Volume 2, Number 1
Winter 2016
INTERCONNECTIONS JOURNAL OF CATHOLIC SEMINARY STUDIES
2
Interconnections Journal of Catholic Seminary Studies
usml.edu/interconnections EDITOR ASSOCIATE EDITORS
LAYOUT EDITOR FACULTY ADVISOR
Stephen Lilly Michael Brungardt Louis Cunningham Christopher Landfried Michael Lewis Griffin McHaffie Ryan McMillin Daniel Orris Robinson Ortiz Arturo Vigueras Jerome Westenberg, OFM Conv. Luke Zanoni Michael Lewis Rev. Raymond Webb
Interconnections: Journal of Catholic Seminary Studies is an online, studentedited journal based at the University of Saint Mary of the Lake/Mundelein Seminary. By providing a common forum for Catholic seminarians in various formation programs, this journal encourages a dynamic exchange of insights on common areas of study in Catholic theology and in other studies allied with priestly formation. May it help lead seminarians more deeply into the mysteries of salvation. The editors welcome papers that address topics in Catholic theology, Scripture studies, philosophy, Church history, pastoral practice, and the humanities. Homilies will also be accepted. Submissions are limited to Catholic seminarians. For more information about guidelines for submission, please visit usml.edu/interconnections. Views expressed in the articles are those of the respective authors and not necessarily those of the editors or the University of Saint Mary of the Lake/Mundelein Seminary. The journal is published biannually in the Winter and Spring. To receive notifications of a newly published issue, please sign up for our mailing list at usml.edu/interconnections. ISSN: 1944-088X 漏 2016 University of Saint Mary of the Lake/Mundelein Seminary I N T E R C O N N E C T I O N S 路 2:1 路 Winter 2016
3
Contents
Volume 2, Number 1 · Winter 2016 4
Editor’s note Stephen Lilly
5
When Ontology Meets Angelology Perfection, Prime Matter, and How They Relate to Angels in the Metaphysical System of Thomas Aquinas Ryan McMillin
19
A Further Analysis The Phoenix Hospital Medical Procedure of 2009 Patrick Ryan Sherrard
33
Entropy and Inspiration Notes on the Relation of Textual Criticism to Theories of Biblical Inspiration Friar Jerome Mary Westenberg, OFM Conv.
On the cover: The Annunciation by Gerard David (Netherlandish, ca. 1455–1523), 1506, oil on wood (The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Bequest of Mary Stillman Harkness, 1950, www.metmuseum.org). This panel faced one of the Blessed Virgin Mary. Together, they were part of a spectacular multi-storied polyptych commissioned by Vincenzo Sauli, a wealthy Italian banker and diplomat with connections to Bruges, for the high altar of the Benedictine abbey church of San Gerolamo della Cervara, near Genoa.
I N T E R C O N N E C T I O N S · 2:1 · Winter 2016
4
Editor’s Note
A
fter a nearly seven-year hiatus since its inaugural issue was published, I would like to present to you this revived version of Interconnections: Journal of Catholic Seminary Studies. Originally published under the leadership of Andrew Liaugminas, now a priest of the Archdiocese of Chicago, Interconnections was intended to be a forum for Catholic seminarians from different formation programs across the country and, potentially, the world to exchange insights on common areas of study. It was hoped that the journal would foster a deeper reflection on Sacred Scripture, the teachings of the Church, and the Catholic worldview among those men soon to be entrusted with sharing these with others. These aims are equally pertinent today, and we therefore intend to continue this journal with its original intent. Therefore, I ask for your support as we endeavor to fulfill these aims of Interconnections. Please support us with your readership and your referral to others. Seminarians, please support us by submitting your work for consideration for publishing. And, most importantly, please support us with your prayers. STEPHEN LILLY University of Saint Mary of the Lake/Mundelein Seminary
I N T E R C O N N E C T I O N S · 2:1 · Winter 2016
When Ontology Meets Angelology Perfection, Prime Matter, and How They Relate to Angels in the Metaphysical System of Thomas Aquinas RYAN McMILLIN University of Saint Mary of the Lake/Mundelein Seminary
F
or medieval philosophy, being is ordered. This is nowhere more evident than in the work of Saint Thomas Aquinas, the exemplar of high scholasticism whose metaphysical system is inextricably tied to a presumption of a principle of order and perfection, inherited from Neoplatonic sources and modified thereafter. This paper attempts first to outline briefly this order from the perspective of act and potency, concentrating especially on the paradox of prime matter, to which Thomas ascribes the characteristic of pure potency. It will be shown that pure potency must be unique in Thomas’s system and that, as a consequence, the identity of prime matter and pure potency that Thomas posits has negative implications for his own angelology. The three proofs for the existence of angels that Thomas offers in De spiritualibus creaturis will be considered and critiqued before concluding that if angels are to have any potency at all, it must find its source in prime matter.
I. Thomas’s Ordered System: From Pure Act to Pure Potency The source of being in Thomas’s metaphysical system is pure act, self-subsisting being—the perfect, first, and uncreated act of to be itself in whose being all other beings participate analogously. The perfection of a being depends on its proportion of act to potency; the more actuality a thing possesses—that is, the greater the degree to which it participates
I N T E R C O N N E C T I O N S · 2:1 · Winter 2016
6 · When Ontology Meets Angelology
in pure act—the more perfect it is on the scale of being.1 It follows that in the hierarchy of real existents, pure act stands in direct opposition to pure potency.2 Between pure act and pure potency are the many finite beings composed of both potency and act. The manifestation of act and potency in finite beings is a topic that stirred great debate among thirteenth-century philosophers. The traditional viewpoint, originating with the Jewish Avicebron and later finding a place in the work of Alexander of Hales and his pupil Bonaventure, was that matter is identical to potency and form to act.3 According to this view, whose perceived strength for the Christian philosophers is that it clearly recognizes the distinction between God (Pure Act) and finite beings (composites), matter is the passive principle that represents indetermination, and form is the active principle that gives determination.4 Logically consequent upon this is the notion of universal hylomorphism—that all finite beings, because they are composed of potency and act, are likewise composed of matter and form; corporeal beings have matter in the traditional sense (that is, matter with extension in space), whereas spiritual beings have spiritual matter, one that does not necessarily have extension or the same properties that physical, non-spiritual matter has.5 Thomas, however, firmly rejects the doctrine of universal hylomorphism in his assertion that matter is only one type of potency. Any attribution of matter to spiritual substances, he
1. See, among others, Thomas Aquinas, De spiritualibus creaturis, a. 1, ad. 25. 2. John Wippel, The Metaphysical Thought of Thomas Aquinas: From Finite Being to Uncreated Being (Washington: Catholic University of America Press, 2000), 315; Thomas Aquinas, Summa contra gentiles, trans. Anton C. Pegis (New York: Hanover House, 1955–1957), I., c. 17, accessed February 1, 2015, http://www.dhspriory.org/thomas/english/ContraGentiles.htm. It should be noted that to Thomas pure potentiality is not absolute nothingness, which is not in the hierarchy of being precisely because it is not a being. For this reason, it is pure potentiality that occupies the lowest rung on the ladder of existence. 3. James Collins, The Thomistic Philosophy of the Angels (Washington: Catholic University of America Press, 1947), 42–74; David Keck, Angels and Angelology in the Middle Ages (New York: Oxford, 1998), 94. Keck indicates that there is some debate as to whether Avicebron is the true originator of the exact correspondence between matter (form) and potency (act). Augustine may have affirmed the existence of spiritual matter in some of his texts, but it is generally accepted that he did so less clearly than Avicebron in Fons Vitae. 4. Keck, 96. 5. Tobias Hoffman, A Companion to Angels in Medieval Philosophy, ed. Tobias Hoffman (Boston: Brill, 2012), 6.
I N T E R C O N N E C T I O N S · 2:1 · Winter 2016
When Ontology Meets Angelology · 7
argues, is an equivocation and an unnecessary addition to the landscape of the metaphysical universe.6 Thomas’s rejection of the identity of matter and potency may help to understand his views on pure potency, the lowest possible form of being. The concept of pure potency is one that is more difficult to describe than those of pure act or act-potency composition because it has a rather paradoxical existence. Thomas attempts to escape the Parmenidean dilemma in his assertion that pure potency is not absolute non-being (sheer nothingness), but rather relative non-being—something that has being but never manifests its being except in other beings.7 Curiously, Thomas seems to accept the existence of more than one kind of pure potency. The pure potency to which he devotes considerable attention is prime matter, which he defines succinctly as “that which is in potency to substantial existence”8 and elsewhere more completely as “something which is in the genus of substance as a kind of potency, which is understood as excluding every species and form, and even as excluding privation, and yet is a potency capable of receiving both forms and privations.”9 Another potency that he distinguishes from prime matter or pure potency is the potency to receive an intelligible form. He contends that the distinction between prime matter and this type of potency is necessary because an intelligible form is unable to undergo contraction, and the very function of prime matter is to receive a form by contracting it to a particular being.10 Whether this position is
6. Collins, 68. Of course, Thomas escapes attributing matter to spiritual substances because he relies on a separate distinction: essence-existence. Spiritual substances are individuated by their different essences, which makes them matter-less and therefore simple. Another factor in Thomas’s rejection of universal hylomorphism could be its inconsistency with the view put forth by Pseudo-Dionysius, whose positions he viewed to be authoritative ones. Pseudo-Dionysius asserted that angels are incorporeal in every way, and so they could not be said to have matter (Keck, Angels and Angelology, 94). 7. Wippel, 317. 8. Thomas Aquinas, De principiis naturae, trans. R. A. Kocourek (St. Paul: North Central, 1948), c. 1, n. 3, accessed February 1, 2015, http://www.dhspriory.org/thomas/english/DePrincNaturae.htm. 9. Thomas Aquinas, De spiritualibus creaturis, trans. Mary C. Fitzpatrick and John J. Wellmuth (Milwaukee: Marquette University Press, 1949), a. 1, ans, accessed February 1, 2015, http://www. dhspriory.org/thomas/english/QDdeSpirCreat.htm. 10. Ibid.: “[A]ll spiritual substances are intellectual. Now, the potency of each individual thing is such as its perfection is found to be; for a proper act requires its own proper potency. Now the perfection of any intellectual substance, insofar as it is intellectual, is intelligible because it is in the intellect. The sort of potency then that we must seek in spiritual substances is one that is proportionate to the reception of an intelligible form. Now the potency of prime matter is not of I N T E R C O N N E C T I O N S · 2:1 · Winter 2016
8 · When Ontology Meets Angelology
consistent with his contention that prime matter is pure potency will be discussed later, but for now it suffices to say that Thomas views prime matter as the basic capacity to receive a substantial form. Throughout his writings, Thomas makes an important distinction between two types of prime matter: that in the order of nature and that in the order of time. Prime matter in the order of nature is completely formless and functions more as a metaphysically constructed boundary or limit for existence. Thomas views this type of prime matter as that which would be the result of removing all form from a natural being.11 This type is to be contrasted with prime matter in the order of time, which serves as a building block for more complex physical things. Thomas acknowledges this type of prime matter in part because of his uncertainty regarding the eternity of the world; he reasons that if the world is not eternal, there must have been some point in time when the most primitive of material—even more primitive than the elements— was not yet formed into distinct entities. Prime matter in the order of time therefore serves as the unique source for physical existents, and it follows that if the world is eternal, so is prime matter.12 However, if prime matter is to be considered as such, it must have some form, as Thomas concedes.13 Insofar as prime matter exists in the physical world, it does not constitute a capacity to receive any and all forms; the very fact that it exists in the temporal order means that it is already constrained to a particular order, a particular way of being. The prime matter in water, for instance, has no capacity to be changed
this sort, for prime matter receives form by contracting it to the individual being. But an intelligible form is in the intellect without any such contraction; for thus the intellect understands each intelligible as its form is in it. Now the intellect understands the intelligible chiefly according to a common and universal nature, and so the intelligible form is in the intellect according to its universality (secundum rationem suae communitatis). Therefore, an intellectual substance is not made receptive of form by reason of prime matter, but rather through a character which is, in a way, the opposite. Hence it becomes obvious that in the case of spiritual substances the kind of prime matter which of itself is void of all species cannot be part of that substance.” 11. Thomas Aquinas, Scriptum super Sententiis II, dist. 12, a. 4, r.: “Insofar as it indicates the order of nature, prime matter is that into which all natural bodies are ultimately reduced and must be without any form.” 12. Ibid. 13. Ibid.
I N T E R C O N N E C T I O N S · 2:1 · Winter 2016
When Ontology Meets Angelology · 9
immediately into gold (so far as modern physics can tell).14 On the other hand, prime matter in the order of nature, as it is an entirely metaphysical concept and never actually realized, should thus allow for all formal possibilities.15 In other words, while it is impossible in the order of time to have matter without form, it is possible in the order of nature. Because prime matter in the order of time already exhibits some determination, it adds little to the discussion of pure potency and will be set aside from this point forward. If either of the two types of prime matter is to be equated with pure potency, it is prime matter in the order of nature. Preserving the distinction between the two types of prime matter, it is not difficult to see that the Thomistic corpus provides ample evidence of Thomas’s belief that prime matter in the order of nature is being in potency only.16 Accepting this equivalence for the moment, the question to be raised at this juncture is whether prime matter is the only pure potency in Thomas’s system. Thomas himself denies this when he claims that spiritual substances possess a potency different than prime matter.17 Because prime matter limits a form to a specific, individual existence, it cannot receive intelligible forms, which when received in an intellect are never limited.18 This claim suggests that another kind of pure potency exists. But is this position logically tenable? Pure potency is characterized, as it has been shown above, by its lack of any determination or form. If that is the case, then one kind of pure potency cannot be distinguished from another, for to distinguish one entity from another relies on some sort of determination, which is absurd since pure potency, by definition, lacks all determination. By this argument, it must be the case that there is only one pure potency, the source of all potency in any finite being. If there is only one pure potency, and prime matter is proven to be a pure
14. Mark McGovern, “Prime Matter in Aquinas,” Proceedings of the American Catholic Philosophical Association, 61, no. 14 (1987): 224–25. 15. Rather ironically, prime matter in the order of nature is a misnomer because it itself is completely immaterial. Perhaps it would be better termed “source of matter,” or something that captures its function as origin of matter and not matter itself. 16. Wippel, 313ff. 17. See note 10 above. 18. Wippel, 305–06.
I N T E R C O N N E C T I O N S · 2:1 · Winter 2016
10 · When Ontology Meets Angelology
potency, it must be that the two are indistinguishable and that no other potency in this purest form may exist. This will have consequences for Thomas’s angelology.
II. Application to Angelology: The Existence and Nature of Angels Having briefly sketched Thomas’s ordered metaphysical system from the perspective of act and potency, we can now concentrate on arguably the most intriguing stratum in that system: the angels.19 First to be considered is how the notion of perfection contributes to his proofs for the existence of angels, themselves act-potency composites. Following this will be a discussion of the generation of angels in light of our assertion that prime matter is the only pure potency in the system. Thomas’s angelology cannot be understood without an appreciation for his highly ordered metaphysics. Indeed, order and perfection are integral if the existence of separated substances20 is to be proven using only philosophical and not theological means. Thomas offers three proofs21 for the existence of angels in his De spiritualibus creaturis, each of which is consequent upon the notion of perfection of the metaphysical
19. Although more properly the Intelligences are the subject of philosophical analysis and the angels of theological analysis, I opt here and henceforth, following Thomas’s own attribution of the identity of the angels and the Intelligences, to use only the term “angel.” See Doolan, “Aquinas on the Demonstrability of Angels” in Hoffman, 28, for a discussion of this. 20. In using the term separated substance here, I am acknowledging the subtle distinction between spiritual substances that do not have bodies (e.g., angels and disembodied souls) and spiritual substances that do have bodies (i.e., the embodied human soul). 21. It is worthwhile to note here Bazán’s position on whether Thomas’s arguments for the existence of angels are philosophical or not. Bazán notes that according to Thomas’s standards, a philosophical demonstration must be either propter quid (a priori) or quia (a posteriori). Bazán claims that there are no propter quid demonstrations for the existence of angels and that the quia demonstrations that Thomas offers are rendered invalid because of their reliance on obsolete cosmology and astronomy (Bernardo Carlos Bazán, “On Angels and Human Beings: Did Thomas Aquinas Succeed in Demonstrating the Existence of Angels?” Archives d’Histoire Doctrinale et Littéraire du Moyen Age, 77, no. 1 [2010]: 49). On this point, Doolan disagrees that Thomas believes the cosmological proofs offered to be demonstrable (Doolan, 28–29). Bazán characterizes the arguments from De spiritualibus creaturis as theological arguments (73– 76), though Doolan raises issue with this. Bazán cites Thomas’s implicit reference to Genesis 1 in De spiritualibus creaturis, a. 5, as evidence of a theological argument, but the case can be made that Thomas’s reference here is only supplementary and not essential to the argument. Doolan suggests that it is Neoplatonic philosophy that influenced Thomas on this notion of perfection (Doolan, 19– 20, n. 17). I N T E R C O N N E C T I O N S · 2:1 · Winter 2016
When Ontology Meets Angelology · 11
universe.22 A metaphysical system, in order to be perfect, cannot lack any nature that can possibly exist.23 This is the first of the three arguments for the existence of spiritual creatures that Thomas advances in the fifth article of this treatise.24 The implication, as Cajetan indicates, is not that the perfection of the world compels creation of this or that species within one of the ontic orders, but creation of at least one species in an order.25 The second argument is related to the first: because the metaphysical universe is perfect, it must also be ordered continuously such that there exists some intermediate nature between human beings and God. It is here that Thomas argues that this order depends on a certain kind of continuity: the two extremes—simplicity of the divinity and multiplicity of the corporeal—must be connected via a mean.26 Not unrelated is Thomas’s third argument for the existence of purely spiritual substances, wherein he states that the intellectual faculties of material things are imperfect because they rely on sense perception. There must be a more perfect intellectual faculty prior to such imperfect faculties in the order of being; in other words, there exist intellects that are completely free from corporeity.27 Each of these three proofs merits critique. As for the first, could not the defense Thomas uses against Anselm’s ontological argument for the existence of God be employed here as a counterargument to Thomas himself? Anselm’s argument defines God as that than which nothing
22. Recall that the Latin perficere is “to do” or “make through,” so to be perfect to Thomas is not so much to be ideal as it is to be complete (Doolan, 33). 23. Doolan, 31. 24. Similar proofs may be found in Cont. gent., but because that work pre-dates the De spir. creat., I will refer only to the latter unless otherwise noted. 25. Doolan, 36. An example of an ontic order is the immaterial world; it includes all the species and genera that are immaterial. 26. Doolan, 31; Aquinas, De spiritualibus creaturis, a. 5: “If in a genus, moreover, there exists something imperfect, then one finds a reality antecedent to it; a thing which, in the order of nature, is perfect in that genus, for the perfect is prior in nature to the imperfect. Now, forms existing in matters are imperfect acts, since they have not complete being. Hence, there are some forms that are complete acts, subsisting in themselves, and having a complete species. But every form that subsists through itself without matter is an intellectual substance, since, as we have seen, immunity from matter confers intelligible being. Therefore, there are some intellectual substances that are not united to bodies, for every body has matter.” 27. Thomas Aquinas, De spiritualibus creaturis, a. 5, ans.
I N T E R C O N N E C T I O N S · 2:1 · Winter 2016
12 · When Ontology Meets Angelology
greater can be thought.28 Thomas—following Anselm’s first critic, Gaunilo of Marmoutiers—rejects the argument, saying that the mere thought of God is not enough to guarantee his actual existence.29 If this is the case, then it cannot be that the actual existence of angels is guaranteed solely by the idea of a perfect universe. Thomas seems to have revised the ontological argument so that the new subject is not God, but the angels: a perfect universe lacks no possible nature, but the nature of angel (pure form) can be thought; ergo, the perfection of the universe requires the existence of this angelic nature that can be thought. Even if the original ontological argument were to prove soundly the existence of God, this modified one is presented with even greater difficulties. For one, why must the universe itself be perfect? Surely God (Pure Act) must be perfect and therefore immutable in this system, but the perfection of the universe is only possible, not required. Second, as it deals with secondary causes (the angels), and not with an absolute, self-subsistent, and infinite entity, Thomas’s ontological argument is at the start even weaker than the original.30 Further, even if the first proof were found to be philosophically demonstrable, it would demonstrate only the existence of one angel. Because Thomas rejects the concept of universal hylomorphism, he is forced to admit of a distinct non-material principle of individuation for angels. Suffice it to say that his theory of real distinction between essence and existence allows him to conclude that essence is what individuates angels. An immediate effect of this claim is that each angel constitutes its own species and, conversely, that no species contains
28. Anselm of Canterbury and Gaunilo of Marmoutiers, Proslogion: With the Replies of Gaunilo and Anselm (Indianapolis, IN: Hackett, 2001), 7. 29. Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae I., (Prima Pars), q. 2, a. 1, ad. 2: “Perhaps not everyone who hears this word “God” understands it to signify something than which nothing greater can be thought, seeing that some have believed God to be a body. Yet, granted that everyone understands that by this word “God” is signified something than which nothing greater can be thought, nevertheless, it does not therefore follow that he understands that what the word signifies exists actually, but only that it exists mentally. Nor can it be argued that it actually exists, unless it be admitted that there actually exists something than which nothing greater can be thought; and this precisely is not admitted by those who hold that God does not exist.” 30. See, for instance, Bazán, 50–52, 73–74. Here he notes Thomas’s tendency to infer actual existence from possible existence, noting that these and other demonstrations for the existence of angels are less philosophical and less rigorous than any of his demonstrations for the existence of God. See also Doolan, 41, and Collins, 39.
I N T E R C O N N E C T I O N S · 2:1 · Winter 2016
When Ontology Meets Angelology · 13
more than one angel.31 The argument from perfection, because it argues for the necessary existence of just one being in each ontic order, would certainly not provide anything more than probable support for the existence of multiple angels. Bazán sees in the second proof either an illogical leap or a subtle appeal to the theological authority of Pseudo-Dionysius. Aristotle’s Metaphysics traditionally has been thought to be the source of the doctrine of means between extremes, the doctrine to which Thomas appeals in this proof. Yet Aristotle’s Metaphysics and Thomas’s Commentary on the Metaphysics discuss extremes as they relate to movement, not extremes in a hierarchy of being, as this second proof would suggest. If this is the true source, then Thomas seems to be analogizing invalidly since movement is only possible within the same genus. In other words, while Aristotle’s Metaphysics details the continuity between two extremes in a genus, Thomas’s proof here attempts to apply this intra-genus continuity to the entire metaphysical system, which is logically suspect. At that, even if it were a sound analogy, the nature of such an intermediate requires the presence of characteristics of both extremes, forcing angels to be both simple and corporeal, an absurdity.32 Assuming that Thomas understood the appeal
31. Giorgio Pini, “The Individuation of Angels from Bonaventure to Duns Scotus,” in Hoffmann, 84ff. 32. Bazán, 74–75. In note 74, Bazán isolates Aquinas’s argument for the existence of intermediaries found in De spiritualibus creaturis, a. 5, ans.: “[T]he same consideration can be arrived at in consequence of the orderly arrangement of things, which is found to be such that we cannot go from one extreme to the other except through intermediates: thus, for instance, fire is found immediately beneath “heavenly body,” and beneath this air, and beneath this water, and beneath this earth, following the sequence of the nobility and subtlety of these bodies. Now at the topmost summit of things there is a being which is in every way simple and one, namely, God. It is not possible, then, for corporeal substance to be located immediately below God, for it is altogether composite and divisible, but instead one must posit many intermediates, through which we must come down from the highest point of the divine simplicity to corporeal multiplicity. And among these intermediates, some are corporeal substances that are not united to bodies, while others, on the contrary, are incorporeal substances that are united to bodies.” Bazán then declares Aquinas’s argument to be weak because of its misuse of Aristotle: “Aristotle and Thomas state that [the extremes in the process of movement] and all the intermediaries in the process ‘are in the same genus’ [emphasis original] (cf., X, 7, 1057a20–21; 1057a29–30), because ‘change from one genus into another is impossible’ (1057a27–28). Thomas repeats this principle often: ‘Opposita [the extremes] sunt circa idem’ or ‘opposita sunt unius generis.’ If the principle is based on Aristotle’s Metaphysics, the argument is not conclusive because neither the extremes (God and the corporeal substances) nor the intermediaries (incorporeal substances) are in the same genus, and because even if they were, the intermediaries between the absolute simple and the corporeal substances would still have to share properties of both according to Aristotle [emphasis original].”
I N T E R C O N N E C T I O N S · 2:1 · Winter 2016
14 · When Ontology Meets Angelology
to this part of the Metaphysics to be flawed in the context of the discussion of the existence of angels, Bazán hypothesizes that this proof is one that actually appeals to Pseudo-Dionysius’s ordered system and therefore lacks any philosophical credence.33 To accept Bazán’s hypothesis here is to admit that Thomas imposes order on the world based on theological presupposition. On the question of whether Thomas’s argument lands on the side of philosophy or theology there might be a more moderate ground that views it as coming from a philosophically theological presupposition. It is true, of course, that Thomas viewed Pseudo-Dionysius’s writings to be of (apostolic) authority. And it is equally true that Pseudo-Dionysius’s philosophy was decidedly Neoplatonic. But to what extent is PseudoDionysian Neoplatonism itself a theology, or at least dealing with theological principles? It assumes certain premises—not revealed, as those in Christian theology—about the One, the source of all being and goodness, the God of that system.34 To discuss God, the “God of philosophy,” is still to theologize, even if it occurs outside the context of an organized religion like Christianity. One need not agree with Bazán, then, that to appeal to a Neoplatonic and religious figure like PseudoDionysius constitutes an appeal strictly to theology. One of the (potential) difficulties with the second proof reappears in the third proof, wherein Thomas seems to extend what is applicable only to a genus—this time, the principle of perfection—beyond the genus itself. Human intellective faculties belong to the genus animal and have as a specific difference rationality, and only with a material body could they constitute a perfect human being. Therefore, human perfection must be essentially different from angelic perfection because it requires a matter-form composite and angelic perfection does not.35 The preceding critiques offer additional insight into Thomas’s views on the generation of angels, a topic to which he devotes relatively little attention. Although he affirms the common viewpoint that angels, as finite beings, must be composed of act and potency, he flatly rejects the
33. Bazán, 75. 34. On the divinity of the One in his philosophy, see Pseudo-Dionysius, Pseudo-Dionysius: The Complete Works, trans. Colm Luibheid (New York: Paulist Press, 1987), 56, 127–29. 35. Bazán, 75–76.
I N T E R C O N N E C T I O N S · 2:1 · Winter 2016
When Ontology Meets Angelology · 15
idea that they receive their potency from prime matter as lower creatures do. Again following Pseudo-Dionysius, he argues that of all finite beings the angels are closest to God and therefore are more perfect and possess more actuality than lower creatures. Invoking the order of the metaphysical system, he claims that because prime matter is the most incomplete and lowest of all beings, the angels—the beings that are “on a level that is far above all matter and all material things”—have no need for prime matter.36 Elsewhere, he articulates a similar view, this time clearly meant to refute Avicebron: [I]t must be said that the more a thing is in act, the more perfect it is; whereas the more a thing is in potency, the less perfect it is. Now, imperfect beings derive their origin from perfect beings, and not conversely. And hence it does not have to be the case that every thing which is in potency in any way whatever must get its potentiality from the pure potency which is matter. And on this point Avicebron seems to have been deceived, in his book Fons Vitae, since he believed that every thing which is in potency, or is a subject, has this character somehow from prime matter.37 Not only does the principle of perfection within the universe guarantee the existence of angels, but it also demands that nothing relatively imperfect could be responsible for any part of its nature. In other words, pure potency in this system is far too inferior to contribute anything to a superior substance like an angel. This position is highly problematic, though. It destroys any possibility of accounting for angelic generation in the metaphysical system Thomas already has established. Anything that actually exists— except perhaps for one thing, pure act—must exist as a composite of act and potency, and therefore potency cannot be ignored in its determination; otherwise, it could never exist. It has already been demonstrated that pure potency must be unique and, thereby, that if prime matter is equated with pure potency, it must be the source for all potency. If angels are composed of act and potency, they must receive
36. Thomas Aquinas, De spiritualibus creaturis, a. 1, ans.: “Therefore the ordered scheme of things does not in any sense imply that spiritual substances, for their own actual being, need prime matter, which is the most incomplete of all beings; but they are on a level that is far above all matter and all material things.” 37. Thomas Aquinas, De spiritualibus creaturis, a. 1, ad. 25.
I N T E R C O N N E C T I O N S · 2:1 · Winter 2016
16 · When Ontology Meets Angelology
their potency from somewhere, and the only feasible option is that it comes from prime matter. That a substance is material or immaterial is inconsequential; both kinds of substances must receive their potential being from that which exists yet lacks all determination—pure potency. Moreover, if the order of the universe dictates that angels cannot receive their potency from prime matter because of its poverty on the scale of being, then prime matter cannot be the source of potency for any being at all, including material things like rocks, plants, or human beings. Angels are finite and therefore do not transcend potency in any way; even their relative proximity to God—should it actually be the case that they are metaphysically more proximate to God—cannot compensate for the total transcendence of pure and unlimited act over them. Even if their distance from pure potency is farther than that for human beings, this does not negate the fact that they too rely on it for their own measure of potency. Indeed, pure potency suggests the ability to become anything, to receive any substantial form (or privation), whether of rock, plant, human being, or angel.
III. Concluding Remarks This investigation has sought to explore whether, through the lens of act and potency, Thomas’s ordered system is entirely consistent with the angelology that it begets. It has been demonstrated that because pure potency must be unique and because Thomas viewed it to be identical to prime matter, even the angels require it to be their source for potential being. Thomas himself recognized in the loaded term “prime matter” dual traits—one as material building block and the other as utter formlessness, which one contemporary Thomist calls “an ocean of indetermination that is indefinitely the same.”38 Yet because his system dictated that prime matter was the lowest of beings and angels nearly the highest, Thomas never allowed the idea of prime matter (pure potency) to infiltrate the superior level of angelic being. This perfectly ordered system, beginning with pure act and ending with pure potency, cannot serve as the basis for a truly philosophical proof of the existence of angels. Any attempt to declare that the perfection of the universe
38. Yves Simon, An Introduction to the Metaphysics of Knowledge (New York: Fordham, 1990), 64.
I N T E R C O N N E C T I O N S · 2:1 · Winter 2016
When Ontology Meets Angelology · 17
demands the existence of some genus of being is to legislate a subjective order on the objective world, to assert, by means of inductive argument, that what is logically only possible (or even probable) is certain.
Bibliography Anselm of Canterbury and Gaunilo of Marmoutiers. Proslogion: With the Replies of Gaunilo and Anselm. Translated by Thomas Williams. Indianapolis, IN: Hackett, 2001. Barron, Robert E. The Priority of Christ: Toward a Postliberal Catholicism. Grand Rapids, MI: Brazos, 2007. Bazán, Bernardo Carlos. “On Angels and Human Beings: Did Thomas Aquinas Succeed in Demonstrating the Existence of Angels?” Archives d’Histoire Doctrinale et Littéraire du Moyen Age 77, no. 1 (2010). Collins, James. The Thomistic Philosophy of the Angels. Washington: Catholic University of America Press, 1947. Doolan, Gregory. “Aquinas on the Demonstrability of Angels.” In Hoffman, 13–44. Hoffman, Tobias. A Companion to Angels in Medieval Philosophy. Edited by Tobias Hoffman. Boston: Brill, 2012. Keck, David. Angels and Angelology in the Middle Ages. New York: Oxford, 1998. Maritain, Jacques. Three Reformers: Luther, Descartes, Rousseau. London: Sheed & Ward, 1950. Marshall, George J. Angels: An Indexed and Partially Annotated Bibliography of Over 4300 Scholarly Books and Articles Since the 7th Century B.C. London: McFarland, 1999. McGovern, Mark. “Prime Matter in Aquinas.” Proceedings of the American Catholic Philosophical Association 61, no. 14 (1987). Pini, Giorgio. “The Individuation of Angels from Bonaventure to Duns Scotus.” In Hoffman, 79–115. Pseudo-Dionysius. Pseudo-Dionysius: The Complete Works. Translated by Colm Luibheid. New York: Paulist Press, 1987. Simon, Yves. An Introduction to the Metaphysics of Knowledge. New York: Fordham, 1990. Thomas Aquinas. De principiis naturae. Translated by R. A. Kocourek. St. Paul: North Central, 1948. Accessed February 1, 2015. http://www. dhspriory.org/thomas/english/DePrincNaturae.htm.
I N T E R C O N N E C T I O N S · 2:1 · Winter 2016
18 · When Ontology Meets Angelology ———. De spiritualibus creaturis. Translated by Mary C. Fitzpatrick and John J. Wellmuth. Milwaukee: Marquette University Press, 1949. Accessed February 1, 2015. http://www.dhspriory.org/thomas/ english/QDdeSpirCreat.htm. ———. Scriptum super Sententiis. Dominican House of Studies. Accessed February 1, 2015. http://www.dhspriory.org/thomas/english/Sentences.htm. ———. Summa contra gentiles. Translated by Anton C. Pegis. New York: Hanover House, 1955–1957. Accessed February 1, 2015. http://www.dhspriory.org/ thomas/english/ContraGentiles.htm. ———. Summa theologiae. Translated by Fathers of the English Dominican Province. New York: Benziger Bros, 1947. Accessed February 1, 2015. http://www. dhspriory.org/thomas/english/summa/index.html. Wippel, John. The Metaphysical Thought of Thomas Aquinas: From Finite Being to Uncreated Being. Washington: Catholic University of America Press, 2000.
Ryan McMillin is currently in his first year of theology studies at Mundelein Seminary, studying for the Archdiocese of Chicago. Prior to his entry into the seminary, he received a Master of Science degree in Mathematics and Statistics from Georgetown University and worked as a financial economist in Washington, DC. He also began working professionally as an organist in 2007, and he continues playing for liturgies at Mundelein Seminary.
I N T E R C O N N E C T I O N S · 2:1 · Winter 2016
A Further Analysis The Phoenix Hospital Medical Procedure of 2009 PATRICK RYAN SHERRARD University of Saint Mary of the Lake/Mundelein Seminary
Introduction
T
hroughout its history the Catholic Church has steadfastly taught that abortion is an offense against human life and the dignity of the human person. Pope John Paul II declared that “direct abortion, that is, abortion willed as an end or as a means, always constitutes a grave moral disorder, since it is the deliberate killing of an innocent human being.”1 Furthermore, the Catechism of the Catholic Church teaches that some acts are “gravely illicit by reason of their object; such as blasphemy and perjury, murder and adultery. One may not do evil so that good may result from it.”2 Certain moral theologians, however, have questioned what constitutes a “direct abortion”, even insisting that such distinctions between direct abortion and indirect abortion (treating a pathology separate from the fetus which unintentionally causes the death of the fetus) are morally irrelevant in some circumstances. In November 2009, St. Joseph’s Hospital in Phoenix, Arizona, was treating a twenty-seven-year-old pregnant woman who was suffering from pulmonary hypertension. The child that she was carrying was eleven weeks into term. The doctors at St. Joseph’s Hospital concluded that the child would not survive being carried to term and that unless the placenta was removed the mother would not survive the pregnancy. The doctors then performed a procedure to remove the placenta in order to preserve the life of the mother. The Bishop of Phoenix, Thomas Olmsted, determined that such a procedure constituted a direct abortion
1. John Paul II, Evangelium Vitae, Vatican Website, March 25, 1995, accessed November 7, 2013, http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/john_paul_ii/encyclicals/documents/hf_jp-ii_enc_25031995_ evangelium-vitae_en.html, no. 62. 2. Catechism of the Catholic Church, (New York: Doubleday Publishing, 1994), par. 1756.
I N T E R C O N N E C T I O N S · 2:1 · Winter 2016
20 · A Further Analysis
in violation of the Ethical and Religious Directives for Catholic Health Care Services, written by the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops and published in 2009. In response to this, Bishop Olmsted issued a decree in which he revoked the Catholic status of St. Joseph’s Hospital. However, several moral theologians have disagreed with Bishop Olmsted’s judgment. One of the most high-profile defenses of the actions of St. Joseph’s Hospital has been forwarded by M. Therese Lysaught, a moral theologian at Marquette University who specializes in bioethics. Lysaught reviewed the case at the behest of Catholic Healthcare West, the hospital system of which St. Joseph’s Hospital is a part. She maintains that the procedure was in accord with the Ethical and Religious Directives because it was not a “direct abortion” since the child’s life was, for all practical purposes, already over. The relevant directives from the Ethical and Religious Directives for Catholic Health Care Services are directives forty-five, which states that “abortion (that is, the directly intended termination of pregnancy before viability or the directly intended destruction of a viable fetus) is never permitted,” and number fortyseven, which states that “operations, treatments, and medications that have as their direct purpose the cure of a proportionately serious pathological condition of a pregnant woman are permitted when they cannot be safely postponed until the unborn child is viable.”3 In this paper I will analyze both arguments as to whether or not the procedure at St. Joseph’s Hospital constituted a direct abortion and was therefore in violation of the Ethical and Religious Directives of the United States Bishops. Ultimately, I will attempt to explain why such a procedure was morally illicit. Finally, I will conclude by reflecting on some pastoral principles on how to address a similar situation in the future.
Case Details The issue surrounds a twenty-seven-year-old woman who was in her eleventh week of pregnancy and suffered from “a history of moderate but well-controlled pulmonary hypertension.”4 As stated in Lysaught’s analysis of the case, a consequence of pulmonary hypertension is that
3. United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, Ethical and Religious Directives for Catholic Health Care Services, 5th ed. (Washington D.C.: USCCB, 2009), 23. 4. M. Therese Lysaught, “Moral Analysis of Procedure at Phoenix Hospital,” Origins 40 (2011): 537.
I N T E R C O N N E C T I O N S · 2:1 · Winter 2016
A Further Analysis · 21
the heart has to exert a higher amount of pressure than is usual in order to move blood through constricted arteries in the lungs. This eventually causes one of the chambers of the heart to fail.5 The condition becomes exacerbated in the case of pregnancy as there is an increased volume of blood, decreased blood pressure, and higher heart output. Lysaught’s analysis states that the patient was informed that if she continued with her pregnancy, then her mortality rate was “near 100 percent.”6 The pathologies that existed in this case were not in the fetus; rather, they were in the right side of the heart and cardiogenic shock, according to Lysaught.7 Given the fact that the fetus was only eleven weeks into term and was not viable outside the womb, no possibility existed for saving its life. The only possibility that existed for saving the mother’s life was to reduce the volume of blood needed to maintain the mother’s body and thereby decrease the stress on the heart. Doctors concluded that the only way that this was possible was by removing the placenta, a shared organ between the mother and the child which maintains the pregnancy in the uterus and which was the organ responsible for the increase in blood volume and therefore stress on the heart.8 The ethics committee, consulting the Ethical and Religious Directives for Catholic Health Care Services, approved the dilation and curettage (removal) of the placenta with the understanding that it did not constitute a “direct abortion” given the circumstances of the case.9
Lysaught’s Analysis Lysaught’s analysis of the case reaches the conclusion that no direct abortion occurred in this procedure. The analysis also invokes other moral theologians who maintain that in the circumstances of the case it was morally justifiable to remove the placenta because the distinctions between “direct” and “indirect” abortion are essentially meaningless when speaking of a life that has de facto already ended. Therefore, the
5. Lysaught, 538. 6. Ibid. 7. Ibid. 8. Ibid., 539. 9. Ibid.
I N T E R C O N N E C T I O N S · 2:1 · Winter 2016
22 · A Further Analysis
only morally relevant object is to secure whatever measures are necessary to protect the life of the mother since it is only her life that is at stake. The argument defending the procedure maintains that it was not a direct abortion because the moral object of the act was not abortion but rather preserving the life of the mother. Lysaught’s analysis acknowledges that in Veritatis Splendor Pope John Paul II taught that abortion is an intrinsically evil act because it is “incapable of being ordered” to God.10 However, according to Lysaught, “the moral object of an action is determined by the proximate end deliberately chosen by the will (in conformity with reason).”11 Relying on William F. Murphy Jr.’s analysis of the document, Lysaught emphasizes that the moral object of an act is disconnected from being considered solely from the perspective of the physical action. She acknowledges that the exterior act is “not irrelevant.”12 It works in conjunction with the interior act (the intention) in order to determine its moral quality. In order to demonstrate what she calls the “complex interplay”13 of the exterior act and the interior act, Lysaught cites several examples that show that the moral quality of certain actions depends on both the intent and the actual act. She cites the Catholic teaching on the permissible usages of contraception, Aquinas’ justification of self-defense, and a woman choosing to endure a pregnancy that will result in her death, ostensibly for martyrdom but in reality because she suffers from depression. In the last case the result will essentially be tantamount to suicide, which, unlike martyrdom, is not morally permissible.14 I note these three examples that Lysaught uses because the first two would not, unlike abortion, be defined by the Church as intrinsically evil acts. Suicide would be considered intrinsically evil by the Church; however, it does not fit well within the scope of Lysaught’s analysis because she is trying to argue that an unjust external act (abortion) can be considered just
10. John Paul II, Veritatis Splendor, Vatican Website, August 6, 1993, accessed November 7, 2013, http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/john_paul_ii/encyclicals/documents/hf_jp-ii_enc_06081993_ veritatis-splendor_en.html, no. 80. 11. Lysaught, 542. 12. Ibid. 13. Ibid. 14. Ibid.
I N T E R C O N N E C T I O N S · 2:1 · Winter 2016
A Further Analysis · 23
given the proper intent, whereas her comparison shows that a just act (martyrdom) can be considered unjust without the proper disposition (suicide). Unjust acts cannot be considered just in certain circumstances simply because there are instances in which just acts become unjust when done without the proper disposition. She also argues that later documents by the Committee on Doctrine give evidence for the fact that the Church considers the moral object of an act dependent upon the intent of the person even within the scope of terminating pregnancies. She cites as evidence their language that “surgical removal of the fallopian tube containing a fetus” or the “surgical removal of a cancerous uterus containing a fetus” are considered by the Committee on Doctrine to be acts “benefiting the health of the mother” and not an abortion.15 Lysaught then moves on to discuss the work of Martin Rhonheimer to counteract the argument that the principle of double effect would negate the moral viability of the action because the fetus is being treated as a means to justify the end of saving the life of the mother. Rhonheimer specifically discusses the question of whether or not a mother’s life can justifiably be saved by abortion in a situation in which the fetus will surely die in any outcome in his text Vital Conflicts in Medical Ethics: A Virtue Approach to Craniotomy and Tubal Pregnancies. Rhonheimer says that “the concept of injustice, which is at the foundation of the prohibition of killing, is no longer comprehensible in these extreme cases … Killing as a morally reprehensible act … is not even an issue.”16 Abortion in this case “does not involve a decision against the life of another; no one is killed, but one is saved and the other is allowed to die, without anyone being held responsible, for in truth nothing can be done.”17 Lysaught uses Rhonheimer’s analysis to conclude that if “no action can save the life of the child, its death effectively falls outside the scope of the moral description of the action.”18 She continues, “Moreover, since there are not two effects, one
15. Lysaught, 543. 16. Martin Rhonheimer, Vital Conflicts in Medical Ethics: A Virtue Approach to Craniotomy and Tubal Pregancies (Washington, D.C.: The Catholic University of America, 2009), 13. 17. Ibid., 7. 18. Lysaught, 543.
I N T E R C O N N E C T I O N S · 2:1 · Winter 2016
24 · A Further Analysis
cannot argue that the death of the child is a means to the end of saving the life of the mother.”19 Rhonheimer also appeals to Aquinas’s justification of self-defense in which a physically evil action can be redeemed with the proper intention. Germain Grisez’s work in The Way of the Lord Jesus: Living a Christian Life is appealed to as further justification for Lysaught’s position. Grisez argues, Sometimes the baby’s death may be accepted to save the mother. Sometimes four conditions are simultaneously fulfilled: (i) some pathology threatens the lives of both a pregnant woman and her child, (ii) it is not safe to wait or waiting will surely result in the death of both, (iii) there is no way to save the child, and (iv) an operation that can save the mother’s life will result in the child’s death.20 Grisez, like Rhonheimer, gives paramount focus to the intent of the acting person when considering the moral object of the act. He argues that one can perform an abortion without intending to kill, such as in the case of the treatment of a disease through abortion or giving aid to a rape victim who wants to be freed from the trauma of bringing a child to term. Such acts should not be considered abortions, according to Grisez, but rather the treatment of a disease or an aid to a victim of rape. The death of the fetus is the unintended side effect.21 Grisez does not insist that these circumstances would necessarily be morally licit. Rather, he attempts to give the intention of the moral agent the highest value when considering the moral framework. Lysaught references the work of Grisez in her conclusion, asserting, “Grisez would therefore likely hold that the intervention enacted at St. Joseph’s ought not be categorized as a direct killing, for the baby’s death was not intended.”22 Lysaught concludes by trying to counteract arguments by the National Catholic Bioethics Center. In doing so, she states that if the principle of double effect is invoked (even though she argues that it should not be under Rhonheimer’s logic) then the placenta dilation and
19. Lysaught, 543. 20. Ibid., 545. 21. Ibid. 22. Ibid.
I N T E R C O N N E C T I O N S · 2:1 · Winter 2016
A Further Analysis · 25
curettage should be seen as at least morally neutral.23 This will be significant later as I will argue that the placenta dilation and curettage cannot be viewed as a morally neutral act because of its relationship with the fetus. In summary, Lysaught argues that the traditional dichotomies of “direct” and “indirect” are inadequate when addressing the moral object of the surgical procedure at St. Joseph’s Hospital. Appealing to Aquinas and Veritatis Splendor, Lysaught claims that it is a long-standing principle of Catholic tradition that the moral object of the act is principally determined not by its physical dynamic but by the intention of the acting person. She invokes Rhonheimer to explain that the life of the fetus is of no value when considering the moral scope of the action because it “was in the process of ending.”24 This also means that the circumstance is immune from consideration within the confines of the principle of double effect because there are not two effects in the action, only one: namely, saving the life of the mother. She also invokes Grisez to support her position that the object of the act lies in the intent of the acting person.
Against Lysaught’s Position: The Moral Problem of the Termination of Pregnancy Perhaps the most critical component of Lysaught’s position is that the moral object of the act was not the abortion but rather saving the life of the mother. She arrives at this position through a particular reading of Veritatis Splendor and Thomistic theology. Lysaught cites several passages of Pope John Paul II’s document consecutively, attempting to highlight the primacy of the role of intent within the scope of the morality of the act. She arrives at the conclusion that “the moral object of the intervention was properly described as ‘saving the life of the mother.’”25 This, I argue, is incorrect because it centralizes the moral object of the act completely within the realm of intent and closes it off from any physical analysis whatsoever.
23. Lysaught, 546. 24. Ibid., 539. 25. Ibid., 546.
I N T E R C O N N E C T I O N S · 2:1 · Winter 2016
26 · A Further Analysis
Lysaught acknowledges two ideas present in Veritatis Splendor: intrinsic evil and the role of the external act within the scope of the moral object. However, she fails to apply these concepts to her argument in any effective way. “Saving the life of the mother” is not an act at all; it is an effect of another act rendered. In fact, “saving the life of the mother” is a secondary effect to the primary effect of easing the pressure on the heart of the mother. The act itself is removing the placenta (part of both the fetus and the mother). Lysaught ignores the question of the act rendered and its effect on the morality of the whole situation (the act rendered along with the intent), and she instead chooses to focus solely on intent. Veritatis Splendor, however, disagrees with Lysaught’s approach to understanding the moral object. It reads, “A good intention is not itself sufficient but a correct choice of actions is also needed.”26 The document clearly delineates two elements in determining the morality of an action: the intention and the action itself. Lysaught seems to understand this when she quotes, “A proper description of the moral object, then, certainly includes the ‘exterior act’—since it is a necessary part of the moral action as a whole—but it derives its properly moral content first and foremost from the proximate end deliberately chosen by the will.”27 Nothing in Lysaught’s analysis, however, respects the role of the action in the moral object. This is the critical error in her moral analysis of the procedure. The external action performed in the case is the removal of the placenta for the intended effect of releasing the pressure on the heart and easing the patient’s hypertension, thereby saving her life. One can certainly call the intention of saving the life of the mother good, but it would be a mistake to think that that good intention completely dominates its moral object. The Church is clear that some acts are incapable of being ordered to God no matter how good their intentions are. These acts are called “intrinsically evil” because they can never be justified. Evangelium Vitae affirms, “No circumstance, no purpose, no law whatsoever can make licit an act which is intrinsically illicit, since it is contrary to the Law of God.”28 Pope John Paul II clearly indicated that
26. Veritatis Splendor, no. 78. 27. Lysaught, 542. 28. Evangelium Vitae, no. 62.
I N T E R C O N N E C T I O N S · 2:1 · Winter 2016
A Further Analysis · 27
“direct abortion” was such an act.29 Despite the good intentions of the doctors at St. Joseph’s Hospital, the procedure was evil. In order to support her point, Lysaught cites several instances in which she says that the Church defines acts not in reference to their physical order but rather their intent. She says that these are justified according to the principle of double effect: “surgical removal of a fallopian tube containing a fetus”, “surgical removal of a cancerous uterus containing a fetus”, and “administration of chemotherapy or other pharmaceuticals required to treat maternal diseases or conditions which may result in fetal death.”30 Lysaught, however, misses the reason why these instances pass the principle of double effect and why the procedure at St. Joseph's Hospital fails the principle of double effect. In each of these instances, the performed external act was an operation on a part of the body belonging solely to the mother which unintentionally, but foreseeably, resulted in the death of the fetus. The acts themselves were morally good; they treated a pathology in the woman’s body by removing the pathology. The effects were that the mother had the pathology removed, that her life was saved, and that the fetus died. There are two effects which passed the test of proportionality. The procedure at St. Joseph’s Hospital fails double effect because the action performed is not at least morally neutral; the act performed directly destroys the life of the fetus, which, in the Catholic tradition, equates to murder. It was not performed on some environment around the fetus; rather, it was performed on the placenta, which belongs to the fetus itself and is therefore a direct attack on it. The National Catholic Bioethics Center says regarding the situation that “the first and immediate action performed by the physician is the destruction of the child by crushing or dismembering it and removing it from the uterus.”31 Lysaught contests this point in her analysis wherein she insists that a dilation and curettage is a morally good act because it is a medical intervention. However, this is not accurate because the placenta is a shared organ between the mother and the fetus. If the placenta belonged
29. Evangelium Vitae, no. 62. 30. Lysaught, 542. 31. National Catholic Bioethics Center, “Commentary on the Phoenix Hospital Situation,” Origins 40 (2011): 550.
I N T E R C O N N E C T I O N S · 2:1 · Winter 2016
28 · A Further Analysis
solely to the mother, like the uterus or the ovaries, then the argument would be sound. Since it is a shared organ it has to be seen as part of the fetus that has equal right to it. Therefore, acting on the placenta must be considered as acting on the fetus. In the final section of her analysis, Lysaught reveals that she does not grasp the difference between direct abortion and indirect abortion. She maintains that “in the cases of a cancerous uterus, ectopic pregnancy or chemotherapy, the intervention does in fact physically, directly kill the child, although it is understood to be ‘indirect’ on the moral level.”32 These treatments are not considered indirect on the moral level because their aims are treating a mother who is dying as a result of her pregnancy; rather, they are considered indirect on the moral level because their treatments do not involve a physical act on the fetus. They involve a physical act on the mother which directly affects the fetus. It is indirect on both a physical and a moral level, which the St. Joseph’s procedure was not. Therefore, against the reasoning of Grisez, who, according to Lysaught’s analysis, held that an abortion can be accepted to save the life of the mother in certain conditions, the fetus’s death was used as a means toward the end of saving the life of the mother and was not morally licit. The National Catholic Bioethics Center confirms this in its commentary on the situation: “The physician intends the death of the child as a means toward the good end of enhancing the woman’s health.”33 Despite the fact that Lysaught invokes comparisons to cases which rely on the principle of double effect, her analysis, citing Rhonheimer, reveals that she does not believe such an appeal to be necessary since “there are not two effects.”34 The reason that there are not two effects is because the fetus has basically already died, as it is no longer viable. This argument is both weak and disturbing for its implications on moral teaching. The problem with thinking that the fetus had already died is that the fetus had not already died. It was, by all accounts available, alive at the time of the procedure. Had it not been alive the procedure would have been considered a miscarriage, and it would not be morally
32. Lysaught., 545–546. 33. National Catholic Bioethics Center Commentary, 550. 34. Lysaught., 543.
I N T E R C O N N E C T I O N S · 2:1 · Winter 2016
A Further Analysis · 29
questionable since the dead do not have rights like the living. What makes this procedure so morally contentious is the very fact that the fetus was alive. Using this same logic one can consider a patient who is near death from a terminal illness already dead when it comes to the decision of whether his organs can be used to save the life of a person in need of them. Therefore, according to this reasoning, it would be morally licit to kill this person in order to harvest the much-needed organs since this person’s life is, like the fetus, “in the process of ending.”35 This is not morally viable according to the Catholic Church.
Pastoral Approaches to the Situation In this process of analyzing the moral object, one must not forget that at stake in the analysis of the question of whether or not to perform the given procedure are two people: the mother and the child. Critics of the position that removing the placenta would not be morally justifiable in the circumstance might argue that technical language and scrupulous analysis of a simple medical procedure obfuscates the core issue, namely that the mother’s life can be preserved and the child’s life cannot. Rhonheimer, recognizing the immense difficulty of the situation, maintains that allowing the mother to die purely for the purpose of allowing the child to reach a natural death is “simply irrational.”36 Although Rhonheimer’s conclusion is incorrect, one can certainly understand his reasoning. After all, if one considers the nearly dead fetus to be of no particular value in the moral scope, then allowing the mother to perish for the sake of the child not only seems irrational but possibly even devious. After Bishop Olmstead stripped St. Joseph’s Hospital of its Catholic status, some questioned whether or not Catholic hospitals were safe for women. I think that it is important, first, to give the doctors and the ethics committee at St. Joseph’s Hospital the benefit of the doubt that they were acting in good conscience. The Catechism of the Catholic Church states that an individual is compelled to follow his conscience when
35. Lysaught, 539. 36. Rhonheimer, 123.
I N T E R C O N N E C T I O N S · 2:1 · Winter 2016
30 · A Further Analysis
considering whether or not to perform a certain act.37 If the doctors and the ethics committee tried to apply the principles of Catholic moral teaching to the specific circumstance and act in accord with it, then they did the right thing even though they reached the wrong conclusion. The Church affirms that one must always act in accord with one’s conscience in order that one might always do what one thinks is right. Even though they performed an act which is morally evil, since it did not come from a malicious will but rather a poorly formed conscience their moral culpability for the action is severely reduced. The Church says that for an act to be gravely sinful, full knowledge of the sinful nature of the act must be present. Here, we should assume, such knowledge was not present. So why does it make sense to allow the child to die even though doing so also causes the death of the mother? It makes sense because the child has a right to die naturally. No human being has the right to be the direct agent of another person’s death. From the perspective of the hospital, respecting the life of the fetus acts in accord with the first ethical directive of the Ethical and Religious Directives for Catholic Health Care Services: “[Institutional health care service] must be animated by the Gospel of Jesus Christ and guided by the moral tradition of the Church.”38 At its most basic level abortion is a violation of the moral tradition of the Church. Also, Catholic health care service is governed by the principle of totality: that is, that every person has a right to “physical, psychological, social, and spiritual” care.39 Catholic hospitals care for the total person. The principle of totality respects our Lord’s words in the Gospel of Matthew: “Do not fear those who kill the body but are unable to kill the soul; but rather fear him who is able to destroy both soul and body in hell.”40 The question of whether or not to perform an abortion is not just a physical question, but it is also a spiritual question which has ramifications for the soul of each person involved. In order to give due respect to the principal of totality, one must be mindful of the spiritual well-being of everyone in the hospital: patients, doctors and
37. Catechism of the Catholic Church, par. 1778. 38. United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, 8. 39. Ibid., 11. 40. Matthew 10:28 (NRSV).
I N T E R C O N N E C T I O N S · 2:1 · Winter 2016
A Further Analysis · 31
administrators. Allowing the mother and the child to reach a natural end preserves the spiritual well-being of all involved, tragic as it is. In order to care for the mother, the hospital must make her as comfortable as possible while giving her as much care as she desires insofar as it also respects the rights of the child. The Catholic health care organization has a responsibility to minister to her spiritual needs as well as her psychological and physical needs. Special attention and pastoral skill will no doubt be required to explain to her why the surgical procedure cannot be performed.
Conclusion The decision to remove the placenta in order to alleviate the pulmonary hypertension of the mother at St. Joseph’s Hospital was morally wrong. Although moral theologians such as Lysaught, Rhonheimer, and Grisez have defended such procedures, the act was in violation of the forty-fifth directive of the Ethical and Religious Directives for Catholic Health Care Service. The argument that such a procedure is allowed under the forty-seventh directive, which allows for pathological treatment of a mother which indirectly causes an abortion, is misapplied because the treatment given to the mother at St. Joseph’s Hospital directly acted on the child, not on a pathological condition in the maternal environment. The argument that the child should not be a morally relevant factor in the equation because its life was so close to ending and not able to be saved is unsound because it dispenses with the sacredness of human life. The principle of totality stipulates that all Catholic hospitals (and all Catholic people) are called to observe demands that the whole human person is cared for, which includes the body and the spirit. Performing this procedure violates the principle of totality because it harms the body of the child and the spirits of those consenting persons involved. In this situation the only moral action is to make the mother as comfortable as possible and tend to her physical, psychological, and spiritual needs while respecting the rights of the child.
I N T E R C O N N E C T I O N S · 2:1 · Winter 2016
32 · A Further Analysis
Bibliography Catechism of the Catholic Church. New York: Doubleday Publishing, 1994. John Paul II. Evangelium Vitae. Vatican Website. March 25, 1995. Accessed November 7, 2013. http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/john_paul_ii/encyclicals/ documents/hf_jp-ii_enc_25031995_evangelium-vitae_en.html. ———. Veritatis Splendor. Vatican Website. August 6, 1993. Accessed November 7, 2013. http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/john_paul_ii/encyclicals/documents/ hf_jp-ii_enc_06081993_veritatis-splendor_en.html. Lysaught, M. Therese. “A Moral Analysis of Procedure at Phoenix Hospital.” Origins 40: (2011): 537–548. National Catholic Bioethics Center. “Commentary on the Phoenix Hospital Situation.” Origins 40: (2011): 549–551. Rhonheimer, Martin. Vital Conflicts in Medical Ethics: A Virtue Approach to Craniotomy and Tubal Pregnancies. Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 2009. United States Conference of Catholic Bishops. Ethical and Religious Directives for Catholic Health Care Services. 5th ed. Washington, DC: USCCB, 2009.
Patrick Ryan Sherrard is a deacon in his forth year of theology studies at Mundelein Seminary. Studying for the Archdiocese of Seattle, he anticipates his priestly ordination in June of 2016. Before his studies at Mundelein Seminary, he received his Bachelor of Arts degree in English Literature from Western Washington University, and he worked as a secondary education teacher.
I N T E R C O N N E C T I O N S · 2:1 · Winter 2016
Entropy and Inspiration Notes on the Relation of Textual Criticism to Theories of Biblical Inspiration FRIAR JEROME MARY WESTENBERG, OFM Conv. University of Saint Mary of the Lake/Mundelein Seminary
T
extual criticism has long served Scripture as the Plautine servant to his young master, who is in and out of favour but always relying on the servitor; in a metaphor more contemporary, it has played the role of political back-room-boys, working in darkened rooms to present their choice to the public. The one who prays with, studies, or simply reads Sacred Scripture might do so unaware of these machinations prior to the text, but cannot do so without such machinations. What relation, then, that might subsist between textual criticism and the text itself might be assumed to hold an intrinsic interest to any occupying themselves in Scripture, and, in some modes, this relationship has not been ignored; the literature concerned with textual criticism and exegesis has been voluminous, and frequently fruitful, both reflexively for the art of textual criticism and for the understanding of the Scriptures themselves.1 This work, however, has in its entirety been confined to hermeneutical concerns. Such a restriction can be understood, flowing as it does, from the essence of the art. The nineteenth century, too, intoxicated with higher criticism, the antics of which, like those of Lucy Tantamount, brought an increase of champagne in their wake, had little care for the rather pedantic narrative voice, the lower criticism which had none of the sparkle, which enchanted nobody. Yet, as narrator, to continue the
1. George Kilpatrick, “Conjectural Emendation in the New Testament,” in New Testament Textual Criticism: Essays in Honour of Bruce M. Metzger, ed. Eldon Jay Epp and Gordon D. Fee (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1981). See also Eugene A. Nida, “New Testament Greek Text in the Third World,” in New Testament Textual Criticism: Essays in Honour of Bruce M. Metzger, ed. Eldon Jay Epp and Gordon D. Fee (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1981), for a discussion of areas bearing theological weight.
I N T E R C O N N E C T I O N S · 2:1 · Winter 2016
34 · Entropy and Inspiration
metaphor, the story relied on its presence. Lucy Tantamount is impossible without Huxley. Moving from literary metaphor to the theological implications of this role so expressed, it is evident that any theory of inspiration of Sacred Scripture will have to address textual criticism. Without attempting to present such a theory, this paper will point to some of the issues to be considered by any theory of inspiration through a study of individual textual loci.
Inspiration To one working within the Catholic theological tradition, that Sacred Scripture is inspired cannot be open to doubt. The pronouncements of the magisterium, from the Council of Trent to the Second Vatican Council, supported by the body of the Church Fathers and school men of the mediaeval period, cannot be gainsaid.2 While affirming the inspiration of Scripture, both as a whole and in each part, however, there have been no definitive pronouncements as to the means by which this works. The constitution issuing from Vatican II, Dei Verbum, comes closest when, at no. 11, it declares that: The divinely revealed realities, which are contained and presented in the text of sacred Scripture, have been written down under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. For Holy Mother Church relying on the faith of the apostolic age, accepts as sacred and canonical the books of the Old and the New Testaments, whole and entire, with all their parts, on the grounds that, written under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, they have God as their author, and have been handed on as such to the Church herself. To compose the sacred books, God chose certain men as their author, who, all the while he employed them in this task, made full use of their faculties, so that, though he acted in them and by them, it was as true authors
2. Newman gives an excellent summation of the history of the Church’s teaching on Scriptural inspiration to his day: John Henry Newman, “On the Inspiration of Scripture,” ed. J. Derek Holmes and Robert Murray, S.J. (London: Geoffrey Chapman, 1967). See particularly 107ff, in which the idea of Deus auctor is discussed. For the Second Vatican Council see the next quotation.
I N T E R C O N N E C T I O N S · 2:1 · Winter 2016
Entropy and Inspiration · 35
that they consigned to writing whatever he wanted written, and no more.3 Thus certain limits are set. Whatever other implications for a theory of inspiration that textual criticism might have, it must be accepted that God is author4 and that, although in different modes and sense of the word, both texts and authors are inspired by the Holy Spirit. Furthermore, although Scripture is to be interpreted as a whole,5 it is also affirmed that it is inspired in its parts. This also disallows any theories which propose substantial revision of the text to reinforce an “orthodox” point of view, such as Ehrmann’s.6 Without extending this history of theories of inspiration, it might be noted that the first Vatican Council condemned any theory which saw inspiration as consisting in the Church’s post factum imprimatur or as a negative quality, that is, that the Holy Spirit merely ensured the sacred books were free of error. The discussion of theories of inspiration has, of late, been quieter, and here those of Rahner and Schokel might be mentioned, both “social” theories, although with differing perspectives. Both agree, however, that as it was the Church which gave birth to the scriptures, as, for instance, through the use of certain writings in the liturgy, the inspiration can be considered as being born from and within the ecclesial community.7 While safeguarding the idea of the individual author, this emphasises the importance of the Church to the production of Scripture. Further, it should be noted that theories of inspiration to
3. Second Vatican Council, Dogmatic Constitution on Divine Revelation, in Vatican Council II: The Conciliar and Post Conciliar Documents, ed. Austin Flannery, O.P. (Northport, NY: Costello Publishing Company, 1979). 4. See Newman, op. cit., for a discussion of the weight of this term as used from Trent to his day. The Second Vatican Council, referring this statement to Vatican I, de fida catholica c.2, must be presumed to be setting forward the same meaning intended there and, hence, that which Newman discusses. See also the introduction to Newman’s papers. 5. Catechism of the Catholic Church, 2nd ed. (Washington, DC: Libreria Editrice Vaticana-United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, 2000), par. 102, 105–8. 6. Bart D. Ehrmann, Orthodox Corruption of Scripture: The Effect of Early Christological Controversies on the Text of the New Testament (New York: Oxford University Press, 1993, 2011). A discussion of his thesis is outside of the scope of this paper, as its acceptance implies a Tradition which has falsified rather than preserved the readings. 7. Rahner emphasises that Scripture is constitutive of what it means for the Church to be the Church, and thus allows for inspiration that is not simply somehow spread throughout her members. Karl Rahner, Inspiration in the Bible, trans. Charles H. Henkey (New York: Herder and Herder, 1961). Originally published as Uber die Schriftinspiration (Freiburg: Herder 1961).
I N T E R C O N N E C T I O N S · 2:1 · Winter 2016
36 · Entropy and Inspiration
date have all addressed the interaction between the divine and the human in the inspired author.8
Textual Criticism and Inspiration It might be asked what place there is for textual criticism within these rubrics, whether its practice enters the discussion of inspiration at all. If God is author and Scripture is written under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, then the only demand is to explain how this process works, how the interplay between the divine and human authors might work. It will be argued here that such an approach, if inspiration is to have any real meaning, is too simplistic for the complexities of the manuscript tradition. That such significant textual critics and scholars as MarieJoseph Lagrange have not mentioned these links is an historical accident of the discipline and not an argument against its consideration.9 The endeavours of textual critics until the mid-twentieth century were directed towards an hypothetical original text. It was not until Pasquali’s 1952 Storia della tradizione e critica del testo that the feasibility of this project came into question, and, as often with new ideas, Pasquali’s suggestion won no immediate acceptance. Indeed, Hull notes that this aim of textual criticism is still under discussion.10 Further, textual critics have been reluctant to step outside the confines of their discipline, and theologians to step within it. Before turning to the texts, an objection might be made that textual criticism is beside the point of inspiration, likening textual transmission and reconstruction to the Apostles’ hearing of Christ’s spoken word. In speaking, Christ’s vocal cords vibrated, producing sympathetic motion in the air and, through this medium, in the ears of the Apostles, which
8. See Rahner, op. cit.; Luis Alonso Schökel, The Inspired Word, trans. Francis Martin O.C.S.O. (New York: Herder and Herder, 1966). Originally published as La Palabra Inspirada (Barcelona: Editorial Herder S.A., 1966). Schökel treats the text more as text, including such aspects as its literary expression and intention, while Rahner is considering the idea of inspiration as a whole, even if applied to Scripture. 9. Marie-Joseph Lagrange, Introduction à l’étude du Nouveau Testament: deuxiéme partie: Critique Textuelle (Paris: Librairie Lecoffre, 1935). This remains an invaluable treatment of textual criticism in general and as applied to the New Testament. Its significance here, however, is its silence on our topic. 10. Robert F. Hull Jr. The Story of the New Testament Text (Atlanta: The Society of Biblical Literature, 2010), chapters 8–9, 151ff.
I N T E R C O N N E C T I O N S · 2:1 · Winter 2016
Entropy and Inspiration · 37
vibrations subsequently, interpreted through the proper processes of the brain, became the message received by the Apostles. Thus textual criticism’s problem becomes Crebillon fils’ égarements du corps et de l’ésprit, that is, the ordinary working of an organ, no more relevant than the failure of Jeremiah’s voice if he caught cold. This is an attractive recasting of the problem, but it is by means of an imprecise metaphor. The Apostle, if he was not sure he had understood Christ, could ask for clarification;11 but is not this precisely the task set for the textual critic? The true difference is that Christ was physically present to ensure the correct understanding of the Apostles. His interaction with the transmission of the Gospels is the problem ensuing from a consideration of the interplay of textual criticism and inspiration, the problem this paper considers. This paper, then, will speak to the question, not whether textual criticism will alter our understanding of the Scripture, but simply what account of textual criticism a theory of inspiration must give. The variations in two loci will be examined. Neither bears significant theological import, a deliberate choice in order to remove confounding factors.
Exodus 5:16 The first locus of textual corruption to be considered is a simple case of corruption. The following are some examples of the verse: Douay-Rheims: “We thy servants are beaten with whips; and thy people is dealt with unjustly withal.” Jerusalem Bible: “Tes serviteurs sont même bâtonnés …” (with footnote g: “Le texte massorétique de la fin du v.: ‘le péché de ton peuple’ ne donne aucune sens’”). Clementine Vulgate: “en famuli tui flagellis caedimur, et iniuste agitur contra populum tuum.” Nova Vulgata: “en famuli tui flagellis caedimur, et populus tuus est in culpa.” LXX: ἀδικήσεις οὖν τὸν λαόν σου.
11. As we see happening in the explanations of the parable of the sower.
I N T E R C O N N E C T I O N S · 2:1 · Winter 2016
38 · Entropy and Inspiration
BHS: עמך.וחטאת.12 A comparison of these renderings indicates, firstly, that the tradition of interpretation has been consistent, a result unsurprising with so simply resolved a difficulty. Yet, at the same time, it is equally apparent that the Hebrew text as it has come down to us (“the sin of your people”) does not say what the translators make of it. The translators, with the exception of those responsible for the Jerusalem Bible, have all made the choice to read the text in a certain way, that is, to conjecture from what was given them an original meaning.13 Their translations are, strictly speaking, conjectures, giving what is not in the text, but what they think either was there originally, or what the author intended.14 To this conclusion, in turn, several considerations might be proposed. First, and most convincingly, it might be said, with Dei Verbum no. 22, that “the Church, from the very beginning, made her own the ancient translation of the Old Testament called the Septuagint.”15 Although it be a stretch, this can be interpreted as lending the LXX a certain level of inspiration. Yet against this the Pontifical Biblical Commission has declared, in The Interpretation of the Bible in the Church, that “translating the Bible is already an act of exegesis.”16 When Dei Verbum has explicitly named the LXX a translation, this latter statement should certainly cause a theorist to tread carefully in such a strong interpretation of the LXX’s authority. Further, to claim that the Church’s “making her own” of the LXX as a form of inspiration is to embrace the enchantress Medea, who will save her lover from his scrape with the sheep fleece only to murder his children when it is remembered that the first Vatican Council explicitly rejected such a theory of inspiration.
12. Joüon, although addressing this verse twice in his grammar, writes only of the previous words, and does not speak to this aporia. 13. It might, in this context, be urged that the LXX preserves an earlier reading which does make grammatical sense. Unfortunately, we have not at our disposal the means to confirm or reject such an assertion, and so those scholars who follow the LXX reading are acting as if they are accepting a conjecture, whether it be so or not. 14. It should be noted that these are two separate alternatives, each presenting a different methodology in translation and textual criticism. 15. DV, no. 22. 16. Pontifical Biblical Commission, The Interpretation of the Bible in the Church (Boston, MA: Pauline Books & Media, 1993), 132.
I N T E R C O N N E C T I O N S · 2:1 · Winter 2016
Entropy and Inspiration · 39
The second option is to respond that the original, which did bear grammatical sense, was the inspired reading, and it is the object of textual critics to establish such an original text.17 This seems to augur well for the present circumstances; there can be few who would not agree that the “original sense” of the passage was something very similar to its interpretation within the tradition. This turns out, however, to be again a false support, as it admits the principle of conjecture for textual critics, and thus begs the question with which we began: what implications does the art have for inspiration theories? There are other passages in which no one conjecture wins such consensus,18 but, once conjecture is allowed here, it must be allowed there; because howsoever “evident” in this passage, there is no guarantee that it is correct. Thirdly, there is the option to admit conjecture by textual critics. This can stand methodologically, but it is this which brings in further implications for any theory of inspiration. If we once admit that critics can guess19 in order to get to the original, inspired, text, what does it mean to say with Dei Verbum that the Holy Spirit has ensured the transmission of Scripture through the ages? That the critics are inspired, as was the original author, if to a lesser degree? This, in turn, makes one wonder how one would know if a critic is inspired. The criterion cannot be a subjective “making sense,” as that is to make human the divine message.20 Nor can it be internal coherence, as such would, further, beg the question of the operation of inspiration in a critic, who, working one minute at his Euripides, another at his Old Testament, is acting with the same acumen, with the same treatment of the text as object rather than inspired document, yet is guided by the Holy Spirit in one instance, not
17. Such a claim is troubling in the extreme, as will be demonstrated at a later stage. 18. Kilpatrick, op. cit., discusses this entire issue. 19. Howsoever “educated” the guess might be has no bearing; education, as Christ’s choice of Apostles indicates, is not at all correlated to inspiration. 20. Which of course is not to posit a radical separation between the human and the divine, merely to point out that the former cannot be made into the rule by which the latter is measured.
I N T E R C O N N E C T I O N S · 2:1 · Winter 2016
40 · Entropy and Inspiration
in the other.21 Again, even if this be accepted, it has implications for any theory of inspiration. A fourth option might be to draw the distinction between God, the primary author, and the human author, who brings all his finite powers to the task of writing. If this be forced, then the incoherence will be attributed to God, requiring an explanation of its work within salvation history, or to an allowance of incoherence to the human author. This last seems attractive, without a hint of Thessalian perfume; certainly any human author will almost necessarily err, as I will have made grammatical and spelling errors in writing this paper. However, I will proof my writing. Ought we to argue that the inspired human author was not to do so? Then, too, although there be little that is problematic in an admission that even an author working under inspiration may make errors of spelling, to allow greater errors of incoherence than easily resolved spelling mistakes will be to corrode the very basis of inspiration.22 To allow that a nonsensical passage has God as primary author is to move the aporia from the merely contingent modality of the text to that of divine operation.
II Corinthians 6:16 Douay-Rheims: “For you are the temple of the living God.” Jerusalem Bible: “Or, c’est nous qui le sommes, le temple du Dieu vivant.” (With footnote c: “Var.: ‘Vous qui l’êtes.’”) Clementine Vulgate: “Vos enim estis templum Dei vivi.” Nova Vulgata: “Vos enim estis templum Dei vivi.” Nestle-Aland: ἡµεῖς γὰρ ναὸς θεοῦ ἐσµεν ζῶντος.
21. The question, too, of non-Catholic and non-Christian textual critics, and their level of inspiration, is brought to the fore; this will be addressed more conveniently in discussing the second passage. 22. This is not to ignore other areas of Scripture in which error seems to be inherent in the message, as, for example, in the prophecy of Zerubabel’s triumph by Zachariah. It is, rather, to argue that such larger examples of “incoherence” can be brought into order through a legitimately Christological reading, a solution which will not assist in these cases of syntactical or orthographic error.
I N T E R C O N N E C T I O N S · 2:1 · Winter 2016
Entropy and Inspiration · 41
Again, the versions show a discrepancy.23 The Jerusalem Bible is in accord with the Greek text, as established by Nestle and Aland, and Merk, although with textual variants indicating that the reading of the Byzantine tradition was the same as the Latin. It must first be pointed out that this passage does not require conjectural emendation. With the late koine pronunciation of Greek, it would have been a simple matter for a scribe to have heard ἡµεῖς as ὑµεῖς, or vice-versa, and then changed the verb to reflect this initial hearing. The conjecture, then, is to decide between two alternatives rather than to divine original authorial intention. With the agreement of the Tradition, East and West, a case might be made that in this instance the textual critics have overstepped their bounds. They have established a text which does not reflect the mind of the Church and can therefore be dismissed. As noted, however, this is not a conjecture of the critics (although it is a decision between different readings based on the evidence before them). That is, this reading did not spring from their minds fully formed. It was in the early and reliable manuscript tradition. The refusal of the translators of the Nova Vulgata to agree with the textual critics might be considered an expression of the Church’s mind, and the text’s privileged position within the Church, particularly liturgically, does argue for its adoption and thus for some criteria by which to evaluate the relationship between textual criticism and inspiration. However, in contrast to this, the USCCB allows only the New American Bible to be used within a liturgical setting, and this Bible uses the “we” variation. There is thus no clear stand taken by the magisterium on which textual tradition ought to be used in translating and, hence, which better represents the inspired tradition.24 This leads to the question of the relation of those textual critics outside the fold to the question of inspiration. That is, as demonstrated in the first case, there are places in which the Church seems to privilege over the traditional reading (represented by the Vulgate and the
23. Again, in accord with the avowed methodology, there is no great theological principle riding on the interpretation; this investigation, wishing to focus entirely on the question of textual criticism, has deliberately eschewed those passages which, incorporating other considerations, will muddy the waters of divination. 24. Again, this passage is unimportant, but the acceptance of two differing textual traditions is clearly shown.
I N T E R C O N N E C T I O N S · 2:1 · Winter 2016
42 · Entropy and Inspiration
Byzantine text) a reading established by scholars who are not in communion with the Catholic Church. Even if, learning from Aphrodite’s protection of Paris, we have hidden the textual critic beneath the mantle of ecclesial inspiration, this protection cannot be extended to those outside the pale of ecclesial communion: with Zeus, we must assent to the death of our favourite, allowing it “to be done as it is in the nous.”25 Christian critics might be allowed as baptised members of the Church, even if separated; this argument will not hold for such critics as are not believing. Thus inspiration of the textual critic, even if differing in quality from that of the inspired author, will not answer, making inspiration an essentially meaningless concept, doled out wherever it is needed as theoretical cement.
Textual Criticism and its Limitations Finally, the question proposed earlier, that of access to the original text, must be posed. On the one hand, contemporary critical theory will shy from the very idea of defining, let alone re-establishing, an original text. On the other, the claims of the Church that all Scripture is inspired demand that there be such a text. The concerns, then, of the textual critic are both methodological and historical.26 Historically speaking, what is the original text? Is it the manuscript from which our best traditions spring? If so, this still begs the question of inspiration because that manuscript itself came from somewhere, following a tradition we cannot access at all. If it is that written by the author, what are we to say of, for instance, the “extended” ending to the Gospel of St. Mark? Which, for a textual critic, is to be the “original”? For a Catholic theologian the first definition, while it might be theoretically satisfying on a critical level, begs the question again of inspiration, as we have no means of tracking the tradition from the apostolic autograph to the manuscript from which the other traditions branch, and, as the second instance demonstrates, it cannot be assumed that that manuscript is synonymous with the apostolic autograph. The
25. Iliad 22.185. 26. See Hull for a more full discussion of this point.
I N T E R C O N N E C T I O N S · 2:1 · Winter 2016
Entropy and Inspiration · 43
easy answer that Tradition safeguards the inspiration will not work here either, as Tradition, represented by the Apostolic traditions of the East and West, has preserved one text and then has apparently, in the liturgical use of the New American Bible, abandoned it for another. This clarification brings with it a further suggestion, that Tradition can safeguard the essential meaning while remaining more Adam Smith towards the text. To adopt such a theory is to posit an abstract “meaning” which exists somehow separately from the texts in which it is contained and, thus, to propose two tiers of revelation and to deny its incarnational quality, appearing within a certain temporal and cultural context. Again, even if an original manuscript be posited and be accessible to the critic, this could only apply to the New Testament and some of the later books of the Old Testament, Sirach, for example. The social and cultural context of the early and middle first millennium Canaan does not support the idea of an author sitting down to write a text nor, particularly in the case of the prophets, does the state of the text support such a conjecture.27 Thus any theory of inspiration, even if it manage to avoid the action of textual criticism in the New Testament, will be forced to take account of it in the Old.
Conclusion Textual criticism has been, and will always be, indispensable within our contingent reality in the work of the Holy Spirit to speak to the people of God through Scripture. Thus, any theory seeking to explain how the Holy Spirit works must take into account the problems specific to the discipline of textual criticism. This paper has provided at least some preliminary notes towards these considerations. First, a theory must define that which is specially inspired, having God as author, and that which is safeguarded, in the distinction given within Dei Verbum. This requires the input of textual criticism to decide what is accessible to humanity, as that which cannot be accessed cannot
27. This is not to reject the idea of a single, original, and inspired work from which our tradition dates; it is merely to point out that the idea of authorship was very different in that time and place and that this will impact our theory of inspiration as related to textual criticism.
I N T E R C O N N E C T I O N S · 2:1 · Winter 2016
44 · Entropy and Inspiration
in any real sense be spoken of as an inspired gift of God. As Rahner wrote, “God does not write books for himself alone.”28 Secondly, a theory must address the issue of conjecture. Is it to be allowed?29 If it is not, does it follow that God as author has inspired a nonsensical passage? While this might be attributed to the failings of the human, using his human faculties, it is still to beg the question of inspiration, as Scripture is inspired in its whole and parts. If it be allowed, under what circumstances can it be allowed, and how do these conjectures, themselves inspired or uninspired, relate to the inspired text in which they are embedded? Thirdly, those cases in which mutually exclusive readings are both sanctified by Tradition must be explained, safeguarding both the inspiration of the text and the validity of the Tradition. Again, that these be in areas without theological import is to miss the point. For, in the first place, we have no guarantee that, even if there be no variation in areas of theological import (an assertion which will not be debated here), such will not appear in future. In the second place, the principle must still be addressed by any logically coherent theory of inspiration, even if, concretely, it produces little real effect. It must be reaffirmed that the purpose of this paper is not to disallow, or to argue against, the inspiration of Sacred Scripture. This is incontrovertible and ought to be accepted joyfully by every Catholic theologian as an example of God’s care and loving shepherding of his people; yet it is no excuse for timid shying away from difficulties. If the argument has seemed more destructive than constructive, that is proper to its nature as an attempt to set forth some preliminary requirements for any future edifice, preface to the founding of Eternal Rome, “in whose temples we are never far from God.” Finally, although no theory will be proposed in this paper, it seems to the author that fruitful research, incorporating these notes, might take the practice of the Church Fathers, particularly Origen and St.
28. Rahner, op. cit., 52 29. Kilpatrick makes a good case for the existence already of 2nd century conjectures within the NT text, although simultaneously disallowing most contemporary conjectures.
I N T E R C O N N E C T I O N S · 2:1 · Winter 2016
Entropy and Inspiration · 45
Jerome,30 together with the statements Dei Verbum, that it is the deeds and words of Christ that are Revelation, and the Catechism, that we are a religion not of the book, but of the Word, and that that Word is the person Jesus Christ. If this be so, then every word, every gesture of his, was expressive of Revelation. We have the assurance of the Church that that which was necessary for salvation has come down to us, transmitted faithfully; perhaps, as the very multiplicity of Christ’s actions allowed for a background from which the most important stood forth, so the mass of manuscript readings, the conjectures, more or less correct, are not only a necessary result of the Incarnation but, by providing a negative in some areas, allow textual critics the knowledge to make judgements in others. If one manuscript includes a reading of Paul manifestly false and another does not, while including a variation from the first which there is no particular reason to reject, then that variation might be hypothesised to be a feature of the style of St. Paul, and the critic has gained another locus against which to judge other dubious passages. Further, just as those gestures were symbolic of revelation, rather than revelation (which is the person of Christ alone), so these aporia might themselves be read as a symbolic language necessarily entailed by the Incarnation.31 The construction of such a grammar is well outside the bounds of this paper, which is only to drive Aeneas from Troy. May his mother, and the Church’s, Mary, the true Uirgo Dei Genetrix, guide him to the eternal hills.
Bibliography Catechism of the Catholic Church. 2nd ed. Washington, DC: Libreria Editrice VaticanaUnited States Conference of Catholic Bishops, 2000.
30. Rousseau’s paper “Jerome as Priest, Exegete, and ‘Man of the Church’” provides some excellent material for such a discussion. In Christians Shaping Identity from the Roman Empire to Byzantium, ed. Geoffrey D. Dunn and Wendy Mayer (Boston: Brill, 2015). 31. Although Kilpatrick does not put forth this theory, nor would I impute to him support for it, it ought to be acknowledged that the germ lay in his discussion of the preservation in every case of the original reading at any point in our manuscript tradition – a point which in itself deserves separate discussion.
I N T E R C O N N E C T I O N S · 2:1 · Winter 2016
46 · Entropy and Inspiration Ehrmann, Bart D. Orthodox Corruption of Scripture: The Effect of Early Christological Controversies on the Text of the New Testament. New York: Oxford University Press, 1993, 2011. Hull, Robert F., Jr. The Story of the New Testament Text. Atlanta: The Society of Biblical Literature, 2010. Kilpatrick, George. “Conjectural Emendation in the New Testament.” In New Testament Textual Criticism: Essays in Honour of Bruce M. Metzger. Edited by Eldon Jay Epp and Gordon D. Fee. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1981. Lagrange, Marie-Joseph. Introduction à l’étude du Nouveau Testament: deuxiéme partie: Critique Textuelle. Paris: Librairie Lecoffre, 1935. Newman, John Henry. On the Inspiration of Scripture. Edited by J. Derek Holmes and Robert Murray, S.J. London: Geoffrey Chapman, 1967. Nida, Eugene A. “New Testament Greek Text in the Third World.” In New Testament Textual Criticism: Essays in honour of Bruce M. Metzger. Edited by Eldon Jay Epp and Gordon D. Fee. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1981. Pontifical Biblical Commission. The Interpretation of the Bible in the Church. Boston, MA: Pauline Books & Media, 1993. Rahner, Karl. Inspiration in the Bible. Translated by Charles H. Henkey. New York: Herder and Herder, 1961. Originally published as Uber die Schriftinspiration. Freiburg: Herder 1961. Rousseau, Philip. “Jerome as Priest, Exegete, and ‘Man of the Church.’” In Christians Shaping Identity from the Roman Empire to Byzantium, 186-207. Edited by Geoffrey D. Dunn and Wendy Mayer. Boston: Brill, 2015. Schökel, Luis Alonso. The Inspired Word. Translated by Francis Martin O.C.S.O. New York: Herder and Herder, 1966. Originally published as La Palabra Inspirada. Barcelona: Editorial Herder S.A., 1966. Second Vatican Council. “Dogmatic Constitution on Divine Revelation.” In Vatican Council II: The Conciliar and Post Conciliar Documents. Edited by Austin Flannery O.P. Northport, NY: Costello Publishing Company. 1979.
Friar Jerome Mary Westenberg, OFM Conv. is a member of the Order of Friars Minor Conventual, and he is currently in his first year of theology studies at Mundelein Seminary. A native of Australia, he received his Bachelor of Arts degree in French and Classical Languages from the University of New England in Australia before serving as a political advisor to the Minster of Immigration and the Minister for the Aged Care and Disability of the Australian government. Additionally, he served as an advisor to the Conservative Party in the Greater London Assembly.
I N T E R C O N N E C T I O N S · 2:1 · Winter 2016
“In order that they may illumine the mysteries of salvation as completely as possible, [seminarians] should learn to penetrate them more deeply ... and to perceive their interconnections.” — OPTATAM TOTIUS, NO. 16
A publication of University of Saint Mary of the Lake/Mundelein Seminary 1000 E. Maple Ave., Mundelein, IL 60060 www.usml.edu