|
Pope Benedict XVI- General Audiences |
General
Audience
Hugh and Richard, of the Abbey of St. Victor
"Love Alone Makes Us Happy"
H.H. Benedict XVI
November 25, 2009
www.zenit.org
Dear brothers and sisters,
During these Wednesday audiences, I have been presenting some exemplary
figures of believers who have been determined to show the harmony
between reason and faith, and to witness with their life the
proclamation of the Gospel.
Today I would like to speak to you about Hugh and Richard of St. Victor.
Both are among those notable philosophers and theologians known by the
name of Victorines, because they lived in the Abbey of St. Victor in
Paris, founded at the beginning of the 12th century by William of
Champeaux. William himself was a renowned teacher, who was able to give
his abbey a solid cultural identity. In fact, inaugurated in St. Victor
was a school for the formation of monks, open also to outside students,
where a happy synthesis was made between the two forms of doing
theology, of which I have already spoken in previous catecheses: namely,
monastic theology, mainly oriented to the contemplation of the mysteries
of the faith in Scripture, and scholastic theology, which used reason to
attempt to scrutinize these mysteries with innovative methods, to create
a theological system.
We know little about the life of Hugh of St. Victor. The date and place
of his birth are uncertain: perhaps in Saxony or in Flanders. It is
known that he arrived in Paris -- the European capital of culture at the
time -- and spent the rest of his years in the abbey of St. Victor,
where he was first a disciple and then a teacher. Already before his
death, which occurred in 1141, he achieved great notoriety and esteem,
to the point of being called a "second St. Augustine": Like Augustine,
in fact, he meditated much on the relation between faith and reason,
between profane sciences and theology.
According to Hugh of St. Victor, all sciences, in addition to being
useful to understand the Scriptures, have value in themselves and should
be cultivated to enhance man's learning, and also to correspond to his
desire to know the truth. This healthy intellectual curiosity induced
him to recommend to students that they never stifle the desire to learn
and -- in his treatise on the methodology of learning and pedagogy,
titled significantly Didascalicon (on teaching) -- he recommended:
"Learn happily from everyone what you do not know. He will be the wisest
of all who has desired to learn something from all. He who receives
something from everyone, ends us by being the richest of all" (Eruditiones
Didascalicae, 3,14: PL 176,774).
The science that concerns the philosophers and theologians of the
Victorines is, in a particular way, theology, which requires first of
all the loving study of sacred Scripture. To know God, in fact, one
cannot but begin from what God himself has wished to reveal of himself
through the Scriptures. In this connection, Hugh of St. Victor is a
typical representative of monastic theology, totally based on biblical
exegesis. To interpret Scripture, he proposes the traditional
Patristic-Medieval articulation, that is, the historical/literal sense,
first of all, then the allegorical and analogical, and finally the
moral. These are four dimensions of the meaning of Scripture that also
today are being rediscovered, because it is seen that in the text and
the narration is hidden a more profound indication: the thread of faith,
which leads us on high and guides us on this earth, teaching us how to
live. However, while respecting these four dimensions of the meaning of
Scripture, in an original way in relation to his contemporaries, he
insists -- and this is something new -- on the importance of the
historical/literal meaning. In other words, before discovering the
symbolic value, the more profound dimensions of the biblical text, it is
necessary to know and reflect further on the meaning of the history
narrated in Scripture. Otherwise, he warns with an effective example,
the risk is run of being like grammar scholars who ignore the alphabet.
For those who know the meaning of the history described in the Bible,
the human circumstances seem marked by Divine Providence, according to a
well-ordered plan. Thus, for Hugh of St. Victor, history is not the
result of a blind destiny or an absurd case, as it might seem. On the
contrary, the Holy Spirit operates in human history, arousing a
wonderful dialogue of men with God, their friend. This theological view
of history makes evident the surprising and salvific intervention of
God, who really enters and acts in history, almost makes himself part of
our history, but always safeguarding and respecting man's liberty and
responsibility.
For our author, the study of sacred Scripture and its historical/literal
meaning makes possible true and authentic theology, that is, the
systematic illustration of truths, to know their structure, the
illustration of the dogmas of the faith, which he represents in a solid
synthesis in the treatise De sacramentis christianae fidei (The
sacraments of the Christian faith). There is found, among other things,
a definition of "sacrament" that, subsequently perfected by other
theologians, has features that even today are very interesting. "The
sacrament," he writes, "is a corporeal or material element proposed in a
strange and sensible way, which represents with its similarity an
invisible and spiritual grace, it signifies it, because it was
instituted for this purpose, and contains it, because it is capable of
sanctifying" (9,2: PL 176,317). On one hand the visibility of the
symbol, the "corporeal nature" of the gift of God, in which however, on
the other hand, is hidden divine grace that comes from a history: Jesus
Christ himself has created the fundamental symbols. Hence, three are the
elements that concur in the definition of a sacrament, according to Hugh
of St. Victor, the institution on the part of Christ, the communication
of grace, and the analogy between the visible, material element and the
invisible element, which are the divine gifts. It is a vision that is
very close to contemporary sensibility, because the sacraments are
presented with a language interlaced with symbols and images capable of
speaking immediately to men's heart. Also important today is that the
liturgical leaders, and in particular priests, appreciate with pastoral
wisdom the signs themselves of the sacramental rites -- this visibility
and tangibility of grace -- paying careful attention to their
catechesis, so that each celebration of the sacraments is lived by all
the faithful with devotion, intensity and spiritual joy.
A worthy disciple of Hugh of St. Victor is Richard, from Scotland. He
was prior of the Abbey of St. Victor between 1162 and 1173, the year of
his death. Richard also, naturally, assigns an essential role to the
study of the Bible but, as opposed to his teacher, he favors the
allegorical sense, the symbolic meaning of Scripture with which, for
example, he interprets the Old Testament figure of Benjamin, son of
Jacob, as symbol of contemplation and summit of the spiritual life.
Richard treats this argument in two texts. Benjamin minor and Benjamin
major, in which he proposes to the faithful a spiritual way, which first
invites the exercise of the different virtues, learning to discipline
and order with reason the feelings and interior affective and emotional
movements. Only when man has achieved a balance and human maturity in
this field is he prepared to accede to contemplation, which Richard
describes as "a profound and pure look of the soul directed to the
wonders of wisdom, associated to an ecstatic sense of wonder and
admiration" (Benjamin Maior 1,4: PL 196,67).
Contemplation is, therefore, the point of arrival, the result of an
arduous journey, which entails dialogue between faith and reason, that
is -- once again -- a theological discourse. Theology begins from the
truths that are the object of faith, but it attempts to deepen its
knowledge with the use of reason, appropriating the gift of faith. This
application of reasoning to the understanding of faith is practiced in a
convincing way in Richard's masterpiece, one of the great books of
history, the De Trinitate (The Trinity). In the six books that make it
up he reflects with acuity on the mystery of God one and triune.
According to our author, given that God is love, the only divine
substance entails communication, oblation and affection between two
Persons, the Father and the Son, who meet one another with an eternal
exchange of love. But the perfection of happiness and of goodness does
not allow for exclusiveness and narrow-mindedness; on the contrary, it
calls for the eternal presence of a third Person, the Holy Spirit.
Trinitarian love is participatory, harmonious and entails a
superabundance of delight, enjoyment of incessant joy. That is, Richard
assumes that God is love, analyzes the essence of love, which is what is
involved in the reality of love, thus coming to the Trinity of Persons,
which is really the logical expression of the fact that God is love.
Richard, nevertheless, is aware that love, though it reveals God's
essence to us and makes us "understand" the mystery of the Trinity, is,
however, only an analogy to speak about a mystery that exceeds the human
mind, and -- poet and mystic that he is -- he takes recourse also to
other images. For example he compares divinity to a river, to a loving
wave that springs from the Father, flows back in the Son, later to be
happily diffused in the Holy Spirit.
Dear friends, authors such as Hugh and Richard of St. Victor raise our
soul to the contemplation of divine realities. At the same time, the
immense joy we get from thought, admiration and praise of the Most Holy
Trinity, establishes and sustains the concrete commitment to inspire us
in that perfect model of communion and love to build our everyday human
relations.
The Trinity is truly perfect communion! How the world would change if in
families, in parishes and in all other communities relationships were
lived following always the example of the three Divine Persons, where
each one lives not only with the other, but for the other and in the
other! I recalled it some months ago in the Angelus: "Love alone makes
us happy, because we live in relation, and we live to love and to be
loved" (L'Osservatore Romano, June 8-9, 2009, p. 1). It is love that
realizes this incessant miracle: as in the life of the Most Holy
Trinity, plurality is repaired in unity, where everything is pleasure
and joy. With St. Augustine, held in great honor by the Victorines, we
can also exclaim: "Vides Trinitatem, si caritatem vides" -- you see the
Trinity, if you see charity (De Trinitate VIII, 8,12).
[Translation by ZENIT]
[The Holy Father then greeted the people in several languages. In
English, he said:]
Dear Brothers and Sisters,
In our continuing catechesis on the Christian culture of the Middle
Ages, we now turn to two outstanding twelfth-century theologians
associated with the monastery of Saint Victor of Paris. Hugh of Saint
Victor stressed the importance of the literal or historical sense of
sacred Scripture as the basis of theology's effort to unite faith and
reason in understanding God's saving plan. His treatise On the
Sacraments of the Christian Faith offered an influential definition of a
sacrament, stressing not only its institution by Christ and its
communication of grace, but also its value as an outward sign. Richard
of Saint Victor, a disciple of Hugh, stressed the allegorical sense of
the Scriptures in order to present a spiritual paedagogy aimed at human
maturity and contemplative wisdom. Richard's work On the Trinity sought
to understand the mystery of the triune God by analyzing the mystery of
love, which entails a giving and receiving between two persons and finds
its perfection in being bestowed upon a third person. These great
Victorines, Hugh and Richard, remind us that theology is grounded in the
contemplation born of faith and the pursuit of understanding, and brings
with it the immense joy of experiencing the eternal love of the Blessed
Trinity.
I offer a warm welcome to the pilgrimage of Bishops and faithful from
Japan celebrating the first anniversary of the Beatification of Blessed
Peter Kibe and Companions. My cordial greeting also goes to the groups
from Denmark and the United States of America. Upon all the
English-speaking pilgrims and visitors present at today's Audience, I
invoke God's blessings of joy and peace!
©Copyright 2009 - Libreria Editrice Vaticana
[At the conclusion of the audience, the Pontiff gave his customary
greeting in Italian:]
I turn, finally, to young people, the sick and newlyweds. Next Sunday,
the season of Advent begins. I exhort you, young people, to live this
"intense time" with vigilant prayer and generous evangelical commitment.
I encourage you, sick people, to sustain with the offer of your
sufferings the Christian peoples' path of preparation for Holy
Christmas. I hope you, newlyweds, will be witnesses of the Spirit of
love that animates and sustains the whole Family of God.
[Translation by ZENIT]
Look
at the One they Pierced!
This page is the work of
the Servants of the Pierced Hearts of Jesus and Mary
