Augustine: our testimony to the Scriptures

Monday, April 19, 2010
    Commemoration of Alphege, Archbishop of Canterbury, Martyr, 1012
Meditation:
    I saw that wisdom is better than folly, just as light is better than darkness. The wise man has eyes in his head, while the fool walks in the darkness; but I came to realize that the same fate overtakes them both.
    —Ecclesiastes 2:13-14 (NIV)
Quotation:
    It often happens that one who is not a Christian hath some knowledge, derived from the evidence of his senses, about the earth, about the heavens, about the elements of this world, about the movements and revolutions, or about the size and distance of the stars, about certain eclipses of the sun and moon, about the course of the years and the seasons, about the nature of animals, plants, and minerals... Now it is an unseemly and mischievous thing, and greatly to be avoided, that a Christian man speaking on such matters, as if according to the authority of the Christian Scriptures, should talk so foolishly that the unbeliever on hearing him and observing the extravagance of his error, should hardly be able to refrain from laughter. And the great mischief is not so much that the man himself is laughed at for his errors, but that our authors are believed, by many people without the Church, to have taught such things, and so are condemned as unlearned and cast aside, to the great loss of those for whose salvation we are so much concerned. [Continued tomorrow]
    ... St. Augustine of Hippo (354-430), On Genesis [415], tr. John Hammond Taylor, Newman Press, 1982, I.xix, p. 42-43 (see the book)
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, grant me the wisdom to speak with humility. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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