Category: Apologetics

God’s Elect in 1 Clement

divine electionCalvinist theology places a great deal of emphasis on the concept of God’s elect.

The term “elect” is taken from the Greek word eklektos, which means “chosen.”

In Calvinist thought, the elect are those that have been chosen by God to be saved on the last day. The Westminster Confession of Faith states, “God hath appointed the elect unto glory” (3:6).

This sense of the term is not unique to Calvinism. It is also the way the term has traditionally been used in Catholic theology, from which Calvinism inherited it.

However, it is important to be careful about the way terms have come to be used in theology, because language changes over time, and sometimes the meaning a term has in later texts does not correspond to the one it has in earlier ones.

A classic example of this is “heresy.” Originally, the Greek term hairesis just meant “opinion” or “sect” (i.e., the group of people who hold a particular opinion), but today it means something very different.

What about “elect”? Can we count on early texts using it in the sense later theologies have?

 

Multiple Senses of “Elect”

It’s easy to show from the Bible that the term isn’t always used in the later, theological sense. When Jesus is described in John 1:34 as the “Chosen One” (eklektos) of God, it does not mean that God has chosen Jesus to be saved on the final day.

Similarly, there are various passages in the Old Testament where God’s people Israel is described as his “chosen” (Heb., bakhir; LXX, eklektos; e.g., 1 Chr. 16:13, Ps. 105:6, Is. 65:9).

However, if we set these aside and look at early Christian texts that speak of a group of people in God’s new dispensation as “the elect,” what do we find?

A striking example of where the term is not used in the later theological sense is found in 1 Clement, and it is worth looking at the way this document uses it.

 

Introducing 1 Clement

1 Clement is a letter written from Rome to Corinth in the first century. It is often dated to around A.D. 96, but it is more plausibly dated to the first half of A.D. 70.

Although written in a corporate manner (1 Clem. 65:2 describes it as “The letter of the Romans to the Corinthians”), its eloquence reveals that it is the product of a single author (not a committee), as was virtually universal for letters at this time.

The extensive knowledge of the Old Testament that its author clearly possesses suggests that he was of Jewish extraction.

Various early Christian sources identify the author as Clement, a bishop of Rome, and there is no good reason to doubt this identification.

It is significant for our purposes is that this Clement was a disciple of both Peter and Paul.

He may be the same Clement mentioned in Philippians 4:3, and 1 Clement describes Peter and Paul as men of “our generation” (5:1-7). Both Peter and Paul are known to have spent significant amounts of time at Rome, and both were martyred there—likely just a handful of years before the letter was written.

Although 1 Clement is not part of the New Testament, the fact it was written so early and by a disciple of Peter and Paul make its discussion of the elect significant, and it may shed light on the way this term is used in New Testament texts.

So how is the concept is handled in 1 Clement?

 

Election in 1 Clement

The first mention of the elect in 1 Clement occurs in its opening passage. Responding to a crisis that has occurred in the church of Corinth—whereby the leaders of that church had been unjustly expelled from office—the author notes that this “unholy rebellion” is “both foreign and strange to the elect of God” (1:1).

From this we may infer that God’s elect are to be characterized by holiness and due order in church affairs.

Clement next comments on how the Corinthians have made great efforts to seek the salvation of others. He writes:

It was your struggle,  both day and night, on behalf of the whole fellowship of believers,  to save the total number of his elect with mercy and conscientiousness (2:4).

This passage uses the term “elect” in a way distinctly different from its later theological use.

Here “the total number of his [God’s] elect” is identified with “the whole fellowship of believers”—a usage reminiscent of the Old Testament passages that speak of the people of Israel collectively as God’s chosen.

We thus need to be alert to the idea that Clement simply envisions the Christian community in the same way: Christians as a whole are God’s new elect or chosen people.

This understanding is strengthened by the fact he here says that the Corinthians have struggled to ensure that “the total number of his elect” be saved, for it suggests that the total number of the elect might not be saved.

This makes better sense if the elect are conceived of as Christians in general rather than those who will be saved on the last day. The former (people who have professed faith in Jesus Christ and been baptized) are not guaranteed salvation, but those who will be saved on the last day—by definition—are.

The natural sense of the passage is thus that the Corinthians have made great efforts to ensure the salvation of all believers, though this salvation is not guaranteed. (Indeed, Clement later warns those who fomented the Corinthian rebellion that they need to repent or they will be “driven out from his [Christ’s] hope,” literal translation; 57:2).

As we will see, this corporate understanding of the elect is consistent with all of the other references Clement makes to the elect.

Clement notes that, to Peter and Paul “a great multitude of the elect was gathered” (6:1).

He also refers to us approaching the Father, “who made us his own chosen [eklogēs] portion” (29:1)—an idea strongly reminiscent of and undoubtedly based on Israel as God’s portion, which he chose (cf. Deut. 7:6, 14:2, 32:9).

It is important to note that here Clement conceives of Roman and Corinthian Christians as a whole—not just certain individuals among them—as being God’s chosen.

Later he quotes from Psalm 118:25-26, writing:

“With the innocent one you [God] will be innocent and with the elect you will be elect and with the perverse you will deal perversely.” 

Therefore let us cling to the innocent and the righteous, as these are the elect of God (46:3-4).

Here he identifies the elect as “the innocent and the righteous”—terms that can characterize Christians in general.

In the same chapter, he writes:

Remember the words of the Lord Jesus, for it says, “Woe to that person, it would be better for him if he had not been born than to cause one of my elect to sin. It would have been better for him to be tied to a millstone and to sink into the sea than to turn away one of my elect” (Matt. 26:24 with Luke 17:1-2). Your schism has turned many away . . . ! (46:7-9).

Here Clement envisions it being possible for the elect to sin and to “turn away”—something he says the Corinthian schism has accomplished.

Clement later writes that “All of the elect of God were made perfect in love. Apart from love, nothing is pleasing to God” (49:5), indicating that the elect are to be characterized by love.

Quoting Psalm 32:1-2 (or perhaps Rom. 4:7-9), he writes:

“Blessed are those whose trespasses are forgiven and whose sins are covered up; blessed is the one the sin of whom the Lord does not take into account, and in his mouth there is no deceit.” 

This blessing was given to those who have been chosen [eklelegmenous] by God through Jesus Christ our Lord (50:6-7).

Thus the elect have been given the blessing of forgiveness.

Clement identifies the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit as “both the faith and the hope of the elect” (58:2)—meaning they believe and hope in the Persons of the Trinity.

He says that the Roman church will make “earnest prayer and supplication, that the number of those who are counted among his elect throughout the whole world, the Creator of everything may guard unharmed through his beloved child Jesus Christ” (59:2). The elect thus need to be guarded from harm.

In the same chapter, Clement addresses God directly, noting that he “multiplies the nations upon earth and chose [ekleksamenon] from all of them those who love you through Jesus Christ your beloved child” (59:3).

Here the elect are again identified with “those who love you [God] through Jesus Christ”—i.e., the worldwide Christian community.

The above are the only places where 1 Clement refers to “the elect” or uses the corresponding terms for choosing to refer to a group of people in the Christian age.

He also uses these terms to refer to specific chosen individuals, such as Aaron (43:4-5), David (52:2), and Jesus (64:1), as do various passages in the Old Testament. However, these do not pertain to the subject we are examining.

What, then, can be said about 1 Clement’s understanding of the elect?

 

Synthesis

It appears that 1 Clement’s understanding of “the elect” is based on Old Testament passages (e.g., Deut. 7:6, 14:2, 32:9, 1 Chr. 16:13, Ps. 105:6, Is. 65:9) that conceive of Israel as God’s elect or chosen people.

Clement thus refers to members of the Roman and Corinthian churches as a whole (not just certain individuals) as the subject of God’s election, saying that he “made us his own chosen portion” (29:1).

Today, the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are “the faith and the hope of the elect” (58:2), and from among the nations, God “chose . . . those who love you through Jesus Christ your beloved child” (59:3). The elect are thus identified with the worldwide Christian community.

Therefore, “the total number of his elect” is identified with “the whole fellowship of believers” (2:4).

In Rome in particular, “a great multitude of the elect was gathered” around Peter and Paul (6:1).

The elect have been given the blessing of forgiveness. (50:6-7), and thus can be described as “the innocent and the righteous” (46:3-4), for “all of the elect of God were made perfect in love” (49:5). Consequently, they are to be characterized by holiness and due order in church affairs (1:1).

However, it is possible for members of the elect to sin and to “turn away”—something the Corinthian schism has caused to happen (46:7-9).

It is not guaranteed that “the total number of his elect” will be saved, and the Corinthians themselves have struggled to ensure their salvation (2:4). The Roman church likewise prays that God “may guard [them] unharmed through his beloved child Jesus Christ” (59:2).

 

Conclusion

We thus see that Clement—a disciple of Peter and Paul—conceives of “the elect” simply as the Christian people as a whole, not specifically as that group which will be saved on the last day.

His use of the term thus differs from the use it has in later Catholic and Calvinist theologies.

Given the fact his understanding of election closely corresponds to the Old Testament’s treatment of Israel as God’s elect people—not to mention his early date and the fact he was a disciple of Peter and Paul—this may well shed light on the way the term is used in the New Testament.

However, that is a subject for another time.

The 95 Theses: 8 Things to Know and Share

Luther as Professor, 1529 (oil on panel) by Cranach, Lucas, the Elder (1472-1553); Schlossmuseum, Weimar, Germany; (add.info.: Luther als Professor; Martin Luther (1483-1546);); German, out of copyright

In 1517, Martin Luther drafted a document known as The 95 Theses, and its publication is used to date the beginning of the Protestant Reformation.

The recent 500th anniversary of that event focused a good bit of attention on the 95 Theses.

Here are 8 things to know and share . . .

 

1) What are The 95 Theses?

The 95 Theses are a set of propositions that Martin Luther proposed for academic debate. As the name indicates, there are 95 of them.

Despite the fact they played a key role in starting the Protestant Reformation, they do not deal with either of the main Protestant distinctives. They do not mention either justification by faith alone or doing theology by Scripture alone.

Instead, they deal principally with indulgences, purgatory, and the pope’s role with respect to the two.

 

2) Did Luther nail them to a church door?

Despite constant statements to the contrary, the answer appears to be no, he didn’t.

 

3) Are they all bad?

No, they’re not. It can come as a surprise to both Protestants and Catholics, but some of them agree with Catholic teaching.

Here are the first three of Luther’s theses, along with parallel statements from the Catechism of the Catholic Church:

Thesis 1: When our Lord and Master Jesus Christ said, “Repent” (Mt 4:17), he willed the entire life of believers to be one of repentance.

    • CCC 1431: Interior repentance is a radical reorientation of our whole life, a return, a conversion to God with all our heart, an end of sin, a turning away from evil, with repugnance toward the evil actions we have committed.

Thesis 2: This word [i.e., Christ’s call to repent in Mark 4:17] cannot be understood as referring to the sacrament of penance, that is, confession and satisfaction, as administered by the clergy.

    • CCC 1427: Jesus calls to conversion. This call is an essential part of the proclamation of the kingdom: “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent, and believe in the gospel” [Mark 4:17]. In the Church’s preaching this call is addressed first to those who do not yet know Christ and his Gospel. Also, Baptism is the principal place for the first and) fundamental conversion.

Thesis 3: Yet it [i.e., the call to repent in Mark 4:17] does not mean solely inner repentance; such inner repentance is worthless unless it produces various outward mortification of the flesh.

    • CCC 1430: Jesus’ call to conversion and penance, like that of the prophets before him, does not aim first at outward works, “sackcloth and ashes,” fasting and mortification, but at the conversion of the heart, interior conversion. Without this, such penances remain sterile and false; however, interior conversion urges expression in visible signs, gestures, and works of penance.

 

4) How did the Church respond to The 95 Theses?

In 1520, Pope Leo X published a bull known as Exsurge Domine (Latin, “Arise, Lord”) in which he rejected 41 propositions taken from the writings of Martin Luther up to that time.

However, only a few of the rejected propositions came from The 95 Theses. Most were based on things Luther said in other writings.

 

5) Which of The 95 Theses did Exsurge Domine reject?

The rejected propositions in Exsurge Domine are formulated from things Luther said, but they are not verbatim quotations.

Three of the rejected propositions—numbers 4, 17, and 38—are drawn from The 95 Theses. In each case, the rejected proposition is based on two of Luther’s original theses.

Here are the rejected propositions along with the corresponding theses:

Proposition 4. To one on the point of death, imperfect charity necessarily brings with it great fear, which in itself alone is enough to produce the punishment of purgatory and impedes entrance into the kingdom.

Thesis 14. Imperfect piety or love on the part of the dying person necessarily brings with it great fear; and the smaller the love, the greater the fear.

Thesis 15. This fear or horror is sufficient in itself, to say nothing of other things, to constitute the penalty of purgatory, since it is very near the horror of despair.

Proposition 17. The treasures of the Church from which the pope gives indulgences are not the merits of Christ and of the saints.

Thesis 56. The treasures of the church, out of which the pope distributes indulgences, are not sufficiently discussed or known among the people of Christ.

Thesis 58. Nor are they the merits of Christ and the saints, for, even without the pope, the latter always work grace for the inner man, and the cross, death, and hell for the outer man.

Proposition 38. The souls in purgatory are not sure of their salvation, at least (not) all; nor is it proved by any arguments or by the Scriptures that they are beyond the state of meriting or of increasing in charity.

Thesis 19. Nor does it seem proved that souls in purgatory, at least not all of them, are certain and assured of their own salvation, even if we ourselves may be entirely certain of it.

Thesis 18. Furthermore, it does not seem proved, either by reason or Scripture, that souls in purgatory are outside the state of merit, that is, unable to grow in love.

Note that Proposition 17 only deals with the substance of Thesis 58. The part of Thesis 56 that it picks up (“The treasures of the Church from which the pope gives indulgences”) is just to supply the antecedent for the pronoun “they” in Thesis 58. The remainder of Thesis 56 is not commented upon.

Therefore, Exsurge Domine rejected things it saw expressed in theses 14, 15, 18, 19, and 58.

 

6) What did Exsurge Domine say about the rejected propositions?

The bull closes with the following censure:

All and each of the above-mentioned articles or errors [i.e., all 41 of them], as set before you, we condemn, disapprove, and entirely reject as respectively heretical or (aut) scandalous or (aut) false or (aut) offensive to pious ears or (vel) seductive of simple minds and (et) in opposition to Catholic truth.

This kind of condemnation is sometimes referred to as an condemnation in globo (Latin, “as a whole”). They are rejected as a batch, but without indicating which censure applies to which proposition.

The condemnation has to be read with care because in Latin, aut indicates an exclusive “or” (i.e., this or that, but not both) while vel indicates an inclusive “or” (i.e., this or that, but possibly both).

Thus Exsurge Domine indicates that some of the 41 rejected propositions are heretical, some are scandalous, some are false, some are offensive to pious ears—but they are not all four.

The use of aut between these censures tells you that a given proposition may fall into one of these four categories.

The only time an inclusive “or” is used is before the fifth and sixth categories: Some propositions may be “seductive of simple minds and (et) in opposition to Catholic truth.” Here vel is used because things that are heretical (etc.) can also be seductive of simple minds (the fifth category) and obviously would be opposed to Catholic truth (the sixth category).

 

7) What does that mean for The 95 Theses?

It means that Exsurge Domine rejected things expressed in Theses 14, 15, 18, 19, and 58, and it thus warned Catholics away from these theses. However, it does not tell us what the problem was in particular cases. It could have been any of the following:

  • The thesis is heretical
  • The thesis is scandalous
  • The thesis is false
  • The thesis is offensive to pious ears
  • The thesis is seductive of simple minds
  • The thesis is opposed to Catholic truth

The difference between these is significant:

  1. If something is heretical then it is both false and contrary to a divinely revealed dogma
  2. If it is scandalous then it can lead people into sin
  3. If it is false then it is not true, though it may not be opposed to a dogma
  4. If it is offensive to pious ears then it is badly and offensively phrased
  5. If it is seductive of simple minds then it can mislead ordinary people
  6. If it is opposed to Catholic truth then it could be opposed in one of the five ways named above.

It is important to note that if the problem is (1) or (3) then the Thesis is necessarily false.

However, if the problem is (2), (4), or (5) then the Thesis is not necessarily false—it could be technically true but phrased offensively, phrased in a misleading way, or phrased in a way that could lead people to sin.

Because Exsurge Domine doesn’t assign particular censures to particular propositions, it doesn’t tell us what the status of the theses in question are. It warns us away from them but leaves it up to theologians to classify the particular problem with a thesis.

 

8) Does the fact that Exsurge Domine only rejects things said in five of the theses mean that the other 90 are okay?

No. This does not give the rest of The 95 Theses a clean bill of health. They can also be problematic, they just weren’t among those dealt with in Exsurge Domine.

It would be interesting to go through The 95 Theses and analyze of the degree to which each of them fits or doesn’t fit with Catholic thought, but that would be a lengthy effort that would go far beyond what can be accomplished in a blog post.

Did the Exodus Happen?

EXODUSAccording to multiple books in the Old Testament, the Israelites came into possession of the land of Canaan after they left slavery in Egypt—an event known as the Exodus.

Yet, according to some skeptical scholars today, the Exodus never happened.

Instead, the Israelites simply were a group of Canaanites, and they eventually took over the territory in which they already lived—either as part of a peasant revolt or through some other process.

Despite these claims, there are reasons to hold the Exodus occurred.

Let’s talk about that.

 

Origin Stories

Every people has an account of its origins, or what could be called its origin story.

  • In the case of the United States, our origin story involves the original thirteen rebellious colonies that seceded from England in the American War of Independence, starting in 1776.
  • In the case of the United Kingdom, the origin story involves the uniting of the Kingdom of England with the Kingdom of Scotland in 1701.
  • In the case of Rome, the story involves the founding of the city by the hero Romulus.

But everybody’s got an origin story.

History doesn’t know any people who, if asked about their origins, would say, “Well, we don’t really know who we are or where we came from.”

The Israelites were no exception: Their national origin story involved the Exodus.

So why wouldn’t one take them at their word?

 

Sketchy Stories

It’s certainly true that you can’t take everybody’s origin story at face value.

For example, certain long-settled peoples have no memory of their true origins, and they have provided an account based on folklore and mythology.

When this happens, they may say that their people was created by the gods—or otherwise entered the world—in the same territory they now occupy.

This is the case with the Hopi and Zuni tribes of North America, whose origin stories hold that human beings—including themselves—first emerged into this world out of a hole in a rocky mound known as the Sipapuni, which is located on the Colorado River outside Grand Canyon National Park.

However, if modern scientific accounts are remotely accurate, their ancestors originated in the Old World and migrated over the Bering Land Bridge connecting Siberia and Alaska.

Sketchy origin stories are found in the Old World as well. The Egyptians, similarly, had no memory of their ancestors ever having lived anywhere else, and they set their creation stories in the Nile Valley. Curiously, their stories also feature a primeval mound, which they called the Benben.

 

Distance in Time

One thing the Hopi, Zuni, and Egyptian origin stories have in common is that they describe events occurring long before recorded history.

In the absence of historical memory, folklore has filled in the gaps.

This is markedly different from the origin stories of the U.S. and the U.K., which deal with events only a few hundred years ago.

If you read a modern account of the American Revolution or the British Acts of Union, the distance in time between the account and the events it describes is only 250-300 years.

How does Israel’s origin story fare by comparison?

 

References to the Exodus

For much of Church history, the book of Exodus was regarded as having been authored by Moses and thus as having been a record produced within the same generation as the events it describes.

More recently, biblical scholars have drifted away from this view, and by the 20th century it became common to hold that the Pentateuch—of which Exodus is a part—is a composite of four sources known by the initials J, E, D, and P.

The parts of the book of Exodus that deal with the Exodus event itself were held to be derived from the J (“Yahwist”) and E (“Elohist”) sources, which are named after the terms they use for God (“Yahweh,” and “Elohim,” respectively).

Scholars debated precisely when these sources were to be dated, but it was common to date J to some time between 950 and 850 B.C.

It was also common to date E sometime between 850 and 750 B.C.

More recently, the JEDP theory has begun to fall out of favor—at least in its classical form—though there is no current consensus about what should replace it.

However, if—for purposes of argument—we were to accept the dates proposed above, we would have references to the Exodus event in Israel’s literature between around 950 and 750 B.C.

Even if one were to take a more skeptical view and think the Pentateuch is composed of later sources, the date of our earliest Exodus references would not change much, because there are multiple references to the event in the prophets.

Thus in Micah 6:4, God declares, “I brought you up from the land of Egypt, and redeemed you from the house of bondage.”

And in Hosea 11:1, he says, “When Israel was a child, I loved him, and out of Egypt I called my son.”

  • Micah prophesied between the times of King Jotham and King Hezekiah (Mic. 1:1), which puts his ministry between 750 and 687 B.C.
  • Hosea prophesied between the times of King Uzziah and King Hezekiah (Hos. 1:1), which puts his ministry between 783 and 687 B.C.

We therefore would still have references to the Exodus event in Israelite literature by the 700s.

The fact we have multiple such references (and there are others) means the tradition was widespread and thus has to be dated earlier to allow time for it to become popular and be mentioned multiple times in the surviving literature.

We thus would conclude that the story had to be circulating by around 850 B.C.—a century before the prophets just mentioned.

 

Dating the Exodus

That leads us to the question of when the Exodus occurred.

The traditional date for the event is in the 1400s B.C. However, more recently a date in the 1200s B.C. has been proposed.

The latter seems more likely, and it corresponds to the earliest extra-biblical reference we have to Israel.

This is found on an Egyptian monument known as the Merneptah Stele, which celebrates a military victory over the Israelites by the Egyptian pharaoh, Merneptah, who reigned between 1213 and 1203 B.C.

The inscription on the stele is significant not just because it refers to Israel but because of the way it refers to it.

Egyptian writing uses a set of symbols—known as determinatives—to help the reader identify the kind of thing being described. For example, when a man’s name is given, a symbol representing a seated man is often placed after it. When a woman’s name is given, a symbol representing a seated woman is used.

On the Merneptah Stele, when Israel’s name is given, a determinative indicating a foreign people is used.

This determinative is usually used for nomadic peoples that do not have a settled location, suggesting the inscription was made during the period of wandering before Israel was settled in the land.

That would suggest that the Exodus occurred in the reign of Pharaoh Ramses II (1279-1213 B.C.).

 

The Role of Writing

If accounts of the Exodus were circulating in Israel by 850 B.C. and if the event itself would have taken place around 1250 B.C., that’s only a gap of 400 years.

Four centuries is not a long time when it comes to national origin stories.

Even in purely oral (illiterate) societies that depend entirely on tradition for knowledge of the past, collective memory can preserve the core facts regarding where a people came from for that length of time.

But Israel was not a purely oral society at this time.

We have artifacts with Hebrew writing that date from the time of King David’s reign, in the 10th century B.C.

Given the fragmentary nature of the historical record in this period, writing had to have been in use in Israelite society even earlier. Very conservatively, we could push it back by a century, into the 11th century B.C.

That would reduce the time between the proposed date of the Exodus (13th century) and the Israelite use of writing (11th century) to only two hundred years.

That’s not long at all for oral tradition to preserve memories of something as important as how a nation was founded, and there’s no reason it need be that long. The Israelites could have been using writing even earlier.

In fact, according to the Exodus account, they came from Egypt, which had been a literate culture for 2,000 years by that point.

Even if they hadn’t yet begun writing their own language in the Phoenician-based script that they later used, the Israelite’s origin story attests that they had been exposed to a literate culture, and they could have been using writing even before the Exodus.

But there’s another reason we should give credence to the Exodus.

 

You Wouldn’t Make This Up

Nobody wants to look down on their ancestors, and national pride pushes people to glorify their ancestors and the founding of their nation.

Even if your nation was founded as, say, a penal colony, you’ll want to find admirable things about your ancestors and talk about their heroic struggle in a new and difficult land.

But you wouldn’t invent the idea that your nation was founded by convicts if it wasn’t true.

Long before 1984, inconvenient facts like that would be conveniently sent “down the memory hole” if at all possible.

We see this all the time in the ancient world. If you read the military records left by Egyptian pharaohs, guess what! They never lost a battle! (Though we do sometimes read about them “winning” battles progressively closer and closer to home as their armies were forced to retreat.)

If the Israelites had been in Canaan since time immemorial, they would have done what other ancient peoples did, such as saying they were created there.

They might have even depicted the Canaanites they displaced as invaders whose yoke they threw off.

Or they might have said their ancestors came from a powerful, nearby civilization which they admired (the way the Romans said Romulus was a descendant of the Trojan hero Aeneas).

But they would not have invented a shameful past that depicted their ancestors as slaves in a neighboring country that they hated and that periodically conquered them in their own land—which Egypt did.

Slavery was not a desirable condition in the ancient world, and Jewish people were as sensitive to that as anybody.

Thus the Gospel of John reports that, on one occasion, Jesus’ opponents declared, “We are descendants of Abraham, and have never been in bondage to any one” (John 8:33).

This hasty statement ignores not only the bondage in Egypt but the subsequent conquest by the Babylonians and even their present subjection by the Romans—but it testifies to the common feeling of national pride that leads people to minimize or ignore uncomfortable facts about their past.

“We were slaves in Egypt” is one such uncomfortable fact, and it is not something that the Israelites would have made up.

We thus have good reason to hold that the Exodus occurred.

If Enough People Reject Church Teaching, Does That Make It Wrong?

Dissent_magazine_US_logoIt’s no secret that, today, a lot of people disagree with the Church’s teaching on various points.

That’s no surprise. The Church, like Christ, has always been “a sign that is spoken against” (Luke 2:34).

What’s more surprising—and scandalous—is that in our age many professing Catholics reject Church teaching, even teachings regarded as infallible.

The most famous example is the Church’s teaching on contraception. Opinion polls have revealed widespread dissent from this teaching, even among Catholics.

Sometimes those seeking to justify this dissent argue that the Church’s teaching on contraception has not been “received” by the faithful, and therefore is not authoritative. (More recently, Fr. James Martin, SJ has proposed a similar argument concerning homosexual behavior.)

What are they talking about?

 

Reception and the Sense of the Faithful

After reviewing how the Holy Spirit assists the Church when it infallibly defines a teaching, the fathers of the Second Vatican council stated:

To these definitions the assent of the Church can never be wanting, on account of the activity of that same Holy Spirit, by which the whole flock of Christ is preserved and progresses in unity of faith (Lumen Gentium 25).

The Council teaches that the Holy Spirit preserves the flock of Christ in the unity of faith. And so, when the Magisterium infallibly defines a teaching, the Holy Spirit guides the faithful to accept—or “receive”—that teaching.

This process of reception reflects what theologians have called the “sense of the faithful” (sensus fidelium) or the “sense of faith” (sensus fidei).

According to Vatican II:

The whole body of the faithful . . . cannot err in matters of belief. This characteristic is shown in the supernatural appreciation of faith (sensus fidei) on the part of the whole people, when, from the bishops to the last of the faithful, they manifest a universal consent in matters of faith and morals (Lumen Gentium 12; CCC 92).

The Holy Spirit thus gives the Church—including the ordinary faithful—a supernatural sense of what constitutes the true faith, and when the Magisterium infallibly defines a point of faith, the Holy Spirit guides the Church’s members to accept or receive this teaching.

 

Clarifying the Sense of the Faithful

In the debate over contraception that followed Paul VI’s 1968 encyclical Humanae Vitae, dissenters argued that so many Catholics rejected its teaching that the process of reception had not occurred and thus that the teaching was not accurate or authoritative.

They even used quotations from Vatican II—like the ones we have just seen—to argue their point.

This led defenders of the Church’s teaching to try to clarify the proper role of the sense of the faithful.

One point they made was that the process of reception is just that: a process. You can’t look at the immediate reaction to a teaching as a definitive guide. You have to give the Holy Spirit time to do his work in guiding the faithful.

Over time, a number of documents appeared that treated the subject of reception and the sense of the faithful.

One of the most thorough was produced by the International Theological Commission.

The ITC is not itself an organ of the Magisterium. Instead, it is an advisory body run by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. Its documents are submitted to the pope and the CDF, and they are only published “on condition that there is not any difficulty on the part of the Apostolic See” (Statutes 12; cf. 11).

The ITC’s published documents—like its 2014 Sensus Fidei in the Life of the Church, which was authorized for publication by Cardinal Muller—are thus considered theologically orthodox.

 

The ITC on Reception

The ITC notes that, despite the generally smooth reception of magisterial teachings:

There are occasions, however, when the reception of magisterial teaching by the faithful meets with difficulty and resistance, and appropriate action on both sides is required in such situations.

The faithful must reflect on the teaching that has been given, making every effort to understand and accept it. Resistance, as a matter of principle, to the teaching of the magisterium is incompatible with the authentic sensus fidei.

The magisterium must likewise reflect on the teaching that has been given and consider whether it needs clarification or reformulation in order to communicate more effectively the essential message (n. 80).

 

Conditions for the Sense of the Faithful

The ITC pointed out that just because a person is a Catholic doesn’t mean he is authentically displaying a true sense of faith. The fact Catholics disagree on various points guarantees that they can’t all be right, and it’s obvious that some Catholics are more faithful than others.

Through his work in our lives, God offers all the baptized guidance in discerning truth from falsehood, but we still have free will, and so we must cooperate with his work for this guidance to bear fruit.

The commission thus identified a set of criteria that an individual needs to authentically participate in the sense of faith:

a) Participation in the life of the Church
b) Listening to the word of God
c) Openness to reason
d) Adherence to the magisterium
e) Holiness—humility, freedom, and joy
f) Seeking the edification of the Church

All of these are common sense.

  • If a person was baptized Catholic but subsequently has never darkened a church’s door, he is so disconnected from his faith that he can’t be said to display a supernatural sense of faith.
  • The Faith is contained in the word of God, and so a willingness to listen to Scripture and Tradition is needed.
  • A person who is unreasonable, who is determined to hold his opinions regardless of the arguments brought forward, is not displaying the discernment needed to distinguish truth from falsehood.
  • Christ gave us a Magisterium, and a person who fundamentally refuses to listen to that Magisterium is not authentically faithful.
  • Holiness is a key goal of God’s work in our lives, and a person who doesn’t seek and display holiness is not cooperating with that work.
  • Finally, God guides individuals to build up or edify their fellow Christians, and someone fundamentally oriented toward creating division and disedification is not cooperating with him.

 

Opinion Polls and the Sense of the Faithful

In many parts of the world, America included, most Catholics don’t even go to Mass on a regular basis. They thus don’t seem to have the level of involvement in their faith needed to meet even the first criterion laid out by the ITC.

When you consider how many Catholics display the qualities listed above, it is clear that public opinion polls cannot be relied upon as a guide to the sense of the faithful. Thus the ITC comments that one can’t identify the sense of faith with public opinion:

i) First of all, the sensus fidei is obviously related to faith, and faith is a gift not necessarily possessed by all people, so the sensus fideican certainly not be likened to public opinion in society at large.

Then also, while Christian faith is, of course, the primary factor uniting members of the Church, many different influences combine to shape the views of Christians living in the modern world.

As the above discussion of dispositions implicitly shows, the sensus fidei cannot simply be identified, therefore, with public or majority opinion in the Church, either. Faith, not opinion, is the necessary focus of attention.

Opinion is often just an expression, frequently changeable and transient, of the mood or desires of a certain group or culture, whereas faith is the echo of the one Gospel which is valid for all places and times.

ii) In the history of the people of God, it has often been not the majority but rather a minority which has truly lived and witnessed to the faith. The Old Testament knew the ‘holy remnant’ of believers, sometimes very few in number, over against the kings and priests and most of the Israelites. . . .

In many countries today, Christians are under strong pressure from other religions or secular ideologies to neglect the truth of faith and weaken the boundaries of ecclesial community. It is therefore particularly important to discern and listen to the voices of the “little ones who believe” (Mk 9:42) (n. 118).

Therefore, one needs to think twice before one takes the latest opinion poll—whether about contraception or anything else—as a sign that a particular Church teaching has not been received by the faithful.

Obviously, many who dissent from Church teaching are regular churchgoers, and they may meet multiple criteria identified by the ITC. However, the fundamental point remains that the true sense of faith is displayed by those who are authentically faithful and not simply those who are baptized.

How Could Catholics and Protestants Commemorate the Reformation–Together?

reformationIn recent years both Catholics and Protestants have been puzzled by occasional mentions in the press that the two groups would be jointly commemorating of the upcoming five hundredth anniversary of the Protestant Reformation.

What on earth?

Why would Catholics commemorate such an event?

Let’s talk about that.

 

“And So, It Begins . . .”

According to legend, on October 31, 1517, Martin Luther nailed his 95 Theses to the door of the castle church in Wittenburg, Germany.

Despite the legend, we don’t have solid evidence that he actually did this, but it is true that in 1517 Luther published a set of 95 propositions he proposed for academic debate.

Surprisingly, the 95 Theses do not refer to or sola scriptura or sola fide—doctrines that later came to define the Protestant movement. In fact, the concept of justification isn’t even mentioned in them.

Instead, they deal with indulgences, purgatory, and various Church teachings and practices connected with them.

With time, however, the debate widened to include additional subjects, and within a few years a whole host of doctrines were under dispute.

Attempts were made for several decades to reconcile the parties involved, but with time the divisions hardened, and the Protestant-Catholic split has been with us ever since.

 

Anniversaries of the Reformation

Whether or not Luther did anything on October 31, 1517, that date became standard for marking the anniversary of the Protestant Reformation.

Even today, some Protestant churches celebrate “Reformation Day” as an alternative to Halloween.

And even in groups that don’t have a problem with Halloween, there are periodic celebrations of the anniversary of the Reformation.

The centennial anniversaries—1617, 1717, 1817, and 1917—had particularly notable celebrations in the Protestant community.

Now we’ve arrived at the five hundredth anniversary—2017—and this has posed new challenges, for both Protestants and Catholics.

 

Mutual Animosity

In the past, it seemed obvious how the two communities should mark hundredth anniversaries of the Reformation.

For Protestants, it was obvious that they should have a big party—a celebration of Luther and his colleagues as (small “s”) saviors of Christendom, who rescued the Christian Faith from popish corruption and heresy. The Reformation was a glorious triumph, and that needed to be celebrated.

For Catholics, the reverse was true: The Reformation was a horrible tragedy, and it should in no way be celebrated. There should be no Catholic marking of the occasion, except as the anniversary of one of the darkest days in history, with the memory of Luther—the arch-heretic—thoroughly execrated.

Given the mutual animosity between the two groups, these ways of looking at the event were a given.

 

A Change in Attitude

The twentieth century saw a change in attitude between the two groups.

While there are still strongly anti-Catholic Protestants and strongly anti-Protestant Catholics, the two communities have, as a whole, developed much warmer relations.

A variety of factors have contributed to this warming.

In the 1500s, religion was closely tied to the local government. The principle cuius regio, eius religio (Latin, “Whose region, his religion”) meant that the religion of the local ruler would be the religion of the state.

Consequently, subscribing to a different faith could be seen as a politically subversive act, and feelings of nationalism got tangled up with religious sensibilities.

As society has become more secular, though, those tensions have eased among Christians.

Indeed, growing secularism has led Protestants and Catholics to band together. Here in the United States, Roe v. Wade led to unprecedented cooperation between the two on the subject of abortion, and more recent developments have seen the two sides uniting in mutual defense of religious freedom.

We’re also living in an age of increased social mobility and communication. People no longer spend their whole lives within ten miles of the tiny agricultural village where they were born, and they can communicate with anyone in the world via the Internet.

These factors have all led Protestants and Catholics to get to know each other better, to build bridges, and to form alliances.

Socially, we are not the enemies that we once were. Now, we’re usually allies.

 

“That They May Be One”

Accompanying these changes, both groups have also meditated more profoundly on Our Lord’s requirement that Christians must work to overcome differences and strive for unity.

On the night he was betrayed, Jesus spoke—repeatedly—about the need for Christian unity.

Among other points, he said that it would be by Christians’ love for one another that the world would know they are his disciples.

For Christians to be locked in conflict and mutual hostility therefore creates a barrier to the spread of the Gospel, and this came to weigh more heavily on Christian leaders as the gospel began losing ground to secularism.

Over the course of the twentieth century, Christian leaders became more and more convinced that we needed to find a way around the old hostilities and to begin rebuilding the unity we had lost.

This put the approaching five hundredth anniversary of the Reformation in a new light.

 

Jesus on Christian Unity

“A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another; even as I have loved you, that you also love one another. By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another” (John 13:34-35).

“If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and abide in his love” (John 15:10).

“And now I am no more in the world, but they are in the world, and I am coming to thee. Holy Father, keep them in thy name, which thou hast given me, that they may be one, even as we are one” (John 17:11).

“I do not pray for these only, but also for those who believe in me through their word,  that they may all be one; even as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be in us, so that the world may believe that thou hast sent me.  The glory which thou hast given me I have given to them, that they may be one even as we are one, I in them and thou in me, that they may become perfectly one, so that the world may know that thou hast sent me and hast loved them even as thou hast loved me” (John 17:20-23).

 

“What Unites Us”

As Christians began to move closer together, they began a mutual re-examination and re-appraisal.

A starting point for this was the willingness to acknowledge the good in each other’s communities: Protestants acknowledged that Catholics were not all bad, and Catholics did the same for Protestants.

This applied not only to personal morals but also to our respective theologies.

In the years of conflict that followed the Reformation, attention focused on our theological differences, but we share a great deal of theology—belief that there is only one, true God, that Jesus Christ is his Son, that God is a trinity of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

Concerning Jesus, we believe in his Virgin Birth, his atoning death on the Cross, his bodily resurrection and ascension, and his Second Coming.

We believe in the general resurrection and the final judgment, in heaven and hell, in sin and salvation, in the holy Scriptures as the inspired word of God, and in numerous additional truths.

In words commonly attributed to St. John XXIII: “What unites us is much greater than what divides us.”

 

Purification of Memory

Preparing for the Jubilee Year 2000, St. John Paul II called for a “purification of memory.” This, he explained, “calls everyone to make an act of courage and humility in recognizing the wrongs done by those who have borne or bear the name of Christian” (Incarnationis Mysterium 11).

The jubilee year may have been a particularly appropriate occasion for this, but such a re-examination, in general terms, was already well underway.

The mutual Catholic-Protestant re-assessment meant not only seeing the positive aspects of the other party, it also meant acknowledging the flaws of our own side.

For Protestants, this meant a frank examination of Luther and his colleagues with the understanding that they could and did make mistakes.

For Catholics, it meant a look back at the time leading up to the Reformation, and the Reformation itself, with an awareness of our own forebears’ mistakes.

There were things in the Church needed of reform. That’s why we held a Counter-Reformation.

The Council of Trent did not meet simply to condemn things Protestants were saying. It has numerous decrees dealing with reforming various aspects of the Catholic Church. And there was a vast amount of reform work done in Catholic circles in the century following the council.

Both groups also have troubled histories in the years since the Reformation began. Pope Benedict XVI noted:

“Looking back over the past, to the divisions which in the course of the centuries have rent the Body of Christ, one continually has the impression that, at critical moments when divisions were coming about, not enough was done by the Church’s leaders to maintain or regain reconciliation and unity. One has the impression that omissions on the part of the Church have had their share of blame for the fact that these divisions were able to harden” (Letter, July 7, 2007).

And once the divisions between Protestants and Catholics did harden, we had the European Wars of Religion, mutual martyrdoms, and ongoing mutual persecution and hostility.

 

From Heretics to Separated Brethren

For centuries, Catholics and Protestants routinely described each other as heretics. Yet today this language has largely been dropped.

Why is this?

There is no official definition of the term “heresy” in Protestant circles. It is taken to mean some kind of highly unacceptable theological view, though there is no agreed-upon standard of what counts as a heresy.

Consequently, the growing acceptance of Catholics as fellow Christians, along with warmer social relations, has led most in the Protestant community to retire the term for Catholics.

In the Catholic Church, the Second Vatican Council set a new and more positive tone by referring to Protestants not as heretics but as “separated brethren.” The basis of this term is found in the fact that they are brothers in Christ by virtue of their baptism, but they are separated since they are not in communion with the Catholic Church.

While this description is accurate, is there any reason—other than politeness—to think that the term “heretic” should be avoided?

Unlike in the Protestant community, the term “heresy” has an official definition in the Catholic Church.

The Catechism of the Catholic Church explains: “Heresy is the obstinate post-baptismal denial of some truth which must be believed with divine and catholic faith, or it is likewise an obstinate doubt concerning the same” (CCC 2089).

The phrase “some truth which must be believed with divine and catholic faith” refers to a doctrine that has been infallibly defined by the Church as divinely revealed—i.e., a dogma.

While Protestants have been baptized and do deny or doubt various Catholic dogmas, they typically do not do so out of bad faith (Latin, mala fide) and therefore do not meet the requirement of obstinately denying or doubting a dogma.

The requirement of bad faith obstinacy for heresy has been part of the Church’s understanding for a long time (cf. Code of Canon Law [1917] 1325 §2).

Thus the Second Vatican Council remarked: “The children who are born into these communities and who grow up believing in Christ cannot be accused of the sin involved in the separation, and the Catholic Church embraces upon them as brothers, with respect and affection” (Unitatis Redintegratio 3).

Consequently, the Secretariat for Promoting Christian Unity indicated that people who were born Protestant did not need to make a formal abjuration of heresy upon becoming Catholic (Ecumenical Directory [1967] 19-20).

Thus Protestants are not typically referred to as heretics because they are not presumed to have committed the canonical crime of heresy.

 

From Celebration to Commemoration

As the five hundredth anniversary of the Reformation approached, some in the Protestant community began to ask how it should be marked.

In light of the mutual re-assessments that had taken place, where both parties acknowledged each others good points and their own flaws, the previous kind of celebrations no longer seemed credible.

It would no longer do to one-sidedly portray Luther and his colleagues as glorious heroes against dark-hearted and devilish Catholic villains.

Further, one thing both groups could agree on is that something tragic happened at the time of the Reformation: It was a great rending of Christendom that did not correspond to Christ’s desire for Christian unity and that, if mortal men had acted correctly, would not have happened.

Protestants and Catholic might hold differing views about who was at fault—and many would say there was plenty of fault on both sides—but both could recognize an enormous tragedy as having occurred.

So if the kind of “rah-rah” cheerleading style of celebration wasn’t what was called for, what should the first centennial of the Reformation in the ecumenical age look like?

And who should be involved?

Some in the Protestant community made a striking proposal: It should include Catholics.

The Reformation affected all of western Christendom, and now that Catholics and Protestants again regarded each other as brothers, a way needed to be found that the two communities could mark the occasion together.

This meant holding not a celebration of the Reformation but a commemoration.

 

Remembering Together

To commemorate an event means to remember it together (from the Latin, cum = “together” and memorare = “to remember”).

Catholics could not properly celebrate the Reformation—which involved a grave wound to Christian unity—but they could remember and honestly assess the event with their Protestant brethren.

And so both Protestant and Catholic churchmen approached their leaders and asked if it was possible to find a way for the two communities to jointly remember—not celebrate—the event.

In the Lutheran community, that meant getting the approval of the Lutheran World Federation. And in the Catholic community, it meant the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity developing proposals that would ultimately have to be approved by the pope.

 

What’s a Pope to Do?

Some might think that any kind of joint commemoration of the Reformation is a bad idea, but put yourself in the position of the pope and ask what the alternative is.

Maintaining frosty silence?

Meeting requests for a joint commemoration with firm denials?

Answering press queries by saying, “The Reformation was a horrible tragedy and Martin Luther was an arch-heretic and a historical villain of enormous proportions?”

The fundamental question that confronts every pontiff is how to ensure the good of the Christian community, for Christ made Peter the chief shepherd of his Church, and that means his successors have the chief responsibility for promoting the unity among Christians that he willed.

That means that, when approaching the five hundredth anniversary of the Reformation, the pope will not be looking to reinforce old divisions but to find a way to encourage Christian unity.

Thus, though joint commemoration is a delicate prospect that undoubtedly involves some discomfort, the fundamental orientation of a pope would be to look for a way to bring something positive out of the occasion.

And it’s easy to see what some of the desired elements for such a commemoration would be:

  • That it not be a triumphant celebration of the Reformation
  • That it involve our joint profession of the Christian Faith
  • That it invoke our common Christian patrimony
  • That it involve prayer for forgiveness of the wrongs committed by both groups
  • And that it ask the Lord for future growth in the Christian unity he wills

Not surprisingly, these were exactly the factors Benedict XVI named in speaking of the forthcoming event.

 

Benedict XVI on the Joint Commemoration

On January 24, 2011, Pope Benedict gave an address to delegates of the United Evangelical Lutheran Church of Germany in which he spoke of the 2017 joint commemoration. He said:

Today ecumenical dialogue can no longer be separated from the reality and the faith life of our Churches without harming them.

Thus, let us turn our gaze together to the year 2017, which recalls the posting of Martin Luther’s theses on Indulgences 500 years ago.

On that occasion, Lutherans and Catholics will have the opportunity to celebrate throughout the world a common ecumenical commemoration, to strive for fundamental questions at the global level, not—as you yourself have just said—in the form of a triumphant celebration, but as a common profession of our faith in the Triune God, in common obedience to Our Lord and to his Word.

We must give an important place to common prayer and to interior prayer addressed to our Lord Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of mutual wrongs and for culpability relative to the divisions.

Part of this purification of conscience is the mutual exchange appraising the 1,500 years that preceded the Reformation, and which we therefore have in common.

For this reason we wish to implore together, constantly, the help of God and the assistance of the Holy Spirit in order to take further steps towards the longed-for unity and not to be satisfied with the results we have achieved so far.

 

Arrival of the Anniversary

In preparation for the anniversary, there have already been a number of concrete forms of commemoration.

Thus on October 31, 2016—the beginning of the anniversary year—Pope Francis participated in an ecumenical prayer service in Sweden with representatives of the Lutheran World Federation.

On that occasion, he said: “As Catholics and Lutherans, we have undertaken a common journey of reconciliation. Now, in the context of the commemoration of the Reformation of 1517, we have a new opportunity to accept a common path, one that has taken shape over the past fifty years in the ecumenical dialogue between the Lutheran World Federation and the Catholic Church.

“Nor can we be resigned to the division and distance that our separation has created between us. We have the opportunity to mend a critical moment of our history by moving beyond the controversies and disagreements that have often prevented us from understanding one another.”

Additional commemorations are scheduled at events throughout 2017, and especially on October 31.

Most of these will be of brief duration, and they will largely echo themes that have already been explored.

The most substantial common statement on the anniversary, however, is a preparatory document that appeared in 2013.

Then, the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity and the Lutheran World Federation issued a document titled From Conflict to Communion: The Lutheran-Catholic Common Commemoration of the Reformation in 2017.

It is available on the Vatican’s web site, and it is the most informative joint reflection on the anniversary of the Reformation, the history that ensued, and where Catholics and Lutherans stand today.

Is the Vulgate the Catholic Church’s Official Bible?

VULGATESt. Jerome’s Latin Vulgate is the most influential Bible translation in the history of western Christendom.

As a translation, it’s been astoundingly important—even more than the King James Version.

For many centuries, it effectively was the Bible for countless Christians.

Through long ages in the west, educated people could read Latin but not Greek or Hebrew, and there were few Bible translations in the vernacular available.

There is no getting around the fact that the Vulgate has a uniquely influential place here in the west—or that it continues to have a unique role today.

But does that make it the Catholic Church’s “official” Bible?

 

How would you show that?

If you wanted to show that the Vulgate was the Catholic Church’s “official” Bible, you’d need a text where the Church declares it the official one.

Otherwise, it’s not.

Since “official” is a legal status, such a text would belong to canon law, and the logical place to look for it would be in the current edition of the Code of Canon Law.

But there is no such text.

The Vulgate is not mentioned in the current Code of Canon Law. Neither is it mentioned in the original, 1917 edition of the Code. Nor is it mentioned in the 1990 Code of Canons of the Eastern Churches.

So we are not off to a promising start.

We will need to look at other documents of current law and see if any of them declare the Vulgate to be the Church’s official Bible.

Before we do that, though, we should clarify an important point.

 

The Original Languages

Despite its influential role, the Vulgate is a translation.

It thus does not contain the text of the Bible in the original languages (Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek).

While it can play a useful role as a translation, it cannot replace the original language texts.

This is an important point, because some Catholics have placed so much stress on the Vulgate that some people have been confused on this point.

 

Trent’s Statement

To see this, let’s start by looking at what the Council of Trent had to say regarding the matter:

[This] sacred and holy Synod—considering that no small utility may accrue to the Church of God, if it be made known which out of all the Latin editions, now in circulation, of the sacred books, is to be held as authentic—ordains and declares, that the said old and vulgate edition, which, by the lengthened usage of so many years, has been approved of in the Church, be, in public lectures, disputations, sermons and expositions, held as authentic; and that no one is to dare, or presume to reject it under any pretext whatever [Decree Concerning the Edition and Use of the Sacred Books, 1546].

Or, more simply:

[This Synod] ordains and declares, that the said old and vulgate edition . . . be, in public lectures, disputations, sermons and expositions, held as authentic.

“Authentic” in this context means “authoritative.” So Trent is saying that, of the Latin editions available in its day, the old Vulgate was to be considered the authoritative edition for use in lectures, debates, sermons, and expositions.

Note the qualifiers: “out of all the Latin editions, now in circulation.”

Trent isn’t saying anything about original language editions. It’s just talking about Latin ones.

It also isn’t saying that the old Vulgate can’t be superseded at a later date by a newer Latin translation.

Both of these points will be important.

 

Pius XII’s Statement

In 1943, Bl. Pius XII commented on Trent’s statement, writing:

And if the Tridentine Synod wished “that all should use as authentic” the Vulgate Latin version, this, as all know, applies only to the Latin Church and to the public use of the same Scriptures; nor does it, doubtless, in any way diminish the authority and value of the original texts.

For there was no question then of these texts, but of the Latin versions, which were in circulation at that time [Divino Afflante Spiritu 21].

Here Pius XII does two important things.

First, he makes the point we’ve already mentioned—that the Vulgate does not “in any way diminish the authority and value of the original texts” (i.e., the ones in Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek).

Second, he clarifies that Trent’s declaration “as all know, applies only to the Latin Church.”

This is important because the Latin Church is not the whole of the Catholic Church.

 

Non-Latin Catholic Churches

There are more than twenty other Churches—the Melkite Church, the Chaldean Church, the Maronite Church, etc.—that are also part of the Catholic Church.

These Churches—being in the East—historically did not use Latin.

Instead, they celebrated the liturgy and read the Scriptures in other languages, such as Greek and Aramaic.

Thus, rather than using the Latin Vulgate, Greek-speaking Catholics historically have used the Greek Septuagint translation of the Old Testament and the original Greek New Testament.

Aramaic-speaking Catholics historically have used an edition in Syriac (a form of Aramaic) known as the Peshitta.

In these Catholic Churches, the Vulgate was never the primary version of Scripture.

We thus need to be careful that we don’t represent what Trent said as applying to the whole Catholic Church. It doesn’t.

As Pius XII pointed out, it applies only to the Latin Church.

 

Current Law?

Since the time of Trent, canon law has been completely reorganized, and thus we need to see what current law has to say concerning the Vulgate.

We’ve already seen that the Vulgate is not given any special status in the current codes of canon law (Western or Eastern), but this does not mean it isn’t dealt with in other legal documents.

In fact, St. John Paul II dealt with it in a 1979 apostolic constitution known as Scripturarum Thesaurus.

This document promulgated a new, revised edition of the Vulgate—known as the Nova Vulgata, Neo-Vulgate, or New Vulgate—which had been in preparation for some time.

In this short document, the pope makes some of the points we have already discussed—such as when he notes that “in the regions of the West the Church has preferred to the others that edition which is usually called the Vulgate.”

However, the point we are interested in is what he says to say about the legal status of the current edition of the Vulgate. Concerning it, he says:

[B]y virtue of this Letter we declare the New Vulgate edition of the Holy Bible as “typical” and we promulgate it to be used especially in the sacred Liturgy but also as suitable for other things, as we have said.

“Typical” is a term of art in canon law. To declare something to be the typical edition of a work means that it is the authorized reference edition that is to be consulted in cases of dispute.

Thus here John Paul II declares the New Vulgate to be the typical edition—or authorized reference edition—of the Vulgate.

This, not prior or parallel editions, is the one that the Church will be using.

He also promulgated it “to be used especially in the sacred Liturgy”—about which we will have more to say—and “also as suitable for other things,” the other things including “sharing the word of God with the Christian people” (at least those who speak Latin).

John Paul II thus did not declare the New Vulgate to be the official Bible of the Catholic Church.

He declared it the typical edition of the Vulgate and he authorized it for certain uses, especially in the liturgy.

 

The New Vulgate in the Liturgy

When the liturgy is celebrated in Latin (at least in the ordinary form), the New Vulgate is the translation used in the Scripture readings.

It is also used when Scripture is quoted in the prayers of the liturgy.

Its role also was clarified in a 2001 document known as Liturgiam Authenticam, which was released by the Congregation for Divine Worship (CDW). It provided that:

[I]t is not permissible that the translations [of the liturgy] be produced from other translations already made into other languages; rather, the new translations must be made directly from the original texts, namely the Latin, as regards the texts of ecclesiastical composition, or the Hebrew, Aramaic, or Greek, as the case may be, as regards the texts of Sacred Scripture.

Furthermore, in the preparation of these translations for liturgical use, the Nova Vulgata Editio, promulgated by the Apostolic See, is normally to be consulted as an auxiliary tool (no. 24).

Thus when the Latin Church’s liturgy is translated into vernacular languages like English or Spanish, the Scripture readings are to be based on the original biblical language but the New Vulgate is to be “consulted as an auxiliary tool.”

The document goes on to name the situations in which the New Vulgate is to be consulted. They concern things like when translators have to choose:

  • among different manuscript traditions (no. 37)
  • among possible renderings of passages that have traditionally been rendered one way in the liturgy (no. 41a)
  • how to render certain words that can sound strange in the vernacular if rendered literally (no. 43)

Because of questions that arose concerning Liturgiam Authenticam, the CDW later sent a letter which discusses the matter further. In part, it said:

[I]t is reasonable that a translator of the Scriptures should work with the original languages before consulting other versions, including the Latin.

Afterwards, however, it can only be beneficial for a translator to consider the Latin text as a window through which to view the same Hebrew, Greek, or Aramaic text from the standpoint of a healthy sympathy with the best insights of the Latin Church over the centuries.

This is substantially what the recent Instruction calls for as regards the preparation of translations intended for use in the Roman Liturgy.

It was thus clear that the New Vulgate be used as an aid—an auxiliary tool—in developing liturgical translations. It does not serve as the base text to be translated.

 

The Accuracy of the Vulgate

No translation of a lengthy text is able to capture all the nuances found in the original language, and thus no translation is perfect in that sense.

What degree of accuracy does the Church claim for the Vulgate?

Pius XII stated:

[The] special authority or as they say, authenticity of the Vulgate was not affirmed by the Council particularly for critical reasons, but rather because of its legitimate use in the Churches throughout so many centuries; by which use indeed the same is shown, in the sense in which the Church has understood and understands it, to be free from any error whatsoever in matters of faith and morals; so that, as the Church herself testifies and affirms, it may be quoted safely and without fear of error in disputations, in lectures and in preaching; and so its authenticity is not specified primarily as critical, but rather as juridical.

Here the pontiff indicates that the Vulgate was “free from any error whatsoever in matters of faith or morals”—meaning that it contains no theological errors, for these would have been discovered in the long centuries of its use in the Church. It was therefore safe to quote without fear of theological error.

However, this does not mean it is not subject to revision and improvement as a translation of the original languages. Thus Pius XII noted that Trent did not view the Vulgate as authoritative in the Latin Church “particularly for critical reasons.” Indeed, he noted that:

It is historically certain that the Presidents of the Council received a commission, which they duly carried out, to beg, that is, the Sovereign Pontiff in the name of the Council that he should have corrected, as far as possible, first a Latin, and then a Greek, and Hebrew edition, which eventually would be published for the benefit of the Holy Church of God (no. 20).

Thus even at Trent it was asked that a corrected edition of the Vulgate be produced which would improve it as a translation, even though it already contained no theological errors.

In the same way, the Church makes no claims to unalterable perfection for the New Vulgate. The CDW explained:

While constantly defending the inerrancy of the Sacred Scriptures as such, the Church has never claimed unalterable perfection for her own officially approved Latin edition of the Scriptures, and has sought to improve that version several times.

It is not to be excluded, and indeed, it is to be expected, that such work continue in the future.

 

The Bottom Line

From what we’ve seen, the Vulgate historically has been an extraordinarily influential translation in the Latin Church.

It has been given special recognition by the Church, and it does not contain theological errors.

At the same time, it has always been recognized that it could be further improved, like any biblical translation.

The current edition, known as the New Vulgate, is the typical Latin edition of the Scriptures used in the Latin Church, especially in the liturgy.

However, none of this supports the claim that the Vulgate is the official Bible of the Catholic Church as a whole.

It is an important translation that the Latin Church uses for certain purposes, but the Church has not declared any single edition of the Bible to be its sole and definitive version.

Do Dogs Go to Heaven? And More!

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In this episode of Catholic Answers Live (July 11, 2017, 1st hour), Jimmy answers the following questions:

0:15 What are some of Cy’s favorite books?

2:30 What’s significant about John Paul II’s book “Crossing the Threshold of Hope”? (Hint: One thing is that he basically revealed the Third Secret of Fatima in it!)

4:50 Did Joseph Ratzinger ghostwrite many of John Paul II’s writings?

6:35 How to find hidden treasures in John Paul II’s and Benedict XVI’s Wednesday audiences.

11:50 How to respond to the challenge that Catholicism is false because it bases its teachings on things other than the Bible–the word of God.

16:00 What is the new path that Pope Francis has instituted for people becoming saints?

25:17 – What are some early church sources about the immaculate conception?

31:26 – Can a pope be a heretic personally?

33:40 – What is the earliest evidence for Purgatory?

37:50 – In Acts 11, St. Paul says his proof for the Gentiles in the Church is that the Holy Spirit falls on them. Is this analogous to the Holy Spirit working in other churches today?

44:06 – What are we supposed to be doing in the afterlife?

46:30 – How do we define grace? Someone told me we merit grace, but we also receive initial grace free of merit. So what are the different kinds of grace, where are some places we can find them in the Bible?

54:55 – Can a non-baptized person, who’s married to a Catholic, receive a Catholic funeral and burial?

57:50 – Do dogs go to Heaven?

Resources Mentioned:

The Drama of Salvation by Jimmy Akin

Click here to watch the video on YouTube.

Use this link to listen to the MP3.

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How to Use the Internet for Evangelization–And More!

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In this episode of Catholic Answers Live (July 13, 2017, 2nd hour), Jimmy answers the following questions:

4:25 How to responding to the challenge that Acts isn’t reliable history because it was written long after the events it describes.

12:11 – How can we use the internet for evangelism?

20:40 – In Revelation what does it mean at the end when it gives a curse to people who add or subtract?

29:39 – I’m wondering if there’s a definitive description of Heaven and Purgatory.

34:45 – Why is it that God can strike someone dead with no warning?

44:50 – Do you believe that Catholics and Protestants can be reconciled? And what form might it take?

51:32 – I’m marrying a non-Catholic and he has some weird history questions, why is the Vatican surrounded with walls? Where did all the treasure from the Crusades go?

Click here to watch the video on YouTube.

Use this link to listen to the MP3.

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Is There Free Will in Heaven? And More!

free will in heaven

In this episode of Catholic Answers Live (June 22, 2017, 1st hour), Jimmy answers the following questions:

02:30 – What are your thoughts about baptizing infants twice? Once in the Catholic Church, once in the Protestant church.

10:30 – Will there be free will in Heaven?

12:10 – Does 1 John 5:13 tell Christians that they know for sure whether or not they are saved?

16:25 – What are some tips for Catholics who are concerned about doing wrong?

32:05 – What is your take on protesting on blasphemous images of Jesus Christ?

41:45 – Can I attend a SSPX Mass with my family?

44:55 – I have heard that Jesus had a blood brother who was not part of the faith until Jesus died and rose again. That was why he chose Peter. What is your stance on this?

49:50 – If one is experiencing temporal punishment because he committed a mortal sin, can the punishment be used as redemptive healing for someone else?

Resources Mentioned:

http://www.scrupulousanonymous.org


Click here to watch the video on YouTube

Use this link to listen to the MP3

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Catechism of the Catholic Church Index

I use the online version of the Catechism of the Catholic Church at the Vatican web site all the time, so I decided to make an upgraded version of their index page (here). The improvements on this version include:

  1. The links now open pages in new tabs.
  2. I’ve added links to the Latin version, to make it easier to check the original.
  3. I’ve added the passage numbers in parentheses after each link, to make it easier to look up passages by their number.

Feel free to bookmark this page. A short link for it is JimmyAkin.com/catechism