Traduction Masquer
Reply to Faustus the Manichaean

88.

Little need be said of Solomon, who is spoken of in Holy Scripture in terms of the strongest disapproval and condemnation, while nothing is said of his repentance and restoration to the divine favor. Nor can I find in his lamentable fall even a symbolical connection with anything good. Perhaps the strange women he lusted after may be thought to represent the Churches chosen from among the Gentiles. This idea might have been admissible, if the women had left their gods for Solomon's sake to worship his God. But as he for their sakes offended his God and worshipped their gods, it seems impossible to think of any good meaning. Doubtless, something is typified, but it is something bad, as in the case already explained of Lot's wife and daughters. We see in Solomon a notable pre-eminence and a notable fall. Now, this good and evil which we see in him at different periods, first good and then evil, are in our day found together in the Church. What is good in Solomon represents, I think, the good members of the Church; and what was bad in him represents the bad members. Both are in one man, as the bad and the good are in the chaff and grain of one floor, or in the tares and wheat of one field. A closer inquiry into what is said of Solomon in Scripture might disclose, either to me or to others of greater learning and greater worth, some more probable interpretation. But as we are now engaged on a different subject, we must not allow this matter to break the connection of our discourse.

Edition Masquer
Contra Faustum Manichaeum libri triginta tres

88.

Iam de Salomone quid dicam, quem vehementer arguit sancta scriptura atque condemnat nihilque de paenitentia eius vel in eum indulgentia dei omnino commemorat? Nec mihi prorsus occurrit, quid saltem in allegoria boni significet haec eius flenda subversio, nisi forte quis dicat mulieres alienigenas, quarum amore exarserat, significare ecclesias electas de gentibus. p. 693, Posset hoc fortasse non absurde intellegi, si illae propter Salomonem desererent deos suos et colerent deum eius. Cum vero ipse propter illas offendit deum suum et coluit deos earum, non est, quid inde boni coniectare possimus. Nec tamen nihil arbitror significare, sed malum, sicut de uxore filiabusque Loth diximus. Apparet enim in persona huius Salomonis mira et excellentia et mira subversio. Quod igitur in illo diversis temporibus exstitit, prius bonum et posterius malum, hoc in ecclesia in isto adhuc saeculo simul uno tempore ostenditur. p. 693,26 Nam bono illius bonos ecclesiae, malo autem illius malos ecclesiae significatos puto, tamquam in unitate unius areae, sicut in illo uno homine, bonos in granis, malos in palea, ut (et ?) in unitate unius segetis bonos in tritico, malos in zizaniis. Si quid hinc sane his, quae de illo scripta sunt, diligentius pertractatis sive mihi sive hoc doctioribus atque melioribus aliud probabilius elucere potuerit, nunc tamen non eam rem ita dimisimus, ut intentionem nostram in alia properantem tamquam interrupta series contextionis impediat.