Original Douay–Rheims AnnotationsHebrews 11

Faith is.

^◦ By this description of faith, and by all the commendation thereof through the whole chapter, you may well perceive that the Apostle knew not the forged special faith of the Protestants, whereby every one of these new Sectmasters & their followers believe their sins are remitted, and that themselves shall be saved, though their sects be clean contrary one to another.

• ◦ Not only or a special faith.

Not appearing.

^◦ This is the praise of faith, saith S. Augustine, if that which is believed, be not seen. For what great thing is it, if that be believed, which is seen? According to that sentence of our Lord when he rebuked his disciple, saying: Because thou has seen me Thomas, thou hast believed: blessed are they that have not seen and have believed. Aug. in evang. Io. tract. 79. Which may be a rebuke also and a check to all those faithless speeches, I would see him, taste him, touch him and feel his very flesh in the Sacrament, otherwise I will not believe.

• ◦ Faith is of things not seen: as in the B. Sacrament.

He that cometh.

^◦ Faith is the foundation and ground of all other virtues and worship of God, without which no man can please God. Therefore if one be a Jew, a Heathen, or an heretic, that is to say, be without the Catholic faith, all his works shall profit him no whit to salvation.

• ◦ Nothing profitable or meritorious without faith.

Adored the top of his rod.

^[1] The learned may see here that the Apostle doth not tie himself to the Hebrew in the place of Genesis ^[2] whence it is alleged, but followeth the Septuaginta, though it differ from the Hebrew, as also the other Apostles and Evangelists and our Saviour himself did: neither were they curious (as men now a days) to examine all by the Hebrew only, because they writing and speaking by the Holy Ghost, knew very well that this translation ^[3] is the sense of the Holy Ghost also, and as true, and as directly intended as the other: and therefore also that translation continued always authentical in the Greek Church, notwithstanding the diversity thereof from the Hebrew. Even so we that be Catholics, follow with all the Latin fathers the authentical ^[4] Latin translation, though it be not always agreeable to the Hebrew or Greek that now is. But Calvin is not only very saucy, but very ignorant, when he saith that the Septuaginta were deceived, and yet that the Apostle without curiosity was content to follow them: because it is evident, that ^[5] the Hebrew being then without points, ^[6] might be translated the one way as well as the other. Which they understood so well (and therefore were not deceived) that within three lines after, in the beginning of the next chapter, they translate the same word, as he would have it in this place.

• 1 The citations in the new Testament, not only according to the Hebrew, but to the Septuaginta.
• 2 Gen. 47. v. 31.
• 3 * Aug. de civ. Dei li. 15. c. 14.
• 4 The vulgar Latin translation.
• 5 מטה
• 6 * ῥάβδος, rod. κλίνη, bed.

^[1]

Again observe in those words, He adored the top of his rod, that adoration (as the Scripture useth this word) may be done to creatures, or to God at and before a creature: as, at or ^[2] before the Ark of the Testament in old time, now at or before the crucifix, relics, images: and in the Psalms 98. 131. Adore ye his footstool. Adore ye toward his holy mount. We will adore toward the place where his feet stood: or (which by the Hebrew phrase is all one) Adore ye his holy mount. We will adore the place where his feet stood. as also ^[3] the Greek Fathers, S. Damascene li. 1. de imaginibus, and Leontius cited of him, yea S. Chrysostom also do handle these places, and namely that of the Apostle which we now speak of, interpreting the Greek as our Latin hath, and as we do, He adored the rod or the top of his rod, that is, the sceptre of Joseph now Prince of Ægypt, so fulfilling Joseph's dreams which foretold the same Gen. 37: and withal signifying as it were by this prophetical fact, ^[4] the kingdom of Israel or of the ten tribes that was to come of Joseph by Ephraim his younger son in the first king Jeroboam, thus the Greek Fathers. Whereunto may be added, that all this was done in type and figure of Christ's sceptre and kingdom, whom he adored by and in his Cross, as he did Joseph by or in his rod and sceptre: and therefore the Apostle saith, he did it by faith, as having respect toward things to come. By all which it is evident, that it is false which the Calvinists teach, that we may not adore image, crucifix, or any visible creature, that is, we may not adore God at or by such creatures, nor kneel before them: and therefore their ^[5] corrupt translation of this place for the same purpose is intolerable, saying thus, (Leaning) upon his staff he adored (God). adding no less than two words more than is in the Greek. Which though it might be the sense of the place, and S. Augustine so expoundeth it, yet they should not make his exposition the text of holy Scripture, specially whereas he only of all the ancient Fathers (as Beza confesseth) so expoundeth it.

• 1 Adoration of creatures, and namely of holy things.
• 2 * Ios. 7, 6.
• 3 * Oecum. in Collect.
• 4 * 3. Reg. 11, 12.
• 5 Corrupt translation against Dulia.

Wrought justice.

^[1] Men are not just by belief only, as the Protestants affirm, but by working justice. And we may note that in all this long commendation of faith in the Fathers and holy persons, their good works are also specially recounted, as Rahab's harbouring the spies, Abraham's offering his son (which their works S. James ^[2] doth inculcate:) Noe's making the Ark Gen. 6. Abel's better oblation than Cain's Gen. 4. & Hebr. 11. v. 4. and so forth. Therefore S. Clement Alexandrinus saith ^[3], that the said persons and others were just by faith and obedience by faith and hospitality, by faith and patience, by faith and humility.

^◦ The Apostle's purpose then is nothing else, but to prove to the Hebrews (who made so great account of their Patriarchs and forefathers and their famous acts) that all these glorious personages and their works were commendable and acceptable only through the faith they had of Christ, without which faith none of all their lives and works should have profited them any whit: the Gentiles doing many noble acts (as Heretics may also do) which are of no estimation before God, because they lack faith. And that is the scope of S. Paul's Epistle to the Romans, and of all other passages where he commendeth faith: further proving specially in this Epistle to the Hebrews, that all their sacrifices were nothing else but figures and attestations of the Christian faith in Christ and his death. All which high resolution & conclusion against the Jews and Gentiles, that the Christian faith is the true faith & religion, the Heretics of our time ignorantly and brutishly abuse against Christian works, sacrifice, and Sacraments, which the Apostle meant specially to commend and establish by his high commendation of the faith in Christ.

• 1 Not faith only.
• 2 Iac. 2.
• 3 Li. 4. Stro. pag. 240.
• ◦ No works of the Patriarchs or any other profitable, but by their faith in Christ: Which is always the Apostle's meaning in commending faith.

Without us should not.

^◦ The Fathers before Christ could not be accomplished, that is, not admitted to the heavenly joys, vision, and fruition of God, till the Apostles and other of the new law were associate to them, and the way to everlasting glory opened by our Lord's death and Ascension. Neither shall either they or we be fully perfected in glory both of body and soul, till the general resurrection: God's providence being so, that we should not one be consummated without another, all being of one faith, and redeemed by one Lord Christ.

• ◦ The Patriarchs and other just not in heaven before Christ.