Forbes on Article VI: Of the Sufficiency of the holy Scriptures for salvation

speak of Him as in nature naturally diverse from the Father and the Son, whom we cannot find to be diverse in operation ; and if it be thus right to acknow ledge unity of nature from unity of work, let no one hesitate to acknowledge Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, a Unity of persons being preserved, to be one God by nature, who could make all things by His will, who can govern all things by the power of His omnipotence, who can fill all things by the incomprehensibility of His Divinity a.”

a Ad Translmund. iii. 38. Vide Petavius de Deo, ad loc.

SCRIPTURA sacra continet omnia, qua ad salutem stint neccssaric!, ita ut quicquid in ca nee legitur, neque inde vrobari potcst, non sit a quoquam exigendum, tit tanquam at’ticulus fidei credatur, ant ad salutis necessitatem requiri putetiir.

Sacra Scriptures nomine, cos canonicos libros vetcris ct non Tettamaiti intdligimus, de quorum authoritate in Ec- clcsla nunquam dulitatum est.

DE ^OillNIBUS ET NUMEEO LIBEORUM SACE2E CANONIC^ Sc’EirTUE.E YETEEIS TESTAMENTI.

Genesis. Prior liber ParaUpomenon.

Exodus. Secundus liber ParaUpomenon.

Leviticus. Primus liber Esdra.

Numeri. Secundus liber Efidrfp.

Deuteronomium. Liber Hester.

Josuce. Liber Job.

Judicum. Psalmi.

Ruth. Proverbia.

[…]

Alios autem libros (ut ait llieronymus} legit quidem JEcclesia, ad excmpla vita, et formandus mores : illos tamen ad dog-

kmata confirmanda non adhibet, ut sunt,

[…]

Beliquum libri Hester. Historia Susanna.

Liber Sapientice. De Bel et Dracone.

Liber Jesu filii Sirach. Oratio IM.ana.ssis.

[…]

Novi Testamenti omnes libTos (nt vulgo recepti sunt) recipl mns) et habcmns pro canonicis.

Of thc Sufficiency of the Holy Scriptures for Sahation.

” HOLY Scripture containeth all things necessary to salvation : so that whatsoever is not read therein, nor may be proved thereby, is not to be required of any man that it should be believed as an article of the faith, or be thought requisite or necessary to salvation. In the Name of the Holy Scripture, we do understand those canonical Books of the Old and New Testa ment, of whose authority was never any doubt in the Church/’

Of the Names and Number of the Canonical Book*.

Genesis. First Book of Chronicles.

Exodus. Second Book of Chronicles.

Leviticus. First Book of Esdnis.

Numbers. Second Book of Esdras.

Deuteronomy. Book of Esther.

Joshua. Book of Job.

Judges. Psalms,

liuth. Proverbs.

First Book of Samuel. Ecclesiastes or Preacher.

Second Book of Samuel. Canticles, or Songs of Solomon.

First Book of Kings. Four Prophets the greater.

Second Book of Kings. Twelve Prophets the less.

“And the other books, as Hierome saith, the Church

OF THE SUFFICIENCY, &C. 91

doth read for example of life and instruction of man ners, but yet doth it not apply them to establish any doctrine : — such are these following :

Third Book of Esdras. Baruch the Prophet.

Fourth Book of Esdras. Song of the Three Children.

Book of Tobias. Story of Susannah.

Book of Judith. Of Bel and the Dragon.

Rest of the Book of Esther. Prayer of Manasses.

Book of Wisdom. First Book of Maccabees.

Jesus the Son of Sirach. Second Book of Maccabees.

” All the Books of the New Testament, as they are commonly received, we do receive, and account them canonical.”

1. A PROFOUND reverence for the Bible as the inspired Word of God is a dominant idea in the Articles. Not only in the present Article, but in the Twentieth, there is a special jealousy with regard to its authority. Certain statements are made to rest in a special way on this foundation. The Creeds are to be received and believed, ” for they may be proved by most certain warrants of Scripture” (VIII.) The position with regard to works of supererogation is made to rest upon a text of Scripture (XIV.) ; as is also the universality of human sinfuliiess (XV.) Again, Holy Scripture is said to set out unto us only the Name of Jesus, whereby men must be saved (XVIII.) Con- ciliar authority also is limited thereby (XXI.) Cer tain Romish doctrines are said to be repugnant to the Word of God, and are therefore rejected (XXII.) ; so is speaking in a language not understanded of the

people (XXIY.) Transubstantiation, in the sense in which it is condemned a, is said to be repugnant to the plain words of Scripture (XXVIII.) Tradition and ceremonies also are ruled by it (XXXI Y.) And, finally, the power of the civil magistrates is limited thereby (XXXVII.)

To have such weight, it must be granted that the Word of God is inspired. Although the Church has never yet ruled in what measure that inspiration is given, or in what way it works, yet from the be ginning it has been believed that God the Holy Ghost inspired certain persons to record certain events ; that in accordance with the promise of our Lord that the Comforter should bring to mind all the matters to be recorded, these authors owed the remembrance of the facts to supernal illumination, and that therefore there is no room for allowing of any errors, even the slightest. Following the analogy of the Incarnate Son Himself, of His Church, and of His Sacraments, the devout student recognises a Divine and a human element in the Inspired Word. He is no more disturbed by the provincialisms of St. Mark, than he is with the evil lives of the rulers of the Church, or by anything else that exhibits the human organ in the Church, but he cannot allow the human element to account for what seems to imply the slightest historical inaccuracy, be yond the use of popular unscientific language, the employment of which is a necessity if the revelation is in any sense to be intelligible to those to whom it

• See the mode in which the subject is handled under Article XXVIII.

OF THE SUFFICIENCY, &C. 93

is made. The God of truth cannot give mistaken or imperfect information, and he sees the dilemma, and accepts it ; that either the Bible must be true in every respect, or not the word of God at all. He can accept no such patronised and apologised-for document as the half-belief of the present day would seek to put before him. Making every allowance for the possible errors of copyists, where mistakes may have crept in, he is bound to stake the issue upon the absolute genuineness and truthfulness of what is given to him as the Holy Scriptures.

And this genuineness and truthfulness being granted, he takes a firm step forward to the thought of its in spiration. It is no vicious circle to say that Holy Scripture proves the existence of the Church, and that this, the Church, proves Holy Scripture. An am bassador comes to a king bearing his credentials in a letter. He himself is the authority for the genuine ness of the letter : when the letter is opened, it is found to define the powers, plenipotentiary or other, of the messenger who brought it. Thus it is with Holy Scripture. We have a set of documents which external and internal evidence, on the ground of the most rigid criticism, agree in holding to be genuine documents. They are certainly of the time of which they profess to be. Costume, incidental illustration, events known from other sources, make this certain. Furthermore, the genuineness of the documents is a strong presumption in favour of their authenticity. This presumption amounts to the highest probability.

The documents are not only real documents, but the events recorded in them really took place. Well, among the events so recorded, there is the institution of a mighty power called the Church, the historic ac count of the formation of a certain corporation with spiritual faculties, for certain supernatural ends ; and among the spiritual faculties is that of a certain instinct whereby truth is distinguished from error, in conse quence of an indwelling of God the Holy Ghost.

The first effect of the exercise of this instinct on the part of the Church, is to declare that the documents, already proved to be authentic, are canonical and in spired. There is no vicious circle here. The exist ence of a book, as containing the revealed will of God, is so consonant to merely human ideas of the fitness of things that we find it in many false religions. Both the Hindoos, and the Chinese, and Parsees, have their symbolical volumes by the side of an authoritative system. The fullest development of this is in the case of the Moslem, to whom the Koran stands in the highest order of authority, but then we must recollect that Mahomedanism, being rather a heresy than an entirely false religion, has borrowed this from the Judaism with which it is so strongly impregnated. However, the continued existence of this state of things in these systems shews that there is no antecedent re pugnance to right reason in the idea of an inspired book standing as a sort of silent appeal beside a living- system of authority, such as the Church of God.

To us Christians, the position of the ancient Scrip-

OF THE SUFFICIENCY, &C. 95

tures at the time of our Lord is sufficient guarantee for the soundness of the view. Then the Scribes and Pharisees sat in Moses* seat, and our Lord Himself commands deference to them as authorities, but He constantly appeals to that which was ” said to them of old,” by way of correction of the Pharisaic utter ances. No doubt we must make allowance for the fact that the Holy Ghost was not given to the Jewish Church as He is given to the Catholic Church now, but still the Eternal Word was to the old Israel what the Paraclete is to us, and there was an authority in the living Church then, as there was the gift of pro phecy in the case of Caiaphas. If, then, this system could co -exist with a volume in the position and with the authority of the old Testament, there is no reason that now there should not coexist in the Church of God two authorities, mutually corrobora tive of each other, and, so far as individual interpre tation of each, mutually corrective of each other : the inspired Word and the inspired Church. The inspired Word, receiving its canonicity, its interpretation from the inspired Church ; and the inspired Church, tested in its development by the inspired Word.

Holy Scripture, either implicite or explicitc, contains the faith. “The Church joineth the Law and the Prophets with the writings of the Evangelists and Apostles, and thence drinketh her faith b.” St. Cle ment teaches that ” we have the Lord as the source of the doctrine, guiding the true knowledge from

b Tcrtullian De Prase., § 36.

beginning to end, ‘in divers portions and in divers manners/ through the Prophets, the Gospel, and the holy Apostles c.” ” In the two Testaments every word appertaining to God may be sought and discussed, and from them may all knowledge be obtained d.” ” The holy and inspired Scriptures are sufficient of themselves for the preaching of the truth e.” Every word or thing ought to be confirmed by testimony of God-inspired Scripture, to the full conviction of the good and the shaming of the evil. ” What is the character of faith ? An unhesitating conviction of the truth of the God- inspired words (Holy Scriptures). What is the cha racter of the faithful? With the same conviction to embrace the meaning of what is said, and not to venture to annul or to add. For if everything which is not of faith is sin, as the Apostle says, and faith is from learning and hearing through the Word, everything which is without the God-inspired Scriptures is sin f.” ” The doctrine of the Church, which is the House of God, is found in the fulness of the divine Scriptures s.” St. Ambrose asksh, “How can we use what we do not find in Holy Scrip ture?” St. Augustine, “In those things which are set down plainly in Scripture are found all things which contain faith and the way of life, i.e. hope and charity1/’ So again, ” Whatever ye hear thence (the divine Scrip-

c Clem. Strom, vii. 16. d Origen, in Lev. Horn. v. n. 9. ii. 212,

ed. De La Rue. e S. Athanasius, cont. Gent, ad in it. f S.Basil, Reg. 2G, 80. c. 22. s S. Jcrom. ad Paul. h De Off. i. 23.

§ 102. * De Doct. Xna. ii. 9. § 14.

OF THE SUFFICIENCY, &C. 97

tures) let that savour well unto you; whatsoever is without, reject k.” ” The city of God believeth the Holy Scriptures, both the Old and the New, which we call canonical, from which the faith chiefly is derived,, whereby the just liveth, by which we walk without doubting, as long as we are absent from the Lord V

” The opposing parties (Roman Catholics and members of the English Church) attach different meanings to the word ’ proof,’ in the controversy whether the whole faith is, or is not, contained in Scripture. Roman Catholics m mean that not every article is so contained there that it may thence be legally proved, independently of the teaching and authority of tradition : but Anglicans mean that every article is so contained there, that it may thence be proved, provided there may be added the illustrations and compensations of the tradition. And it is in this latter sense, I conceive, that the Fathers also speak. 1 am sure, at least, that S. Athana- sius frequently adduces passages as proofs of points in con troversy, which no one would see to be proofs, unless apos tolical tradition were taken into account, first as suggesting, then as authoritatively ruling their meaning. Thus you

k Serm. 46. de Past., c. 11. § 21. Opp. v. 238.

m ” We believe that there is no other groundwork whatever for faith except the written Word of God ; because we allow no power in religion to any living authority, except inasmuch as its right to define is con ferred in God’s written Word. If, therefore, you hear that the Church claims authority to define articles of faith, and to instruct her children what they must believe, you must not for one moment think that she pretends to any authority or sanction for that power, save what she conceives herself to derive from the clear, express, and explicit words of Scripture.” — (Wiseman’s Lect., iii. p. 60, ed. 1836.)

II

(Anglicans) do not deny that the whole is not in Scripture in such sense that pure unaided logic can draw it from the Sacred Text ; nor do we (Roman Catholics) deny, that the faith is in Scripture, in an improper sense, in the sense that tradition is able to recognise and determine it there. Angli cans do not profess to dispense with tradition ; nor do lloman Catholics forbid the idea of probable, secondary, symbolical, annotative senses of Scripture, over and above those which properly belong to the wording and context n.”

The Anglican Article expresses itself in terms of the greatest moderation. It defines the sense in which it means that Holy Scripture contains all things necessary to salvation, by the most important qualifications. It leaves the amplest room for the deductions which tra dition or even individual doctors may gather from it, in the term ” or may be proved thereby/1 It leaves the fullest scope for pious opinions where it asserts that Scripture, in its letter or in such deductions, alone is to regulate what is de fide. It says nothing against the acceptance of whatever the Church proposes to our be lief, because whatsoever is so proposed to us must rest ultimately on the authority of Scripture, of which the Church is the guardian and the expounder. All that it seeks to protect the faithful against is the enforcement on them, as requisite to salvation, of individual opi mons, which being without the authentication of Church authority, have consequently no Scriptural authority. Any accretive development, that would add to the sub stance of the faith, would be condemned by this Article,

D Newman’s Letter to Dr. Pusey on the Eirenicon, p. 14.

OF THE SUFFICIENCY, &C. 99

but it would not condemn the enunciation by legitimate authority of any doctrine deduced from the original -deposit.

It leaves a wide range for the indulgence of a holy imagination as the result of meditation on the mys teries of the faith; all that it guards against is that these shall not become de fide. It guards against the abuse that may arise from the assertion of doctrine on the strength of visions and supernatural illuminations. And its most extended sense does not go beyond the general assertion borne witness to by the Bible, that the Holy Ghost was to lead the Apostles, ei? Traaav Trjv akijOeiav ; that there was nothing incomplete in the belief of the Apostolic or Post-apostolic age; that what has somewhat over-boldly been called the thin and colourless Christianity of the primitive Church was ” able to make men wise unto salvation.”

In the celebrated oration by John of Kagusa, before the Council of Basle, he lays down the following canons with regard to Holy Scripture.

After asserting, in the words of St. Augustine, ” Non crederem evangelic, nisi me commoveret Ecclesise auc- toritas,” that the Catholic Church is ruled over by the Holy Spirit, and cannot err in matters of faith, he adds, that because the declaration of this universal principle is mainly to be taken from the authority of Holy Scripture, he lays down certain rules for its right understanding °.

1. The foundation of all is, that all Scripture, both of the Old and J^ew Testament, is inspired.

2. 80 great is the certitude of the truth of the Holy Scripture, that nothing asserted or expressed in it can be lying or mistaken. To assert the opposite is to destroy the entire foundations of the faith.

3. It is congruous to the divine essential goodness that God should communicate Himself, by His inspired Word, to all His creatures, according to the measure of their wants and requirements.

4. Holy Scripture has various senses, e.g. the literal and spiritual sense.

5. The principal literal sense is not always that on the surface, but what God the Holy Ghost intends, as in the case of the Parables.

6. The faith, and all things necessary to salvation, are founded on the literal sense, and from it alone may arguments be drawn for such things.

7. Holy Scripture, well and soundly understood in the literal sense, is an infallible and most sufficient rule of faith.

8. It is not improper, that in one and the same text of Scripture there may be more literal senses than one.

9. To the proper understanding of any text, reference must be had not only to the context, but to the rest of the inspired volume.

10. To discover the true sense it is necessary very diligently to attend to the various methods of proceed ing, for in the same sentence words are sometimes literal, sometimes mystical.

OF THE SUFFICIENCY, &C. 101

11. Difficulties in interpretation are good and neces sary to call out the diligence of the students, and to try their humility.

12. Hence the necessity of able expositors.

13. Those are to be chosen who are best qualified, with preference for the Ancients.

14. Expositors are to be compared with each other, and with themselves ; and that doctor is to be chosen whose opinion is nearest to the sense which God the Holy Ghost, the author of the Scriptures, intends, and which is corroborated by the authority of the Church.

15. Holy Scripture suffers from proud and presump tuous students.

16. And lastly, Holy Scripture, in its reception and authentic expositions, finally resolves itself into the authority, reception, and approbation of the Catholic Church, as into a first principle of religious doctrine and science.

To return to the consideration of the Article, while the authority of Scripture is vindicated, nothing is said with regard to any power or duty of individuals to judge whether the decrees of the Church are in con formity with the Word of God. The constitution of a country, assuming a contract between monarch and subjects, may lay down what are the duties of a sub ject, without giving individuals the right to judge him, far less to rebel against him. There is no sanction here for the right of private judgment. Such a notion never entered into the minds of the compilers of the Articles. Any modification in the form and rites of a religion

in those days was a matter of government. No one- dreamt of a man in his study sitting down to evolve for himself out of Scripture a system of religious belief. There was a re-adjustment of the balance of the divine grounds of faith, but the very limitation of authority implied authority. The Articles would be meaningless unless we assume the existence of an institution set up on earth claiming to decide doctrine, to define what should be believed as an article of faith, and to decree what is requisite to salvation.

After asserting the office of Holy Scripture in acting as a check upon any developing power by way of accre tion in the Church, the Article goes on to the vexed question of the Canon, and herein takes a middle line between the decree enunciated in the fourth Session of the Council of Trent and the Protestant Confessions.

First of all it maintains, in accordance with the authority of Josephus, quoted by Eusebiusp, the pre eminence of the twenty-two books * of the first Canon*

v Hist. EccL, iii. 9.

The Jews thus made their enumeration : — ‘Genesis, Exodus,

fG(

I *>

Books of

•< -Leviticus, ,

MoseS’ j Numbers,

l^Deuteronomy. J

C Joshua, Pour Books of , j ,

[…]

rlsaiah, -s

[…]

Later i Ezekiel, ( IY’J

Prophets. Ll2 Lesser ProphJ

OF THE SUFFICIENCY, &C.

” The Jewish Church had only twenty-two books of Scripture which might justly challenge credit and be lief among them ; whereof five were the books of Moses, containing little less than 3,000 years, and thirteen the books of the prophets, wherein they wrote the acts of their times, from the death of Moses till the reign of Artaxerxes, after Xerxes, King of Persia ; and four more containing both hymns to God and admonitions to men for the amendment of their lives ; but from the time of Artaxerxes till our own times, though certain books had been written, yet they de served not the same credit and belief which the former had, because there was no certain succession of prophets among them. It is henceforth clear how we attach ourselves to the true Scriptures, for in spite of so great a time having elapsed, no one has dared to add, diminish, or alter aught in them ; it being a maxim

(^Psalms, Proverbs, The Preacher,

The Song of Songs,

The rest of the Holy Writers.

Job,

IX.

Daniel,

Ezra aiidXehemlah,

Esther,

‘^Chronicles, 1 and 2. j XXIT. It would seem that even among the Jews there was a difference of view with regard to the Canon of the Old Scripture, which extended itself to the Christians. The Jews of Palestine admitted the Palestinian Canon, in which were only the books written in Hebrew ; and those of Alexandria the Alexandrian, which comprehended those written in Greek. Vide Klee’s Histoire des Dogmeo Chretiens, vol. i. p. 146, Paris, 1848.

engrafted into all Jews from their childhood to regard them as the dogmas of God, to adhere constantly to them, and, if need be, to die for them.”

The Early Church seems to have followed in the same line. In the Apostolic Constitutions, whatever be their value, there is no mention of the Apocryphal Books ; and in the Canons of the Apostles the old Jewish canon is adhered to, with the addition of a recommendation of the reading of the Wisdom of Sirach for the young, and in some manuscripts the Book of Judith is men tioned. It is the same with the author of the ” Eccle siastical Hierarchy,” though he does in another place mention the Book of Wisdom. In the catalogue of all the books that, by common consent of the Oriental Churches, was received as Canonical Scripture, made by St, Melito, Bishop of Sardis, in the middle of the second century, we have the old Canon, with the ex ception of Nehemiah and Esther. St. Justin Martyr nowhere quotes the Apocryphal books.

Origen, in his preface to the Psalms1’, gives the Hebrew Canon with the Hebrew names, although he does cite, under the general name of Scripture, Tobit and the Maccabees s. St. Clement gives no list of the Canonical Books, but frequently cites the Apocrypha. Eusebius supplies us with the term avriXeyo/jLeva ; and St. Athanasius, in one of his Paschal Epistles, gives a perfect catalogue both of the Canonical and eccle siastical books then received by the Church, and

r torn. ii. p. 529. s lib. viii. in Ep. ad Rom. p. 621 and GiO.

OF THE SUFFICIENCY, &C. 105

charges orthodox Christians to abstain from apocry phal writers introduced by heretics. First he gives the twenty-two of the Old Testament, adding that these are the only fountain of salvation from whence all doctrine of piety and religion is preached, and whereunto none ought to add or none detract. Then he speaks of the ecclesiastical books not admitted into the Canon of Scripture, but appointed by the Fathers to be read by those who were beginners in religion, the Wisdom of Solomon, the Wisdom of Sirach, the Greek Esther, Judith, Tobit, the Apostles’ doctrine, the Shepherd of Hermas. Elsewhere, but not here, he mentions Susanna and the Maccabees, only, how ever, as dvTiXeyo/ueva.

St. Hilary gives the testimony of the Western Church for the same period. St. Cyril of Jerusalem that of the Palestinian Church, though he puts Baruch and the Epistle of Jeremiah with the Prophecies. He quotes the ecclesiastical books often ; and when he disapproves of apocryphal books he does not mean them, but such things as the false gospels. All this is the more re markable because in the East they always used the Septuagint, of which the avTik€*/op,€va are an integral portion.

The Council of Laodicea, A.D. 364, is the first authen tic conciliar recognition of the Canon; Baruch, how ever, being added to the Old, and the Apocalypse being omitted in the New ; the first being, however, pro bably not the distinct book so called, but merely the history of Baruch as given in Jeremiah. St. Epipha- mus quotes the Hebrew Canon, never mentions Tobit,

10G ARTICLE VI.

Judith, Baruch, or the Maccabees, and of the two- Wisdoms says, ” They are not to be counted within the number of the Holy Scriptures, however useful and profitable, having never been put into the Ark of the Covenant*.” Yet elsewhere11 he ranges Wisdom and Ecclesiasticus among the Oeial jpa(f)al. Ecclesiasticus was received among the Ketubim in the fourth cen tury x. St. Basil and St. Gregory of Nazianzum endorse the teaching of Origen ; and there are some curious iambics of St. Amphilochius, Bishop of Iconium in Ly- caonia, in the same sense, expressing the doubt about Esther. St. Chrysostom acknowledges none but those which were first written in the Hebrew tongue >’.

A new epoch comes in with St. Jerome. He ap proaches the Old Scriptures in the spirit of enlightened and reverential criticism. For this he was prepared by a certain knowledge of the Hebrew tongue, and by the assistance he received from a Jew with whom he studied. It is from his Prologue to the books of Solo mon that the quotation in the Article is taken. It is to this effect z : ” For as the Church indeed reads the books of Tobit, Judith, and the Maccabees, but does not receive them among the Canonical Scriptures, so let her read these two volumes (the Wisdom of Sirach and the Wisdom of Solomon) for the edifica tion of the people, and not to confirm the authority of ecclesiastical dogmas.”

o

I User. via. cont. Epicur., lib. i. t. i. p. 19, t. ii. p. 162.

II User. Ixxvi. ad Actium, t. i. p. 941.

x Dr. Pnsey’s “Daniel,” p. 301. > Horn. iv. in Gen., t. iv. p. 25. z vol. ix. col. 1293.

OF THE SUFFICIENCY, &C. 107

Bufinus, whose work on the Creed is one of great au thority, follows St. Jerome in the division of the books.

While these books were thus excluded from the Canon, it would be uncandid to deny that the Fathers frequently quote them under the title of prophetic writings, and a certain amount of inspiration was attributed to them. St. Clement of Alexandria and Theodoret quote Baruch ; St. Cyprian, Wisdom and the Maccabees, and Susanna ; St. Cyril, Ecclesiasticus ; and St. Ambrose, Tobit. Other books, also held both by us and the Council of Trent as apocryphal, such as Enoch, Hermas, and the Prayer of Manasses, were quoted in a loose way.

In the fifth century St. Augustine, while he advo cates the use of the Latin and Greek versions which had the Apocryphal books, and uses them freely, yet he does set a mark of distinction between them and the books and Canon of the Hebrew Bible a ; yet his work, however, dc Doctruid Ckri#ti&xd*, is that which is cited for the modern Roman Canon. The same was endorsed by the Council of Carthage, A.D. 379 c, by that of A.D. 419, and by that of Hippo, A.D. 393. This testi mony is followed, with the exception of Baruch and the Maccabees, by Pope Innocent, in his third letter to Exuperius, Bishop of Thoulouse. St. Hilary of Aries demurs to the canonicity of Wisdom.

At the end of this century Pope Gelasius held a Synod at Rome, and put forth a Canon in the same sense.

a De Civ. Del, 1. xviii. 26, 36 ; xvii. c. 20 : De Cur. pro Mort., c. 15. b ii. n. 12, 13. c c. xlvii.

In the sixth century Cassiodorus, Junilius Primasius, Anastasius of Antioch, Leontius, the author of de Sectis, and Yictorinus of Poitiers, are quoted in behalf of the shorter Canon.

In the seventh, St. Gregory the Great apologizes for the use of a passage in the Maccabees. St. Isidore of Seville gives both catalogues, preferring St. Augus tine’s. The quinisext Council in Trullo accepts both the Laodicean and the Carthaginian Councils.

In the eighth age St. John Damascene keeps to the Hebrew Canon and rejects the other, ” having never been laid up in the Ark of the Covenant/’ as Epipha- mus had said before him, whether correctly or not we cannot say.

In the ninth century Mcephorus, followed by Anasta sius Bibliothecarius, makes a threefold distinction, oaai elal Oeiai ypatyal €KK\7]o-ia%6jj,evaL, the twenty-two ; then ocrai dvTi.\erai,, those which we call the Apo crypha ; and then the a7roKpv(f>a, viz. Enoch, the Patri archs, the Prayer of Joseph, the Testimony of Moses, the Assumption of Moses, Abram, Eldad and Medad, Elias the Prophet, the prophecy of Sophonias, Zacha- riah the father of John, and the false writings of Baruch, Abaccuc, Ezekiel, and Daniel. Alcuin, con futing Elipandus, calls Sirach an apocryphal and dubi ous Scripture. Rhabanus Maurus transcribes Isidore.

The tenth and eleventh ages are not without their witness in Radulphus Flaviacensis, Herman nus Con- tractus, and Gislebertus, Abbot of Westminster.

The great twelfth-century divines, Hugo and Richard

OF THE SUFFICIENCY, &C. 109

of St. Victor, testify to the assertion in our Article. In the thirteenth, the very same line is taken by the pious and learned author of the Glossa Ordinaria, by Car dinal Hugo, and by St. Thomas. In the fourteenth century Nicholas Lyranus, who was converted from Ju daism and became a friar minor, declares his intention of writing on the books which are not canonical, Wis dom, Ecclesiasticus, Judith, Tobit, and the Maccabees, Paulus Burgensis, also a converted Jew, whose notes are printed with the Glossa, keeps up the distinction. This brings us down to the Council of Florence. Of this Council, Carranza gives a doubtful Canon to the Arme mans, in which the authority of St. Augustine is pre ferred to that of St. Jerome ; but St. Antoninus and Tostatus in the same age do not obey it. Tostatus, following the ancient Fathers, distinguishes between two sorts of apocryphal books, whereof some are so called because it is not known for certain who wrote them, or whether they were written by the inspiration of the Holy Ghost, or whether all things contained therein be undoubtedly true; others which, beside all these uncertainties, have many things in them mani festly false or shrewdly suspected to be so. Dionysius Carthusianus says of the books “that though true, they are not to be computed among the Canonical Scrip tures, and that the Church does not receive them to prove any Article of faith by them.” In the sixteenth century the Complutensian speaks of the libri extra Canonem : Picus of Mirandula, Faber Stapulensis, Clichtoveus, Ludovicus Yives, Erasmus, Ferus, Driedo,

and, above all, Cardinal Cajetan, maintain the dis tinction d.

The neglect with which the Apocrypha is treated is not in the interests of truth. Because there is a marked difference in the authority of the proto-canonical and deutero-canonical books, people should not ignore the latter in the way they do. That they are an integral part of the version generally used by our Lord and His Apostles, ought of itself to invest them with reverence, but they are more important when we come to see the principles involved in them. First, the}” supply a most important historical link between the Old and the New Testament, carrying on the continuity of the fortunes of the people of God from the time when prophecy ceased. Secondly, they exhibit the gradual develop ment of truth, a very marked increase of the knowledge of God being traceable between the Books of Moses and the Books of Wisdom and Ecclesiasticus. Thirdly, they recognise in a practical manner the permissibility and advantage of religious fiction ; the Book of Judith being probably a romance written to raise the spirits of the chosen people at some time of their depression. Fourthly, they exhibit, in a very marked way, the effect of the union of the Jewish and Greek ideas in the evolution of a religious philosophy. Fifthly, they form a remarkable key to the understanding and in terpretation of the New Testament, as supplying us

d See a Scholastical History of the Canon of Holy Scripture by •Cosin. Works, vol. iii. Oxf. Edit. 1849.

I

OF THE SUFFICIENCY, &C. Ill

with the clearest manifestation of the modes of thought current among the Jews in the times immediately pre ceding the manifestation of St. John the Precursor. Lastly, they are very rich in anticipation of Christian ideas, witnessing to that preparation of heart which was in the power of, and actually obtained by, those earnest souls who waited for the consolation of Israel, and therefore supplying material for an. intellectual acquiescence in the award whereby those who rejected our Lord when He came are condemned.

“We find an uncertainty in the early ages relative to the Canon of the New Testament. Eusebius, in that which he has transmitted to us e, divides the books into 6jAo\o<yovfjieva and avn\ey6^eva ; in the last class he places St. James, St. Jude, the Second Epistle of St. Peter, the Second and Third Epistles of St. John. He designates as voda those whose authorship was de monstrated to be not Apostolic, as the Acts of Paul, the Shepherd of Hennas, the Apocalypse of St. Peter, the Epistle of St. Barnabas, the book entitled SiSa^at in the Apostolic Constitutions, and the Gospel of the Hebrews. He says also that some include the Apoca lypse of St. John. Beyond this he further brackets certain works as aroira and Swae/Si], as the Gospels of St. Peter, St. Thomas, and St. Matthew, the Acts of St. Andrew, St. John, and of the other Apostles.

By degrees the avrCke^o^eva of Eusebius began to

take their place among the recognised books. St. Atha-

nasius and St. Epiphanius admit them. All, with the

exception of the Apocalypse, are cited by St. Gregory

e Hist. Eccl. iii, 24.

Nazianzen, the Apostolic Constitutions, and the cele brated Canon of Laodiccea, C. Cyril.

Yet we still find occasional isolated opposition against other books of the azmXeyo^ez/a. The Iambics to Se- leucus, printed in the works of St. Gregory Nazian zen f, say that many do not admit the Second Epistle of St. Peter, the Second and Third Epistles of St. John, St. Jude, the Hebrews; and that the greater part reject the Apocalypse. Didymus of Alexandria doubts the Canonicity of the Second Epistle of St. Peter ; and Theodore of Mopsuestia is indisposed to that of St. James. The Syrian version only recognises of the Catholic Epistles, as Canonical, the First Epistle of St. John, the First Epistle of St. Peter, and St. James. The Latin Church, in view of Montanism, tended to dislike the Hebrews. The Greek Church, in fear of Mil- lenarianism, mistrusted the Apocalypse g. The Council of Nice, by affording means to the Bishops of the East and “VYest to compare notes, enabled the Western to learn that the Hebrews was part of Canonical Scrip ture, and the Eastern the genuineness of the Apo calypse. This practically ended the question as to the New Testament Canon. Doubts subsequent to this were rather the abnormal opinions of individuals, and therefore do not invalidate the statement in the Arti des, that concerning what we now receive ” there was never any doubt in the Church.”

f torn. ii. p. 165.

s Klee, Sistoire des Dogmes Chretiens, i. 146. Cf. Westcott’s General Survey of the History of the Canon of the New Testament. Cambridge, 1855.

Notes

• Civ. Dei, xix. 18. t. vii. p. 562.
• Concilia, t. xvii. p. 832, eel. Colet.