I'm reading Fray Juan de Pineda's Thirty-five Dialogues. It's very interesting so far. It's essentially a book that treats every subject under the sun in the form of a dialogue between a wise friar, a typical layman doctor, a young lad, and an old man, it's 1760 double-column pages so I don't plan on actually reading the whole thing, I use it more like a table book, skim the titles and read what sounds good or interesting. Here's an excerpt I wanted to share:
PHILOTIMUS: It is generally understood (according to common tradition) that the beginning of the world was on the twenty-fifth of March, and the Resurrection is celebrated much closer to these days than Septuagesima; most notably, when the Resurrection falls on the twenty-second of March, Septuagesima falls on the eighteenth of January, the feast of the Chair of Saint Peter in Rome. And since readings ought to be adapted to their appropriate seasons, it would seem more fitting to read the beginning of Genesis from mid-March onward, rather than at a time so distant from when the world was created.
PHILALETES: With this objection, you have compelled me to account and give reason for many matters pertaining to the divine office that is recited and sung in our Holy Mother the Roman Catholic Church; and thus I tell you, in the words of the most wise writer of Daroca, that the principal intention of the holy doctors and prelates of the Church was to string together and weave, over the course of a year, the general history of the world from its beginning to its end. That is to say, in this, the sixth age of the world, commemoration is made of the various events concerning God’s people, acting as the ultimate culmination of all the others.
Yet I also tell you that this commemoration is not meant merely to touch upon history, but rather to shape the morals of the Christian people, for the very end of God's law is to make faithful believers into servants of God, which depends upon their virtuous conduct in accordance with the divine commandments. For this reason, you must note that although all divine offices are drawn from various parts of the Holy Scriptures, their sense is not identical to that which they bear within the Scriptures themselves, but rather something quite distinct from their original scriptural context.
Whoever wishes to truly understand the mystical sense underlying the divine office of any given day must necessarily know in what sense the scriptural passages chosen for that office are employed. Many understand those words in the literal sense in which Scripture originally spoke them, failing to understand them in the sense in which the Church receives and reads them within the divine office. Few have written on this subject, and few apply themselves to it; thus, few are able to speak properly on the matter without offending the dignity and majesty of the divine office.
You must hold it as an article of faith that the Holy Spirit assists in the governance of the Catholic Church, and just as nothing was ordained for the rituals of the ѕуηαgσgυє—its sacrifices, vessels, and the instruments of the tabernacle and the temple—except by God's command, so too are the divine offices and ceremonies of the Church ordained by pontiffs inspired by God, for no one can know the will and pleasure of God unless He reveals it. And since these divine offices, alongside their chants and canticles, are ordained to praise God, to offer Him musical praise, to petition for the forgiveness of the sins of wayward Christians, and to implore grace and glory for all, it was necessary for God to reveal or inspire in the Church the words and ceremonies with which He desires to be praised, supplicated, and honored. From this, we conclude that all divine offices are of divine rather than human ordination, and that all their ceremonies, divisions, and allocations are mystical and figurative of other things concerning the salvation of souls.
With these premises established, I come directly to the point you raised: that the beginning of Genesis ought to be read in the divine office around the time of the March equinox, since the world was created at such a time. To this I say that the Holy Church and the Holy Spirit do not insert the Holy Scriptures into the divine office according to chronological order, whether first or last, nor according to the times in which those events actually occurred. To do so would be to follow the literal sense of the scriptures rather than the sense intended by the Church in its offices and divine canticles. Therefore, considering what is fitting for her and by what order and harmony, the Church selects from Scripture whatever she deems appropriate for her purpose and end, paying no heed to when or why something was said in Scripture regarding a specific time, person, or event.
PHILOTIMUS: What you have said satisfies me greatly.
Topic: Informal Book club (Read 13216 times)