De Moor II:44: The Object of Interpretation: The Whole Scripture

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On the Object of Interpretation, to which our AUTHOR now comes, he maintains that it is to be extended to the Whole Scripture, not restricted to the Gospels of the Lord alone, or some Pericopes of the Gospels and Epistles, wont to be read aloud and explained on the Lord’s Day, and making a circuit yearly, as the same in many Calendars also are wont to be assigned to particular Lord’s Days. That is, when in the primitive Church the Sacred Books in their entirety were wont both to be read and to be explained by the Bishops in order, yet with particular texts selected on the feasts of Christ’s Nativity, Easter, Ascension, Pentecost:  certain Pericopes were chosen from the Gospels and adapted to certain times of the year; until Charlemagne near the beginning of the Ninth Century appointed Paul Warnefridus the younger, first Deacon of Aquileia,[1] whence he is called Paul the Deacon, and finally a Monk Monte Cassino; until, I say, he appoint him out of the Homilies of the Fathers to subjoin to particular texts what thing make for their explication; which he furnished in a book that thence was called Homiliarium/Homiliary:  from which time today’s division of the dominical texts was established, and the practice grew, that in the place of Sermons anniversary Lectiones/ Readings of those Homilies, taken by Paul from the Fathers and arranged under the particular texts, were subjoined to the texts read aloud, whence his work is also called Lectionarium/Lectionary; and also Postillarium/Postillary, because those homilectical, or explanatory, Readings were called Postils, by a word barbarously constructed from post/after and illa/those, since they were following post illa, after those things, that had been read aloud from the Sacred text.  But what is set forth in writing, that today’s division of those Gospel Pericopes is attributed to JEROME, does not approve itself to Critics of keen judgment:  see SPANHEIM, Historia Ecclesiastica, Century IX, chapter XIV, § 7, columns 1414, 1415; RUMPÆUS, Commentatione critica ad Novi Testamenti Libros, § XXXIX, pages 176-201; BUDDEUS, Isagoge ad Theologiam universam, book II, chapter VIII, § 10, tome 2, pages 1640-1645a.

Now, those postillary Readings and their yearly repetition was received by the common consent of the Church, so that the rude common folk, who were not able to read Scripture, nor to preserve it in memory, might thereby more easily learn the History of Christ and some principal testimonies concerning the articles of Faith and Christian duties toward God and the neighbor.

But in this way the Reading of the Bible gradually fell into disuse, and the attentiveness of those learning, together with the diligence and progress of those teaching, was necessarily much diminished; while the Ministers considered nothing, but acquiesced in those Readings and Homilies.

It is certainly superior, therefore, that the explication be extended to the whole Scripture, whether the Books in their entirety be expounded in continuous order, or a text be select from here or there according to the time and emergent circumstance, with the rule of the maximum edification of the Church always in view.  Thus, α.  Paul led the way, Acts 20:27.  β.  To this end the entirety of Scripture was committed to writing for us, Romans 15:4.  γ.  And the explication of the entirety of Scripture furnishes for us eminent and most ample uses, 2 Timothy 3:16.

Whether the yearly explication of the Dominical texts be altogether abrogated, as was done in a great many of the Reformed Churches of France, Scotland, and the Netherlands:  or the abuses originating in the Papacy be excised, but the use of explaining the Dominical texts in an annual course be retained in some measure, as was done in the Protestant Church throughout Germany, England, Denmark, Sweden, Poland, and Hungary, in which regions something was conceded to the rudeness of the people, with the integrity of the Word preserved, no less than the liberties of the Pastors and Church.  Indeed, with the Integrity of the Word preserved, because in other sermons the Pastors declare to the people the whole Word of God in the Old and New Testaments in order, although one be allotted to the Dominical texts, of which sort something also obtains in some of our Churches.  With the Liberty of the Pastors and Church also preserved:  because thus they are not bound to them, indeed, as often as they please or the circumstances require, either they may put other texts in their place, or they may augment the same texts by the addition of what precedes or follows, or diminish them.

This is well done in a variety of ways:  only let it ever be for the sake of the progress and edification both of the teachers and of the learners.  Among the particular Questions set forth at the General Synod of Middelburg in 1581, the Twentieth was this:  Whether it is expedient to explain the Dominical Gospels before the people?  Response:  It is better that an entire Book of the Old or New Testament be explained, than this or that part of it:  yet with this prudence applied, that Books be selected of the sort that most suit the Condition of the Church.  VOETIUS, Politicæ Ecclesiasticæ, part I, book II, tractate II, chapter III, page 607:  “In the selecting of texts to be explained the Preacher is to have regard to the necessity and present state of his Church.  For he ought to know what exhortations, what corrections, what didactic instructions, what consolations, what reproofs, are even now required by these.  Beyond this necessity it appears to be intended, and in our well constituted churches observed, that entire books, or at least whole chapters, be explained in continuous order.  To bind themselves and others to the Dominical texts perpetually breaking into the order, appears less advantageous.  For the whole counsel of the Lord is not able to be set forth to the Church by occasion of those texts:  unless against the art and method of preaching one should wish to rove about, and to bring not a few doctrines to the text rather than bring them from the text.  Finally, whoever the author of those sections may have been, it is not able to be denied that other texts to be set forth to the hearers upon the pretext of sounder sermons could have been selected, and could have been partly added to, partly substituted in the place of, those already selected.  I judge that it is not at all suitable to these things, that Preachers in whatever parts of the world, and at whatever time, be bound to the explanation of those dominical texts, even indeed on those stated Lord’s Days; when the present posture of affairs and of Churches appears to require other texts, and other treatments.  Apart from the fact that among the dominical texts some occur, the explication of which ought to be discharged not so much in one, as in two, three, or more Lord’s Day meetings.  Finally, this inconvenience appears to follow from this postillophagia, that such Dominical Sermons constantly breaking in upon the order fosters ignorance and idleness among both the Preachers and the Hearers:  as experience has proven:”  see what additional things follow there.

In particular our AUTHOR maintains that the Prophecies are to be contemplated with diligence, according to the admonitions of the Lord, Matthew 24:15, and of His beloved disciple, Revelation 1:3; by which appointment the Obscurity that obtains in certain and many Prophecies ought not to discourage us; since, on the other hand, this furnishes an argument to whet our diligence, while frequent meditation upon the prophetic Writers gradually makes those things easier that at first appeared to be impossibly difficulty, Daniel 12:4:  consult CARPZOV’S Introductionem ad Libros Propheticos Veteris Testamenti, chapter I, § 23, pages 65, 66.

Nevertheless, in the Prophecies that contemplation must be coupled with all prudence, that is, lest we be completely immersed in those Prophecies, with the more necessary doctrine and practices neglected, or we mold the Prophecies according to our pleasure, or we draw all thing to hypotheses already assumed by us, for example, Periodic hypotheses, concerning which see below, Chapter XXXII, § 29-31.

Before all things, the exposition of Controverted Passages is not to be neglected, so that they might be useful for the silencing of adversaries, Titus 1:9; 2 Timothy 2:16, 25.  For this is to do what is no less useful than to deliver Systematic Theology:  for this has likewise been done of old, and yet remains especially necessary.  As long as errors do not cease, the solid refutation of the same is not to be forgotten.  In the midst of a time of peace, arms are still to be handled, lest we become unaccustomed to them.  How much more when we see ourselves surrounded on all sides by enemies, who never cease to oppose true doctrine; moreover, new arms are constantly being forged, with which they might rise up against us:  against whose darts our soul is hence to be fortified.

[1] Aquileia is a town in northeastern Italy.