Remonstrants — the latter indeed in their apology, chapter 12, the former in the colloquy of Thorn, chapter 1, discussion 10 and 11. All of whom contend that Christ the Lord emended the depraved moral precepts of the Mosaic law, and to prove this they bring forward various additions made by Christ to each of the precepts of the Decalogue, which they think is proved especially from chapter 5 of Matthew, where Christ the Lord, discussing many precepts of the Decalogue as they were in practice among the Jews, indicates how He wills them to be observed when He says: It was said to them of old etc., But I say to you etc. But in those words Christ indeed overthrows the false and erroneous interpretation of the precepts of the Decalogue given by the Scribes and Pharisees, but He does not affix another meaning to the words of the law, nor does He act as a new lawgiver but only as interpreter and vindicator of the law delivered through Moses; and He sets His sayings against, not the sayings or writings of Moses, but those of the Scribes and Pharisees, as they boasted that they had received them from the ancient doctors. This is clear: 1. from Christ's proposition, verse 20, where He speaks of the justice of the Pharisees: Unless your justice abound more than that of the Scribes and Pharisees. Therefore He intends to act against Pharisaic justice, not against the justice commanded by the law of Moses. 2. From His manner of speaking: He does not say, it is written in the law of Moses, or the law said to you, or Moses said to you, but you have heard that it was said to them of old by the Scribes, namely, or by the Pharisees, or of old. And thus He shows that He refutes only the traditions of the ancients, of which mention is made in Matthew 15, and the perverse interpretation of the Scribes and Pharisees, not the very law of Moses. Wherefore He did not emend the law itself, but vindicated it from depraved interpretations and commentaries, restored it to its former splendor and purity, and by adding certain appendices which were implicitly contained in it illustrated it more brightly. That this may be made manifest, each precept must be examined singly.

The first precept concerning divine worship was most wretchedly interpreted by the Scribes and Pharisees as referring to external worship alone, which they placed solely in civil matters, as sacrifices and other signs of ritual. But Christ declared its true and genuine sense when He said, John 4: True adorers shall adore the Father in spirit and in truth.

Likewise the second precept, on not taking the name of God in vain, the Pharisees restricted to perjury on the part of one who had sworn by the name of God, and they loosened the rein for light and rash oaths in everyday speech, as also for oaths by creatures: as if no offense were committed against the law or the Lawgiver by swearing rashly and lightly, or even falsely, provided it were not by the name of God but by the name of some creature. And indeed he who had sworn by the name of God, or by gifts consecrated to God, would be bound; but not he who had sworn by the temple, by the altar, by similar things, Matthew 23, verses 16, 17, 18; such oaths could be made and violated with impunity. Christ rebuked these most false glosses, showing that neither vain and rash oaths are lawful, nor those which are framed by means of creatures, of whatever kind they may be, as appears from these words, Matthew 5, verse 34 and following: But I say to you not to swear at all, neither by heaven, for it is the throne of God: nor by the earth, for it is his footstool: nor by Jerusalem, for it is the city of the great King: neither shalt thou swear by thy head, because thou canst not make one hair white or black. But let your speech be yea, yea: no, no: and that which is over and above is of evil.

Similarly the third precept, whereby it is provided that one must keep free from every work on the sabbath day, which doctors of the law interpreted so badly that they asserted that on that day it was not licit even to perform works of charity for the solace of one's neighbor. Wherefore, when Christ the Lord had cured on the sabbath day a woman who had a spirit of infirmity for eighteen years, the ruler of the synagogue, indignant that this miracle had been wrought on the sabbath, said to the crowd flocking to Christ that they might likewise receive health: There are six days in which you ought to work; in them therefore come, and be healed, and not on the sabbath day. Refuting this most wicked interpretation, Christ the Lord says, Luke 13, verse 15: You hypocrites, doth not everyone among you on the sabbath day loose his ox or his ass from the manger and lead them to water? And ought not this daughter of Abraham, whom Satan hath bound, lo these eighteen years, to be loosed from those bonds on the sabbath day?

The fourth precept, concerning honoring parents, whereby it is established that they must be relieved in necessity, the Pharisees explained thus, that they judged it more fitting that offerings should be made to God than help rendered to parents, and that what could relieve the misfortunes of parents should be expended upon the worship of God. This perverse interpretation of the divine law Christ the Lord thus reproves and corrects, Mark 7: Moses said: Honour thy father and thy mother. And: whosoever shall curse father or mother, dying let him die. But you say: If a man shall say to his father or mother, Corban (which is a gift, whatsoever profit thou mightest have received from me); and further you suffer him not to do anything for his father or mother, making void the word of God by your tradition which you have handed down; and many other such like things you do.

As regards the fifth precept, on avoiding homicide, which the Pharisees thought satisfied if anyone had inflicted upon his neighbor neither death nor a wound; while moreover they deemed it licit to repay injuries with injuries, and to turn enmities into estrangements — but Christ the Lord rebukes this, Matthew 5, verse 21: You have heard that it was said to them of old: Thou shalt not kill. And whosoever shall kill, shall be in danger of the judgment. But I say to you, that whosoever is angry with his brother, shall be in danger of the judgment. And whosoever shall say to his brother, Raca, shall be in danger of the council. And whosoever shall say, Thou fool, shall be in danger of hell fire — by which He proscribes every affection of anger and revenge. Which He again confirms, adding, verse 38: You have heard, He says, that it hath been said, an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth. But I say to you not to resist evil: but if anyone strike thee on thy right cheek, turn to him also the other. Nay more, that He may banish all animosities from His followers, He commands there, verse 44, that enemies are to be loved, that good is to be done to those who hate us, and that prayer is to be offered for those who persecute and calumniate us.

The sixth precept the Pharisees thought themselves to fulfill exactly if they did not invade and defile the bed of their neighbor. But Christ the Lord asserts there, verse 28, that by this precept not only outward filthiness and the defilement of the body through adultery is forbidden, but also the wicked concupiscence of a woman. Whosoever shall look, He says, on a woman to lust after her, hath already committed adultery with her in his heart.

As to the observance of the seventh precept, the Pharisees considered it sufficient if they did not altogether invade the goods of their neighbor; moreover they urged that their own possessions were to be guarded tenaciously and carefully. But Christ the Lord says there, verse 40: And he that will contend with thee in judgment and take away thy coat, let go thy cloak also unto him. And He cuts off every root of avarice and extinguishes the fuel of it when He says, Matthew 6, verses 19 and 20: Lay not up to yourselves treasures on earth, where the rust and moth consume, and where thieves break through and steal. But lay up to yourselves treasures in heaven. Which indeed is done by dispensing generous alms to the poor, and especially by giving them even one's superfluities.

As regards the two last precepts, the Scribes and Pharisees judged that for their observance it sufficed if one did not attempt by study and craft secretly to seize his neighbor's wife and goods and claim them for himself for perverse pleasure and unlawful use. But Christ the Lord pronounces that even the desire of these things is unjust and wicked, saying that these affections must be utterly rooted out from the heart, inasmuch as those concupiscences lurking in the heart contaminate men altogether; for He says, Matthew 15: Things that proceed out of the mouth come forth from the heart, and those things defile a man. For from the heart come forth evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false testimonies, blasphemies.

From all this it appears that Christ the Lord did not abolish but confirmed the observance of the precepts of the Decalogue, and that He interpreted it according to the intention and mind of the divine Legislator and prescribed its legitimate norm, whereby is proscribed the error of the Socinians, who renewing the heresy of the Manichaeans contend that the Decalogue, as well as the other precepts of the Mosaic law, was abolished by Christ the Lord.

Second Conclusion. — The Mosaic Law began to languish and to be weakened by the Birth of Christ, but it died and was extinguished only by his death.

Proof of the first part: First indeed from that of Luke 16: the law and the prophets lasted until John, that is, until the birth of Christ the Lord, they had the force of binding, but especially in those precepts and ceremonies which foreshadowed the nativity and advent of the Messias. It is added that at least some ceremonial precepts of the law were fulfilled through the various mysteries of Christ the Lord wrought before his death was accomplished: namely all those ceremonies which prefigured his miracles and doctrine, especially in cleansing lepers, enlightening the blind, raising the dead, instructing the ignorant, feeding the hungry through the miraculous multiplication of bread and fishes. Finally, baptism instituted by Christ was before his death, and had the power of giving life and remitting original sin, and thereupon the precept of circumcision in part ceased to bind before the Passion of Christ.

The second part is also evident, namely that the Mosaic Law began to die, and was extinguished only by the death of Christ. It is urged, first, because just as when the Priesthood is transferred the law must be transferred, as the Apostle says to the Hebrews 7, so while the Priesthood endures the law must subsist; but the Priesthood of the Mosaic law was not transferred until the passion and death of Christ, as the Apostle affirms to the Hebrews 9, where, having said that Christ entered once into the holies by his own Blood, he concludes: And he is the Mediator of the New Testament, that by means of his death, for the redemption of those transgressions which were under the former Testament, they who are called may receive the promise of eternal inheritance: for where there is a testament, the death of the testator must of necessity intervene. As if he were saying: The Old Testament lost its force only where the New was established: but this was established only by the death of Christ: therefore only by the death of Christ did the Old Testament begin to cease and to die.

Further, Christ even to his death commanded certain precepts of the law to be observed: therefore it is a sign that the law itself still had some force up to the passion of Christ. The antecedent is evident from that of Matth. 8, where Christ, having healed the leper, commanded him to go to the Priest and offer the gift which Moses had prescribed to be offered for cleansed lepers: and Matth. 23 he said: The Scribes and the Pharisees have sat on the chair of Moses: all things therefore whatsoever they shall say to you, observe and do: moreover, on the very day before he suffered he willed to fulfil the precept of eating the Paschal lamb: hence Luke 22 it is said, And the day of the unleavened bread came, on which it was necessary that the pasch should be killed: necessary, I say, by the necessity of a precept, which Christ himself willed to fulfil.

Finally, the Mosaic Law was wholly shadowy and figurative, and therefore it did not cease until all its figures and shadows were fulfilled: but these were not fulfilled until Christ, being about to yield up his last breath, said: It is consummated. Therefore the Mosaic Law, as regards all its precepts, was not entirely extinguished except by the death of Christ: whence deservedly St. Thomas, qu. 103. art. 3. ad secundum: While Christ was preaching and working miracles the Law and the Gospel ran together, because the mystery of Christ had already been begun, but not yet consummated, and for this reason the Lord Christ before his passion commanded the leper to observe the legal ceremonies.

This same truth is confirmed by the fact that at the passion of Christ the Lord the veil of the temple is read to have been rent, Matth. 27, which was truly an indication that the law of Moses had ceased. Hence St. Ambrose lib. 1. in Luc. c. 23: And the veil of the temple is rent, that the profanation of the mysteries of the synagogue might be declared: and St. Augustine sermon 111. De Temp.: The veil of the Temple is rent, he says, because the Synagogue is stripped of honour, the ancient observance dissolved. I said pointedly, however, that the Mosaic law was extinguished only in the death of Christ: for it does not seem to have been utterly extinct before the day of Pentecost, on which the Evangelical law was promulgated. For the Mosaic Law did not cease before the Evangelical began to bind, since the generation of the one is the corruption of the other: according to that of the Apostle to the Ephes. 2: Voiding the law of commandments decreed: that is, excluding the Mosaic law by the Evangelical decrees, as Chrysostom, Theophilactus, and Oecumenius expound in the same place: whereas the Evangelical law did not begin to bind before the day of Pentecost: therefore before that day the Mosaic law did not cease to bind. They suppose the major as certain. But the minor is proved: a law does not bind before its promulgation, as St. Thomas also teaches q. 90. art. 1.; but the Evangelical law was not promulgated before Pentecost: therefore before the day of Pentecost it did not begin to bind. The minor is proved: both because up to the time of Pentecost the Apostles did not set forth the Gospel publicly to the people: and also because, just as the old law was not promulgated except on the fiftieth day from the Passover of the Jews, so the new law ought not to be promulgated except after fifty days from the Passover or Resurrection of Christ. For that the promulgation of the Mosaic law was a figure of the promulgation of the Evangelical law, the holy Fathers teach, above all St. Augustine Epist. 119. and St. Leo Sermon 1. De Pentecoste. The marvellous conformity between the promulgation of each law urges the same point alike. First, for just as the Mosaic law was promulgated on the fiftieth day after the Passover, so also the Evangelical law was promulgated on the fiftieth day from the Resurrection of Christ the Lord, Act. 2. Secondly. Just as that was promulgated on mount Sinai, so this on mount Sion, according to that of Isaias 2: Out of Sion shall go forth the law, and the word of the Lord out of Jerusalem. Thirdly, just as on mount Sinai thunders were heard, and lightnings, and the Angel of God acting as deputy appeared to Moses in the midst of fire: so here suddenly there came a sound from Heaven as of a mighty wind coming, and there appeared parted tongues as it were of fire.

Third Conclusion. — The Mosaic Law was not mortal as soon as it lost its force of binding, but after its abrogation it was licit, though not necessary, for some time to keep its ceremonial precepts.

Proof: That cannot be judged mortal which was practised by the Apostles filled and enlightened with the Holy Spirit: but after the death of Christ, after the promulgation of the Evangelical law on the day of Pentecost, nay after its publication among the Jews and among the Gentiles, the Apostles themselves

practised and frequented the ceremonial precepts of the Mosaic law, although they judged them not necessary to be observed: therefore the observance of the law was not mortal as soon as its obligation was dead. The major stands. The minor is proved by several deeds of the Apostles. First, for Paul, who would not suffer Titus the Gentile to be circumcised lest prejudice be given to the truth of the Gospel, Galat. 2. c., nevertheless Act. 16 circumcised Timothy, born of a Jewish mother and a Gentile father, and c. 18 shaved his head at Cenchrea after the manner of the Nazarites: and c. 21 he purified himself with the Jews that he might conciliate them to himself, and having purified himself with them he entered into the temple. Moreover, St. James, who at Act. 15. had gone over to the opinion of Peter, namely that those converted from the Gentiles to Christ should not be burdened with the heavy yoke of the law, the same at Act. 21. gave counsel to Paul that he should present himself, purified together with others, to the levitical Priest, evidently that he might turn aside the envy and emulation of newly converted Jews; for he addresses him thus by the counsel of the elders: Thou seest, brother, how many thousands there are in Judea that have believed, and all are zealots of the law: now they have heard of thee that thou teachest those Jews who are among the Gentiles to depart from Moses, saying that they ought not to circumcise their children, nor walk according to the custom. What is it then? and the multitude must needs come together: for they will hear that thou art come. This therefore do as we say to thee: There are four men with us having a vow on themselves: take these, and sanctify thyself with them, and bestow on them that they may shave their heads: and all will know that the things which they have heard of thee are false, but thou thyself walkest keeping the law.

But that James judged this observance of the law not to be necessary, but merely licit, is evident from what he subjoins: But as touching the Gentiles that believe, we have written, decreeing that they abstain from things sacrificed to idols, and from blood, and from things strangled, and from fornication. Finally, all the Apostles also coming together in Council Act. c. 15. decreed that Christians should abstain from blood and things strangled: but abstinence from blood and things strangled was one of the legal ceremonies: therefore the Apostles did not judge the observance of the old law to be mortal as soon as its force and obligation were dead. This truth the resolution of the following little question will demonstrate more clearly.

You ask: what sort, and how great, was the controversy and disputation of St. Augustine with St. Jerome concerning legal observance after the promulgation of the Evangelical law?

I answer 1. That it was indeed of the gravest kind, as is evident from the letters which the two holy Fathers wrote to one another on this subject: for when St. August. had read the Commentary of St. Jerome upon the Epistle to the Galatians, and had noticed that he contended that what is narrated in chapter 2 concerning the reprehension of Peter by Paul, because the latter usurped legal observances, and separated himself from the Gentiles recently converted at Antioch, so as to live after the manner of a Jew with the Jews who had come from Jerusalem to Antioch by way of James: which, I say, St. Jerome wished that reprehension not to have been serious, but simulated, nor did the Apostle observe the legal rites seriously, but only in simulation, lest namely it be a scandal to the Jews newly converted; St. Augustine receiving this gravely, thus writes to him in Epistle 9.

In the exposition of the Epistle of Paul to the Galatians we find something that moves us greatly: for if officious lies should be admitted to the Holy Scriptures, what authority will remain to them? What sentence at length will be passed upon those Scriptures, by whose weight the wickedness of contentious falsehood may be undermined? For immediately when he has brought it forth: if he thinks otherwise, who strives against it: he will say that what has been brought forth was lied by the writer out of some honest duty. Wherefore since he had disapproved that sentiment of St. Jerome in many words, and had said: Therefore he also (Peter) was truly corrected, and Paul spoke truth, lest Holy Scripture, which has been published to posterity unto the end, its authority being admitted to falsehood, totter throughout and waver in doubt. At length he concludes: Wherefore lay hold, I beseech thee, of that ingenuous and truly Christian severity with charity for correcting and amending that work; and sing, as it is called, the palinode, for the truth of the Christians is incomparably more beautiful than Helena of the Greeks.

But when St. Jerome had received this Epistle together with two others written by the same St. Augustine, he indeed took it gravely and bitterly, that St. Augustine challenged him to sing the palinode: wherefore he wrote back to him the Epistle which is number eleven among those of Augustine, in which he censures the same St. August. not lightly, and endeavors with many arguments to persuade that the Apostles observed the legal rites only in simulation, and so that St. Paul reprehended Peter. Whence after many things he thus concludes the Epistle: I enjoin at the end of the Epistle that you compel not an old man now resting, and already a veteran, to serve as a soldier, and again to hazard his life, you who are young, and established in the summit of the Pontificate, teach the peoples, and enrich with our fruits of Africa the Roman roofs. It suffices me to whisper with a poor hearer and reader in a corner of the Monastery.

Therefore the sum of this controversy between the two Fathers was, that although they agreed among themselves in three points: First, that the observance of the legal rites, whether feigned or serious, was in some way licit after the death of Christ: Second, that it was not necessary, nor had force or efficacy unto salvation: Third, that after the sufficient preaching of the Gospel this observance at length became deadly: nevertheless they disagreed with one another chiefly in four points. For first St. Hieron. judged that two periods were to be distinguished, one before the Passion of Christ, in which the legal rites were not dead, but still retained some obligatory force, and likewise expiatory force in their own way; nor were they deadly either, because those observing them did not sin: The other after the Passion of Christ, in which the legal rites were not only dead, nor possessed any force of obliging or efficacy, but were even deadly, namely such that whosoever observed them sinned mortally: whence he thus addresses St. Augustine: Paul kept the ceremonies of the Jews when he was already an Apostle of Christ, and do you say they are not pernicious to those who wish to keep them as they received them from their Parents? I on the contrary will speak, and with the world protesting, pronounce with free voice, that the ceremonies of the Jews are both pernicious and deadly to Christians, and whosoever shall have observed them, whether of the Jews or of the Gentiles, him I hurl into the pit of the devil. For the end of the law is Christ, unto justice for every one that believeth, namely Jew and Gentile; neither shall there be an end unto justice for every one that believeth, if the Jew is excepted. Indeed however Augustine wished three periods to be distinguished, one before the Passion of Christ, in which the legal rites were neither dead, nor deadly: another after the time of the sufficient promulgation of the Gospel, in which the legal rites are dead and deadly, namely because from this time they could not be observed without mortal sin: but the third was the intermediate period, namely from the Passion of Christ until the sufficient publication of the Gospel, during which period indeed the legal rites were dead, because they neither had any force, nor was anyone bound to observe them by precept: yet were they not deadly, because those who had been converted from the Jews to Christ could during that period keep the legal rites, provided they did not think them necessary unto salvation, as if without the legal rites the faith of Christ could not justify. Second, St. Jerome deemed that the Apostles never according to truth kept the legal rites, but simulated that they kept them, that they might avoid the scandal of those who were of the circumcision: which indeed doing they did not delude others, because they performed this not with a mind of keeping the legal rites, but on account of other causes, just as if someone now abstained from blood and things strangled because it was adverse to his health: St. Augustine held on the contrary that the Apostles kept the legal rites sincerely, yet did not place in them the hope of salvation, as if they were necessary unto salvation: and this indeed they did, not with the cunning of one lying, but with the affection of one compassionate, not with simulation of deceit, but with compassion of mercy. That this was done, the Apostle said in 1 Cor. 9.: I became to the Jews a Jew, that I might gain the Jews: that is, says Augustine Epist. 9., he acts like a sick man who ministers, who does not lie in pretending that he has fevers, but with a mind sympathizing considers how he would wish to be ministered unto, were he himself sick: For certainly he was a Jew, but having become a Christian, he had not abandoned the sacraments of the Jews, which that people fittingly received, and in their lawful season when it behooved: finally he had abandoned their celebration, being already an Apostle of Christ, that he might teach they were not pernicious to those who wished to keep them as received from their Parents through the law, even when they had believed in Christ: nevertheless they no longer placed in them the hope of salvation, since through the Lord Jesus that salvation had come which those sacrifices signified. Third, St. Jerome deemed that Peter in that dissimulation, by which he is said to have compelled the Gentiles to judaize, taught not by the command of one teaching, but by the example of his conversation, says St. August. which, I say, St. Peter by this inducement did not sin: because he did this from a motive of charity, lest namely it be a scandal to the Jews. But St. Augustine on the contrary deemed that St. Peter sinned, venially however, namely on account of too little discerning an adherence to the party of the Jews, in order to avoid namely their scandal. Hence St. Hieron. thought that St. Augustine did not depart far from his own opinion, thus writing: Nor does it much matter between my opinion and yours: because I say that both Peter and Paul exercised, nay simulated the commands of the law through fear of the Jewish faithful: But you assert they acted clemently, not with the cunning of one lying, but with the affection of one compassionate, provided it stand firm that, whether through fear or mercy, they simulated being what they were not. Fourthly at length St. Jerome deemed that Paul did not truly reprehend Peter, but only in simulation, just as Peter himself only in simulation kept the legal rites; so that as Peter, unwilling to scandalize the Jews, simulated that he kept the legal rites, so Paul, lest he scandalize the Gentiles, wished to reprehend Peter, whereby he signified that he did not approve what Peter did, and thus by convention and pact each provided for the faithful committed to themselves: Peter indeed to the Jews, but Paul to the Gentiles. But St. August. on the contrary deemed that Paul truly reprehended Peter, and not in simulation: and although Peter sinned venially in keeping the legal rites, because thence arose scandal among the Gentiles, from whom he withdrew himself: nevertheless Paul did not sin in reprehending Peter, because from his reprehension no scandal arose. These things having been thus premised,

I answer 2. that the Apostles did not observe the legal rites with a feigned and simulated mind, nay, nor could they observe them. The prior part of this response stands from what has been said; and moreover it is proved, because no argument of such simulation exists in the Scriptures, nay the contrary is gathered from this, that Paul at the counsel of James and of the elders sanctified himself with four men. The motive of which counsel indeed was, that by this rite Paul might show that he did not teach a secession from Moses; whence James subjoined: And let all know that the things which they have heard of thee are false: but walk thou thyself keeping the law. But that counsel was not given to Paul, that he should merely simulate his sanctification with the four men; but that he should sanctify himself simply; for, says St. Augustine epistola 19., If he had truly been so reprobated as he had been rumored, and therefore undertook the celebration, that by a simulated action he could conceal his opinion: James would not say, and let all know: but would say, and all will think, that the things which they have heard of thee are false: especially since in Jerusalem itself the Apostles had already decreed that no one should compel the Gentiles to judaize; but they would not decree that no one should then prohibit the Jews from judaizing, although Christian doctrine compelled not even them to judaize. The second part of the response is also evident: for that cannot licitly be done which would have annexed to it falsehood, irreligion and scandal: but these three would have been found in the simulated observance of the legal rites by the Apostles. Falsehood indeed, for one is held to lie as often as he assumes false signs to insinuate a false opinion with an intention of deceiving: whereas if the Apostles had kept the legal rites with a feigned mind, they would have assumed false signs to insinuate a false opinion with an intention of deceiving: for if they had used the legal rites, that they might persuade that through those legal rites they worshipped religiously, while nevertheless their mind was not of worshipping God with such cult: therefore they would truly have lied. There would have been likewise irreligion in the very act: for then is irreligion, when someone assumes the rite of a false religion with that mind, that others may believe him to follow that false religion as true: whence it is a sin against religion to assume even the external distinctive signs of pseudo-religion: hence very many are numbered among the Martyrs, and are venerated by the faithful, because they refused to offer incense to idols: but if it had been licit to do this with a feigned mind, they would not have merited veneration as Martyrs, but contempt as homicides and the malediction of men; wherefore lib. 2. Machab. c. 6. the elder Eleazar rightly deservedly, when he was solicited by his friends that he should simulate having eaten swine's flesh, as the King had commanded, that by this deed he might be delivered from death; answered with generous mind, saying that he wished to be sent to hell: For it is not worthy of our age, that many of the adolescents thinking Eleazar of ninety years to have passed over to the life of foreigners, themselves also on account of my simulation, and on account of the malice of a corruptible life their time be cut short: and thereby I bring upon my old age a stain and execration. But if the Apostles had kept the deadly legal rites with a feigned mind, they would have assumed the rite of a false religion with that mind, that others believe them to have followed that false religion as true.

Finally, as regards scandal it is proved: he gives scandal to another, who confirms him by his example in the working of evil, or induces others by his example to do evil: whereas if the legal rites were deadly in the time of the Apostles before the sufficient publication of the Gospel, the Apostles would by their example have confirmed the Jews in the observance of the legal rites, which was evil, seeing that it was deadly. By their example also they would have provoked the Gentiles to a similar observance, who would deservedly have believed that what they recognized as assumed by the Apostles was to be assumed by themselves from religion. Nor indeed did the Apostles give scandal when they observed them sincerely. Not to the Jews, before whose eyes they signified that they assumed them for this reason, not as though they were necessary for attaining salvation, but that with honor they might conduct the Synagogue to the tomb, nor detest her as idolatry is to be detested, since God commanded that one, Satan persuaded this: and that as they ought not to be sought as necessary, so neither ought they be condemned as sacrilegious. Not to the Gentiles, because they signified to them that they bestowed honor on God with such cult for this reason, that they themselves had been taken from the Jews, among whom the old law no longer flourished, was good then when it was observed, now dead, but not deadly, whereas on the contrary the cult of idols always brought death.

It is confirmed. 1. Because no other reason can be brought why it is now not licit to keep the legal rites even with a feigned mind, than that they are now deadly: therefore if in the time of the Apostles before the publication of the Gospel they were deadly, not even with a feigned mind was it licit for the Apostles to keep them. Secondly, because it is not licit to simulate Gentilism, because it is something deadly: therefore neither equally was it licit for the Apostles to simulate Judaism, which was deadly. But St. Augustine urges this reason epist. 19:

Why, he says, is it not licit for me to say that the Apostle Paul, and other Christians of right faith, ought then by observing those old Sacraments a little to commend them reverently? Those observances of prophetic signification, guarded by the most pious fathers, would be accounted by posterity as diabolical sacrileges to be detested: for already, when faith had come, which was first announced in those observances, and revealed after the death and resurrection of the Lord, they had lost as it were the life of their office; nevertheless like the lifeless bodies of dear ones they were in a manner to be conducted with offices of necessity to burial, not simulated, but religious: nor yet straightway to be cast aside, or exposed to the calumnies of enemies as to the bites of dogs. Therefore now whosoever of Christians, even though he be of the Jews, shall will to celebrate them in like manner, digging up as it were their sleeping ashes, shall not be a pious mourner of the dead, or bearer of the body, but an impious violator of sepulture.

You will say with St. Jerome:

But either the legal rites were good and brought salvation, or they were not; if they brought not salvation, why are they observed? but if they are to be observed, surely they bring salvation, especially because when observed they make martyrs: for they would not be observed, unless they brought salvation: nor are they indifferent between good and evil, as the Philosophers dispute: continence is good, luxury is evil; indifferent between both is to walk, to cleanse the refuse of the belly, to cast forth the > refuse of the head and nostrils, to throw rheums with spittle. This is neither good nor evil: whether you have done it, or not done it, you will have neither justice nor injustice. But to observe the ceremonies of the law cannot be indifferent, but either it is evil, or it is good: you say good, I assert evil, and evil not only to those who believed from the Jewish people. In this place (unless I am mistaken), while you avoid one thing, you fall into another. For while you fear Porphyry blaspheming, you run into the snares of Hebion, decreeing to those who believe from the Jews that the law is to be observed.

St. Augustine answers Epist. 19. that the legal precepts immediately after the death of Christ our Lord could be said to be neither good nor evil.

But why, he says, should I not say that those precepts of the ancient Sacraments were neither good, because men are not justified by them, for they are shadows foreshadowing the grace by which we are justified; nor yet evil, because they are precepts divinely given, suited to the times and to the persons: since the Prophetic utterance also aids me, wherein God says that He gave to that people precepts that were not good: perhaps for this reason He did not call them evil, but only not good, that is, not such that by them men become good, or that without them they do not become good. If anyone, a holy Oriental in mere pretence, when he comes to Rome, fast on the Sabbath, except on that day of the Paschal vigil? But if we have said thus, we shall condemn not only the Roman Church, but also many places near to her, and somewhat more remote, where the same custom is observed and remains. If, however, we have thought it an evil not to fast on the Sabbath, shall we with rashness accuse so many Churches of the East, and much more of the Christian world? Does it please you, that we say there is a certain middle thing, which nevertheless is acceptable to him who does it not in pretence, but with fitting fellowship and without superstition? And yet we read nowhere in the Canonical books that this was ever commanded to Christians: how much less do I dare to call that evil which I cannot deny by the very Christian faith that God commanded, because I have learned that men are not justified thereby, but by the grace of God through Jesus Christ our Lord? I say therefore that circumcision of its proper time, and other things of this kind, were given by God to the former people through the Testament which is called Old, for the signification of things to come, which had need to be fulfilled through Christ; upon whose coming those things remained for Christians only to be read, for the understanding of the Prophecy set forth before, but not to be necessarily done, as though there were yet to be awaited the coming of the revelation of faith, of which these things signified that they were signs. But although they were not to be imposed upon the Gentiles, yet they ought not so to have been taken away from the custom of the Jews as things detestable and to be condemned. Gradually therefore, and little by little, while the sound preaching of the grace of Christ burned fervently, whereby alone believers knew that they were justified and made saved, not by those shadows of things before future, then already coming and present — so that in the vocation of those Jews whom the presence of the Lord's flesh and the Apostolic times found thus situated, all that action would be consumed, this sufficing to them concerning the shadows for their commendation, so that it was not shunned as detestable and like unto idolatry, but beyond that it should have no further progress as though salvation were from it, or could not be without it. This the heretics thought, who, while they wish to be both Jews and Christians, can be neither Jews nor Christians; whose opinion, although I have never been in it, you have deigned to admonish me most benevolently to guard against.

In this indeed St. Jerome seems not to have attained the mind of St. Augustine in the earlier Epistles: for from the fact that St. Augustine asserted that the legal observances were licitly used by the Apostles, thence St. Jerome judges that he wished them to be still licit even after the sufficient promulgation of the Gospel; for the reason that Augustine had not determined the time within which the observance of Legal rites could licitly be done, as he himself indicates in Epist. 19, saying:

I confess indeed, in what my Epistle contains, that for this reason Paul had undertaken to celebrate the sacraments of the Jews when he was already an Apostle of Christ, to teach that they were not pernicious to those who wished to keep them, as they had received them from their parents through the law, in that I placed less [weight] upon that time only, in which the grace of faith was first revealed, for then this was not pernicious; but with the progress of time it was pernicious, unless those observations were abandoned by Christian men: lest if they were then done, there would be no discerning what God commanded His people through Moses from that which the unclean spirit does in the temples of demons, etc. Therefore rather my negligence is to be blamed, because I did not add this, than your rebuke.

You ask 2. Whether Peter was truly reprehensible, and truly, and not in pretence, rebuked by Paul?

I affirm; and it is proved first from chapter 2 of the Epistle to the Galatians, where St. Paul says: But when Cephas was come to Antioch, I withstood him to the face, because he was to be blamed. And afterwards: When I saw that they walked not uprightly unto the truth of the Gospel, I said to Cephas etc. Before which words indeed he had premised in chapter 1: Now the things which I write to you, behold, before God, I lie not. For if it is true that nothing false is contained in Sacred Scripture, it is true that Peter was deservedly to be blamed, and truly rebuked by Paul. Whence Augustine, Epist. 19:

If Peter did this, which he ought to have done, Paul lied, in that he saw him not walking uprightly unto the truth of the Gospel. For whoever does what he ought to do, certainly does rightly, and he says the same thing falsely of him who says that he did not do rightly what he knew he ought to have done. But if Paul wrote truly, it is true that Peter was not walking uprightly unto the truth of the Gospel: therefore he was doing that which he ought not to have done. And if Paul himself had already done any such thing, I would believe rather that, being corrected, he could not neglect the correction of his fellow-apostle, than that he set down anything mendaciously in his Epistle: and if not in any Epistle whatsoever, how much more in that one in which he had premised: now the things which I write to you, behold, before God, I lie not?

It is proved secondly; because he is reprehensible who by his example induces others to do that to which they are not bound as though they were bound to it, and so becomes to them the cause of scandal: but Peter by his example was inducing the Gentiles to judaize, as though that were necessary which nevertheless had been decreed not necessary for them in the Council of the Apostles: for the matter stood thus: Peter was conversing with the Gentiles converted to the faith, using their foods indifferently, and that by the instinct of the Holy Spirit, who had said to him: What God hath cleansed, that call not thou common. Acts 10. But when afterwards the Jews had come to him from James, zealous for the legal observances, he withdrew himself from the Gentiles, and separated himself from them, because he feared these Jews, pretending himself to be of their opinion. By his example Barnabas, and the other Jews who were at Antioch, likewise separated themselves from the Gentiles in food. Then the Gentiles were troubled, as though the yoke of the law were being laid upon them: whence and do you not judge, how you compel the Gentiles to judaize? Not indeed by command, but by the example of his own conduct. Hence arose the occasion of the reproof, because although Peter had been instructed by God concerning the non-distinction of foods, he nevertheless feigned the contrary: thence followed the scandal of the Gentiles.

You will object 1. This happened after the grace of the Holy Spirit had been received by the Apostles on the very day of Pentecost: but from that time the Apostles sinned in no way: therefore it is false that Peter was then reprehensible: for no one is reprehensible except on account of sin.

I answer. From the day on which the Apostles received the Holy Spirit, they no longer sinned with mortal sin; because they were confirmed in grace: moreover they sinned venially, because they were not confirmed in good. But the sin of St. Peter was a venial vice of conduct, not of doctrine, as Tertullian speaks, book 4 against Marcion, chapter 3, of superstitious pretence, from which followed the scandal of the Gentiles.

You will object 2. It is not likely that Paul argued this in earnest against Peter, which he himself judged could be done legitimately, nay, and had done: but Paul had observed the legal rites for fear of offending the Jews, and had been made a Jew to the Jews and all things to all men, that he might gain all. With what face therefore, says St. Jer., with what boldness does Paul blame in another what he himself committed? Hence he had premised:

O blessed Apostle Paul, who didst reprehend in Peter the pretence whereby he withdrew himself from the Gentiles for fear of the Jews, who had come from James, why art thou compelled to circumcise Timothy, the son of a Gentile woman, and himself a Gentile — for he was not a Jew, since he was not circumcised — against thy own judgment? Thou wilt answer me: on account of the Jews who were in those places. If therefore thou forgivest thyself in the circumcision of a disciple coming from the Gentiles, forgive also Peter thy predecessor, that he did some things for fear of the believing Jews.

St. Augustine answers that the observance of legal rites was not equal in the two Apostles; for, he says, Peter kept them with the cunning of one dissembling, but Paul with the affection of one who sympathized; for Paul circumcised Timothy, lest the Jews, and especially those of his maternal kindred who had believed in Christ from among the Gentiles, might seem thus to detest circumcision, as idolatry is to be detested, since God had commanded the former to be done, whereas Satan persuaded the latter: and he did not circumcise Titus for this reason, lest he should give occasion to those who said that believers could not be saved without any circumcision, and boasted that Paul also held this opinion, to the deception of the Gentiles. Therefore Paul performed all these things out of the affection of one who sympathized, namely lest they should prove a stumbling-block either to the Jews or to the Gentiles; but Peter did not so, but acted in order that he might pretend to zeal for the law and the observance of legal rites together with the Jews; for, as St. Thomas says, q. 103, art. 1, ad 2: Peter did not sin in this, that he observed the legal rites for a time, because this was permitted him as one converted from among the Jews; but he sinned in this, that he showed too great diligence in the observance of legal rites, lest he should scandalize the Jews, so that from this there would follow the scandal of the Gentiles: whereas Paul exercised a moderate diligence in things legal, because he made use of them only lest he might be judged to condemn the synagogue, and that he might bury it with honor.

You will object 3. An inferior cannot licitly rebuke a superior: but Paul was inferior to Peter, who had been instituted by Christ the prince of the Apostles, that he might confirm the others: therefore etc. — St. Augustine answers in Epistle 19 that an inferior indeed cannot rebuke a superior by way of reprehension exercised through authority, which he grants; by way of the liberty of charity, which he denies. His words are:

But Peter himself received what was being done by Paul profitably in the liberty of charity, with holy and kindly piety of humility, and afforded to posterity a holier and rarer example, that they should not disdain to be corrected even by their juniors, if perchance at any time they should have left the path of rectitude; than Paul, that they might confidently dare, even the lesser against the greater, to resist at least in fraternal charity, for the defense of Evangelical truth. There is therefore praise of just liberty in Paul, and of holy humility in Peter.

Moved surely by this example, Augustine at the end of the same Epistle thus beseeches St. Jerome:

I ask the same of you in turn, that you correct me confidently, wherever you shall perceive that I have need of this; for although according to the titles of honors which the usage of the Church has now established, the Episcopate is greater than the priesthood, yet in many things Augustine is less than Jerome, although even correction from anyone lesser is not to be shunned nor disdained.

You ask: whether he who was rebuked by Paul was truly Peter the prince of the Apostles: or some other, seeing that he is not named Peter there, but Cephas?

I answer 1. To some it seems that that Cephas rebuked by Paul was one of the 72 disciples. So judge Dorotheus in his Synopsis, and Clement of Alexandria as cited by Eusebius, book 1, History, chapter 12. They rest upon this ground, that St. Luke in the Acts of the Apostles does not recount the coming of Peter to Antioch, in which city nevertheless he was who was rebuked by Paul.

I answer 2. It appears more true that that Cephas rebuked by Paul was truly Peter the prince of the Apostles: because this Cephas, who was rebuked, is said in the same place, together with James and John, to be a pillar of the Church, and to have given the right hands to Paul and Barnabas: but another besides Peter the prince of the Apostles does not seem able to be joined to James and John, so as to be called a pillar with them, whereby the Church was especially upheld; whereupon the opinion of the other holy Fathers appears more true, who judged that that Cephas was truly Peter the prince of the Apostles.