Réplica a Fausto el maniqueo

1. Faustus said: You quote from the Gospel the words, "Many shall come from the east and the west, and shall sit down with Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob, in the kingdom of heaven," [Mateo 8:11] and ask why we do not acknowledge the patriarchs. Now, we should be the last to grudge to any human being that God should have compassion on him, and bring him out of perdition to salvation. At the same time, we should acknowledge in such a case the clemency shown in this act of compassion, and not the merit of the person whose life is undeniably blameworthy. Thus, in the case of the Jewish fathers, Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob, who are mentioned by Christ in this verse, supposing it to be genuine, although they led wicked lives, as we may learn from their descendant Moses, or whoever was the author of the history called Genesis, which describes their conduct as having been most shocking and detestable; we are ready to allow that they may, after all, be in the kingdom of heaven, in the place which they neither believed in, nor hoped for, as is plain enough from their books. But then it must be kept in mind that, as you yourselves confess, if they did attain to what is spoken of in this verse, it was something very different from the nether dungeons of woe to which their own deserts consigned them, and that their deliverance was the work of our Lord Christ, and the result of His mystic passion. Who would grudge to the thief on the cross that deliverance was granted to him by the same Lord, and that Christ said that on that very day he should be with Him in the paradise of His Father? [Lucas 23:43] Who is so hard-hearted as to disapprove of this act of benevolence? Still, it does not follow that, because Jesus pardoned a thief, we must approve of the habits and practices of thieves; any more than of the publicans and harlots, whose faults Jesus pardoned, declaring that they would go into the kingdom of heaven before those who behaved proudly. [Mateo 21:31] For, when He acquitted the woman accused by the Jews as sinful, and as having been caught in adultery, He told her to sin no more. [Juan 8:3-11] If, then, He has done something of the same kind in the case of Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob, all the praise is His; for such actions towards souls are becoming in Him who makes His sun to rise upon the evil and upon the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust. [Mateo 5:45] One thing perplexes me in your doctrine: why you limit your statements to the fathers of the Jews, and are not of opinion that the Gentile patriarchs had also a share in this grace of our Redeemer; especially as the Christian Church consists of their children more than of the seed of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. You will say that the Gentiles worshipped idols, and the Jews the Almighty God, and that therefore Jesus had regard only to the Jews. It would seem from this that the worship of the Almighty God is the sure way to hell, and that the Son must come to the aid of the worshipper of the Father. That is as you please. For my part, I am ready to join you in the belief that the fathers reached heaven, not by any merit of their own, but by that divine mercy which is stronger than sin.

2. However, there is a difficulty in deciding as regards this verse too, whether the words were really spoken to Christ, for there is a discrepancy in the narratives. For while two evangelists, Matthew and Luke, both alike tell of the centurion whose servant was sick, and to whom these words of Jesus are supposed to have applied, that He had not seen so great faith, no, not in Israel, as in this man, though a Gentile and a Pagan, because he said that he was not worthy that Jesus should come under his roof, but wished Him only to speak the word, and his servant should be healed; Matthew alone adds that Jesus went on to say, "Verily I say unto you, that many shall come from the east and from the west, and shall sit down with Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob, in the kingdom of heaven; but the children of the kingdom shall be cast into outer darkness." By the many who should come are meant the Pagans, on account of the centurion, in whom, although he was a Gentile, so great faith was found; and the children of the kingdom are the Jews, in whom there was no faith found. Luke, again, though he too mentions the occurrence in his Gospel as part of the narrative of the miracles of Christ, says nothing of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. If it is said that he omitted it because it had been already said by Matthew, why does he tell the story at all of the centurion and his servant, since that, too, has the advantage of being recorded at length in Matthew’s ingenious narrative? But the passage is corrupt. For, in describing the centurion’s application to Jesus, Matthew says that he came himself to ask for a cure; while Luke says he did not, but sent elders of the Jews, and that they, in case Jesus should despise the centurion as a Gentile (for they will have Jesus to be a thorough Jew), set about persuading Him, by saying that he was worthy for whom He should do this, because he loved their nation, and had built them a synagogue; here again taking for granted that the Son of God was concerned in a pagan centurion having thought it proper to build a synagogue for the Jews. The words in question are, indeed, found in Luke also, perhaps because on reflection he thought they might be genuine; but they are found in another place, and in a connection altogether different. The passage is where Jesus says to His disciples, "Strive to enter in at the strait gate; for many shall come seeking to enter in, and shall not be able. When once the Master of the house has entered in, and has shut to the door, you shall begin to stand without, and to knock, saying Lord, open to us. And He shall answer and say, I know you not. Then you shall begin to say, We have eaten and drunk in Your presence, and You have taught in our streets and synagogues; but He shall say unto you, I know not whence you are; depart from me, all you workers of iniquity. There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth, when you shall see Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob, and all the prophets, entering into the kingdom of God, and you yourselves cast out. And they shall come from the east, and from the west, and from the north, and from the south, and shall sit down in the kingdom of God." [Lucas 13:24-29] The part where it is said that many shall be shut out of the kingdom of God, who have only borne the name of Christ, without doing His works, is not left out by Matthew; but he makes no mention here of Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob. In the same way, Luke mentions the centurion and his servant, without alluding in that connection to Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob. Since it is uncertain when the words were spoken, we are at liberty to doubt whether they were spoken at all.

3. It is not without reason that we bring a critical judgment to the study of Scriptures where there are such discrepancies and contradictions. By thus examining everything, and comparing one passage with another, we determine which contains Christ’s actual words, and what may or may not be genuine. For your predecessors have made many interpolations in the words of our Lord, which thus appear under His name, while they disagree with His doctrine. Besides, as we have proved again and again, the writings are not the production of Christ or of His apostles, but a compilation of rumors and beliefs, made, long after their departure, by some obscure semi-Jews, not in harmony even with one another, and published by them under the name of the apostles, or of those considered the followers of the apostles, so as to give the appearance of apostolic authority to all these blunders and falsehoods. But whatever you make of that, as regards this verse, I repeat that I do not insist on rejecting it. It is enough for my position, that, as I said before, and as you are obliged to confess, before the coming of our Lord all the patriarchs and prophets of Israel lay in infernal darkness for their sins. Even though they may have been restored to light and liberty by Christ, that has nothing to do with the hateful character of their lives. We hate and eschew not their persons, but their characters; not as they are now, when they are purified, but as they were, when impure. So, whatever you think of this verse, it does not affect us: for if it is genuine, it only illustrates Christ’s goodness and compassion; and if it is spurious, those who wrote it are to blame. Our cause is as safe as it always is.

4. Augustine replied: Poor safety, indeed! When you contradict yourself by hating the patriarchs as impure, at the same time that you grieve for your impure god. You allow that, since the advent of the Saviour, the patriarchs have had purity restored, and have enjoyed the rest of the blessed; while your god, even after the Saviour’s advent, still lies in darkness, is still sunk in the ocean of iniquity, still wallows in the mire of all uncleanness. These men, therefore, were not only better than your god in their lives, but also happier in their death. Where was the abode of the just who departed from this life before Christ’s coming in the flesh, and whether their condition also was improved by the passion of Christ, in whom they had believed as to come, and to suffer, and to rise again, and had, moreover, foretold this in suitable language under the guidance of the Spirit of prophecy, is to be discovered from the Holy Scriptures, if any clear discovery in this matter is possible; we are not called on to adopt the crude notions of all and sundry, still less the heretical opinions of men who have gone astray into such egregious error. There is a vain attempt here on the part of Faustus to introduce by a side-door the idea that we may obtain something after this life besides the due reward of our conduct in this life. It will be better for you to abandon your error while you are still alive, and to embrace and hold the truths of the Catholic faith. Otherwise the expectations of the unrighteous will be sadly disappointed when God begins to fulfill His threatenings to the unrighteous.

5. I have already given what I considered a sufficient answer to Faustus' calumnies of the lives of the patriarchs. That they were punished at their death, or that they were justified after the Lord’s passion, is not what we learn from His commendation of them, when He admonished the Jews that, if they were Abraham’s children, they should do the works of Abraham, and said that Abraham desired to see His day, and was glad when he saw it; [Juan 8:39, 56] and that it was into his bosom, that is, some deep recess of blissful repose, that the angels carried the poor sufferer who was despised by the proud rich man. [Lucas 16:23] And what are we to make of the Apostle Paul? Is there any idea of justification after death in his praise of Abraham, when he says that before he was circumcised he believed God, and that it was counted to him for righteousness? [Romanos 4:3] And so much importance does he attach to this, that the single ground which he specifies for our becoming Abraham’s children, though not descended from him in the flesh, is, that we follow the footsteps of his faith.

6. You are so hardened in your errors against the testimonies of Scripture, that nothing can be made of you; for whenever anything is quoted against you, you have the boldness to say that it is written not by the apostle, but by some pretender under his name. The doctrine of demons which you preach is so opposed to Christian doctrine, that you could not continue, as professing Christians, to maintain it, unless you denied the truth of the apostolic writings. How can you thus do injury to your own souls? Where will you find any authority, if not in the Gospel and apostolic writings? How can we be sure of the authorship of any book, if we doubt the apostolic origin of those books which are attributed to the apostles by the Church which the apostles themselves founded, and which occupies so conspicuous a place in all lands, and if at the same time we acknowledge as the undoubted production of the apostles what is brought forward by heretics in opposition to the Church, whose authors, from whom they derive their name, lived long after the apostles? And do we not see in profane literature that there are well-known authors under whose names many things have been published after their time which have been rejected, either from inconsistency with their ascertained writings, or from their not having been known in the lifetime of the authors, so as to be banded down with the confirmatory statement of the authors themselves, or of their friends? To give a single example, were not some books published lately under the name of the distinguished physician Hippocrates, which were not received as authoritative by physicians? And this decision remained unaltered in spite of some similarity in style and matter: for, when compared to the genuine writings of Hippocrates, these books were found to be inferior; besides that they were not recognized as his at the time when his authorship of his genuine productions was ascertained. Those books, again, from a comparison with which the productions of questionable origin were rejected, are with certainty attributed to Hippocrates; and any one who denies their authorship is answered only by ridicule, simply because there is a succession of testimonies to the books from the time of Hippocrates to the present day, which makes it unreasonable either now or hereafter to have any doubt on the subject. How do we know the authorship of the works of Plato, Aristotle, Cicero, Varro, and other similar writers, but by the unbroken chain of evidence? So also with the numerous commentaries on the ecclesiastical books, which have no canonical authority, and yet show a desire of usefulness and a spirit of inquiry. How is the authorship ascertained in each case, except by the author’s having brought his work into public notice as much as possible in his own lifetime, and, by the transmission of the information from one to another in continuous order, the belief becoming more certain as it becomes more general, up to our own day; so that, when we are questioned as to the authorship of any book, we have no difficulty in answering? But why speak of old books? Take the books now before us: should any one, after some years, deny that this book was written by me, or that Faustus' was written by him, where is evidence for the fact to be found but in the information possessed by some at the present time, and transmitted by them through successive generations even to distant times? From all this it follows, that no one who has not yielded to the malicious and deceitful suggestions of lying devils, can be so blinded by passion as to deny the ability of the Church of the apostles— a community of brethren as numerous as they were faithful— to transmit their writings unaltered to posterity, as the original seats of the apostles have been occupied by a continuous succession of bishops to the present day, especially when we are accustomed to see this happen in the case of ordinary writings both in the Church and out of it.

7. Pero Fausto encuentra contradicciones en los Evangelios. Di, más bien, que Fausto lee los Evangelios con un espíritu equivocado, que es demasiado necio para comprender y demasiado ciego para ver. Si estuvieras animado por la piedad en lugar de dejarte extraviar por el espíritu de partido, podrías fácilmente, examinando estos pasajes, descubrir una armonía admirable y sumamente instructiva entre los escritores. ¿Quién, al leer dos relatos del mismo suceso, pensaría en acusar de error o falsedad a uno o a ambos autores, porque uno omite lo que el otro menciona, o porque uno cuenta concisamente, pero con acuerdo sustancial, lo que el otro relata con detalle, de modo que indique no sólo lo que se hizo, sino también cómo se hizo? Esto es lo que hace Fausto en su intento de impugnar la verdad de los Evangelios; como si el hecho de que Lucas omita alguna palabra de Cristo registrada en Mateo implicara por parte de Lucas una negación de lo afirmado por Mateo. No hay dificultad real en el caso; y crear una dificultad muestra falta de reflexión, o de la capacidad de reflexionar. Hay, ciertamente, un punto en el relato del centurión que se discute entre los creyentes, y sobre el cual los incrédulos de no gran erudición plantean objeciones, demostrando su espíritu pendenciero cuando, después de ser instruidos, no abandonan sus errores. El punto es que Mateo dice que el centurión vino a Jesús "rogándole y diciendo"; mientras que Lucas dice que envió a Jesús a los ancianos de los judíos con esta misma petición, para que sanara a su siervo que estaba enfermo; y que cuando Él se acercó a la casa envió a otros, por medio de los cuales dijo que no era digno de que Jesús entrara en su casa, y que no era digno de venir él mismo a Jesús. ¿Cómo, pues, leemos en Mateo: "Vino a Él, rogándole y diciendo: Mi siervo yace en casa enfermo de parálisis, y gravemente atormentado?" La explicación es que el relato de Mateo es correcto, pero breve: menciona la venida del centurión a Jesús, sin decir si vino él mismo o por medio de otros, o si las palabras acerca de su siervo fueron pronunciadas por él mismo o por medio de otros. Pero ¿no es común hablar de una persona como acercándose a una cosa, aunque no llegue a alcanzarla? E incluso la palabra alcanzar, que es la forma más fuerte de expresión, se usa con frecuencia en casos en que la persona de quien se habla obra por medio de otros, como cuando decimos que llevó su caso ante el tribunal, que alcanzó la presencia del juez; o, de nuevo, que alcanzó la presencia de algún hombre poderoso, aunque probablemente haya sido por medio de sus amigos, y puede que la persona no haya visto a aquel cuya presencia se dice que alcanzó. Y de la palabra alcanzar damos el nombre de Pervertidores a quienes por artes ambiciosas logran acceso, ya sea personalmente o por medio de amigos, a las mentes, por así decirlo, inaccesibles de los grandes. ¿Acaso, al leer, hemos de olvidar el uso común del lenguaje? ¿O debe la Sagrada Escritura tener un lenguaje propio? Las cavilaciones de los críticos insolentes se refutan así con una referencia a las formas usuales del habla.

8. Quienes examinan este asunto no con espíritu de disputa sino con espíritu creyente y sereno, son invitados a venir a Jesús, no exteriormente sino en el corazón, no en presencia corporal sino en el poder de la fe, como hizo el centurión, y entonces comprenderán mejor el relato de Mateo. A tales se les dice en el Salmo: "Venid a Él, y sed iluminados; y vuestros rostros no se avergonzarán." De aquí aprendemos que el centurión, cuya fe fue tan altamente encomiada, vino a Cristo más verdaderamente que las personas que llevaron su mensaje. Encontramos un caso análogo en la mujer con flujo de sangre, que fue sanada al tocar el borde del manto de Cristo, cuando Cristo dijo: "Alguien me ha tocado." Los discípulos se maravillaron de lo que Cristo quería decir al afirmar: "¿Quién me ha tocado?", "Alguien me ha tocado", cuando la multitud lo apretujaba. De hecho, respondieron así: "La multitud te apretuja, ¿y dices: Quién me ha tocado?" [Lucas 8:43, 46] Ahora bien, así como la gente apretujaba a Cristo mientras la mujer lo tocaba, así los mensajeros fueron enviados a Cristo, pero el centurión verdaderamente vino a Él. En Mateo tenemos una forma de expresión no infrecuente, y al mismo tiempo un significado simbólico; mientras que en Lucas hay un relato sencillo de todo el suceso, tal que nos llama la atención sobre la manera en que Mateo lo ha registrado. Quisiera que una de esas personas que fundan sus necias objeciones contra los Evangelios en dificultades tan insignificantes contara él mismo una historia dos veces, dando honestamente un relato veraz de lo sucedido, y que sus palabras fueran escritas y leídas ante él. Veríamos entonces si no diría más o menos en una ocasión que en otra; y si no cambiaría el orden, no sólo de las palabras, sino de las cosas; y si no pondría en boca de otro alguna opinión propia, porque, aunque nunca lo oyó decirlo, sabía perfectamente que estaba en su mente; y si no pondría a veces en pocas palabras lo que antes había relatado con amplitud. En éstas y otras maneras, que tal vez podrían reducirse a regla, los relatos de la misma cosa por dos personas, o dos relatos por la misma persona, podrían diferir en muchas cosas sin oponerse, podrían ser distintos sin ser contradictorios. Así se deshacen todas las vendas con que los pobres maniqueos se ahogan para conservar el espíritu de error, y para excluir todo lo que pudiera conducirlos a la salvación.

9. Ahora que todas las calumnias de Fausto han sido refutadas, al menos las de los temas aquí tratados con amplitud y explicados plenamente según el Señor me ha capacitado, cierro con una palabra de consejo para vosotros, que estáis implicados en esos errores escandalosos y condenables: que, si reconocéis la autoridad suprema de la Escritura, reconozcáis aquella autoridad que desde el tiempo del propio Cristo, por el ministerio de sus apóstoles, y por una sucesión regular de obispos en las sedes de los apóstoles, se ha conservado hasta nuestros días en todo el mundo, con una reputación conocida por todos. Allí el Antiguo Testamento también tiene sus dificultades resueltas, y sus predicciones cumplidas. Si pedís demostración, considerad primero lo que sois, cuán incapaces de comprender la naturaleza de vuestra propia alma, por no hablar de Dios; me refiero a una comprensión inteligente, como la que profesáis desear, o haber deseado en otro tiempo, y no las nociones de una fantasía crédula. Admitiendo esta incapacidad, que debe continuar mientras permanezcáis como sois, se os puede al menos remitir a la convicción natural de toda mente humana, a menos que esté corrompida por el error, de la perfecta inmutabilidad e incorruptibilidad de la naturaleza y sustancia de Dios. Admitid esto, o creedlo, y ya no seréis maniqueos, de modo que con el tiempo podáis llegar a ser católicos.