Seventh, from a deduction to the absurd.
Seventh, from a deduction to the absurd.
§ 421. (VII) If Scripture is not clear in handing down the necessary things, the consequence will be: (1) That it is incorrectly called a light and a lamp. (2) That God was either unwilling or unable to speak clearly in Scripture. (3) That one cannot learn from Scripture the way to reach eternal life. (4) That the writings of the fathers are much clearer than Scripture itself, though they prove or try to prove or are bound to prove everything from Scripture. (5) That Scripture could not have been understood before the fathers wrote their commentaries. (6) That the purpose has failed that the prophets had set for themselves in recording Scripture, which is “to make wise unto eternal life.” All these, however, are absurd. Therefore that, too, is absurd from which such consequences follow.
Bellarmine’s exceptions are as follows: (1) “We must distinguish between clarity with respect to the truth of matters and with respect to the words.” He says: “The fathers confirm their statements with the testimonies of the Scriptures because what we have in Scripture is better known to be true than what we have in the fathers. Nevertheless the same fathers illustrate Scripture with their commentaries because the words of Scripture are less clear than those of the fathers.” We respond. The fathers do not shed light onto Scripture but borrow light from Scripture for their commentaries. In clear and perspicuous statements of Scripture there is set forth the analogy of faith, according to which we must examine every dictum of the fathers and from which light is drawn for the more obscure passages. Thus the commentaries of the fathers do not prove an obscurity of Scripture in teaching what is necessary but only a difficulty of certain passages of Scripture covered with obscurities, which difficulty the work of interpreters removes not by bringing in light from a different source but from the light sought in Scripture itself.
(2) “Before the commentaries of the ancients were published, the fathers of the first Church went to the living apostles and did not wish to understand Scripture on the basis of their own ability.” We respond. It is one thing to want to understand Scripture on the basis of one’s own ability, but it is another to draw the meaning of truth from Scripture itself. We disapprove the former; we commend the latter. The former ought never happen; the latter could have happened even before the fathers wrote their commentaries. For example, when the Epistle to the Romans was transmitted by Phoebe, the church of Rome at that time certainly read and understood it without commentaries. It is certain that there was a time when the apostles had already died and when the early Church read and understood the Scriptures without commentaries. No one can be brought forward who wrote commentaries on Divine Writ before Origen, who lived two hundred years after Christ. Bellarmine reports from Jerome, Catal. illustr. viror.: “Justin and Irenaeus wrote commentaries on Revelation.” But Revelation was not the only book extant at that time, was it? Or could not the rest of the books have been read and understood as far as necessary dogmas are concerned without commentaries? Jerome says, “They had interpreted Revelation.” This can be taken as the explanation of some less clear passages. What they excelled at will be apparent from the fact that they embraced the error of the Chiliasts.