Seventh, one must consult the ancient and more recent interpreters.
Seventh, one must consult the ancient and more recent interpreters.
§ 537. (VII) In our interpretation of Scripture we both can and should use gratefully the efforts of the ancients, as well as the more recent teachers of the Church. This rule is set forth by the apostle: “Do not despise prophesying” (1 Thess. 5:20). You see, because God distributes to each His gifts as He wishes (1 Cor. 12:11), to which the gift of prophecy also belongs, we should reverently acknowledge, therefore, the gifts of God in others and gratefully use their assistance in the interpretation of Scripture. One should not think that the witness of an earlier age has been preserved for us in vain. Instead, their witness has been preserved in order to be an aid for searching out the meaning of Scripture and to confirm the spirits of the devout when the true meaning has been grasped from Holy Writ. Philipp, in a letter to a friend: “Although faith does not depend upon human authority but on God’s Word, nevertheless, because Scripture wants the stronger to strengthen the weak, it does help to have the witness of the Church in every kind of temptation. Just as we freely consult the living whom we consider to have some experience of spiritual matters, so also do I think that we must consult the ancients whose writings are approved. There are also other reasons why I do not hold the witness of the ancients in contempt, for I think that the Church has universally perceived what they wrote. Nor is it safe to depart from the common position of the ancient Church.”
These are the principal rules that must be observed in the true and genuine interpretation of Scripture. In our Meth. studii theol., part 3, sect. 4, c. 2, we discussed in detail the proclamation of the true meaning that has been found and how the preacher should make an application of it in the ecclesiastical homilies for the salvation of his listeners.
85 Read with Cotta, who adds Hieronymum.