CHAPTER XI

THE THREE MEANS OF PERFECTION, OF WHICH WE HAVE HITHERTO BEEN SPEAKING, BELONG, PECULIARLY, TO THE RELIGIOUS STATE

WE find the three ways to perfection in religious life, embodied in the three vows of perpetual poverty, chastity, and obedience. Religious follow the first road to perfection by the vow of poverty, whereby they renounce all property. By the vow of chastity, whereby they renounce marriage, they enter on the second road to perfection. They set forth on the third road to perfection, by the vow of obedience, whereby they sacrifice their own will. Now these three vows well beseem the religious life. For, as St. Augustine says (lib. x. de Civitate Dei), "The word religion means, not any sort of worship, but the worship of God." And Tully says, in his Rhetorica, that "religion is a virtue, paying worship and reverence to a certain higher nature which men term the Divine nature."

             Now the worship which is due to God alone, consists in the offering of sacrifice. Such sacrifices may consist in external things, when they are given for the love of God. Thus, St. Paul says, (Hebrews xiii. 3), "Do not forget to do good and to impart; for by such sacrifices God's favour is obtained." We also offer to God the sacrifice of our own bodies, when, as St. Paul says (Gal. v. 24), "we crucify the flesh with its vices and concupiscences," or, when we obey his exhortation to the Romans (xii. 1), "Present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, pleasing, unto God." There is, again, a third and most agreeable sacrifice to God, spoken of in the 50th Psalm (v. 19), "a sacrifice to God is an afflicted spirit."

             The difference, says St. Gregory, in his Commentary on Ezechiel, between a sacrifice and a holocaust is, that, whereas every holocaust is a sacrifice, every sacrifice is not a holocaust. In a sacrifice a part of the victim was immolated; but in a holocaust the entire offering was consumed. "When, therefore, a man vows one thing to God, and does not vow another, he offers a sacrifice. When, however, he dedicates to the Almighty all that he has, all that he takes pleasure in, and his entire life, he is offering a holocaust." This he does, most perfectly, by the three religious vows. Hence, it is clear that the name of religious is strictly applied, according to the very meaning of the word, to those who pay their vows as a holocaust to God.

             According to the Levitical law the offering of sacrifice was ordained for the atonement of sin. Again, in Psalm lv., immediately after the verse, "the things you say in your hearts, be sorry for them upon your beds," we read, "offer up the sacrifice of justice," that is to say (as the Gloss explains), "perform works of justice after your lamentations of penitence." Since, then, a holocaust is a perfect sacrifice, a man who makes the religious vows, (thereby offering, of his own will, a holocaust to God), makes perfect satisfaction for his sins. Hence we see, that the religious life, is not only the perfection of charity, but likewise the perfection of penitence, since, however heinous may be the sins committed by a man, he cannot be enjoined, as a penance for them, to go into religion; for the religious state transcends all satisfaction. We see (in 33, quaest. II. cap. Admonere), that Astulplus, who had killed his wife, was advised to go into a monastery as the easiest and best course to pursue; for, if he remained in the world, a very severe penance would be imposed upon him.

             The vow which, of all the three religious vows, belongs most peculiarly to the religious life, is that of obedience. This is clear for several reasons. First, because, by obedience man sacrifices to God his own will; by chastity, on the other hand, he offers his body, and by poverty his external possessions. Now, since the body is worth more than material goods the vow of chastity is superior in merit to that of poverty, but the vow of obedience is of more value than either of the other two. Secondly, because it is by his own will that a man makes use either of his body or his goods: therefore, he who sacrifices his own will, sacrifices everything else that he has. Again, the vow of obedience is more universal than is that of either poverty or chastity, and hence it includes them both. This is the reason why Samuel preferred obedience to all other offerings and sacrifices, saying, "Obedience is better than sacrifices" (1 Kings xv. 22).