Chapter 11 — Attacks made on religious because they study

Objections

We now proceed to consider the objections brought against the studious life led by religious.

Obj. 1: We find certain persons, who were a danger to the Church, accused of always being instructed and never arriving at a knowledge of the truth (2 Tim 3:7). For this reason, it is considered a suspicious circumstance when religious are fond of study.

Obj. 2: St. Gregory makes the following remarks on the words, my enemy has looked at me with terrible eyes (Job 16:10): the incarnate truth, he writes (Moral., 13), chose for his preachers such as were poor, simple, and unlearned. But, on the other hand, the astute and double-tongued man, filled with the knowledge of this world, whom at the end of time the apostate angel will elect to propagate his falsehood, will be damned. (Gregory the Great, Morals 13.10.13 (CCSL 143A; PL 75:1023C).) Hence religious, because they exercise the office of preaching in a learned manner, are regarded as the forerunners of antichrist.

Obj. 3: I saw another beast that rose out of the earth; it had two horns like a lamb (Rev 13:11). On these words of the Apocalypse the Gloss remarks: the description of the tribulation which will be caused by antichrist and his princes is followed by a narrative of the evils which will befall the Church, by means of the apostles of antichrist, who will travel throughout the entire world. (Glossa ordinaria 6, 1592 at Rev 13:11 (PL 114:733).) Again, coming up out of the earth signifies going forth to preach (Gloss). (Glossa interlinearis, at Rev 13:11 (in Glossa ordinaria 6, 1591-92).) On the words it had two horns the Gloss remarks: these preachers are said to have two horns, because they will profess to imitate the innocent and spotless life of our Lord, to work miracles resembling his, and to preach his doctrine; or else because they will usurp to themselves the two testaments. (Glossa ordinaria 6, 1592 at Rev 13:11 (PL 114:733).) Hence it would appear that they who go forth to preach, with the knowledge of the two testaments, and with an appearance of sanctity, are the apostles of antichrist.

Obj. 4: Knowledge puffs up, but love builds up (1 Cor 8:1). Now as religious are in a peculiar manner bound to the practice of humility, they ought to abstain from knowledge.

Obj. 5: Of St. Benedict, patriarch of religious, we are told that he withdrew from the study of literature, and that his learning was unlearned and his wisdom untaught (St. Gregory, Dialogues, 2). (Gregory the Great, Dialogues bk. 2, prologue (PL 66:126B).) Hence after his example, religious should desist from study.

Obj. 6: St. Paul (2 Thess 3:11), reproves those who neglected manual labor, and indulged themselves in curiosity and sloth. As then the acquisition of knowledge is curiosity, religious ought not to abandon manual labor for the sake of study.

Response

I answer that, now those who have been quoted above are not the originators of the error we are refuting. Julian the Apostate was the first to conceive this idea. He, as we are told in ecclesiastical history, forcibly prevented Christians from acquiring knowledge. Those therefore who imitate him, by forbidding religious to study, act in a manner opposed to the precepts of Scripture.

We read, for instance, in Isaiah 5:13: therefore, is my people led away captive, because they had not knowledge. Gloss: because they would not have knowledge. (Glossa interlinearis, at Isa 5:13 (in Glossa ordinaria 4, 69-70).) Now voluntary ignorance could not deserve punishment, were not knowledge praiseworthy.

In Hosea 4:5 we read: in the night I have made your mother to be silent. My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge; because you have rejected knowledge, I reject you from being a priest to me. This text clearly shows how severely ignorance will be punished.

In Psalm 118:66, we read: teach me goodness and discipline and knowledge. On these words, the Gloss says: teach me goodness, that is, inspire me, with charity; teach me discipline, that is, give me patience; teach me knowledge, that is, enlighten my mind. For that knowledge is useful, whereby a man becomes known to himself. (Peter Lombard, Commentaries on the Psalms and St. Paul, at Ps 118:66 (PL 191:1076D).)

St. Jerome writes to the monk Rusticus: let a book be never absent from your eyes or hand. (Jerome, Epistle 125, para. 11 (CSEL 56:129; PL 22:1078).) Again, love the knowledge of the Scriptures, and you will not love the vices of the flesh. (Jerome, Epistle 125, para. 11 (CSEL 56:130; PL 22:1078).) The same saint likewise writes to the monk Paulinus: holy ignorance is only profitable to itself, and inasmuch as when accompanied by the example of a good life it edifies the Church of Christ. It is harmful, when it is powerless against those who impugn her doctrine. (Jerome, Epistle 53, para. 3 (CSEL 54:447; PL 22:542).) Hence the learning of the saints is preferable to the holiness of the unlearned.

In the same epistle, after enumerating the books of Sacred Scripture, St. Jerome continues: I beseech you, brother, let these books be the companions of your life and the subject of your meditation. I know nothing but these, and seek no other thing. Don’t you see that in this way you may on earth enjoy the kingdom of heaven? (Jerome, Epistle 53, para. 10 (CSEL 54:463; PL 22:549).) A heavenly life then consists in the, constant study of Sacred Scripture.

St. Paul points out that knowledge of the Scriptures is essential to preachers. For, he says, until I arrive, give attention to the public reading of scripture, to exhorting, to teaching (1 Tim 4:13). It is evident from this that a knowledge of what they are to teach, is necessary for those whose duty it is to preach and to exhort.

St. Jerome writes to the monk Rusticus: spend much time in learning what you must later on teach. (Jerome, Epistle 125, para. 18 (CSEL 56:137; PL 22:1082).) Once more he writes to the same, if you desire to enter the clerical state, study, in order that you may teach. (Jerome, Epistle 125, para. 8 (CSEL 56:127; PL 22:1077).)

St. Gregory says, in his Pastoral Rule: it is eminently necessary that they who accept the office of preachers should not desist from sacred study. (Gregory the Great, Liber regulae pastoralis 2.11 (PL 77:50A).)

The life of religious is established primarily for contemplation; but, as Hugh of St. Victor says, reading is part of contemplation. (Hugh of St. Victor, Didascalion, bk. 5, ch. 9 (PL 176:797A).) Hence religious have a right to apply themselves to study.

They are best capable of prosecuting their studies with success, who are least embarrassed by earthly ties. We read in Isaiah 28:9, whom will he teach knowledge, and to whom will he explain the message? Those who are weaned from milk, those taken from the breast. The Commentator says, (on Physics, 7) that chastity and the other virtues, whereby the desires of the flesh are curbed, are special aids to the acquisition of speculative knowledge. (Averroes, Commentary on the Physics, bk. 8, ch. 3, comm. 20.) Now as religious consecrate themselves to a life of continence and abstinence, they are peculiarly fitted for study.

St. Jerome proves, moreover, in a letter Pammachius the monk that it is commendable in religious to devote themselves, not only to sacred learning, but to secular study. If, he says, you are enamoured of the spouse knowledge, whom you have taken captive (that is to say if your heart is enthralled by the beauty of secular knowledge), cut off the tresses of this maiden, and remove the ornaments from her head, whereby I mean, heed not, when you study, the meretricious charms of language. Bathe your spouse, learning, in the salt of prophetic wisdom; and then, resting with her, speak saying: "her left hand is under my head, and with her right hand she will embrace me." Then, shall this captive raise up around you a numerous offspring, and this Moabitess shall become an Israelite in truth. (Jerome, Epistle 66, para. 8 (CSEL 54:658; PL 22:644).) Hence we may understand that it is permissible for religious to occupy themselves with secular branches of learning if, according to the rule of Sacred Scripture, they avoid all that may be reprehensible.

St. Augustine (De doctrina Christiana, 2) says: those philosophers, especially of the Platonic School, whose teaching is true and consistent with the Faith, are not to be feared. On the contrary, we may make use of them, as we may despoil those who are in unjust possession of our property. (Augustine, On Christian Doctrine 2.40.60 (CCSL 32; CSEL 80; PL 34:63).)

On the words, Daniel resolved that he would not defile himself (Dan 1:8), the Gloss says: he who would not eat at the king’s table, lest he should thereby be defiled; he would never have studied the science of the Egyptians, had he considered it to be sinful. He studied it, however, not in order to follow it, but to judge and confute it. Now if a man, ignorant of mathematics, undertakes to argue with a mathematician, or if one who knows nothing of philosophy enter the lists against philosophers, what does he do, save expose himself to ridicule? (Glossa ordinaria 4, 1498, at Dan 1:8, from Jerome, On Daniel, at Dan 1:8 (PL 25:497A).)

From all that has been said, we see then that it is advisable for religious, and especially for preachers, to be learned, and that above all things they ought to have a good knowledge of Sacred Scripture.

Replies to objections

Ad 1: The words, always being instructed and never arriving at a knowledge of the truth (2 Tim 3:7), are a rebuke, not to such as are ever learning, but to those whose study withdraws them from the Faith, and who, therefore, never attain to the knowledge of the truth. Such men are reprobates at heart and blinded to the faith. (2 Tim 3:8)

Ad 2: When St. Gregory says that the preachers of Antichrist are learned in the knowledge of this world, he refers to those preachers who make use of earthly learning to draw their hearers to sin and to worldly desires. For, in the context to the words we have quoted, he cites the following verse of Isaiah: ah, land of whirring wings beyond the rivers of Ethiopia, sending ambassadors by the Nile in vessels of papyrus on the waters! (Isa 18:1) Upon these words, St. Gregory makes this comment: paper is made from the reed papyrus. What then shall we understand by the bulrushes, or reeds, of which the prophet is speaking, save earthly learning? The vessels of bulrushes then ate the hearts of worldly men; and to send ambassadors upon the waters in vessels of bulrushes, is to base our preaching on the arguments of carnal wisdom, and to attract our hearers to sin. (Gregory the Great, Morals 13.10.13 (CCSL 143A; PL 75:1024A).)

Ad 3: The words of the Gloss, quoted in the third objection, refer (as may be plainly seen by comparing this passage with many others) to preachers whom Antichrist will, at his coming into the world, send forth. Neither is the fact that the knowledge of the Old and the New Testament may be abused an argument against religious possessing such knowledge; unless we likewise say that because they may make a hypocritical display of innocence and purity of life, these virtues are therefore to be reprobated.

Ad 4: To the objection that science puffs up, we reply that it certainly does so, unless it is accompanied by charity. Thus, the Gloss says: knowledge alone puffs up, and again; (Peter Lombard, Commentaries on the Psalms and St. Paul, at 1 Cor 8:1 (PL 191:1601D).) and further on: add charity to your knowledge, and your knowledge will be useful. (Peter Lombard, Commentaries on the Psalms and St. Paul, at 1 Cor 8:1 (PL 191:1601D).) Hence to those who practice works of mercy, learning will not be very dangerous. But if we are to avoid knowledge because it leads to pride, we ought, on the same grounds, to desist from any good work. For, St. Augustine says, pride insinuates itself into good actions, in order to render them worthless. (Augustine, Regula ad servos Dei, para. 2 (PL 32:1379).)

Ad 5: To the argument, founded on the example of St. Benedict, we reply that this Saint did not forego study from a dread of learning, but from fear of the effects of a worldly life and society. Thus, St. Gregory tells us that being in Rome, St. Benedict applied himself to liberal studies, and to literature; but perceiving that many of those around him fell into sin, he withdrew the foot with which he had stepped out into the world, fearing lest, if he attained to worldly learning, he might likewise fall into the abyss of sin. (Gregory the Great, Dialogues, bk. 2, prologue (PL 66:126A).) Therefore, they are worthy of all praise who abandon the life of worldly students and retire into a monastery, where they may prosecute their studies.

Ad 6: To the last objection proposed, we reply that idle and inordinate curiosity is a danger attendant not only on study, but on all other mental occupation; and that superfluous anxiety, which is engendered by curiosity, is reprehensible. But in the words of St. Paul (2 Tim 3), quoted as an argument against religious, the Apostle, as the Gloss points out, rebukes those who, from an undue desire for material gain, entangle themselves in their neighbours’ concerns. (Peter Lombard, Commentaries on the Psalms and St. Paul, at 2 Thess 3:11 (PL 192:325B).) To speak of study of Sacred Scripture as a life of idleness is flatly to contradict the Gloss. For, on the words of Psalm 118, my eyes have fainted, the Gloss says: as he is not idle who only studies the word of God, neither can he who performs manual labor be more justly accused of sloth, than he who is occupied with the study of divinity. Such learning is the greatest of all work; and Mary, who listened to our Lord, is preferred before Martha, who ministered to him. (Peter Lombard, Commentaries on the Psalms and St. Paul, at Ps 119:123, labeled 174 in the gloss (PL 191:1085B).)