Distinction LXXXVIII

GRATIAN. Part I. Clerics, therefore, are prohibited from undertaking the affairs of cupidity, not from bestowing pious care upon widows and orphans. Hence Pope Miltiades:

The holy synod has decreed that henceforth no cleric is either to lease possessions or to involve himself in secular affairs, except on account of the care of wards, orphans, or widows, or if perhaps the bishop of the city commands him to have solicitude for ecclesiastical property. Here it is evident that secular affairs are one thing, ecclesiastical affairs another. Was Moses not in the world when he repeatedly entered the tabernacle and went out—he who within was carried away in contemplation, and without was pressed by the affairs of the weak? Thus Jacob too saw angels ascending and descending, because the rulers of the Church not only ascend by contemplation but also descend by compassion to her members below. And while priests imitate the deeds of these men, they both guard themselves and bear the burdens of their subjects.

Likewise Gelasius, [Pope, to the Bishops throughout Lucania, c. 17]. It follows that we also considered that those things which a report recently sent to us from the districts of Picenum announced were not to be passed over, namely that very many clerics apply themselves to dishonest trading and shameful gains, taking no heed through any sense of shame of the Gospel reading in which the Lord himself is declared to have expelled the merchants from the temple after beating them, nor recalling the words of the Apostle in which he says: “No one serving as a soldier of God entangles himself in secular affairs”; and dissembling with a deaf ear the Psalmist David as he sings: “Because I have not known business dealings, I will enter into the powers of the Lord.” Accordingly, let persons of this sort know either that they must henceforth abstain from unworthy gains and cease from every contrivance and cupidity of any trading, or, in whatever grade they have been placed, that they are immediately to be compelled to abstain from clerical offices, because the house of God both ought to be and to be called a house of prayer, lest through the offices of trading it be instead a den of robbers.

Likewise from the [Seventh] Canon of the Apostles. Let a bishop, priest, or deacon by no means assume secular cares; otherwise, let them be deposed.

Likewise Gregory to Romanus the Defender, [book VIII, epistle 11]. It has been brought to us that our most reverend brother Bishop Basil is occupied in secular causes just like one of the laity and unprofitably attends the law courts. Since this matter both renders him contemptible and annihilates priestly reverence, as soon as your experience receives this precept, compel him by strict execution to return, so that, with you pressing him there, he may not be permitted under any excuse to remain for five days, lest, if you permit him in any manner to remain there longer, you begin to be gravely culpable before us together with him.

Likewise from the Fourth Council of Carthage, [c. 18]. A bishop is not to undertake the guardianship of testaments.

Likewise from the same, [c. 20]. A bishop is to recall no care of household property to himself, but is to be at leisure only for reading, prayer, and the word of preaching.

Likewise from the same, [c. 17]. A bishop is to administer the governance of widows, wards, and strangers not through himself but through the archpriest or archdeacon.

Likewise Gregory to Prefect Quertinus, [epistle 30, book X]. It is unprofitable and exceedingly laborious for a learned man to assume causes involving accounts and to bind himself in them to what is not expedient.

Likewise Jerome, [to Nepotian, On the Life of Clerics]. Shun as certain plagues a cleric who is a merchant, rich from being needy and glorious from being ignoble.

Likewise Augustine, in the book Questions of the Old and New Testament, [c. 127]. Men are never permitted to fornicate, but sometimes they are permitted to engage in trade, and sometimes they are not; for before anyone is an ecclesiastic, he is permitted to engage in trade; once made one, he is not permitted.

[PALEA.

Likewise John Chrysostom, on Matthew, (that is, the author of the Incomplete Work, homily XXXVIII, on Matthew c. 21). By casting those selling and buying out of the temple, the Lord signified that a merchant can scarcely or never please God. And therefore no Christian ought to be a merchant; or, if he should wish to be one, let him be cast out of the Church of God, as the Prophet says: “Because I have not known business dealings, I will enter into the powers of the Lord.” For just as one who walks between two enemies, wishing to please both and commend himself to both, cannot be without evil speech—for it is necessary that he speak evil of this one to that one, and of that one to this one—so one who buys and sells cannot be without lying and perjury. And with a few things interposed: § 1. But their property is neither stable, nor does what is gathered from evil advance toward good. For just as, if you sift wheat or another such thing in a sieve, while it is tossed here and there all the grains gradually fall downward, and at last nothing remains in the sieve except the refuse alone, so at the end nothing remains from the property of merchants except sin alone. § 2. But all men seem to be merchants; I will therefore show who is not a merchant, so that you may understand one who is not such to be a merchant. Whoever purchases a thing not in order to sell that same thing whole and unchanged, but so that it may be material for him to work something from it, is not a merchant; but one who purchases a thing in order to profit by giving away that same thing whole and unchanged is a merchant, who is cast out of the temple of God. § 3. Hence above all merchants the usurer is more accursed; for he sells a thing given by God, not one purchased, as the merchant does, and after the interest he demands his own thing back, taking another’s things together with his own; but the merchant does not demand back the thing sold. § 4. Someone still says: Is one who leases a field so that he may receive a field-rent, or a house so that he may receive rents, not like one who gives money at usury? Far from it. First, because money is arranged for no use except buying; second, because one who has a field receives fruit from it by ploughing, and one who has a house takes from it the use of dwelling. Therefore one who leases a field or house is seen to give his own use and receive money, and in a certain way is seen to exchange gain for gain; you take no use from stored money. Third, a field or house grows old through use. But when money has been lent, it is neither diminished nor grows old. § 5. “And he overturned the tables of the money changers.” Spiritually, money is understood as men, because, just as a coin has the imprint of Caesar, so a man has the imprint of God. And just as a solidus which does not have the imprint of Caesar is rejected, so also a man who does not show the image of God in himself is judged rejected. Hence Isaiah said to Jerusalem: “Your money is rejected; your taverners mix wine with water, etc.” Therefore he overturned the tables of the money changers, signifying that in the temple of God there ought not to be coins except spiritual ones, that is, those which bear the image of God, not of the devil. Or certainly by the tables of the priestly money changers he means the Scriptures. For when the New Testament succeeded the former, their Scriptures were overturned.]

[PALEA.

Likewise from the words of Augustine, (collected from here and there and reduced to a summary, on Psalm LXX, at the verse, “Because I have not known”). “Because I have not known literature”: some codices have “business dealings”; in this the diversity of interpreters shows the sense and does not introduce error. Therefore, if this man speaks the praise of God all day for this reason, that he has not known business dealings, let Christians correct themselves and not engage in trade. But the merchant says to me: I bring goods from far away; I seek the reward of my labor, whence I may live: “the laborer is worthy of his reward.” The matter concerns lying and perjury, not business. For I lie, not the business. For I could say: I bought it for so much; I shall sell it for so much; if it pleases you, buy it. How, therefore, do you call me back from trade? All artisans lie—shoemakers and farmers. Do you wish me to desire a time of high prices, so that I may be able to sell the grain that I preserved? But good farmers, you say, do not do this, nor do good merchants do those things. What then? Is it also evil to have children because, when their head hurts, evil and unbelieving mothers seek sacrilegious amulets and incantations for them? All these are sins of men, not of things. Therefore seek, O bishop, the merchant says to me, how you are to understand the Psalmist, and do not prohibit me from trade; for trade does not make me evil, but my iniquity and my lying. Let us therefore seek the merchants who presume to glory in their own works, whether they are against that grace which this Psalmist commends, so that no one glories in his own works. And just as, against proud physicians who promise health, this saying keeps watch: “All day long your salvation,” so, against merchants glorying in their works, this saying keeps watch: “My mouth will announce your justice.” Hence the Lord also expelled from the temple those who wished to establish their own justice and were ignorant of the justice of God. Business is rightly called negotium, because it denies leisure—otium—which is evil, and does not seek the true rest which is God.]

[PALEA.

Likewise Cassiodorus, on the same Psalm LXX, at the same verse. What else is business than to wish to sell more dearly things which can be bought more cheaply? And below: Therefore those merchants are judged abominable who, giving no consideration to the justice of God, are polluted by the immoderate pursuit of money, loading their merchandise more with perjuries than with prices. Such persons the Lord cast out of the temple, saying: “Do not make the house of my Father a house of business.”]

Likewise Cyprian, [to the Clergy and People of Furni, book I, epistle 9]. Part II. Nor do those men deserve to be named at the altar of God in the prayer of the priests who have wished to call priests and ministers away from the altar. And therefore, since Victor, contrary to the form recently given by the priests in council, dared to appoint the priest Geminus Faustinus as guardian, let no offering be made among you for his falling asleep, nor let any supplication for his name be repeated in the church, so that the decree of the priests, made religiously and necessarily, may be observed by us.