CHAPTER VIII
CHAPTER VIII
SECOND PoINT OF THE THIRD ANSWER, IN WHICH
LEVITICAL AND ECCLESIASTICAL OWNERSHIP OF
WEALTH ARE SHOWN Not To BE ConTRARY TO
THE PERFECTION OF PovERTY, WHILE COMMEN-~
DATION OF WEALTH AS SuCH Is PRovED UNSAFE
e|N TIMES past, so distasteful was the f| "hateful good"? of poverty to the sensibility of mortals that, before the coming of Christ, there is hardly found a perfect man to recognize its perfection.
After Christ, however, it was admired Zaz %zdG| so greatly by men both spiritual and wise that Gaca is hardly found a heretic so perverse as to dare attack its worth—except, perhaps, a certain Vigilantius, who must have been sleeping, as the holy doctor
Jerome said of him in jest long ago,'f but who seems to have remained awake in this no less wicked man, in this new enemy of poverty.{ He has been spewing venom from his heart against the state of poverty and against the support of the Mendicants. Placing as he does abundant temporal goods at the summit of perfection, and accusing of imperfection and superstition the state of voluntary poy~ erty, he proves himself a disciple of the man who calumniated the Orders of preaching and mendicant poor in a defamation which was condemned later by the Apostolic
+ ''Vigilantius'' means 'The Watchful One."' Jerome writes that he should have been called "Dormitantius," 'The Sleepy One." t Gerard of Abbeville.
DEFENSE OF THE MENDICANTS
See.t With no small temerity, he supports the innocence of this man, recommending and approving his doctrine, thus gravely insulting the same Apostolic See— since asserting that the author of a condemned defamation is innocent amounts to reproving the judgment of the condemning authority.
2. In the very beginning of his Second Book, he rises against the Pastor of the Church. In order to attack more cruelly this Pastor's flock of poor men, he arms himself first with the weapon of Levitical ownership. The crux of his argument consists in this, that since the form of perfection existed originally in the Levites— to whom the Lord attributed tithes, and first-fruits, and offerings, and cities wherein to live, and the fields around them to feed their livestock — and since the New Testament does not contra~ dict the Old but confirms it, as it were a wheel in the midst of a wheel, in no way could the second manner of perfecJames, Jeioytion consist in the lack of such things. On the contrary, they were to be possessed as the Lord's gift.
Such an opinion, which this man follows along the byways of loquacity, not only is clearly untrue: it even contradicts his own statements.
Attacking the perfection of abstinence in the first book, he had said that wine was forbidden to the priests, sons of Aaron, because of their imperfection.{ Now he says that these same priests are perfect in the affluence of their possessions, as if he had forgotten what he had said before. On the other hand, he may have remembered, but fallen into the darkness of believing there is imperfection in the flight from pleasure and perfection in the possession of wealth. Furthermore, t William of St. Amour.
£ CE. ch. V, | 20.
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since he had recently taught that the beginning of evangelical perfection consisted in contempt for all ownership, and that the priests of the Levitical Order had daughters and sons to whom they handed down their possessions by true hereditary succession of private property,t it neces~ sarily follows that the Levites did not practice evangelical perfection— or else, that renouncing ownership is not the beginning of it. He is clearly contradicting himself.
3. He is also contradicting the truth. If the Levitical way of life had truly contained the perfection of the Evangelical
Law, since the perfect way of life holds a place of supreme importance both in the Old and in the New Testaments, if the perfection of the Law were equal in this matter to the perfection of the Gospel, it would necessarily follow that the summit of the Law and the summit of the Gospel are equal as regards both merit and reward; that Testament is equal to Testament, promise to promise, and priesthood to priesthood. Hence, if the Law brought nothing to perfecHeb. 7:19 cf. Gal. 2:21 tion, neither did the Gospel; if there had been no justice through the Law, neither would there be any through the Gospel; and if those living under the Law had been accursed, so also were those living under the Gospel. It is in cf. ibid. 3:
10-13 vain, then, that the Son of God became incarnate and suffered, in vain that the priesthood was passed down, in vain that most of the Law's observances were abolished and evangelical truths brought in. All such conclusions being false, impious, and worthy of absolute rejection as heretical, we must necessarily admit the falsity of their premise: that the summit of evangelical perfection consists in the way of life of the priests under the Law.
+ Cf. ch. IL, ¥ 10.
DEFENSE OF THE MENDICANTS
That is why the Apostle writes to the Hebrews: If then consummation —according to the gloss, this means perfection—was by the Levitical priesthood, ... what further need was there that another priest should rise, according to the order of Melchisedech, and said not to be according to the order of Aaron? For when the priesthood is changed, it is necessary that a change of law be made also. And the gloss comments at this point:* "Here he
Heb. 7:11-12 [Paul] begins to show the difference between the New and the Old Testaments, indicating that the latter is imperfect and the former perfect."* And the same Apostle continues along the same lines: For the Law, he says, having but a shadow of the good things to come, and not the exact image of the objects, is never able... to perfect those who draw near. And the gloss explains: "The Law alone, having but a shadow, cannot make priests perfect in virtue and completely good.' For in the literal observance of the Law's ibid. 10:1 commands and in the manner of life required of its priests, the perfection of evangelical virtues and counsels is not found, but merely their figure and shadow. This manner of life is said to be a wheel in the midst of a wheel, not that literal observance of both Testaments is of equal worth, but that one is a mysterious prefiguration of the other in a spiritual sense.
Ez. 1:16* 4. If anyone objects, as does our adversary, that the said manner of life was imposed upon priests by Ezechiel who was describing, not the shadow of the temple, but the holy and true temple of the Church, let him note that in this same passage it is written that a priest should take a virgin for wife and that he should offer lambs and calves in sacrifice. The very same arguments called upon to prove that evangelical perfection had existed originally in the cf. ibid. 45:4f. cf. ibid. 44:22; Lv. 21:13f. cf. Ez. 43:19
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ownership of property by the Levites may be used to demonstrate the same perfection in their wives, their sacrifices, and their other practices. If this were true, the priests of the New Law would have to have wives, to offer goats and calves, and to be the first to proceed with trumpets on the battlefield in order to be perfect. All this is absurd. And cf. Jos. 6:4 so, the description of true perfection should not be sought in this temple literally, but figuratively.
Jerome writes to Nepotianus: "Let no one argue against me by mentioning the riches in the temples of Judea, the altars, the luminaries, the chalices, the mortars and other implements of gold. In those days when priests immolated victims, and the blood of beasts was the price of sin, the Lord approved all these furnishings— but originally all cf. 3 Kgs. 5:6* these things were done as prefigurations only. Now that the cf. 1 Cor. 10:11 destitute Lord has established the poverty of His house, let us meditate on His cross and consider riches as mere dirt.
Is there any wonder that Christ called Mammon wicked?
Why should we desire and love that which Peter asserted he did not have? If we follow the letter strictly and rejoice cf. Lk. 16:9 cf. Acts 3:6 in the accumulation of gold and riches, let us also take up the other observances. Let the priests take virgins for wives, cf. Lv. 21:13 let the leprosy of the body be considered before the vices of the soul, let us be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth, let cf. ibid. 13
Gn. 1:28 us raise the tabernacle on the seventh month, and announce with trumpets the solemn times of fasting. But if, combining spiritual with spiritual, we understand these things in the way our Lord understood and interpreted them, let us repudiate the Sabbath and the gold together with other Jewish superstitions — otherwise, if we are pleased with the gold, cf. ibid. 9:1
IsGore ao let us be pleased with the Jews, for we must either approve or condemn them together with the gold."® In the light of
DEFENSE OF THE MENDICANTS
these words from Jerome, the aforementioned argument is clearly reduced to naught, while the perfection of evangelical poverty clearly appears as fitting for the New Law.
5. Hence, we should never believe that the possessions of the Levites were dedicated to the Lord on account of some intrinsic holiness, as if they could not have been occa~ sions of sin: on the contrary, they were offered merely for the sustenance of those who served the Lord. And of these servants of the Lord, it is said that the Lord is their possession: as others lived on the fruit of their fields, these survived on the proceeds of divine service, but in such a way that, by right of property, they could hand down to their heirs the goods they had received from such service. We have already seen that, as the fullness of chastity had not yet been imposed upon them, neither had poverty been counseled.
Jerome writes to Eustochius: "Different was the beatitude of the Old Law in which it was said: Happy the man who hath seed in Sion. As soon as the Son of God appeared on Is. 31:9 (Sept.) earth, He established a New Law related to Himself, so that He who was adored by angels might have angels both in heaven and on earth. In olden times, the chaste Judith cut cf. Jdt. 13:10 off Holophernes' head; now, James and John leave their father, their nets, and their boat to follow the Saviour, abandoning at the same time the affections of kinship, the bonds of the world, and the care of their house. Now these words are heard for the first time: "If anyone wishes to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me." No soldier ever takes his wife with him on the battlefield; and the disciple who desired to go to his father's cf. Mt. 4:21
Mt. 16:24 cf. Lk. 9:60 tCE | 2.
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funeral was not permitted to do so. The foxes have dens, and the birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay His head—lest perhaps you may be saddened if you happen to live in a state of need.'""
Lk. 9:58
6. By these words Jerome clearly teaches that, as wealth and marriage were suited to the conditions of the Old Testament, so poverty and chastity conform with the perfection of the New. Virginity, introduced by Christ, did not destroy the Law, but fulfilled it. Neither did the counsel of poverty destroy the Law, but consummated it. In the Law of the Gospel, the counsels do not contradict the precepts: they add to the perfection of righteousness. cf. Mt. 5:17
And so, as it is unreasonable to see the model of perfect chastity in the wives of Levitical priests, so is it contrary to sound doctrine to see perfect poverty in Levitical possessions.
Bernard concurs in his "Colloquy of Simon and Jesus":
"Tt is vastly different," he says, 'to pick one's way in the mud of many waters at the bottom of a divided sea through the lawful possession of earthly goods, or to walk with renewed steps on the very surface of the water by abandoning all such things. This prerogative had to come in a time of cf. Mt. 19:27 grace, when Peter received the privilege of following a new road, and of giving an example of it. Undoubtedly, the form of evangelical poverty did not exist in the old days of the Patriarchs, at the time when the Lord of Majesty was cf. Bar. 3:38 seen on earth and had His conversation among men; in those days, men seldom followed in spirit the Spirit of the Lord.
But as soon as the Word was made flesh and dwelt among Jn. 1:14 us, in Him we received the image of life and the example of conversation which we could imitate even bodily, so that we may walk with both feet, and not limp with one thigh, cf. Gn.32:32 as did the Patriarch Jacob. We do not mean to say that a
DEFENSE OF THE MENDICANTS
man who lived differently could not be saved, but that such a man must be aware of his level and of the place where perfection belongs, and that he presume not to claim the function of a disciple (of Christ)." Such words eliminate the perverse error of covetous and carnal men who, under the guise of piety, attack poverty by referring to the riches of the Patriarchs. They also prove that when our adversary bases his argumentation on these same riches — acting, not as a friend of poverty, but as an enemy of the poor—he is not building the foundations of perfection, but destroying them.
7. The practices of the Old Law do not argue against the perfection of extreme poverty, neither do the apostles' way of life, the purse of Christ, nor the promise of a hundredfold, as it clearly appears from what has been said;{ nor again does the abundance of ecclesiastical wealth with which the enemy of the Mendicants covers himself later as with an armor, intending not so much to defend the loftiness of the clerical state as to destroy the summit of evangelical poverty. Had he praised ecclesiastical goods as being permitted, fitting and compatible with perfection in the person of those who possess them in common and dispense them according to holiness, he would have been following the lead of sacred doctors and agreeing with their rulings against heretics who asserted that the Church had fallen from the state of righteousness and perfection because of the riches it had accepted to own. By teaching this, he would not have damaged holy poverty, since there
+ This is a clear example of Bernard's excessive rigidity, characteristic, perhaps, of the clerical notion of perfection which he developed from the Fathers' earlier teachings and which Bonaventure unfortunately endorses here.
(Cf. Foreword, p. IX.) {Cf ch. VIL, 4 20, 29-32, 35f.
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are different modes of perfection within it, as we have shown in the beginning of the present answer.t Now, however, because he tries to convince us that ecclesiastical wealth is an element of the highest perfection, as if it were more perfect to possess riches in Christ than to lack them for the sake of Christ, not only does he deprive poverty of any glory: he even undermines the very foundations of the Church by his attempt to prove that Christ and the apostles owned temporal goods so as to give an example of perfection.
8. Christ had said of Himself that He had nowhere to lay His head. But this man teaches that "He had a house,
Lk. 9:58; Mt. 8:20 for we read that He said: 'My house shall be called a house of prayer.''' And he continues later: '""When Christ became man, He had no place to lay His head by any true right of property, yet as true God He owned all the possessions of the Levites.'' By saying such things, he shows himself amazingly devoid of any understanding of the truth, being unable to distinguish between the attributes of Christ's divinity and those of His humanity. When we say that Christ was poor, we refer to the humanity He assumed and by which He gave us an example of perfect life—and not to the might of His divinity by which He had dominion not only over the temple and Levitical possessions, but also over heaven and earth, and all things that are under the cope of heaven, for as the Prophet says, the Lord's are the ibid. 21:13
Est. 13:10* Ps, 23:1 earth and its fullness.
When our adversary writes that "'to Christ, as to a true priest, the Father... has given all things into His hand, and that through the right of priesthood He owns all the Jn. 3:35
+ CE. ch. VIL, ¢Q 4ff.
DEFENSE OF THE MENDICANTS
possessions of the Levites," he is contradicting himself openly, for he continues a little later: ""The priesthood having not yet been transferred, there was no need for any transferring of tithes or possessions." If the Levitical priesthood had not been transferred before the passion and resur~ rection of Christ, it may be deduced clearly that Christ cf. Heb. 7:1ff. owned absolutely nothing of the possessions of the Levites on the strength of any priesthood law.
9. After contradicting both the truth and his own words, and failing to find any temporal possession in Christ, the cf. Jn. 14:30 utterly poor Head, he now turns his arguments against the Body, that is, Holy Mother Church. After a few worthless introductory words, he reasons, on the authority of Canon Law,' that "for practical purposes, the Church began to retain ownership of the land and buildings which she had a customary right to sell." Whence he argues as follows:
"Because, to quote Ambrose, the useful and the honorable are the same," and a thing loses honorability in the measure in which it is imperfect, and that which pertains to honorability also pertains to perfection: the ownership of Church estates increases the perfection of perfect men instead of compromising it." Thus does he reason, and these are his very words!
From such premises, true and false conclusions may be drawn. It is true that the buildings of the Church may be owned without impairment to perfection. However, to believe or declare that such ownership is a principle of higher perfection is so absurd that if this were true, the state and way of life of our present time would be better than those of Christ and His apostles— which is most evidently untrue.
For, as Jerome writes in his description of the life of the monk Malchus: "I have planned to write about the time
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extending from the Saviour's advent to our present age— that is, from the days of the apostles until these corrupt times — and to describe how and through whom the Church of Christ was born, grew to adulthood under the persecutions, and was crowned by the martyrs; and how, after reaching the age of the Christian princes, it increased in power and wealth while decreasing in virtue.''!°
10. Furthermore, if the ownership of buildings is a principle of the highest perfection, the more buildings the Church possesses, the more perfect will be those who live in them. By the same token, no one who possesses an abundance of riches given to him by the Church, may, without damage to perfection, transfer his allegiance to one of the Mendicant Orders. On the contrary, holiness and perfection will be found in the rejection of hardships and poverty and in greed for ecclesiastical possessions.
Jerome, writing to Nepotianus, brings out the falsity of such teaching when he says ironically: "Let monks become wealthier than they had been in the world; let them possess, under the poor Christ, wealth they had not owned under the rich Satan; and let the Church aspire to make rich those whom the world had known to be beggars.'"*
Again, if the ownership of Church estates is a principle of the highest perfection, nothing may be sold and given to the poor —even though Christ had recommended this very thing. On the contrary, all of the Church's properties and buildings must be preserved if it is true that an accumula-~ tion of wealth in the Church of Christ contributes to the height of perfect holiness. Jerome, however, writes the opposite to Demetriades: "Some men build churches, cover their walls with marble veneer, hoist massive columns and gild their capitals, adorn golden altars with precious gems.
DEFENSE OF THE MENDICANTS
A different course of action is proposed to you: to clothe cf. Mt. 25:35ff.; Gal. 6:10
Christ in the poor, to visit Him in the sick, to feed Him in the needy, to be His host in those who have no roof —and most of all in those who are of the household of faith.'
From such words as these it may be seen that the conclusions given above are absurd in many ways.
11. The reasoning itself is worthless, for as much as some possessions may be useful, there are many others, such as wives, slaves, weapons, and temporal powers whose posses~ sion does not necessarily lead to the height of perfection.
Nor may Ambrose be quoted in support of our adversary when he says that the useful is the same as the honorable, for he is speaking of the usefulness of spiritual goods, and not of earthly goods. In the same work, he says, indeed:
"We have declared that nothing is useful except that which contributes to the grace of eternal life—and this is not that which contributes to the enjoyment of the present life. We never claimed there was anything helpful in ownership or in great wealth. On the contrary, we believe such things to be harmful, and consider that their weight when they are carried is worse than their loss when they are handed out."
The same Ambrose writes elsewhere in the same book:
"Riches are no help toward the beatific life. The Lord clearly showed it in the Gospels when He said: 'Blessed
Lk. 6:20-21 are you poor, for yours is the kingdom of God. Blessed are you who hunger now, etc....'"
"And so, it has been most evidently declared that poverty, hunger, pain, which had been considered evil, not only are no hindrance to the beatific life, but are actually helpful.
The Lord's teaching confirms the fact that some things t CE 9.
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that seem good—wealth, abundance, painless pleasure— are actually harmful to the maturing of the beatitudes. Not only, then, are external bodily goods of no avail for the blessed life: they are even damaging.''"4 Here as in the preceding passage, Ambrose must be understood as speaking, not of extrinsic usefulness which is the object of the Canon,} but of intrinsic and spiritual usefulness of which the Wise Man says: Wisdom with riches is more profitable.
Heclaz1 2 12. Some earthly possessions are useful for the sustaining of nature, the works of human industry, and the exercise of perfect virtue. This usefulness they do not have by their intrinsic virtue, but through their user.
Thus, Augustine writes toward the end of his book "Whence Evil?'': "Anyone who wishes to make proper use of temporal goods should not be glued to them by his affection, nor should he make of them something like the limbs of his soul by loving them excessively: for as soon as they begin to fall away, they disfigure him through torture and decay. He should instead dominate them entirely, being ready to own and master them, but even more to lose them and be entirely deprived of them."?' Augustine would never have written such a thing had temporal goods been of any use — in the sense in which usefulness and honorability are identified —for no man of true wisdom would rather lose honorability than keep it.
This man, then, speaking of ecclesiastical possessions, was very far from true wisdom when he failed to make a distinction between the honorable and the useful.
13. Worsening his error, he sees a sevenfold relationship between the perfection of virtue and the possession of riches, for he goes on to say: "The Lord willed that the tC | 9.
DEFENSE OF THE MENDICANTS
ministers of the Church who desired to follow Him perfectly possess as common property both furnishings and real estate: first as a safeguard against the future, which is a matter of prudence; second, as a means of sustaining the ministers, which is a matter of justice; third, as a means of sustaining the needy, which is an act of mercy; fourth, for the sake of fostering mutual love; fifth, for the peace of mind of the ministers; sixth, as an example to others and to make possible the distributing of alms; seventh, as a manner of conforming with the heavenly court where all is owned in common." With such reasons as these, he argues that owning ecclesiastical goods does not decrease perfecfe
PAS: tion but consummates it.
14. Although such an array may seem effective and pious when considered superficially, it is seen to be both ineffective and impious when analyzed from within. These arguments are impious, for if the common ownership of furnishings and real estate consummates perfection instead of impairing it, those unwilling or unable to have them can~ not be perfect. Since this was the case with Christ and the apostles, it would follow that the example of utter perfection was not seen in them. These same arguments are also ineffective, for they apply as well to a married layman who would be justified in keeping his possessions so that he may, with prudence, justice, mercy and charity, take care of those who serve Christ; that he may preserve his peace of mind and give examples to others while conforming with the heavenly court, in which there is a lavish sharing of goods.
Either such a man will be perfect, or the said arguments are worthless.
For those who make proper use of them, ecclesiastical goods may be the occasion of many virtuous acts, but for
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those who abuse them, they are incentives to many forms of wickedness: unjust, impious and carnal acts; contention, simony, ambition, and schism. It does not follow, however, from such potential abuse that the ownership of these goods is evil. Yet, by the same token, from their potential good use it does not follow that their ownership is perfect as such, or any more perfect than the lack of it.
15. After developing these arguments—and scattering many absurdities in so doing — this man draws a conclusion which reveals his final goal. It is necessarily of little value but great in perfidy. These are his very words: 'For these reasons, and for others perhaps a wise man may find, God commanded and willed that perfect men possess the temporal goods of the Church as a condition to their living on the summit of perfection, since anything less would have been imperfect."
When he says this, he is clearly seen to be trying with all his might to destroy the perfection of evangelical poverty. If the possession of the temporal goods of the Church is as perfect as he claims it to be, so that anything less is imperfect, then the poor of Christ who choose to possess nothing at all but to give all they have—as did the poor widow — either stand below the summit of perfection and cf. Mk. 12:42ff.; Lk ory: are then imperfect, or go beyond it and are then superstitious and impious. If Christ really was as described in the Gospel narratives and as shown by the testimonies of the saints we quoted earlier, so also were the apostles. It would then necessarily follow from this man's anti-Christian teaching that Christ and His disciples were either superstitious or imperfect.
Again, if, as he says, Christ willed that these temporal goods be possessed by the perfect, those who profess the
DEFENSE OF THE MENDICANTS
state of perfection and do not have them, stand convicted of having transgressed a divine command. If this were true, no one could have said: 'Blessed are you poor, for yours is
Lk. 6:20 the kingdom of God," nor "Woe to you rich!" But instead, Woe to you poor, for you are wretched, imperfect, unjust and impious. And, Blessed are the rich! Happy the men who possess such things without which they will reach neither the summit of perfection nor the virtue of righteousness. ibid. 24 cf. Ps. 143:15
If it is true that perfection holds the topmost place among the gifts of God, let any man who believes in such teaching beware lest the malediction of the Prince of the Apostles justly descend upon him in these words: "Thy money go to destruction with thee, because thou hast thought that the Acts 8:20 gift of God could be purchased with money."
16. When Christ advises the perfect to sell all they have and give to the poor, when He orders the apostles to travel without purse or money and to possess no silver or gold, cf. Mt. 19:21 cf. ibid. 10:9 it is certainly amazing that anyone could reach such a degree of impiety, attain such insanity, rush headlong into such fatuity, as to say the exact opposite: that the Lord ordered the perfect to possess temporal goods.
The absurdity of the principle on which this man's conclusion rests is apparent from his own words when he says that all things that fail to reach the summit of perfection are imperfect. If "summit" means the extreme and highest point of anything, and if perfection does have a summit, something could still pertain to perfection while remaining below its summit.f When this man asserts that perfection has a summit and that nothing below it is perfect, he is making contradictory statements.
The universal negative t Cf. ch. IL, GY 2ff.
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proposition [nothing below the summit is perfect] is almost entirely false, since there are levels of perfection, not only in the perfection of our pilgrimage on earth, but also in the perfection of the Fatherland. Again, as the perfection of chastity may be of greater or lesser degree, so also may the perfection of poverty as it clearly appears from the Third
Part of the First Answer.
17. Finally, the danger of making an affluence of goods desirable through the lavish praise of them appears clearly in this: that the cravings and emotions of almost every man may easily lead to the concupiscence of the eyes and to the admiration of wealth. As the Apostle writes to Timothy, cf. Gn. 8:21 those who seek to become rich fall into temptation and a 1 Tm. 6:9 snare of the devil.
Now, if this man claims he is not praising every kind of ownership, but only the common ownership of ecclesiastical goods dedicated to the Lord, let him be aware that there is considerable danger concealed in the accumulation of even these. As Bernard writes in the "Colloquy of Simon and Jesus": "We see churches endowed and enriched by the powerful and the wealthy of this world, by those rich in good deeds who, following the Lord's advice, attempt to make friends for themselves with the mammon of wickedLk. 16:9 ness, so that... they may be received into the everlasting dwellings. Why should they not hope to be received by those who seem to have the keys? Alas, their very foresight provides clerics with an occasion for material greed, and they who should have been preparing for themselves and for others a dwelling in heaven join on earth house to house,
Is, 5:8 and lay field to field. Does anyone ever succeed in drawing from the mouths of these apostles of our times these words of trust, these words of grace: 'Behold, we have left all and Mt. 19:27
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followed Thee'? It is the same with the priests and with the cf. Is. 24:2 people: they seek to become rich. Priests alike receive their
1 Tm. 6:9 reward right here, and even more abundantly; they too are in need of friends if they are to be received in the dwellings of others since they have none of their own. Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.'*°
Mt. 5:3
And Bernard goes on a little later: "Would that among every twelve there could be found today a single Peter, one man who would have left everything, one man without a purse! Would that you would be wise in your misery and understand that a treasure of wrath is building up together with the treasure of wealth! Would that you were providing cf. Jn. 6:71 cf. Mt. 19:27
Dy e220" for your last end, realizing that an accumulation of guilt passes much more readily through the eye of a needle than cf. Mt. 19:24 an accumulation of riches! For we brought nothing into the world, and certainly we can take nothing out.'""'
Gregory Nazianzen, speaking against the persecutors of the Church, concurs in one of his sermons: "They will cheat by using privileges. What privileges? My own? It would be easier for them to cut away the wings I do not have. If ecclesiastical privileges, this is precisely the object of all the conflict and fighting. Know we not that craving for money and cheating the purse are a betrayal of Christ?'''*
Ambrose, in his work "On Offices" contributes to the same thesis: "He who sent out the apostles without gold cf. Mt. 10:9 also assembled the churches without gold.'""® And again:
"He who owns much gold lacks abundance, for what is of the world amounts to nothing; but he who owns little gold is not diminished, for what he lacks is nothing. There is nothing to lose in the absence of a thing that is all loss.""° cf. 2 Cor. 8:15 cf. Ex. 16:18
18. From such quotations as these it appears clearly that the foremost concern of holy doctors was not to increase
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love for any kind of ownership, but rather to breed contempt for them in imitation of Christ and the apostles. Yet the conclusion should not be drawn that the proper way to despise ecclesiastical goods is to dilapidate them. The sacred
Canons forbid it.** But those clerics who are not assigned to the care of a flock should renounce wealth for the love of Christ and as a means of greater safety and perfection, while those in charge of dispensing such goods should avoid any bond of affection that may attach them to the things they are dispensing.
This man, on the contrary, seeking to make affluence lovable, places it as a thing of the greatest holiness in the Church's breastplate—an object from which judgment was cf. Ex. 28:4, 15, 30 wont to shine with truth, while his teaching in fact is devoid of any reason or truth. He also fashions a manner of ephod which he then adds to his irrational fantasy by bringing forth twelve holy and proved men who were taken out of the state of poverty in order to assure the distribution of riches.
These are the blessed Clement, Sylvester, Gregory, Cyprian, Hilarion, Basil, Chrysostom, Martin, Nicholas, Paul, Augustine, and Anselm. Twisting their example to fit his error, he writes in the following passage: ""These are the names of the twelve sons of Israel; these are the purple ribbons and Cf. Ex; 282 Th: the golden chains.'' Then he goes on to say: "This is the teaching of the Lord, confirmed by the state of the apostles cf. Acts 4:32 in Jerusalem, exposed by holy doctors, observed by perfect imitators of Christ: not the lack of any common or private property, but the preserving of all Church goods as soon as ownership has come to be despised. If you teach otherwise, beware lest, in the words of the Apostle, you become anathcf. Gal. 1:8 ema. May this never happen to a Catholic man who wishes not to be punished with the apostate Julian."
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Such are the words of this man, and by speaking in this way he demonstrates that he is both ignorant and unkind.
19. Indeed, if he were not unkind, he would not have considered those who practice poverty so uncharitably as to judge them to be anathema from Christ,} as if they were
Rom. 9:3 heretics. For through this blasphemy he attacks not only these poor men of Christ, but also the Roman Church who approved their manner of life,t holy men inscribed on the roster of saints, and, worse still, the apostles themselves who lived in extreme poverty, as shown earlier.ft Through them, as through the twelve sons of Israel, each designated by name, gathered in the ephod of Christ the supreme Pon~ tiff, it is supreme poverty that he is indicting. Indeed, it is written in Matthew: Now these are the names of the twelve apostles: first Simon, who is called Peter, and the others are
Mt. 10:2, 5,9 cf. Ap. 21:14ff. listed by name.
The evangelist continues: These twelve Jesus sent forth, having instructed them thus: "...Do not keep gold, or silver, or money in your girdles, etc...."
Thus he binds the ephod of apostolic life to the breastplate of perfection and of highest poverty by means of the love of the heavenly kingdom, as with the indissoluble bond of the purple ribbons, when he says: 'Freely you have received, freely give."
Mt. 10:8
20. Christ, the true High Priest, wore this ephod and this breastplate when at the same time He taught by word and } This text of St. Paul is misquoted, not in word but in meaning. Cf. Valentin Breton, O. F. M., Saint Bonaventure: Les Six Ailes du Séraphin, Editions Franciscaines, Paris, 1951, p. 17: "L'auteur emploie parfois les mots d'un texte sans tenir compte de leur sens dans le contexte.
Au temps de Saint Bonaventure, ces accomodations étaient courantes, permises, et gotitées.
Les controverses avec les biblistes réformés nous ont obligés et habitués a plus de rigueur."
{ Pope Honorius III.
Tt CE ch. VIL Gq off.
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displayed by His example the perfection of holy poverty, particularly when, as true High Priest, before entering into the Holies...by virtue of His own blood, He was sus~ pended destitute and naked on the cross. Now, it is of this noble and spiritual adornment, of which Christ could not be robbed by those who crucified His body, that this atroHeb. 9:12 cious plunderer attempts to despoil Him, while endeavoring to adorn Him with other trappings not held with purple ribbons or golden chains but with an abundance of earthly possessions as with a viscous and muddy bond ~as if Christ and the apostles had ever possessed anything of the earth, and as if such common possession had had a greater elevating power and were a better way to heaven than the most lofty and supreme poverty. None would doubt that this is false, save a man who completely ignores the ways of mental elevation in God.
Thus, Jerome writes to Lucinus: "Joseph was unable to ef. Gr. 39:12 retain his garment when he fled from the Egyptian woman.
The young man covered with a linen sheet who followed cf. Mk. 14:51f.
Jesus, as soon as he was seized by the attendants, threw off his clothing and ran away naked. Elias, taken up to heaven cf.4Kgs.2:11ff. cf. 3 Kgs. 19:
20ff. in a fiery chariot, left his mantle on the earth.
Eliseus changed into an offering the oxen and yoke of his earlier labors.
The wisest of men says: He who touches pitch blackens his hands. As often as we have to do with the Sir. 13:1 things of the world, and our soul is tied to the procuring of possessions and revenues, we are unable to think about God freely.'
Striking the same note is the gloss on this passage from the Canticle: "I have taken off my robe...": "As soon as concern for temporal matters is permitted, even the most distinguished doctor is hardly able to avoid sin."""'
Criss
DEFENSE OF THE MENDICANTS
21. Now, we are not saying this in the sense that the management of temporal goods cannot be handled by holy men without damage to their perfection: we mean to separate the precious from the vile, for it is not the management of temporal goods that gave perfection to these holy men, but their contempt for them; not an affluence of passing goods, but the spirit of poverty by which they lived, in the midst of an abundance of wealth, as poor yet enriching many, as having nothing yet possessing all things.
Jer 15:19"
2 Cor. 6:10
The same spirit is found in the noble prelate of whom Jerome speaks in his letter to Rusticus: "Saint Exsuperius,
Bishop of Tolosa, a follower of the widow of Sarepta, tormented by the hunger of his brethren, fed them while he himself was in need and growing pale with fasting. Thus, he spent all of his substance for the love of Christ. No one cf.3Kgs. 17:9ff. is richer than the man who carries the body of Christ in a bread-basket, and the blood of Christ in a glass jar; who throws covetousness out of the Temple, overturns the chairs and tables of the sellers of doves, scatters the coins of mammon and of the money-changers, in order that the house of God may be called a house of prayer, and not a den of cf. Mt. 21:12ff. thieves. Follow thou also in the traces of such a man, and of others who are like him in virtue, whom the priesthood makes more humble and more poor. Or, if thou seekest to be perfect, leave with Abraham your country, your kinsfolk;
Gn. 12:1 cf. Acts 7:3 if thou hast any fortune, sell what thou hast, and give to the poor; if thou hast none, thou art delivered of a great burden.
In thy nakedness, follow the naked Christ. It is a hard, sublime, and difficult thing, but great are the rewards.''"4
Mt. 19:21
22. In this passage, Jerome separates the precious from the vile, and at the same time he shows that what is good for the perfection of a prelate, who is a public person, does
Jer. 15:19*
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not always agree with the perfection of a private individual.
Thus, even though, for the sake of prelacy, any religious may be moved from the state of poverty to that of dispensator of temporal goods, some conclusions drawn from this may be illegitimate.
Indeed, from the fact that prelates, in the exercise of their pastoral functions, are sometimes involved in business transactions without any damage to their perfection, we may not conclude that a private individual would attain an identical level of perfection if he were to be troubled with Martha about many things, instead
Lk. 10:41 of reposing with Mary at the Lord's feet through a fervent ibid. 39 and joyful elevation of the heart. The present proposition should also be understood in the same sense. And so, even though high priests or pontiffs — because they are in charge not only of the perfect and strong, but also of the imperfect and weak whom they must feed by their words, by examples, and also by material support according to place and time— may, without any damage to their own perfection, have received possessions for the sustaining of the poor and of the ministers of the Church, it does not follow that these possessions should or even could be entrusted to any private individual, with any position in the Church, as if he were to attain the summit of perfection as readily through the multiplication of his possessions as through the loftiness of his poverty.
23. Now, concerning the opinion of our adversary that those who praise extreme poverty are the imitators of Julian the apostate, he shows himself here to be not only full of malice, but also devoid of any understanding of the truth, for he wickedly accuses of error those who profess the truth, and, ignoring the true perfidy of Julian, suggests that it originated in the praise of poverty. In fact, Julian's
DEFENSE OF THE MENDICANTS
error did not consist in the assertion that all temporal goods are to be given up in conformity with a divine counsel — to which no one is bound, unless he wills—but in this: that, distorting and trampling the Church in conformity with the rapacity of his greed, he said that such giving up was of necessity, by divine command," referring to these words of Christ, in Luke: "Every one of you who does not renounce all that he possesses, cannot be My disciple."
When he says this, he calumniates the whole Church, implying as he does that there is no difference between renouncing all things, and giving up all things. In fact, as the gloss on this same passage says, "'there is this difference between renouncing all things, and giving up all things, that renouncing is suited to all those who lawfully make
Lk. 14:33 use of the worldly goods they possess, yet in such a way as to strive in spirit toward the heavenly; but to give up pertains only to the perfect who set all terrestrial things in the background and actually seek nothing but the heavenly.'
Hence, if a man believes that the perfect give up all temporal goods and aspire to the eternal only, he is following the doctrine of Jesus Christ, and not the perfidy of Julian.
Although Christ says that all things are to be given up for the sake of perfect love, he does not mean that the goods of the Church are to be dilapidated, for it is permissible to give away one's own possessions, but unlawful to waste those of another.