Chapter 36.—That Interpretation of Scripture Which Builds Us Up in Love is Not Perniciously Deceptive Nor Mendacious, Even Though It Be Faulty.  The Interpreter, However, Should Be Corrected.

40.  Whoever, then, thinks that he understands the Holy Scriptures, or any part of them, but puts such an interpretation upon them as does not tend to build up this twofold love of God and our neighbor, does not yet understand them as he ought.  If, on the other hand, a man draws a meaning from them that may be used for the building up of love, even though he does not happen upon the precise meaning which the author whom he reads intended to express in that place, his error is not pernicious, and he is wholly clear from the charge of deception.  For there is involved in deception the intention to say what is false; and we find plenty of people who intend to deceive, but nobody who wishes to be deceived.  Since, then, the man who knows practises deceit, and the ignorant man is practised upon, it is quite clear that in any particular case the man who is deceived is a better man than he who deceives, seeing that it is better to suffer than to commit injustice.  Now every man who lies commits an injustice; and if any man thinks that a lie is ever useful, he must think that injustice is sometimes useful.  For no liar keeps faith in the matter about which he lies.  He wishes, of course, that the man to whom he lies should place confidence in him; and yet he betrays his confidence by lying to him.  Now every man who breaks faith is unjust.  Either, then, injustice is sometimes useful (which is impossible), or a lie is never useful.

41.  Whoever takes another meaning out of Scripture than the writer intended, goes astray, but not through any falsehood in Scripture.  Nevertheless, as I was going to say, if his mistaken interpretation tends to build up love, which is the end of the commandment, he goes astray in much the same way as a man who by mistake quits the high road, but yet reaches through the fields the same place to which the road leads.  He is to be corrected, however, and to be shown how much better it is not to quit the straight road, lest, if he get into a habit of going astray, he may sometimes take cross roads, or even go in the wrong direction altogether.

CAPUT XXXVI. Interpretatio Scripturae licet vitiosa, non est mendax nec perniciose fallax, si modo utilis sit aedificandae charitati. Corrigendus tamen interpres qui sic fallitur.

40. Quisquis igitur Scripturas divinas vel quamlibet earum partem intellexisse sibi videtur, ita ut eo intellectu non aedificet istam geminam charitatem Dei et proximi, nondum intellexit. Quisquis vero talem inde sententiam duxerit , ut huic aedificandae charitati sit utilis, nec tamen hoc dixerit quod ille quem legit eo loco sensisse probabitur, non perniciose fallitur, nec omnino mentitur. Inest quippe in mentiente voluntas falsa dicendi: et ideo multos invenimus, qui mentiri velint; qui autem falli, neminem. Cum igitur hoc sciens homo faciat, illud nesciens patiatur, satis in una eademque re apparet illum qui fallitur, eo qui mentitur esse meliorem; quandoquidem pati melius est iniquitatem, quam facere: omnis autem qui mentitur, iniquitatem facit ; et si cuiquam videtur utile aliquando esse mendacium, potest videri utilem aliquando esse iniquitatem. Nemo enim mentiens, in eo quod mentitur, servat fidem; nam hoc utique vult, ut cui mentitur fidem sibi habeat, quam tamen ei mentiendo non servat: omnis autem fidei violator, iniquus est. Aut igitur iniquitas aliquando utilis est, quod fieri non potest; aut mendacium semper inutile est.

41. Sed quisquis in Scripturis aliud sentit quam ille qui scripsit, illis non mentientibus fallitur: sed tamen, ut dicere coeperam, si ea sententia fallitur, qua aedificet charitatem, quae finis praecepti est, ita fallitur, ac si quisquam errore deserens viam, eo tamen per agrum pergat, quo etiam via illa perducit. Corrigendus est tamen, et quam sit utilius viam non deserere demonstrandum est, ne consuetudine deviandi etiam in transversum aut perversum ire cogatur.