Private Judgement and the Assent of Faith

It doesn't matter if it's Protestant, Orthodox, or Catholic apologetics, almost everyone talks about private judgement without actually understanding it. Yet, as usual, the Catholic tradition has a keen and thoughtful way to approach this, offering an effective argument against Protestantism which is scarcely mentioned. The thesis of this article is that the Protestant notion of privately judging articles of faith is contrary to the nature of faith, for faith is a simple assent on the basis of testimony, not assent on the basis of demonstration. I understand that many Protestants reading this may initially dismiss it as just another overly skeptical argument that just claims you can't read and understand the Bible without the Catholic magisterium. But if you listen carefully to the argument being made, you'll see that this is not the claim at all. Subscribe now This article will use terminology and explanations rooted in scholastic logic, and will provide plenty of citations from the Protestant scholastics in order to show the points of agreement and disagreement. I understand this approach may not be everyone's favorite, so if you prefer a simpler version of the argument, my friend Christian Wagner made agreat videoon this which is easier to understand. This article, however, will get much more into the weeds and cite more extensively. Protestants hold that theological conclusions deduced from Scripture can be assented to by faith, as Francis Turretin says: 'Mixed syllogisms (in which one of the premises belongs to natural, the other to revealed religion) do not cease to be of faith.' Inst. of Elen. Theo., vol. 1, First Topic, q. 12, n. 16. The Anglican Richard Field explains this further, expressing the right of private judgement to individuals on articles of faith, and that believers should only assent if they see how the proposition follows from Scripture: 'Our adversaries confess that the determination of the Church may make a truth to be Catholic – so that everyone must expressly believe it – that was not Catholic before. But we think that it is not the authority of the Church, but the clear deduction from the things which we are bound expressly to believe, that makes things of that sort such that they must be particularly and distinctly known and believed, though they were not necessarily so to be believed before: and therefore, before and without such determination, men seeing clearly the deduction of things of this nature from the former, and refusing to believe them, are condemned of heresy; and men not seeing that deduction, after the decree of a Council has passed upon them, may still doubt and refuse to believe, without being heretics.' Of the Church, Bk. 4, ch. 12. To avoid being horribly misunderstood, I need to make some clarifications. The private judgement discussed here concerns articles of faith. Clearly, private judgement must be used in many areas of the spiritual life, as St. Paul says, 'Examine yourselves, whether you be in the faith,' (2 Cor 13:5) but these do not pose a contradiction. My contention is that privately judging articles of faith contradicts the nature of faith. Reading and assenting to express statements is not an act of private judgement but a simple assent of faith e.g. 'Abraham begot Isaac,' or 'our God and Savior Jesus Christ' (Titus 2:13). Private judgement concerns conclusions which deduce concepts different than what is in the statement e.g. Christ having two wills from Him having two natures, or even uniquely Lutheran or Reformed doctrines, such as how Christ is present in the Eucharist, or different conclusions regarding justification. First, there are first principles which do not require demonstration. In the sciences, the first principles of a lower science are defended by those of a higher science. Thus, the first principles of physics are affirmed without any demonstration, though they are defended by the first principles of mathematics. Furthermore, the first principles of chemistry are not defended or proven within chemistry but within physics. As Gerhard says: 'The principles of the other fields of science are not first simply as such, but first only in their own category.' Method of Theological Study, pref. Eventually, these are reduced to the highest science, metaphysics, in which we reach self-evident principles like the law of non-contradiction, which states that something cannot be and be at the same time. The formal motive or reason that we assent to these is their self-evidence and not any kind of demonstration. Thus, we see that an assent to a first principle is simple, requiring only the first two acts of the intellect: the intellect must apprehend/grasp the concept and then make an affirmative judgement without any reasoning. Science, orscientia, simply means knowledge which follows from first principles and brings out the virtuality in them by way of reasoning, producing scientific conclusions or 'demonstrations.' Usually, these take the form of syllogisms with a major and minor premise which draw out a conclusion virtually contained in the major premise as a property is contained in an essence or an effect is contained in its cause. The formal motive for affirming scientific conclusions is the demonstration since the medium of knowledge — the medium for arriving at the conclusion — is the demonstrative minor premise. As the Scottish Reformed theologian Robert Baron says: 'Faith differs from science because the foundation on which science rests (that is, the middle term of a demonstration) convinces the intellect through the evidence of the thing, by revealing its causes; whereas the foundation on which faith rests (namely, the authority of God) convinces the intellect not through the evidence of the thing to which we assent, but through its own certainty and infallibility.' Philosophia theologiae ancillans,St Andrews, 1621, Exer. Tertia, art. 3, n. 8, p. 186-87. In science, we see that the assent is not simple, for, to reach the scientific conclusion, the intellect must not only grasp/apprehend the concept and affirm it, since the concept isconceptually/virtuallydistinct from the conclusion. Here, the third act of the intellect is necessary, namely discourse, in order to reach the conclusion. An opinion is an assent to a proposition on the basis of probable arguments from fittingness. Unlike first principles andscientia, an opinion is not certain and thus reserves the possibility that an alternate position may be correct — there remains afear of error. Divine faith is an assent to a truth on the basis of God revealing, and has this very fact — 'because God has revealed it' — as its formal motive. Thus, it's essential to have some sort of testimony for faith: 'How are they to believe in him of whom they have never heard? And how are they to hear without someone preaching?And how are they to preach unless they are sent?So faith comes from hearing.' Romans 10:14-17 Faith is similar to first principles and science because it is certain, but it is dissimilar to science since it is a simple assent of the mind without discourse or demonstration. Furthermore, it is unlike first principles and science because the object affirmed is not seen but truly believed, just as St. Paul distinguishes between what is seen and faith, 'for we walk by faith, not by sight' (2 Cor 5:7). In Hebrews 11, he says that faith is 'the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen' (Heb 11:1). Thus, the French Reformed theologian Louis Le Blanc agrees here. The things 'seen' are those we know either as first principles, through the senses, or through demonstration, and these arenotheld by faith. 'The Apostle teaches in Hebrews 11 that faith is of those things which are not seen. But herethose things are said to be seenwhich fall under the senses: then, which through themselves move the intellect to the cognition of themselves and are so set before the mind that our intellect is compelled to assent to them by a certain innate splendor of truth, nor does it need the testimony of anyone for this:Such are the first principlesknown through themselves,and those things which are demonstrated by some evident reason in the sciences.Therefore,we do not properly hold by faith those thingswhich we perceive by sense, nor also those things which have been necessarily and evidentlydemonstrated to us.' Theological Theses,On Faith, n. 23-24.1 The last mode of knowledge istheology.Theology makes conclusions from articles of faith to deduce what is virtually contained in them. For example, many doctrines such as that Mary is the Mother of God, that Christ has two wills, and that the Father and the Son are consubstantial, are not formally taught in Scripture but are deduced by what Protestants call 'good and necessary consequence.' These doctrines are revealed, but not immediately so; instead, they are revealed mediately, that is, within other truths from which they must be brought out. Thus, theology is to faith what the other sciences are to first principles. First principles and articles of faith are assented to immediately; the former because of their self-evidence and the latter because of formal divine testimony — these are the formal motives for affirming these. Louis Le Blanc says: 'But Theology thus taken is related to faith as science is to understanding. For faith is the habit of principles: but Theology the habit of conclusions. The primary and principal object of faith are certain truths immediately and expressly revealed by God. But those things are properly set before Theology which are only mediately and virtually revealed, that is, which are gathered by discourse from those first things immediately revealed. Therefore, although Theology is distinguished from faith, it nevertheless presupposes faith and in a certain way includes it… the principles on which Theology rests are the express sayings and oracles of God, by which are manifested those things which could not become known except through a light higher than reason.' Theological Theses, On Theology, n. 4, 30. Catholics don't have this problem because the Magisterium's definitions convert what was revealed in the deposit only mediately and virtually into immediate revelation by defining and setting down the rule of faith for this new article in an explicit way. Thus, for example, Domingo Banez says: 'Prior to the Council's definition that there existed two wills in the Lord Christ, the following was a theological conclusion: Christ has two wills, divine and human. For from the principle of faith that Christ is a perfect man subsisting out of a rational soul and human flesh, it was evidently inferred through a valid consequence: therefore Christ has a created will. By the fact that this truth was defined in a council, the conclusion is now held as of faith immediately, and it is proposed to everyone as a truth to be believed under threat of anathema.' In2-2, q. 1, a.5. Thus, the Catholic who can demonstrate a Catholic dogma from Scripture has two mediums of knowledge for this truth: theology and faith; the former through demonstration and the latter from the testimony of the Church, which is a rule of faith and has defined such a dogma explicitly. The Protestant, on the other hand, has recourse to theology alone as the medium for knowing such a truth, since, when asked why he believes something like Christ's two wills or his specific views on baptism, he must demonstrate it from what he believes immediately in Scripture, as Le Blanc concedes above. Fr. Francisco Marín-Sola explains: 'It is possible to consider one and the same conclusion under two different aspects, and therefore to give it two spe­cifically different assents, only when that conclusion can be known by us through two specifically distinct mediums, that is to say, when it can be known by us either without reasoning or with reasoning. This happens when a truth is contained explicitly or without reasoning in one part of the deposit, and also contained virtually or with reasoning in another part of the deposit, as for instance, in the case of God's eternity. It also happens when we know a truth through the Church's definition or without reasoning, and also through theological deduction or reasoning, as in the case of the two wills in Christ.' Homogeneous Evolution of Catholic Dogma, ch. 5,§2, n. 243. As I said at the beginning of this video, this is not a hyper-skeptical argument. To conclude that it is simply because it challenges certain assumptions would be irrational. Anyone who is willing to set their emotions aside and think through the argument carefully can see that I am not arguing that the Bible cannot be understood or read for oneself. That is simply not the argument being made. As should be clear by now, the argument is not at all that you cannot understand the Bible without the Church. Obviously, every theological controversy has had theologians who held the right theological conclusion prior to the dogmatic definition of the Church, so of course it's possible for men, even Protestants, to read the Bible and make conclusions by good and necessary consequence with certainty. In fact, under the logic of this argument, a believer could possess the gift of infallibility and always arrive at the correct theological conclusion from Scripture. Yet his theology would still be infallible theology. He would simply know these conclusions through demonstration—an infallible demonstration, to be sure, but one that makes his assent rest on demonstration rather than testimony. His assent would be discursive rather than simple, as the assent of faith ought to be. We could repeat here the analogy of first principles and scientific conclusions from them; even if you could never get a scientific demonstration wrong, the conclusion does not magically become self-evident to you; your only medium of assenting to this conclusion is demonstration — the conclusion is not now a first principle. To make an exception for theological conclusions is entirely arbitrary, though obviously this must be done by Protestants within their paradigm. There are several objections that are brought forward by Protestant theologians, which I will now address. The best and most common objection to this argument is that the theological conclusion is not assented to as deduced, but by a second and distinct assent of faith on the fact that this conclusion is truly revealed, even if only implicitly. This is actually defended by Gabriel Vásquez, S.J., who affirms the Protestant notion. According to Vásquez, theological demonstration is to the theologian what the Church is to the simple layman. The Church proposes dogmas to the layman, but the theologian can give the assent of faith prior to the definition of the Church if he is certain that a truth is contained in the deposit virtually. 'Theological demonstration stands to the theologian who demonstrates just as a Council, when it declares somethingde fide, stands to the whole Church. The only difference is that the Council proposes what it defines to all for belief, so that all are bound to believe; but the theological reasoning proposes [its conclusion] only to those for whom the consequence from the articles of faith is evident. And therefore a proposition contrary to a theological conclusion is commonly called erroneous, not heretical, because it is not proposed to all as to be believed; but a proposition of Scripture, or a definition of the Church, contrary thereto is called heretical, because that is proposed to all as to be believed. Regardless, one who had an evident theological discourse from one premise of faith and another natural, or from both premises of faith, and would not believe the conclusion, would be a heretic, both because, the aforesaid supposition having been made, he was bound to believe it, and also because thereby he would not assent to some premise which is of faith.' In I, a. 2, d. 5, c. 3, n. 8. Francis Turretin argues similarly, saying that there is a two-fold assent, one theological and one by faith to the conclusion deduced through the theological: 'To apprehend the reason ([minor premise]) of a consequence is different from apprehending the [conclusion] itself. Faith apprehends the conclusion; reason the consequence/[demonstration]. And it does not follow from this that faith (by which the consequent is believed) is founded upon reason because reason is not an argument here on account of which I believe, but the instrument through which I believe. Now the instrument does not introduce into the text what was not there before, but deduces by legitimate consequences what was concealed in it. Inst. of Elen. Theo., vol. 1, First Topic, q. 12, n. 14.2 This is also the response of The Other Paul to Christian Wagner, who says that he can assent to a theological conclusion because it is truly revealed. Yet, Paul's specific objection is a misunderstanding of the argument. We are not saying that this theological conclusion isn't revealed because it's not 'express,' or that God didn't intend for it to be included in the more explicit statements; on the contrary, we agree with Protestants that theological conclusions are truly revealed, though mediately/virtually. Remember what we cited from Le Blanc above: 'The primary and principal object of faith are certain truths immediately and expressly revealed by God. But those things are properly set before Theology which areonly mediately and virtually revealed,that is, which are gathered by discourse from those first things immediately revealed.' Theological Theses, On Theology, n. 4. Again, we agree on this. This is why the Church can declare these conclusions dogma — otherwise she could not, since they would lie outside of the very deposit of faith she was entrusted to guard. Thus, if one reads through the section of examples of doctrinal development in Fr. Sola's work, in which he defends the exact argument I am now proposing, he will find that Fr. Sola says many times that virtual conclusions are revealed, contrary to the claims of The Other Paul. As one example of many, here are his words on the consubstantiality of the Son with the Father. 'The Nicene Council defined the consubstantiality of the Son with the Father as a truth of faith. That truth was and is a revealed truth, since only that which is revealed can be defined as of faith. But where and how was that truth revealed? It wasrevealed in other truths in which it is implicit and out of which it is educed through reasoning or inference.Those other truths are the two that follow: first, 'Jesus Christ is true God';second, 'in God there can be no divi­sion, but only mere unicity, of substance.'' Homogeneous Evolution of Catholic Dogma, ch. 4, § 2, n. 202. That these conclusions are truly revealed is affirmed by many earlier Thomistic commentators who defend the same position, such as John of St. Thomas. The true question is not whether theological conclusions are revealed but whether the mediately revealed, once concluded by demonstration, can be assented to as if it was immediately revealed, as Protestants claim. The fact that it is contained and truly follows from the explicit statements still does not change the fact that the medium of knowing that this truth is revealed is demonstration and not testimony. Here, we can repeat the analogy of self-evident first principles and conclusions from them. Valid scientific conclusions are, in the words of The Other Paul on theological conclusions, truly contained in their first principles, just as theological conclusions are truly contained in expressly revealed premises. If we can assent to theological conclusions by faith after we have concluded that they are contained in the immediate articles of faith, can we assent to scientific conclusions with the assent of first principles just because they are contained and deduced from true first principles? If theological conclusions can become articles of faith by demonstration, can scientific conclusions become self-evident first principles after we have demonstrated that they are contained in first principles? Obviously not! It would be completely arbitrary here to grant this for theological conclusions but not scientific conclusions. We can demonstrate the falsity of this objection even further and prove our case by showing how the strength of this assent rests on the demonstration and not entirely on testimony. Fr. Sola explains: 'Let us for a moment suppose that we have assented to the conclusion of a theological reasoning in the belief that it was fully demonstrative; then we find that the minor, which we had thought to be absolutely certain, is not so indeed, but only probable. The conclusionipso factoloses its certainty for us, and becomes only probable… Let's suppose a Council or the Pontiff defines as of faith a truth [virtually contained in the deposit.] After the definition one, several, many or even all of the preambles or reasonings of the dogmatic definition are found to be not as certain as they were believed to be, but only probable, or doubtful, or false. Is the definition, or the defined truth, thereby false, doubtful, probable, or less certain? NO.' Homogeneous Evolution of Catholic Dogma, ch. 3, § 2, n. 132-33. This is why, for example, Protestants like Redeemed Zoomer say they would still have faith in Christ if they changed their mind about the unique things they believe within their Lutheran or Presbyterian denomination. Clearly, they do not have the same certainty regarding their specifically-Reformed doctrines as they do in the divinity of Christ, since the former are deduced by demonstration and the latter is formally present in Scripture. It makes no sense to claim one has more certainty about one article than another, only to then say they are both assented to by divine faith. The second argument is that even expressly revealed truths can be described by a syllogism, therefore reasoning enters into even the seemingly simple assent of faith. This argument is also given by The Other Paul. For example, 'Major Premise: Everything God says is true. Minor Premise: God says X is true. Conclusion: Therefore X is true.' Yet, this is not actually a theological conclusion since theology makes use of what is virtually contained in the revealed truth. The syllogism given above is not properly illative but is only using improper reasoning in the minor premise to explain the major premise. Thus, when I use my senses to see a man, I can affirm immediately that I see a man without reasoning. When I use my senses to feel that I am sitting in a chair, I can affirm immediately that I am sitting in a chair. When I see the self-evidence of a first principle, I immediately assent to it because of its self-evident truth. Again, as we cited above, the Protestant Louis Le Blanc agrees that these assents are immediate: 'Those things are said to be seenwhich fall under the senses: then, whichthrough themselvesmove the intellect to the cognition of themselves and are so set before the mind that our intellect is compelled to assent to them by a certain innate splendor of truth, nor does it need the testimony of anyone for this:Such are the first principlesknown through themselves,' Theological Theses,On Faith, n. 23. Yet, by the logic of this argument, Le Blanc would be wrong since even these truths can be formed in a syllogism, like, 'Anything I see or feel exists. I see or feel this. Therefore this exists,' or, 'Every first principle is true. The law of non-contradiction is a first principle. Therefore, the law of non-contradiction is true.' These syllogisms do not prove the truths but explain some aspect of them; they are not the means by which I know the truths themselves. This is not the case with theological conclusions which actually prove something to be true and are the only means of knowing such truths which Protestants have. If The Other Paul wants to say that even explicit statements in Scripture are assented to through discourse, then he would have to say that, in metaphysics and philosophy, self-evident first principles are not actually self-evident and are not apprehended immediately but instead are demonstrated truths, which is absurd and rejected by Protestant theologians, since this would mean they actually aren't first principles. Thus, he must concede the distinction between a truly illative and demonstrative syllogism, and a merely apparent syllogism, such as 'Every first principle is true. This is a first principle. Therefore this is true.' This is explained by John of St. Thomas well: 'That syllogism is not properly probative, nor does the assent of faith rest upon it as upon its formal reason. Rather, that discourse merely explains in signified act what the certainty of faith itself does in exercised act. And such a syllogism does not prove or manifest the truth any more than if it were not posited, but the assent of faith is made immediately without it. Otherwise, in a similar manner it could be proved that first principles are known through discourse, because we can form this syllogism: 'Whatever is manifested by the light of principles is certain; but this is or is not manifested in this way; therefore it is certain.' Or: 'Whatever I see with my eyes is certain; but with my eyes I see the sun shining; therefore it is so.' These and similar examples are not probative discourses, nor do they add any distinct manifestation beyond what occurs if the thing itself is proposed without such discourse…The fact that it is proposed in the form of a syllogism does not function as a probative middle term, but merely explains, in signified act, what the proposition itself represents in exercised act.' Cursus theologici, t. 1, q. 1, d. 2, a. 4. The third big objection is given by the Reformed theologian Robert Baron, who says that theological conclusions must belong to faith because they are inevident and certain, which are properties of faith: 'For since science, taken generally, agrees with faith in firmness and certainty, and is distinguished from it by evidence alone, it must certainly be said that that habit which lacks evidence, provided certainty and firmness belong to it, is to be referred not to science but to faith. For above it was said that faith is a certain and inevident assent. Moreover, if the habit of theological conclusions deduced from Sacred Scripture is a certain and inevident habit, then it is the substance of the unseen, and therefore it is divine faith.' Philosophia theologiae ancillans,St Andrews, 1621, Exer. Tertia, art. 25, n. 3, p. 318. It is conceded that theological conclusions are inevident since they follow from inevident principles, and in that way is theology different from the other sciences. Yet, this does not help the Protestants at all, for the act of assent is not determined by the material objects or the truths themselves which enter into the assent, but by the medium of knowledge for knowing a truth. The formal object of an act is the motive for the assent, not the material object. No citation should be required for this since Protestants already affirm this; I believe this objection is just an inconsistency. As Louis Le Blanc acknowledges, although the theological conclusion is not evident in itself, since it flows from an inevident principle of faith, it still flows evidently from something else. 'Theological conclusions are not evident. And this because they are gathered from inevident principles. For faith is the habit of Theological principles. But faith is an inevident habit… But here a distinction must be made between the evidence of the consequent and of the consequence. For indeed Theological conclusions are not evident - but nevertheless the consequence by which they are deduced from their principles is evident. They are indeed gathered from inevident premises - but evidently gathered. For example, that Christ is true God and true man is a principle of faith which is not evident from itself but is believed on account of the testimony of God alone. But nevertheless from this it evidently follows that there are two wills in Christ, one divine and the other human.' Theological Theses, On Theology, n. 12, 14.3 Thus, the medium of knowledge for theological conclusions the evident demonstration rather than a medium of testimony, which is the formal motive of faith. Francis Turretin argues: 'Many things establish the use of consequences in things of faith… The example of Christ and the apostles who often used consequences; as when Christ proved against the Sadducees the resurrection of the dead from the formula of the covenant (Mt. 22:32) which says nothing expressly about the resurrection… Otherwise, how could Christ by this proof have stopped the mouths of his enemies who did not acknowledge his authority?' Inst. of Elen. Theo., vol. 1, First Topic, q. 12, n. 9. Nothing in Matthew 22 says Christ expected the Sadduccees to believe by divine faith in the Resurrection. Just because He proved it doesn't oppose us, since remember theological conclusions are still certain. Objection: Some Catholic schools like the Scotists hold to this Protestant position anyway, therefore Catholics are in the same problem.Response: The Scotist ultimately submits his mind to the teaching of the Church were she to speak definitively on this issue. The Protestant is always stuck with a theological conclusion — maybe even a true and certain one, but not faith. To conclude, I'd like to remind the reader that this argument is not claiming you can't interpret Scripture without the magisterium at all. Clear and express passages, as Louis Le Blanc says, are the principal objects of faith and are given a simple assent. If a Protestant makes a theological conclusion but later finds that Scripture teaches this explicitly, they could give the assent of faith to this conclusion since it is immediately revealed in Scripture in another location. Yet, there are many things which Protestants claim to believe but are only brought forward by good and necessary consequence, as Protestants say, and which are revealed only mediately, as not only the Thomists but also Protestants like Louis Le Blanc concede. Since the medium of knowledge, however certain and evident, is demonstration, the conclusion belongs to theology and not faith, since the latter requires testimony as the medium of knowing. St. Thomas summarizes this well: 'For it is essential to opinion that we assent to one of two opposite assertions with fear of the other, so that our adhesion is not firm: to science it is essential to have firm adhesion with intellectual vision, for science possesses certitude which results from the understanding of principles: while faith holds a middle place, for it surpasses opinion in so far as its adhesion is firm, but falls short of science in so far as it lacks vision.' Summa Theologiae,I-II, q. 67, a. 3, resp. Turretin also argues: The foundation upon which a thing rests is different from the instrument which we use for the knowledge of the thing itself. That which has a fallible foundation cannot be infallible because the effect cannot be greater in every respect than its cause. Reason here however is not the foundation, but the instrument. Although the intellect which educes consequences is fallible, it does not follow that the consequences themselves are false and uncertain. The possibility of being deceived is different from being actually deceived.' Inst. of Elen. Theo., vol. 1, First Topic, q. 12, n. 12-13. Again, this has already been refuted above, but, by this logic, one should be able to say that scientific conclusions are also self-evident since they have the foundation of first principles and that demonstration is only the instrument by which they are proven from first principles and not the foundation on which scientific conclusions rest. Protestants would deny this, so why would it be valid for theology? Similarly, Francis Turretin: 'The consequence is a work of reason (considered formally and organically) because it is elicited by reason, but not as considered originally and materially for the doctrine elicited by consequence. Thus consequences are not of faith on the part of the organ by which they are deduced (for I do not believe because I so reason, but because the word of God declares it); yet they are of faith on the part of the principle from which they are deduced (for as the premises, so must the conclusions thence be deduced).' Inst. of Elen. Theo., vol. 1, First Topic, q. 12, n. 27. Turretin here errs since the conclusions formed from some principle fall under a lower science and are assented to by a different habit, as was explained above.