718 THE MIDDLE AGES. A.D. 1294-1617.
as meaning allegorically, Adam, Eve and the light of grace or the Hebrews, (^entiles and Jesus Christ; morally, the soul, body and active intelligence; anagogically, angels, men and the vision of God. In his later years, Colet, in answer to a letter from Erasmus, who insisted upon the fecundity of meanings of Scripture texts, abandoned his former position and declared that their fecundity consisted not in their giving birth to many senses but to one only and that the truest.^ In lijs bette^^ moods, Erasmus laid stress upon the one historical sense, applying to the interpretation of the Bible the rule that is applied to other books.
After the Reformation was well on its way, the old irrational method continued to be practised and Bishop Longland, in a sermon on Prov. 9:1, 2, preached in 1525, explained the words " she hath furnished her table " to mean, that wisdom had set forth in her spiritual banquet the four courses of history, tropology, anagogy and allegory. ^ Three years later, 1528, Tyndale, the translator of the English Bible, had this to say of the mediaeval system of exegesis and the new system which sought out the literal sense of Scripture : —
The papists divide the Scripture into four senses, the literal, tropological, allegorical and anagogical. The literal sense has become nothing at all, for the pope hath taken it clean away and hath made it his possession. He hath partly locked it up with the false and counterfeited keys of his traditions, ceremonies and feigned lies. Thou shalt understand that the Scripture hath but one sense, which is the literal sense, and this literal sense is the root and ground of all and the anchor that never faileth •whereunto, if thou cleave, thou canst never err or go out of the way.^
A decided step in the direction of the new exegesis movement was made by NicolasofLyrain his Postilloe, a brief commentary on the entire Bible.* This commentator, called by
1 See Lupton, p. 104, and Seebohm, pp. 30, 124 sq., 445-447,
2 Farrar, p. 295.
8 The Obedience of a Christian Man, Parker Soc, p. 303 sq. The author of the Epp. ohscurorum virorum speaks of having listened to a lecture on poetry, in which Ovid was explained naturaliter, literaliter, historialiter et spiritnaliter. In his preface to the Pentateuch, p. 394, Tyndale said, "The Scripture hath but one simple, literal sense whose light the owls cannot abide."
* Lyra's work was printed 8 times before 1500. The ed. printed at Rome, 1471-1473, is in 5 vols.
§ 77. STUDY AND CIRCULATION OF THE BIBLE. 719
Wyclif the elaborate and skilful annotator of Scripture, — tamen copiosus et ingeniosus postillator Scripturoe^ — was born in Normandy, about 1270, and became professor in Paris where he remained till his death. He^new Greek and learned HeJ)rew from a rabbi and his knowledge of that tongue gave rise to the false rumor that he had a Jewish mother. Lyra niade a new Latin translation, commented directly on the original text and ventured at times to prefer the comments of Jewish commentators to the comments of the Fathers. As he acknowledged in his Introduction, he was much influenced by the writings of Rabbi Raschi.
Lyra's lasting merit lies in the stress he laid upon the literal sense^which he insistedTsHould alone Fe employed in establishing dogma. In practice, however, he allowed a secondary sense, the mystical or typical, but he declared that it had been put to such abuse as to have choked out — sitffocare — the literal sense. The language of Scripture must be understood in its natural sense as we would expect our words to be understood. ^ His method aided in undermining the fanciful and pernicious exegetical system of the Schoolmen who knew neither Greek nor Hebrew and prepared the way for a new period of biblical exposition. He was used not only by; Wyclif and Gerson,^ but also by:I,jiLb.er^who acknowledged his^ervices in insisting upon the literal sense,
Althougli Wyclif wrote no commentaries on books of Scripture, he gave expositions of the Lord's Prayer and the Decalogue and of many texts, which are thoroughly practical and popular. In his treatise on the Truth of Scripture, he seems at times to pronounce the discovery of the literal sense the only object of a sound exegesis.* A generation later, Gerson showed an inclination to lay stress upon the literal sense as fundamental but went no further than to say that it is to be accepted so far
^ De veritate scr. sac, I. 275. "Wyclif quotes Lyra, II. 100, etc.
2 Prol. 2. Onines presupponunt sensum lit. tanquam fundamentum, unde sicut cedificium declinans a fundamento disponitur ad ruinam expositio mystica discrepans a sensu lit. reputanda est indecens et inepta. See Reuss, p. 610.
3 Du Pin's ed., 1728, L3, etc.
* Sensus lit. scriptures est utrobique vents, De ver., I. 73, 122.