Chapter 3 (137): 1. He Returns To Charity, In Order To Add How The Whole Law
150 | THE SENTENCES, BOOK 3
7. AUGUSTINE. "Why then may not all sins be called equal? Perhaps because one who sins more gravely transgresses more against charity than one who sins less gravely. For no one sins, except by going against charity, which is the fullness of the Law.' And so it is rightly said: Whoever offends against one [of the commandments], becomes guilty of all of them, that is, he acts against charity, from which hang all the commandments."
Chapter 3 (137)
1. HE RETURNS TO CHARITY, IN ORDER TO ADD HOW THE WHOLE LAW
HANGS FROM IT. Since there are two commandments of charity, from which, as has been set out earlier,' hangs the whole Law and the Prophets, we must address how this may be, since in the Law and the Prophets there were many ceremonial precepts which, if they had pertained to the sanctification of charity, it would seem ought never to have ceased.
But because they were not established for the sake of justification, which charity brings about, but as a prefiguring of what was to come, and they were imposed as a burden,' once truth came shining out, they ceased as if a shadow.* And yet even the ceremonial precepts, according to the spiritual understanding which they contain, and all the moral ones are referred to charity. For they all pertain to the ten commandments written on the tablets," where a summation of all of them is briefly related, and from these ten emanate all the others; in the same way, in the Lord's sermon on the mount eight virtues are set forth,° and all the rest are referred to these.
And just as all the rest of the commandments are referred to the ten of the Decalogue, so these same ten are referred to the two commandments of charity.' And so all the commandments pertain to the two of charity, because they are fulfilled through charity, and they must be referred to charity as to their end.*
2. AUGUSTINE, IN THE BOOK ON CHRISTIAN DOCTRINE. Hence Augustine:
"Charity, by which we love God and our neighbour and which is the root of all goods, possesses the whole greatness and breadth of God's utterances. And so Truth says: On these two commandments hangs the whole
°Rom. 13, 10.
°Augustine, Epistola 167, c5 nn16-17.
In cl and in dist. 27 c2.
"Mt. 22, 40.
°Cf. Hebr. 10, 1; Act. 15, 28, "Ci Col 2, 16-19:
°The commandments are treated in the next distinction.
OMtnos sale:
"See above, dist. 27 c2.
*Cf. Rom2135.10; 48 Tims 15.
Distinction XXXVI | 151 Law and the Prophets.' And so, if there is no time to examine all the holy
Pages and to unroll all the rolls of sermons, keep charity, from which they all depend,"'® because it is the perfection and end of them all.—AUGuSsTINE, IN THE ENCHIRIDION: "For it is then that precepts and counsels are rightly done, when they are referred to loving God, and our neighbour for the sake of God. Whatever is done out of fear of punishment or some other carnal intention, so that it is not referred to charity, is not at all done as it ought to be, even though it seems to be so done."''—AUGUSTINE, TO ANASTASIUS: "For he is an enemy of justice who does not sin because of fear of punishment; but he is a friend [of justice] who does not sin because of love of it."!7—AUGUSTINE, IN THE BOOK ON CHRISTIAN DOCTRINE: "And so this is the summation of all [that we have been saying], that love of God and neighbour be understood as the fullness of the Law and of all divine Scripture.""'
DISTINCTION XXXVII
Chapter | (138)
1. ON THE TEN COMMANDMENTS: HOW THEY ARE CONTAINED IN THE TWO
COMMANDMENTS OF CHARITY. But we must now consider the division of the Decalogue, which is fulfilled in the two mandates.—AUGUSTINE, ON THE TEN CHORDS: "For the Decalogue has ten precepts, which form a tenchorded lute.' They are arranged in such a way that the three which are on the first tablet pertain to God, namely to the knowledge and love of the Trinity; the seven which are on the second tablet pertain to the love of neighbour."
2. ON THE FIRST PRECEPT. The first on the first tablet is: You shall not have strange gods; you shall not make for yourself a graven thing, nor any likeness, etc Origen says that these are two commandments,' but Augustine [says there is] only one. For he explains that which said, You shall not have strange gods, more completely with the prohibition against worshipping an image, namely an idol or a likeness of any thing.—
ORIGEN. Origen says that the distinction between these is that an idol is °Mt. 22, 40.
'° Augustine, more accurately, Sermo 350, n2.
'! Augustine, Enchiridion, c121.
' Augustine, Epistola 145, n4.
'5 Augustine, De doctrina christiana, bk | c35 n39.
ICf Ps..143, 9, ? Augustine, Sermo 9, cc5-6.
3Ex. 20, 3-4; Deut. 5, 7-8.
'Origen, /n Exodum, hom. 8 n2.