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by Pheme Perkins
from Women Priests, Arlene Swidler & Leonard
Swidler (eds.), Paulist Press 1977, pp. 156-58. Republished on our website with
the necessary permissions
Pheme Perkins received her B.A. from St. John’s College in Annapolis
and her M.A. and Ph. D. from Harvard University. She was at the time Associate
Professor of Theology at Boston College and served as Associate Editor of
the Catholic Biblical Quarterly and a member of the Editorial Board of
the Journal of Bib!ical Literature. Her publications include
articles on Gnosticism.
Methodological Prolegomenon
When
he faced the question of how Scripture was to be used in theological arguments,
St. Thomas Aquinas argued that the true sense of Scripture, quem auctor
intendit, is the literal sense, not the spiritual.(1) He goes on to insist
that nothing necessary for salvation is contained only in the spiritual sense:
nihil sub spirituali sensu continetur fidei necessarium quod scriptura per
litteralem sensum alicubi manifeste non tradit.(2) In short, the
intentio auctoris is to be discovered through literal interpretation of
Scripture and is the controlling norm for theological use of Scripture.(3)
From
a modern, literary perspective, E. Hirsch argues that the intention of the
author is the only hermeneutical principle which can give us the meaning of any
text. Unless we agree that the author’s intention controls the meaning of
a text, interpretation is subject to the individual whims and peculiarities of
the various modern “relativisms”. (4) The only reliable way of
arriving at an author’s meaning is to do the kind of patient,
historical-critical and literary analysis which has characterized the best
modern biblical scholarship. Hirsch points out that our clues to an
author’s intention are found in the use made of the linguistic and
literary conventions of that time.(5) One cannot include unconscious or
socio-cultural motivations as part of an author’s meaning if there is no
evidence in the work that he or she was aware of them .(6) These principles
apply to biblical interpretation as much as to that of any other text. Any
claim to present the literal - and hence theologically normative - meaning of
Scripture must meet them.
The Declaration’s Use of Acts 2:14
The
Declaration refers to Acts 2:14 as evidence that ministerial priesthood should
be restricted to men: “the proclamation of the fulfillment of the
prophecies in Jesus was made only by Peter and the Eleven (Acts 2:14).”(7)
It implies that the intent of Luke is to limit proclamation to men. But the
criteria for the use of Scripture in theological argument require that one show
that such a limitation is the conscious intent of the author. Unconscious
assumptions do not qualify. A very literal reading of Acts 2:14 would hardly
give such an impression. One might argue that since Peter is the only one of
the Twelve to speak, he alone can authorize proclamation. Or one might claim
that Luke mentions the other Eleven because he does not wish to exclude them.
In either case, the rest of Acts shows such an interpretation to be a dubious
reading of Luke’s intent. The Twelve and those directly commissioned by
them are not the only ones to take up proclamation, as the cases of Barnabas,
Paul and their many associates show. Although Paul does not belong to the
Twelve, his ministry is just as legitimate as theirs.
Commentators have found it impossible to identify from Acts the basis for those
who succeeded to Peter’s tasks within the Jerusalem church.(8) That
difficulty suggests that Luke did not intend to address himself to the question
of ministerial succession. Rather - as all exegetes recognize - he focuses on
Peter and Paul as the key figures in the divinely ordained spread of
Christianity from Jerusalem to Rome.(9) The Twelve have a special
eschatological role corresponding to the twelve patriarchs. No one succeeds to
that office.(10) In Acts 2:14, Luke is simply presenting Peter as spokesman and
preacher in the Jerusalem church.(11) Nothing is implied about ministerial
succession or fitness for ministerial office. Nor does the passage place limits
on who may preach the gospel, as the later descriptions of Barnabas and Paul
make clear.
Conclusion
We
can only deplore such lax methodology in an important document. St. Thomas is
surely right to insist that theologians respect the intent of the sacred
author. Luke did not intend to settle questions of ministerial succession.
Indeed, the Biblical Commission report amply demonstrates the difficulties
inherent in any claim that the New Testament can be invoked to decide the
issue. It should be clear that just as one cannot presume that an author who
does not address the question would be against the admission of women to the
ministerial priesthood, so one cannot take the author’s silence to imply
consent. What the lack of clear biblical evidence does imply - as Aquinas has
made clear - is that the issue does not involve “truth necessary for
salvation.” It is open for reflection and revision as the Spirit may
direct the Church.
Notes
1.
S.T. Ia1,10.
2.S.T. Ia1,l0 ad1.
3.
See the discussion of Aquinas in M.D. Chenu Toward Understanding St.
Thomas (Chicago: Regnery, 1964), pp. 153f.; P. E. Persson, Sacra
Doctrina: Reason and Revelation in Aquinas (Philadelphia: Fortress Press,
1970), pp. 41-90; B. Smalley, Study of the Bible in the Middle Ages
(Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame, 1964), pp. 236-42.
4.
See E. D. Hirsch, Validity in Interpretation (New Haven: Yale, 1967),
pp. 1-31; idem, The Aims of Interpretation (Chicago: University of
Chicago, 1976), pp. 74-92.
5.
Hirsch, Validity, pp. 68-126.
6.
Ibid., pp. 51-61.
7.
Declaration, par. 15.
8.
See R. Brown, K. Donfried, & J. Reumann, eds., Peter in the New
Testament (New York: Augsburg/ Paulist, 1973), pp. 55f.
9.
Ibid., pp. 40-54.
10.
Ibid., p. 40, n. 91.
11. Ibid., p. 41.
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