04 - Roman Catholic Scholarship...

Roman Catholic Scholarship on the Derivation
of the Canon of the Sacred Books of the Old Testament.

It is especially interesting for us to see how Roman Catholic theology approaches the conclusions of the new biblical criticism. Among Chris­tians of other confessions the Roman Church of the second millennium had and has a more complete and, in its own way, a more fully developed theological and church-historical science, in consequence of which its sys­tem of corresponding alterations found for themselves a visible reflection in Russian theology of the most recent centuries. But how far has it now departed from its own traditions! The basic tendency of Roman Catholic ecclesiastical thought has usu­ally been conservative. This can be said of the leadership of the Vatican to an even greater degree. Until the last several decades it has always restrained tendencies towards liberal leanings. During the time of the reli­gious reformation of Luther, the Pope, supported by the Council of Trent, forbade lay people to read the Bible. Now Roman theologians explain that this prohibition referred to “free translations which were not sanctioned by the Church.” How has the See of Rome reacted to the conclusions of biblical criti­cism? In the first decades of our century, they were subject to condemna­tion. Subsequently, however, voices were raised proclaiming the necessity of making a wide opening into the sphere of Catholic thought and world-view for the achievements of the natural sciences in their various forms to enter. Along with this, a reversal took place in theological thought itself with the acceptance of new views on the content of the Bible and the ori­gin of the Scriptures, in the spirit of the new biblical criticism. The Twen­tieth Century Encyclopedia of Catholicism, projected at 150 volumes, with headings in 16 series, first began to see print in 1956, in French, English and other languages. The series “Nature and Man” included such headings as: “The Origin of Man,” “Evolution,” “What is Man?,” “What is Life?,” the aim of which was to reconcile the findings of contemporary natural sciences with basic Roman Catholic dogma. The sixth series of volumes deals with the subject of the “Word of God,” in other words, the Bible as a whole, its parts and aspects, and it must be said that the conclusions of contemporary biblical criticism have been completely accepted. All of the volumes of the Encyclopedia bear the authorization and approval of the Roman Catholic censorship: the Imprimatur and Nihil Obstat. Here we see an agreement of views on the Old Testament of leftist-Protestant criticism and Roman Catholic theology on the main points. Are the foundations of these new views solid? Actually, they are completely hypothetical, and are rooted in their own sort of passion for discovery, for innovation and, at the same time, in a suspicious, skeptical attitude towards that which in the past was elevated, pure, and holy. These new views not only lessen the merit of the schoolmasters that lead men to Christ, i.e. those of the Old Testament Church, but also cast a shadow over the New Testament, over the writings of the apostles. The content of the Pen­tateuch is cited in the Psalms, by the prophets, in the preaching of the apostles, in the book of Acts (see the sermon of the Apostle Paul in ch. 13), and by the Saviour Himself, when, while instructing the Jews, He left these words for us as well: For had ye believed Moses, ye would have believed Me; for he wrote of Me. But if ye believe not his writings, how shall ye believe My words? (John 5:46-47).