Читать книгу On Temporal and Spiritual Authority - Robert Bellarmine - Страница 16

Among the chief heretical beliefs of the Anabaptists and Antitrinitarians of our time there is one that says that it is not lawful for Christians to hold magistracy and that among Christians there must not be power of capital punishment, etc., in any government, tribunal, or court. The ministers in Transylvania who oppose the trinity and the incarnation and infant baptism declared in 1568 in Alba Julia the differences between the true Christ and the false Christ, and the seventh difference is that the false Christ has in His Church kings, princes, magistrates, and swords; the true Christ cannot allow anything like this in His Church.³

Their arguments are these, or certainly can be these: first, from Scripture, Matthew 17: “And when they were come to Capernaum, they that received tribute money came to Peter, and said, Doth not your master pay tribute? etc.”⁴ And Luke 22: “The kings of the Gentiles exercise lordship over them; and they that exercise authority upon them are called benefactors,”⁵ Romans 13: “Owe no man any thing, but to love one another,”⁶ 1 Corinthians 7: “Ye are bought with a price; be not ye the servants of men,”⁷ 2 [1] Corinthians 8: “One Lord,”⁸ Ephesians 4: “One Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God.”⁹

Second, arguments from examples: very many princes abuse their authority, and not only are they not useful to the commonwealth, but they are indeed a nuisance, as is clear at the very beginning of the world in the case of Cain (Genesis 4) and of the sons of God (Genesis 6) who took different wives and were corrupted by every evil, and because of them the flood followed. The same in the case of Nimrod, Pharaoh, Nebuchadnezzar, Saul, Rehoboam, and others: indeed, after the division of the kingdom, of all the kings of Israel not one was good.

Third, arguments from the final cause, for the Jews were allowed a magistrate because of the imperfection of the time: the Jews were all children and therefore had to be ruled by somebody else, as is clear from Galatians 4. But we are perfect men, and “our anointing teacheth us of all things,” to keep with the biblical language.

Fourth, arguments from the efficient cause, for this authority was introduced by God, but it was usurped by men in a tyrannical way: Who made Nimrod king? Who Nebuchadnezzar? Who Alexander? Who Julius Caesar? Who the others? This is the reason why that pirate who replied to Alexander, “I am called a pirate because I go around in a small boat, you are called an emperor because you plunder the world with a big fleet,” is praised (Augustine, De civitate Dei, book 4, chapter 4, from Cicero, De republica, book 3).¹⁰

Fifth, arguments from the origin, for God created man free, and subjection was introduced through sin; therefore once we are freed from sin through Christ, we must be freed also from subjection. The antecedent is clear, as in Genesis 1 it is not said “have dominion over men,” but “have dominion over the fish of the sea.”¹¹ Likewise the woman is now subjected to the man only by a political subjection, but this was introduced through sin, as is clear from Genesis 3 “[thy husband] shall rule over thee.”¹² Moreover, before the flood the first one who founded a city and started a political kingdom was Cain, as Augustine deduced in book 15 of De civitate Dei, chapter 1, out of Genesis 4; and after the flood the first was Nimrod (Genesis 10).

Finally, the Fathers clearly teach this. Augustine in De civitate Dei, book 19, chapter 15, says that God, having made man a rational creature, in His image, did not want him to dominate except over irrational creatures, not over another man but over beasts. Hence the first just men were made shepherds of flocks rather than kings of men, so that God could demonstrate from this what the order of the creatures required and what the punishment of sins demanded. Gregory in his Moralia, book 21, chapter 11 [15], says that nature made all men equals; but through varying degrees of merits, a secret dispensation places some after some others. Indeed that very difference which arose from vice has been rightly ordered by the divine counsels so that, since not every man walks the path of life in the same manner, one may be ruled by another; and he says similar things in De cura pastorali, part 2, chapter 6.

Not only all Catholics, especially blessed Thomas in Opusculum 20, and all philosophers detest this heresy, but also Philip Melanchthon in Loci communes, the chapter on the civil magistrate, and John Calvin in book 4 of his Institutiones, chapter 20, most aggressively and broadly oppose it, and so does Luther himself in De visitatio Saxonica,¹³ although the Anabaptists took as a pretext his own words in De Babylonica captivitate ecclesiae, the chapter on baptism.¹⁴ We will refute this heresy with five arguments, for the principles of our adversaries are that many: first, from the Scriptures; second, from the examples of saints; third, from the final or necessary cause; fourth, from the efficient cause; and fifth, from origin.