Loci Theologici

Loci Theologici are the authoritative sources, witnesses, and fields of evidence from which Catholic theology receives its principles and constructs arguments in service to a reasoned understanding of the faith.

Theological status: Theological synthesis

Overview

Loci Theologici was a term applied by Melanchthon to Protestant systems of dogmatics and retained by many as late as the seventeenth century. It is also a way of ordering the strength of different sources used in Catholic theology, usually attributed to Melchor Cano, and still in use today.

The word was borrowed, as he himself says, from the usage of the classic rhetoricians, in whose works topoi or loci, denote the places or sources from which proofs are deduced. Various systematized indexes of these loci were made from the days of Aristotle, and mere formal categories, such as "person," "nature," or "fortune," were also reckoned under this head. It was the particular task of the rhetorician, however, to trace the concrete case, or "hypothesis," to the general, or "thesis." Thus were evolved loci communes, or arguments which could be applied to many specific cases. The humanistic rhetoricians frequently confused loci communes with simple loci, or general basal concepts. This was especially true of Melanchthon, as is clear from his De rhetorica libri tres (Cologne, 1519), in which he sought to train students for disputation.

Meaning and classical organization

The Latin expression means theological places or loci. It does not refer primarily to physical locations. A locus is a recognized seat of theological evidence: a source in which revealed truth is given, authoritatively interpreted, witnessed, received, or rationally illuminated. The sixteenth-century Dominican Melchior Cano gave the classic systematic treatment, distinguishing proper theological loci from auxiliary sources. Later Catholic theology has adapted the scheme while retaining its central insight that arguments must disclose where their premises come from.

Scripture and Apostolic Tradition stand at the foundation because they transmit the Word of God. The Magisterium serves that Word with authentic judgment. The faith of the whole Church, councils, the Roman Church, Fathers, scholastic theologians, liturgy, canon law, saints, and historical practice can supply differently ranked witness. Natural reason, philosophy, history, and human sciences contribute genuinely without becoming new sources of supernatural revelation.

Source, witness, and auxiliary discipline

The same item can function differently in an argument. A conciliar definition is an authoritative doctrinal act; its proceedings are historical evidence for intention and debate. A liturgical prayer witnesses worship and may embody doctrine; philology helps determine its text. A Father's writing can attest early reception and offer theological reasoning. Naming the function prevents a bibliography from being mistaken for an argument and prevents every Catholic source from receiving equal weight.

Hierarchy and convergence of loci

The loci possess a hierarchy grounded in their relation to revelation and ecclesial authority. Inspired Scripture differs from an approved theologian; dogmatic definition differs from a disciplinary canon; universal liturgical reception differs from private devotion; philosophical demonstration differs from historical probability. A source's institutional prestige also does not make every sentence within it equally authoritative. Genre, intention, subject, promulgation, and doctrinal grade must be identified.

Strong theological conclusions often arise from convergence. Scripture read in canonical unity, ancient creeds, sacramental practice, patristic consensus, conciliar judgment, ordinary episcopal teaching, and the Sensus Fidei can mutually illuminate one revealed reality. Convergence is not vote counting among independent authorities. The sources belong to the one Church and must be ordered according to the functions Christ gave them, with the Magisterium authentically judging disputes concerning the deposit.

Negative and positive use

A locus can support a conclusion positively or mark a boundary negatively. A definition may affirm a proposition; the continuous absence of an alleged doctrine from sources where it should appear may count against a historical claim; a settled dogma excludes incompatible interpretations. Arguments from silence require special caution because records and circumstances differ. The theologian should state whether evidence establishes certainty, fittingness, probability, historical plausibility, or only compatibility.

Catholic theological method

Theology begins by hearing the faith before seeking deeper understanding. It studies the Word in Scripture and Living Tradition, receives the Church's definitions, attends to worship and holiness, and employs disciplined reason. Historical-critical methods, philosophy, languages, archaeology, and social sciences can correct false premises and open new questions. They remain proportioned to their objects and cannot decide by their own methods whether God has revealed a mystery.

Ecclesial obedience does not abolish research. Donum Veritatis calls theology an indispensable vocation that examines questions rigorously within communion with the Magisterium. A theologian may distinguish levels of teaching, investigate development, identify unresolved tensions, and propose explanations. Freedom becomes Catholic theological freedom by remaining answerable to truth received in the Church, not by treating revelation as optional data to be reconstructed according to an external ideology.

Use in doctrinal articles

A sound doctrinal treatment identifies which loci support each kind of claim. Scripture and defined teaching establish dogma; canon law establishes current discipline; liturgical books establish approved worship; Fathers and historical records establish particular forms of reception; theologians offer analysis according to their reasons and standing. Making these distinctions visible in argument allows readers to recognize certainty without cluttering every sentence with an undifferentiated authority claim.

Lutheran View

Melanchthon accordingly advised them to prepare lists of all possible loci communes, and to enter under the proper rubrics (capita) any examples gathered in the course of their reading. Among theological loci communes he lists "faith," "destruction of the body," "Church," "word of God," "patience," "sin," "law," "grace," "love," and "ceremony." Elsewhere he defines loci communes as "certain general rules of living, of which men are persuaded by nature, and which I might not unjustly call the laws of nature." These two definitions, however, are not clearly distinguished and the discussion of the loci communes is consequently somewhat vague.

This criticism applies also to the loci theologici of his famous Loci communes rerum theologicarum (1521), which are primarily basal concepts appearing in the science of theology, to which all in it must be referred. He accordingly begins with his favorite list "God," "one," "triple," and "creation," and closes with "condemnation " and "beatitude." Although this list was derived from Peter Lombard, Melanchthon's treatment is not only more clear than that of his predecessor, but he draws his examples from the Bible instead of from the Church Fathers, and under Pauline influence deduces, in addition to loci communes, certain loci communissimi, such as "sin," "grace," and "law." In view of the long and powerful influence of this book, the result of his failure to give a methodical proof of his series of loci was that Lutheran dogmatics was slow in reaching inherent unity. The term loci theologici gradually came to denote the content, and thus the chief passages of the Bible as included in the individual loci.

For Lutheran theology, Melanchthon's book had the same importance which the work of Peter Lombard possessed for scholasticism. His loci were the subject of commentary as late as Leonhard Hutter, and the term loci communes came to connote any work dealing with the sum of Christian doctrine. Among the Reformed the phrase loci communes was accepted by Wolfgang Musculus (Basel, 1560), Peter Martyr (London, 1576), Johannes Maccovius (Franeker, 1639), and Daniel Chamier (Geneva, 1653). After the middle of the seventeenth century, however, with the rise of a more systematic treatment of dogmatics the term fell into disuse.

Catholic View

Melchor Cano provided a Catholic version of this in his posthumous work, De Locis theologicis (Salamanca, 1562). In this Renaissance work, Cano tried to free Catholic dogmatic theology from the vain subtleties of the schools; by returning to first principles, and by giving rules, method, co-ordination and system, to build up a scientific treatment of theology. In discussing the credibility of sources, he was one of the first to inquire into the principles of the credibility of historical documents. He argues that if all serious historians agree about a fact, then we should believe it, even if it is unlikely. Otherwise "It would be as if the Mediterranean peoples were to deny the existence of the ocean... or if, indeed, we should mock at him who speaks of elephants." Cano lists 10 Loci theologici: Seven proper to theology: (1) Sacred Scripture,(2) apostolic traditions, (3) the universal Church, (4) Church councils, (5) the papal magisterium, (6) Church Fathers, and (7) theologians and canonists; and three borrowed by theology: (8) natural reason, (9) philosophers and jurists, and (10) history and human tradition.

See also

• Loci Communes
• Lutheran scholasticism

From the 1913 Catholic Encyclopedia

Loci Theologici or loci communes, are the common topics of discussion in theology. As theology is the science which places in the light of reason the truths revealed by God, its topics are, strictly speaking, coextensive with the whole content of revelation. Usage, however, and circumstance have restricted the loci to narrower but ill-defined limits. Melanchthon, the theologian of Lutheran Germany, published in 1521 "Hypotyposes theologicæ seu loci communes", a presentation of the chief Christian doctrines drawn from the Bible as the only rule of faith. His avowed intention was to improve on similar works by John Damascene and Peter Lombard. Leaving aside undisputed dogmas which do not bear directly on the salvation of man, he expounds with scanty commentary, or none at all, the state of fallen man, free-will, sin, the law of God, the law of man, the Gospel, the power of the Law and the power of the Gospel, grace, justification, faith, hope, and charity, the difference between the Old and New Testament, the abolition of the Law through the Gospel, the sacraments of Baptism, Penance, and the Eucharist, authority, and scandal. Melanchthon's "Loci" became the textbook for Lutheran theology and the author has rightly been styled the prœceptor Germaniœ. Like Peter Lombard, he had his imitators and commentators, who formed a goodly body of Protestant Schoolmen. The greatest work of this kind is "Loci communes theologici", by John Gerard, professor at Jena, published in nine volumes (1610-1622); it is the greatest and also the last. After Gerard the loci theology gives place to systematic theology; the unconnected exposition of "topics" in the light of the Bible gradually disappears. On the Catholic side Melanchthon's" Loci" were countered by the "Enchiridion locorum communium" of Johann Eck (q. v.), which between 1525 and 1576 ran through forty-five editions. It was dedicated to Henry VIII of England. The topics which Eck expounds and defends against the Reformers are: the Church and her authority, the councils, the primacy of the Apostolic See, Holy Scripture, faith and works, confirmation, ordination, confession, communion under both kinds, matrimony, extreme unction, human laws, feasts, fasts, the worship of saints and their images, the Mass, vows, clerical celibacy, cardinals and legates, excommunication, wars against the Turks, immunities and temporalities of the Church, indulgences, purgatory, annates, the burning of heretics, discussion with heretics, and infant baptism. Other Catholic writers followed on the track of the Ingolstadt professor; e. g. Franciscus Orantes (died 1584), Konrad Kling (died 1566), Joseph V. Zambaldi (died 1722), and Cardinal Bellarmine (q. v.), whose "Disputationes de controversiis fidei" (1581-92) are still the chief arsenal and stronghold of Catholic controversy. But, whilst Protestants concentrated their best theological effort on the loci, Catholics soon returned to the systematic methods of the older Summœ.

Cano (died 1560) applied the term loci theologici to a treatise on the fundamental principles or sources of theological science. On the threshold of every science there stands a complex of preliminary principles, postulates, and questions, which must be elucidated before progress is possible. Some are common to all sciences, some are peculiar to each. Before Cano the questions preliminary to theology had never been treated as a science apart, general dialectics being deemed a sufficient introduction. Cano observes that the "Queen of sciences" draws its arguments and proofs chiefly from authority, and only calls in reason as the handmaid of faith. Accordingly he sets up ten loci - sources of theology - without, however, pretending to limit them to that number. They are: the authority of Holy Scripture, of Catholic tradition, of general councils, of the Roman Church, of the Fathers, of the Schoolmen; natural reason, the authority of philosophers and doctors in civil law, and the authority of history. The first seven are the proper places in which theology moves, the last three are useful auxiliaries. Melchior Cano's work gave a new turn to theological teaching. Much that before his time had been taken for granted, or, at best, only loosely investigated, became the favourite theme of the schools. The foundations of theology, which had lain embedded in the Christian mind, were laid bare, examined, strengthened, and rendered safe both for the believer inside the Church and against the foe without. The scientific method which takes nothing for granted, but investigates and probes to the very root every item of knowledge, is not a thing of yesterday, much less a child of anti-Catholic tendencies: Bishop Melchior Cano introduced it as the best weapon of offence and defence in religious warfare. The "Loci theologici" was first published in 1563, three years after the author's death, by the Grand Inquisitor Valdes. Twenty-six editions followed the first: eight in Spain, nine in Italy, seven in Germany, and two in France. Numerous writers during the following centuries produced works on the same lines: Seraphimus Ractius (Razzi) (died 1613), Petrus de Lorca (died 1606), Dominicus a S. Trinitate (died 1687), Ch. du Plessis d'Argentrée (died 1740), Franciscus Kranz, and many more. Gradually the subject-matter of the loci entered the body of theology under the title of "Prolegomena", general dogmatics, fundamental theology, or apologetics. In "A Manual of Catholic Theology", by Wilhelm and Scannell (London, 1906), the loci are treated in the first book under the following headings: the sources of theological knowledge; Divine revelation; transmission of revelation; the Apostolic deposit of revelation; ecclesiastical traditions; the rule of faith; faith; faith and understanding.

The necessity of meeting attacks on the Faith at the precise point on which they are directed has, of recent years, led to a modification in apologetic methods. Existing textbooks draw their proofs from Scripture, tradition and, when possible, from reason. The authority of these loci, or sources, having been previously proved, the demonstration is considered complete. But since evolutionism has taken hold of the modern mind and filled it with a never-satisfied desire to know the origin and the growth of all things in the realms of nature and of mind, the loci themselves have been submitted to fierce criticism by men who will be convinced by nothing but facts and experiments. They proceed by the positive, or historical, method which eliminates all supernatural factors, and retains only the bare facts linked together in an unbroken chain of causes and effects. The Bible to them is no longer the Word of God, but a mere collection of documents of various merit; the Church is an institution of human origin. It must be confessed that the historical method is fraught with danger even to those who use it in defence of the Church. The danger is real but so is the necessity of facing it, for it is useless to argue from authority with men who acknowledge no authority. What is wanted is that the Catholic apologist keep a steady eye on the landmarks fixed by the Church, and deviate neither to the right nor to the left. With that precaution, the historical method is likely to become an abundant source of light and understanding on points of doctrine and discipline hitherto viewed out of their historical frame and in a borrowed light. Thus the discovery of the Didache (q. v.) has been a revelation which has upset many fond calculations, and the excavations in Palestine, Assyria, Egypt, and other places, where they bear on Bible history, have done more good than harm to the traditional views. The French are at the present day the pioneers of the historical treatment of dogma; one need only point to the splendid series of "Studies in the History of Dogmas" published by Lecoffre in Paris.

WERNER, Gesch. d. apolog. u. polem. Literatur (Ratisbon, 1889); GASS, Gesch. d. prot. Dogmatik (1854); HEPPE, Dogmatik d. deutschen Protestantismus (Gotha, 1857); SCHMID in Kirchenlex., s. v.; HURTER, Nomenclator; see also bibliography under APOLOGETICS and THEOLOGY.