Traduction Masquer
Reply to Faustus the Manichaean

95.

Should the heretics reject our exposition of those allegorical narratives, or even insist on understanding them only in a literal sense, to dispute about such a difference of understanding would be as useless as to dispute about a difference of taste. Only, the fact that the divine precepts have either a moral and religious character or a prophetic meaning must be believed, whether intelligently or not. Moreover, the figurative interpretations must all be in the interest of morality and religion. So, if the Manichaeans or any others disagree with our interpretation, or differ from us in method or in any particular opinion, suffice it that the character of the fathers whom God commends for their conduct and obedience to His precepts is vindicated on a principle which all but those inveterate in their hostility will acknowledge to be true; and that the purity and dignity of the Scriptures are maintained in reference to those passages which the enemies of the truth find fault with, where certain actions are either praised or blamed, or merely narrated for us to form a judgment of them.

Edition Masquer
Contra Faustum Manichaeum libri triginta tres

95.

Has autem rerum gestarum allegoricas narrationes si nolunt haeretici, sicut a nobis exponuntur, accipere vel etiam nihil eas, nisi quod proprie sonant, significare contendunt, non est luctandum cum hominibus, qui dicunt: Non sapit palato meo, quod sapere dicis tuo, dum tamen ea, quae divinitus praecipiuntur, aut mores pietatemque formare aut aliquid figurate significare vel credantur vel intellegantur, aut utrumque potius quam neutrum, dum tamen et ipsa, quae figurate dicta vel facta intelleguntur, ad eosdem mores bonos pietatemque referantur. p. 702,2 Ac per hoc etiam si Manichaeis vel quibusque aliis de his figuris rerum gestarum noster displicet intellectus vel ratio vel opinio, illud sufficiat, quod patres nostri, quibus deus perhibet bonae vitae atque in suis praeceptis oboedientiae testimonium, ea veritatis regula defenduntur, quae nisi pravis et distortis cordibus displicere non possit, et quod ea scriptura, cui perversitas erroris illius inimica est, in quibuslibet hominum factis, quae vel laudavit vel arguit vel tantum narrata nobis iudicanda proposuit, ipsa inculpabilis venerabilisque persistit.