of "equivalence" has always been prevalent in scholastic systems. It means the isolation of phrases, the misapplication of parallel passages, the false emphasising of accidental words, the total neglect of the context, "the everwidening spiral ergo from the narrow aperture of single texts." It is just as prominent, and quite as mischievous, in Hilary and Augustine, in Albert and Aquinas, in Gerhard and Calovius, as in Hillel or Ishmael. Hillel was personally a noble Rabbi; yet by his seven rules he became the founder of Talmudism, with all its pettiness, its perversion of the letter of the Scripture which it professed to worship, and its ignorance of the spirit, of which no breath seemed to breathe over its valley of dry bones. And yet-let me say in passing -Jews have been found to assert, and nominal Christians to repeat, that Jesus was a disciple of Hillel, and borrowed from Hillel the truths which He revealed!1 2. We pass to the second epoch, and find that Alexandrianism also has left us its hermeneutic principles. Those principles are given by Philo in his books on dreams, and on the unchangeableness of God, and the details of their application are scattered throughout his numerous writings. Negatively he says that the literal sense must be excluded when anything is stated which is unworthy of God;-when otherwise a contradiction would be involved;-and when Scripture itself allegorises. Positively the text is to be allegorised when expressions are doubled; when superfluous words are used; when there is a repetition of facts already known; when an expression is varied; when synonyms are employed; when a play of words is possible in any of its varieties; when words admit of a slight alteration; when the expression is unusual; when there is anything abnormal in the number or tense. Many of these rules are not peculiar 1 So first of all Geiger, followed by Friedländer, Löw, Renan, and many others. See further in Lect. II. Hillel's rule, "The more law the more life" (Aboth, ii. 8), is so direct an antithesis to John v. 39, 40, that our Lord might almost seem to have been formally repudiating it. 2 Quod Deus Immutabilis, 11; De Somniis, i. 40. For the details as found in the book, De Legis Allegoriis, and Philo's other treatises, see Siegfried Philo, pp. 160-197. Some illustrations are given infra, Lect. III. An Art of Misinterpretation. 23 to Philo, but are found no less in the Midrashim, and were adopted by Origen. They point to methods which have been applied to thousands of passages during entire centuries, and it is not too much to say that for the most part they do but systematise the art of misinterpretation. They have furnished volumes of baseless application without shedding upon the significance of Scripture one ray of genuine light. The rules become still more futile when they are only applied as Philo applied them, to a translation abounding with errors; but in any case they have scarcely a particle of validity. The repetition "Abraham Abraham" does not imply that Abraham will also live in the life to come;1 nor does "Let him die the death" mean "Let him die in the next world as well as in this." The Septuagint word, eyxpupías, for "cakes" in Gen. xviii. 6 does not imply the duty of esoteric teaching; 2 nor because the word kóσμos means both "universe " and " adornment," does it follow that the dress of the high priest is (as the Book of Wisdom tells us) a symbol of the world. Such explanations, or applications, or halfapplications, often deduced from the falsest etymologies,* may be found in thousands in exegetical literature, from the days of Philo down to those of the Reformation, and even much later. Must we not deplore so fruitless an exercise of fancy, so sterile a manipulation of the Sacred Book? 3. Let us pass from Philo to the third epoch. No interpreter except Origen and Jerome has ever exercised so deep 1 Gen. xxii. 11; Lev. xviii. 6. Gigant. 8. * Wisd. xviii. 24. Philo, De Vit. Mos. iii. 14. De profug. 20. De Migr. Bereshith rabba, § 39, 56. Philo, De 2 De Sacrif. Ab. et Cain. 15. Abr. 18. The identification of Rachel with contemplative, Leah with practical virtue, adopted by Gregory (Homil. in Ezech. ii. 2), and immortalised by Dante (Purgat. xxvii. 101-105), partly depends on the derivation of Rachel from Sparis Beẞnλwσews (De congr. erud. grat. § 6); though, in another aspect Rachel stands for things wholly different-e.g. the source of temptations (De poster. Cain. 40) and of earthly hopes (Leg. Albegg. ii. 13). 5 The chief hermeneutic manuals in the Patristic epoch are Diodorus, τις διαφορὰ θεωρίας καὶ ἀλληγορίας (no longer extant). Adrianus, Eloaywyń (A.D. 433. It is printed in the Critici Sacri. vol. ix., 1660, and was edited by D. Hoeschel, 1602. [Eucherius an influence on the modes of exegesis as Augustine. His comments are sometimes painfully beside the mark, but we get an insight into the erroneous methods by which he was led astray when we find him endorsing with warm praise the seven rules of Tichonius. Those rules are as baseless as Philo's, and even more so than those of Hillel. A book written by Eucherius, Bishop of Trèves about the year 450, called Liber Formularum Spiritalis Intelligentiae, shows the lengths to which allegory had been developed before the fifth century. In this dull and desultory dictionary of metaphors everything is reduced to generalities and abstractions. It is argued that all Scripture must be allegorically interpreted because David says, "I will open my mouth in parables, loquar in aenigmate antiqua." The argument which does not hesitate to apply to the whole literature of a millennium and a-half the misinterpreted expression which the Psalmist used of a single psalm, is a fair specimen of the futility of the proofs offered in defence of these bad methods.1 The rules of Tichonius had apparently been Eucherius Lugdunensis, Liber formularum spiritalis intelligentiac Hieronymus, De optimo genere interpretandi (Ep. ad Pammachium). Cassiodorus, Institutiones (circ. A.D. 560). (Opp. ed. Garet., 1679, I do not add the so-called Clavis of Melito, because it is not a translation of the Kaels of Melito of Sardis, but, as Steitz has proved, a mediaeval Latin work (Stud. u. Krit. 1857). 1 De doctr. Christ, iii. 30-37. Thus the "head of God" is the essential divinity; the "hair" the Holy Angels or the elect; the "eyelids" His incomprehensible judgments; His “mouth” is Christ; His "lips" the agreement of the Old and New Testament, &c., &c. This book, which occupies seventeen folio pages, is a melancholy proof of the depths to which exegesis had sunk. Eucherius is the first to use the word avaywyn, to imply the reference of Scriptural passages to the New Jerusalem. The Libellus de formulis has been edited by Franc Pauly. The remark is borrowed from Clem. Alex., Strom. v. 12, § 81. #epl πάσης γραφῆς . . . ἐν τοῖς ψαλμοῖς γέγραπται ὡς ἐν παραβολῇ εἰρημένοις. He proves his point from isolated passages like Ps. lxxviii. 2; 1. Cor. ii. 6 ; Matt. x. 27; Mark iv. 34, &c. (Strom. vi. 15, § 125.) The Psalm itself (Ps. lxxviii.) bears no resemblance to what we call "a parable," nor does it contain anything enigmatic. The Rules of Tichonius. 25 designed to bring some sort of method into this vast region of Phantasy, which existed long before the days of Eucherius. He thought so highly of them as "claves et luminaria" to the law and the prophets, as to assert that they furnish a secure protection against the possibility of error.1 The first is "About the Lord and His mystic body," namely the Church. Thus in the same passage one clause, such as, dolores nostros ipse portavit, applies to Christ, but following clauses, such as Deus vult, ostendere illi lucem et formare illum in prudentia,2 apply not to Christ but to the Church. And in Is. lxi. 10, Sicut sponso imposuit mihi mitram, applies to Christ, but the following clause, et sicut sponsam donavit me amictu, applies only to the Church. The second rule was "about the Lord's bipartite body," or about true and false Christians. Thus, in Cant. i. 5, "I am black but comely," the first epithet refers to false Christians; the second to true Christians. The third rule "about the Promises and the Law," is theological. The fourth rule is " about Genus and Species," or whole and part. According to this, all nations mentioned in Scripture are types of Churches and may represent either the good or the bad side of the Church, and the words of the Scripture may with constant arbitrary variation, refer sometimes to the whole Church, sometimes to a part of it. The fifth rule suggests a sort of kabbalism of numbers. The sixth rule "About Recapitulation," professes to account harmonistically for events which are related out of order, and supposes a sort of vague analogy between different cycles of generations. The last rule" about the devil and his body," is the counterpart of the first and proposes to teach us how we are to apply some passages to the devil and some to wicked men. These 1 Gennadius cites them as being meant "ad investigandam et inveniendam intelligentiam scripturarum.” 2 Is. liii. 4. 3 Is. lxi. 16. Vulg. "Induit me vestimentis salutis decoratum coronâ, et quasi sponsam ornatam monilibus suis." 99 66 quasi sponsum It is also called "De spiritu et literá," De gratia et mandato." E.g. in Is. xiv. 3. Quomodo cecidisti de coelo applies to the devil; corruisti in terram to the ungodly. rules are perfectly arbitrary; but Augustine in three different passages, and after him Cassiodorus1 and Isidore of Seville refer to them with marked praise, and consider that they throw no small light on the hidden senses of Scripture.2 Partly owing to Augustine's approval they became for a thousand years the fountain-head of unnumbered misinterpretations.3 4. It will not be needful here to do more than allude to the erroneous principles of the other epochs. Throughout the whole of the scholastic epoch (4) dominated the pure fiction of the multiplex intelligentia, or "fourfold sense," which fills volumes of elaborate commentary, and which, together with the unquestioned acceptance of false traditions and usurped authority, vitiates the popular compendiums of five hundred years. The Reformation (5) witnessed an immense advance; but (6) in the epoch which succeeded it, the mediaeval subordination of Scriptural study to Papal authority was succeeded by another subordination of it, nominally to a so-called " Analogy of Scripture," really to the current Confessions of the various Churches. The whole Bible from Genesis downwards was forced to speak the language of the accepted formulae, and the “ perspicuity of Scripture" was identified with the facility with which it could be forced into semblable accordance with dogmatic 1 Cassiodorus, Institt. i. 10. On Tichonius see Gennadius, De Script. Eccl. 18; Trithemius, De Script. Eccl. 92. Cave, Hist. Lit. p. 275; Migne, Patrolog. vol. 50; Tillemont, vi. 81; Neander, iii. 280; Klausen, Hermen, p. 133; Semler, Diss. Hist. de vii. regulis Tichonii, Halae, 1756; A. Vogel in Herzog. vol. xvi. 2 Tichonius said, "Quarum si ratio . . . accepta fuerit, clausa quaeque patefient et obscura dilucidabuntur." Augustine says, "Non parum adjuvant ad penetranda quae tecta sunt." De Doctr. Christ. iii. 4, § 30. Retractt. ii. 18. Contra Epist. Parmeniani, i. See too Jer. De virr. illustr. 18. 3 Augustine vaguely saw in them a Donatist taint: " quae sicut Donatista loquitur," De Doctr. Christ. iii. § 43. They are still referred to by Hugo of St. Victor (Erud. Did. v. 4); and Perez of Valentia († 1490). Incomparably superior was the Eloaywyn els ràs belas ypapàs of Adrianus. He says that three things are to be considered, the διάνοια, the λέξις, and the σύνθεσις, through which we arrive at θεωρία. His book belongs to the school of Antioch, and aims at edification not by allegory but by facts, and by the doctrine of types. Till the days of Nicolas of Lyra it had little influence. Among the Roman Catholics Santes Pagninus (1540) still holds to Tichonius. The first traces of the fourfold sense occur in Eucherius († 450); of the threefold sense in Origen. |