On Christian Doctrine, in Four Books, by St. Augustine.
Preface:
Showing that to teach rules for the interpretation of Scripture is
not a superfluous task
1. There are certain rules for the interpretation of Scripture which
I think might with great advantage be taught to earnest students of the
word, that they may profit not only from reading the works of others who
have laid open the secrets of the sacred writings, but also from themselves
opening such secrets to others. These rules I propose to teach to those
who are able and willing to learn, if God our Lord do not withhold from
me, while I write, the thoughts He is wont to vouchsafe to me in my meditations
on this subject. But before I enter upon this undertaking, I think it well
to meet the objections of those who are likely to take exception to the
work, or who would do so, did I not conciliate them beforehand. And if,
after all, men should still be found to make objections, yet at least they
will not prevail with others (over whom they might have influence, did
they not find them forearmed against their assaults), to turn them back
from a useful study to the dull sloth of ignorance.
2. There are some, then, likely to object to this work of mine, because
they have failed to understand the rules here laid down. Others, again,
will think that I have spent my labour to no purpose, because, though they
understand the rules, yet in their attempts to apply them and to interpret
Scripture by them, they have failed to clear up the point they wish cleared
up; and these, because they have received no assistance from this work
themselves, will give it as their opinion that it can be of no use to anybody.
There is a third class of objectors who either really do understand Scripture
well, or think they do, and who, because they know (or imagine) that they
have attained a certain power of interpreting the sacred books without
reading any directions of the kind that I propose to lay down here, will
cry out that such rules are not necessary for any one, but that everything
rightly done towards clearing up the obscurities of Scripture could be
better done by the unassisted grace of God.
3. To reply briefly to all these. To those who do not understand what
is here set down, my answer is, that I am not to be blamed for their want
of understanding. It is just as if they were anxious to see the new or
the old moon, or some very obscure star, and I should point it out with
my finger: if they had not sight enough to see even my finger, they would
surely have no right to fly into a passion with me on that account. As
for those who, even though they know and understand my directions, fail
to penetrate the meaning of obscure passages in Scripture, they may stand
for those who, in the case I have imagined, are just able to see my finger,
but cannot see the stars at which it is pointed. And so both these classes
had better give up blaming me, and pray instead that God would grant them
the sight of their eyes. For though I can move my finger to point out an
object, it is out of my power to open men's eyes that they may see either
the fact that I am pointing, or the object at which I point.
4. But now as to those who talk vauntingly of Divine Grace, and boast
that they understand and can explain Scripture without the aid of such
directions as those I now propose to lay down, and who think, therefore,
that what I have undertaken to write is entirely superfluous. I would such
persons could calm themselves so far as to remember that, however justly
they may rejoice in God's great gift, yet it was from human teachers they
themselves learnt to read. Now, they would hardly think it right that they
should for that reason be held in contempt by the Egyptian monk Antony,
a just and holy man, who, not being able to read himself, is said to have
committed the Scriptures to memory through hearing them read by others,
and by dint of wise meditation to have arrived at a thorough understanding
of them; or by that barbarian slave Christianus, of whom I have lately
heard from very respectable and trustworthy witnesses, who, without any
teaching from man, attained a full knowledge of the art of reading simply
through prayer that it might be revealed to him; after three days' supplication
obtaining his request that he might read through a book presented to him
on the spot by the astonished bystanders.
5. But if any one thinks that these stories are false, I do not strongly
insist on them. For, as I am dealing with Christians who profess to understand
the Scriptures without any directions from man (and if the fact be so,
they boast of a real advantage, and one of no ordinary kind), they must
surely grant that every one of us learnt his own language by hearing it
constantly from childhood, and that any other language we have learnt,--Greek,
or Hebrew, or any of the rest,--we have learnt either in the same way,
by hearing it spoken, or from a human teacher. Now, then, suppose we advise
all our brethren not to teach their children any of these things, because
on the outpouring of the Holy Spirit the apostles immediately began to
speak the language of every race; and warn every one who has not had a
like experience that he need not consider himself a Christian, or may at
least doubt whether he has yet received the Holy Spirit? No, no; rather
let us put away false pride and learn whatever can be learnt from man;
and let him who teaches another communicate what he has himself received
without arrogance and without jealousy. And do not let us tempt Him in
whom we have believed, lest, being ensnared by such wiles of the enemy
and by our own perversity, we may even refuse to go to the churches to
hear the gospel itself, or to read a book, or to listen to another reading
or preaching, in the hope that we shall be carried up to the third heaven,
"whether in the body or out of the body," as the apostle says,and
there hear unspeakable words, such as it is not lawful for man to utter,
or see the Lord Jesus Christ and hear the gospel from His own lips rather
than from those of men.
6. Let us beware of such dangerous temptations of pride, and let us
rather consider the fact that the Apostle Paul himself, although stricken
down and admonished by the voice of God from heaven, was yet sent to a
man to receive the sacraments and be admitted into the Church; and that
Cornelius the centurion, although an angel announced to him that his prayers
were heard and his alms had in remembrance, was yet handed over to Peter
for instruction, and not only received the sacraments from the apostle's
hands, but was also instructed by him as to the proper objects of faith,
hope, and love. And without doubt it was possible to have done everything
through the instrumentality of angels, but the condition of our race would
have been much more degraded if God had not chosen to make use of men as
the ministers of His word to their fellow-men. For how could that be true
which is written, "The temple of God is holy, which temple ye are,"
if God gave forth no oracles from His human temple, but communicated everything
that He wished to be taught to men by voices from heaven, or through the
ministration of angels? Moreover, love itself, which binds men together
in the bond of unity, would have no means of pouring soul into soul, and,
as it were, mingling them one with another, if men never learnt anything
from their fellow-men.
7. And we know that the eunuch who was reading Isaiah the prophet, and
did not understand what he read, was not sent by the apostle to an angel,
nor was it an angel who explained to him what he did not understand, nor
was he inwardly illuminated by the grace of God without the interposition
of man; on the contrary, at the suggestion of God, Philip, who did understand
the prophet, came to him, and sat with him, and in human words, and with
a human tongue, opened to him the Scriptures. Did not God talk with Moses,
and yet he, with great wisdom and entire absence of jealous pride, accepted
the plan of his father-in-law, a man of an alien race, for ruling and administering
the affairs of the great nation entrusted to him? For Moses knew that a
wise plan, in whatever mind it might originate, was to be ascribed not
to the man who devised it, but to Him who is the Truth, the unchangeable
God.
8. In the last place, every one who boasts that he, through divine illumination,
understands the obscurities of Scripture, though not instructed in any
rules of interpretation, at the same time believes, and rightly believes,
that this power is not his own, in the sense of originating with himself,
but is the gift of God. For so he seeks God's glory, not his own. But reading
and understanding, as he does, without the aid of any human interpreter,
why does he himself undertake to interpret for others? Why does he not
rather send them direct to God, that they too may learn by the inward teaching
of the Spirit without the help of man? The truth is, he fears to incur
the reproach: "Thou wicked and slothful servant, thou oughtest to
have put my money to the exchangers." Seeing, then, that these men
teach others, either through speech or writing, what they understand, surely
they cannot blame me if I likewise teach not only what they understand,
but also the rules of interpretation they follow. For no one ought to consider
anything as his own, except perhaps what is false. All truth is of Him
who says, "I am the truth." For what have we that we did not
receive? And if we have received it, why do we glory, as if we had not
received it?
9. He who reads to an audience pronounces aloud the words he sees before
him: he who teaches reading, does it that others may be able to read for
themselves. Each, however, communicates to others what he has learnt himself.
Just so, the man who explains to an audience the passages of Scripture
he understands is like one who reads aloud the words before him. On the
other hand, the man who lays down rules for interpretation is like one
who teaches reading, that is, shows others how to read for themselves.
So that, just as he who knows how to read is not dependent on some one
else, when he finds a book, to tell him what is written in it, so the man
who is in possession of the rules which I here attempt to lay down, if
he meet with an obscure passage in the books which he reads, will not need
an interpreter to lay open the secret to him, but, holding fast by certain
rules, and following up certain indications, will arrive at the hidden
sense without any error, or at least without falling into any gross absurdity.
And so although it will sufficiently appear in the course of the work itself
that no one can justly object to this undertaking of mine, which has no
other object than to be of service, yet as it seemed convenient to reply
at the outset to any who might make preliminary objections, such is the
start I have thought good to make on the road I am about to traverse in
this book.
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