Girolamo Zanchi on Human Law, Part 3

Girolamo Zanchi

ZANCHI CONCLUDES HIS TREATMENT on the relationship between human or political law and the natural law by addressing the issue of the construction or enforcement of human law, and by pointing out two significant distinctions between human law and the natural law.

With respect to the first issue, Zanchi insists that the natural law has a role in the application of human law in certain situations where the law--if enforced according to the letter--results in injustice. His reasoning as as follows.

Human laws, that is, positive laws of the State, have as their aim the promotion of the common good. On occasion, however, enforcement of the letter of this law may actually result in "the ruin of those people for whose sake it was enacted," thus contradicting its purpose. There are therefore instances where the "letter of the law" should not be followed; rather, the "purpose of the law and the spirit of the law-giver must be examined and followed." This appears to be an application by Zanchi of the legal maxim salus populi suprema lex est, the welfare of the people is the supreme law, a principle as old as the Roman Twelve Tables (Compare Cicero, De Legibus, 3.3.8 ("ollis salus populi suprema lex esto")

As an example of such an instance, Zanchi supposes a human law that provides that no person is allowed to open the city gates if the city is being besieged. Obviously, this law is unobjectionable from a general perspective, and it seeks to protect the citizens and promote the common good when the city is under seige by preventing the city from being occupied by enemy force. Thus, this law would derive from the natural law.

Zanchi then posits the situation where the city is under seige, and the city's army is outside the walls engaged in battle with the opposing army. The city's army retreats and seeks entry into the safety of the very city which they are defending. If the letter of the law is obeyed in this circumstance, the city's army will be slaughtered and without its army the city will ultimately be captured, defeating the law's purpose and the natural law. "[W]ho does not see that in such a case the city gates must be opened despite the letter of the law . . . .?" (345) Clearly, the letter of the law ought not to be followed in such and similar instances, but the purpose of the law, the intent of the legislator, and the natural law override the law's letter.

Justinian's Codex recognized this principle (1.14.5): "There is no doubt that he violates the law, who, adhering to its letter, violates its spirit . . . ." (Non dubium est in legem committere eum, qui verba legis amplexus contra legis nititur voluntatem . . . .). Similarly, this principle is carried forward in the teaching of the Church fathers and ecclesiastics, and applies in the context of divine law as well as human law. "Some law-followers," Zanchi states, "have actually sinned against the will of God" even when externally obeying the letter of the divine law itself because they act against its principle, its spirit. As examples of this, Zanchi cites the various encounters between Jesus and the Pharisees and Scribes related in the Gospel. These are examples where the letter of the law and the spirit of the law conflict. Thus, plucking heads of grain on the Sabbath did not violate the divine injunction to keep the Sabbath day holy (Mark 2:23-28; Matt. 12:1-7), nor did curing a man on the Sabbath (Matt.12:9-14), since they conformed to the purpose of the law, and the enforcement of the letter of the law contradicted its purpose.

Zanchi thus concludes:

Laws are enacted from natural law for the common good and the welfare of human beings, and only for as long as they do so do they have the power to obligate. If, therefore, it should happen that by sticking to the letter of the law, we act against the welfare of human beings, we have acted more against the law than in accordance with it.

(346) However, Zanchi cautions that this principle is not to be used without some restriction. The power to determine in the first instance when enforcement of the letter of the law violates the natural law--and therefore ought not to be obeyed--is with the authorities, assuming that they may coveniently be available. "When, however," the authorities "cannot be easily consulted and there is a danger in delay, and the case of the law is clear to each person," then in such instance "it is appropriate for the person involved, to whom the responsibility falls, or on whom the burden of the State is conferred," when the purpose "of the law is lost, to follow his own interpretation of the law." (346)

Zanchi completes his treatment of human laws by pointing out two fundamental distinctions between the human law and the natural law. The first is that, while human law changes, the natural law does not and cannot. The second difference is that human law only governs external acts, whereas the natural law covers both external and internal acts. He explores those two issues.

First, Zanchi observes that the natural law is unchanging, whereas human law changes depending on the contingencies of time, place, and personality. For this reason, there may be disagreement between human law and natural law. The natural law cannot change for the very simple reason that it "is simply certain, general eternal aspects of God's will, the revelation of the rule for doing and avoiding, written on the hearts of human beings." (347) Human laws, on the other hand, "cannot be eternal and unchangeable because their circumstances," in terms of "place, time, and personality" vary. (347) This distinction between the two is what makes St. Augustine state in his De libero arbitrio (On Free Will) [1.6.14.48] that temporary laws may be suspended for a time (Appellemus ergo istam legem, si placet, temporalem, quae quamquam iusta sit, commutari tamen per tempora iuste potest.)

It follows that human laws must change to conform to the natural law. Human law must therefore change in two situations. First, the development in human reason, as a community advances from relative imperfection to relative greater perfection, demands that the human law be adapted to reason's development. Laws ought to reflect the same development one sees in philosophy or other sciences. Second, differences and varieties in people, communities, or States require different laws adapted to their specific situations. As an example of how the state of a people affects laws, Zanchi again refers to St. Augustine. If a people is virtuous, it may be acceptable for them to elect their own magistrates. However, if the people become depraved, then allowing them to elect their own magistrates may result in the election of criminals, and so the law allowing for participatory elections should be changed. (De Libero Arbitrio, 1.6.14.45-46)

[Zanchi then applies this principle to the Church, and gives as an unfortunate example the selection of ministers; however, here he displays the prejudice of the Reformers which fails to give sufficient deference to the teachings of Christ on Church governance and its constitution.]

How, then, can human laws change, but the natural law not change?

The response to this . . . is quite simple: Anything that human laws retain from natural law cannot be changed, but anything that differs from it because of the particular circumstances and that impedes the public good more than it advances it must be changed. In addition, human laws by their own nature have their own individual circumstances. Thus, because circumstances change, it follows that the [human] law can change entirely too. Still, natural law maintains its general principles without any particular circumstances. Thus, it remains immutable.

(348) The second big difference between the natural law and human law is that the natural law is broader, more extensive than human law. The natural law "prohibits all vices and crimes, in general, both internal and external ones." Thus, the natural law "regulates not only external worship but also internal worship." (348) Likewise, the natural law, in particular the "Golden Rule," prohibits not only external injury to our neighbor, but internal injuries, such as nursing hatred and envy. "Love is commanded," by the natural law, "because we, ourselves, want to be loved."

In contradistinction with the natural law which governs both external and internal fora, human or political laws only relate to "external crimes" and "external duties." (349) Human laws do not reach into the inner part of man. The reason for this is that human laws have limited scope and purpose. Since human or political laws look only toward promoting the common good, they do not look at the private good of an individual except perhaps accidentally.

Moreover, even in externals, human law is limited. There is a prudential aspect in human law that is absent in the natural law. Human laws simply cannot prohibit every external wrong without resulting in greater harm to the common good. Human laws can only prohibit those wrongs that prudently can be prevented. Where something cannot be prevented, either as a result of human nature, custom, or the people's wishes, human law ought not be applied because it would be vain and fruitless or would result in greater harm. Thus Proverbs 30:33: "Pressing the nose produces blood" (qui vehementer emungitur elicit sanguinem). Zanchi suggests that Christ recognized this principle when, as related in Matthew 9:17, he says that if new wine is put into old wineskins, the old wineskins will burst and the wine will be lost. The new wine represents "harsher and stronger ideas," and if people are not ready for them "the people will fall from bad to worse and become more corrupt" by trying to hoist these ideas upon them. Thus, human or political law requires prudent and wise application. This element of human laws gives rise to one of the more important principles of human legislation: "It is essential that the laws be possible. By possible I mean, in accordance with both nature and the customs of the people." (349).

In conclusion, Zanchi's treatment of the natural law is substantially more traditional and classical than Calvin's treatment, though it appears more influenced by the Protestant Reformers' ideas than Vermigli, whose doctrines were reviewed in earlier posts on this blog. Zanchi's treatment, however, is much more complete and methodical than Calvin's and Vermigli's treatment of the natural law. Zanchi, nevertheless, does provide some basis for a Protestant tradition of the natural law, a tradition that, as we discussed in earlier blogs, Karl Barth vehemently, and perhaps--applying strictly the underlying principles of the Reformer's theology--logically rejected.

Doctrines of the natural law will invariably be affected by one's theological or philosophical presuppositions. Theological error will often find outlet in a false view of the natural law. Thus, for example, Calvin's theological error with respect to the depravity of man marred his view of natural law. A fortiori, Barth's theological error entirely blinded him to the continuing validity of the natural law. Similarly, one's philosophical presuppositions can affect one's doctrine of the natural law. Thus, someone with a nominalist or materialist, mechanistic philosophy (as distinguished from someone with a realist philosophy or a philosophy open to the existence of God) will be seriously hampered in his ability to grasp the possibilty eternal or natural law. Theological and philosophical traditions, in addition to our own culture's customs and our own internal passions and vices, can render our vision astigmatic, myopic, hyperopic . . . indeed, can make us even blind to the fullness of the eternal and the natural law, just as it can blind us to the Gospel.

Girolamo Zanchi on Human Law, Part 2

Girolamo Zanchi

ZANCHI MAINTAINS THAT ALL HUMAN LAWS originate, at least with regard to their essence, from the natural law. Zanchi distinguishes between the command and the punishment or sanction of the law. The command in a human law is a conclusion derived from a principle of natural law. As an example, Zanchi observes that laws against murder, adultery, perjury, etc. are conclusions based upon the general principle of the natural law that one should not do to another what he does not want done to himself. Thus the essence of human law, with respect to its content or command component, is the natural law.

On the other hand, Zanchi asserts that the punishment or sanction associated with a law's breach is not derived the natural-law, other than perhaps its general principle that someone who sins ought to be punished and the commonly-held notion that murder should be punished by execution. With respect to specific punishments associated with a law's breach, the justice and fairness ought to be applied to match the severity of the crime. "Thus, it is appropriate, according to natural law," Zanchi concludes, "that sin be punished, but should one sin--murder perhaps--be punished by the sword, and another--petty theft perhaps--be punished by a decision of the law-makers" is a matter for human law.

Zanchi maintains as one of his theses that whenever human law conflicts with, or contradicts, the natural law, the human law is overturned and is unworthy of the name of law.

The reason for this is clear. If natural law is indeed the measure for human laws, then it is also the rule for human actions. Therefore, just as every action that does not agree with natural law is sinful, so, too, is every human law . . . .For this reason, Augustine rightly, in his On Free Will, claimed that a law that is not just should not be called so, and it is not just if it does not agree with natural law.

(340 [Note: The ellipses show where I have left off Zanchi's diatribe against the papacy and celibacy, a diatribe which displays an ignorance, or at least a disdain of, the evangelical counsels preached by Christ himself, and so is unworthy of publication in this blog dedicated to the Lord.])

Zanchi adds that because laws are essentially geared to the glory of God and the common good of men, those laws that contradict those aims are essentially unworthy to be called laws. (340) Zanchi endorses the discussion of Gratian's Decretum (4.2) about the qualities of good laws.

Erit autem lex honesta, iusta, possibilis, secundum naturam, secundum consuetudinem patriae, loco temporique conveniens, necessaria, utilis, manifesta quoque, ne aliquid per obscuritatem inconveniens contineat, nullo privato commodo, sed pro communi utilitate civium conscripta.

Good laws, then, should correspond with religion, should be consonant with the Faith, and ought to improve the life and "safety" of men. Conversely, political laws ought not do battle against the right worship of God, good customs, or detract from human safety or the public good.

For this reason, Zanchi believes it obvious that--to the extent that political laws are derived from the natural law--political laws are just and "do not contain less of God's will than do the other laws," that is natural law and divine law. (341) It is this feature that St. Paul recognizes in his epistle to the Romans (13:1): "Let every person be subject to the governing authorities." It is what Christ intended when he taught that we should render to Caesar that which was Caesar's (Matt. 22:21). In a similar vein, St. Peter in his first epistle enjoins the faithful to "accept the authority of every human institution (or ordinances)," "for the Lord's sake." (1 Pet. 2:13)

If this is the will of God that we be subject to our governing authorities, then we cannot resist those things that do not oppose God's will. . . . . So says the apostle Paul . . . in Romans 13, he said first that the magistrates were those who had received the sword from him and he later adds: "Therefore one must be subject, not only because of wrath but also because of conscience." [Rom. 13:2, 5] Why because of conscience? Because the magistrates hold the law over our conscience? Not at all. James 4 reads, "There is, in fact, one lawmaker." No, it is because the one who orders us to obey our magistrates is the law's authority and conqueror. He holds the law over our conscience.

(341) So Zanchi insists that human or political laws, if not contrary to the natural law or divine law, that is, if they are just, are binding in conscience upon the faithful. They are binding on the faithful through the natural law (and through the fact that they are derived from it), and through the divine law as revealed in the apostolic and the Lord's teaching.

Human laws can be unjust in two ways. First, laws are unjust if the one promulgating the law has no authority. (342) But even if the law is issued by one in authority, if it is ordered against the common good, and for the ruler's good or pleasure, then it remains unjust. A law that demands what is impossible is equally unjust. Laws are unjust if they fail in these things even if they do not go against an express injunction of divine law or contradict God's glory. The second way a law can be unjust is if the law opposes God or his divine law. "Whichever way they become unjust," Zanchi teaches, "unjust laws do not obligate our consciences, because God does not bind our conscience to unjust laws." (342) Zanchi properly observes that laws that may be unjust under the first category (but do not contradict divine law), and therefore do not bind in conscience, may still be obeyed at the discretion of the subject, provided that following it "does not keep us from loving our neighbor or avoiding all crimes." This is suggested by Matthew 5:41, where Christ teaches that if someone forces you to go one mile, go also a second mile.

If laws are unjust because they contradict divine law, however, they can be in no wise be obeyed. Since such laws "force us to do something contrary to God's glory," or something "that opposes his law," the proper response is to resist them. (342) This is the meaning of St. Peter as reflected in Acts 5:29: "We must obey God rather than men." It is likewise the teaching of St. Thomas, who states in his Summa (IaIIae, art. 96, 5):

If laws are unjust through their contradiction to the divine good as are the law of tyrants in leading people to idolatry or to anything else that is contrary to divine law, it is right to resist such laws in any way because this was said in Acts 5: It is better to obey God than man.

All this gives rise to two ways that one may sin with regard to law. First, by failing to obey the just laws of the magistrates. Second, by failing to refrain from obeying unjust laws that contradict God's law.

Zanchi then asks the question forced upon him by his Protestant sola gratia concept that suggests that a Christian is freed from law. "But, how should, or even could, every heart be subject to human laws," Zanchi queries, "when the just have been freed from the law and the law is not profitable for the just?" (343) In responding to this quandary, Zanchi suggests that the law has two functions. First, it has a pedagogical role in teaching what is to be done, and what is to be avoided. Second, the law is a "rule for actions" which obliges and urges those subject to the law to obedience. This bifurcated function of the law results in a two-fold subjection to the law, depending upon whether one is wicked or one is just. The wicked are subject to the law "by compulsion through force and obligation." The just or good, on the other hand, are subject to the law "voluntarily through the training and regulation of one's own actions." Those who "love the law" and "run to it by themselves" therefore do so not by force, but by their own accord and desire for obedience. The law, according to 1 Timothy 1:9, "is laid down not for the innocent but the the lawless." The innocent do not need the law because they "do what is included in the law" since "they have it written in their hearts." (343)

Zanchi then addresses the issue of why people should be bound by the law if the king is not subject to his own law. Zanchi acknowledges that kings are not subject to their own laws by means of compulsion, but neither do they have greater power than God, who ultimately judges them. But they are not really greater than their own laws, though they can alter or enact law by decision, because the purpose of the law is to benefit the State. The king, in any event, cannot be said to be entirely released from the rule of law:

[S]ince the law is the rule for good actions, princes are not released from their own laws as far as the public good is concerned. Instead, they must subject themselves to them by their own decision, and good princes ought to subject themselves willingly to them.

The greater king, one who is virtuous, is the king who subjects himself to the law. This is suggested by both Justinian in his Codex (1.14.4) ["for a sovereign to submit himself to the laws, is in fact a greater thing than imperial power" (Et re vera maius imperio est submittere legibus principatum.)] and by Gratian in his Decretum (9.2) [(Principes tenentur et ipsi vivere legibus suis . . . . Iusta est enim vocis eorum auctoritas, siquod populis prohibent, sibi licere non patiantur")] But this is all relative to the political or human law. The king has no such liberty or right to voluntarily compliance with respect to natural or divine law:

It is also certain that princes, as far as God's judgment is concerned, are not released from just laws that are derived from natural law and ordained for the public good whether from a higher power or from the princes themselves, becuas they ought to promote the public good themselves.

(344) "Therefore," Zanchi concludes this section, "after our first examination of all good laws with God as their source, we are bound by conscience to obey just political laws."

In the next blog post we will wrap up our review of Zanchi's analysis of human or political law and its relationship to natural law and divine law.

Justice as Suum Cuique: The Devil Knows Latin

The Gate at Buchenwald Concentration Camp

SUUM CUIQUE, the Latin phrase for "to each his own," is a traditionally received short definition, a maxim as it were, of justice. The Institutes of Justinian define the precepts of the law as "honeste vivere, alterum non laedere, suum cuique tribuere,"that is, "to live honestly, not to injure another, and to give each one that which belongs to him." (Inst. 1.1.3) Indeed, the Institutes of Justinian define Justice itself as "constans et perpetua voluntas jus suum cuique tribuens," the "constant and perpetual desire to give to each person his due." Justinian's definition was not novel, but traditional; it had roots in received wisdom, and as such participates in the beauty of the ancients. Cicero is quoted as stating in his Tusculan Disputations (V.22[63]), suum cuique pulchrum est, "to each his own is beautiful." Though Cicero's meaning in his Tusculan Disputations is not that justice is beautiful, but that each person's performance is beautiful to himself, it remains true that justice is beautiful, and he would have been the first to acknowledge it. Cicero does, in fact, use the term suum cuique as a definition of justice in his De Natura Deorum (III.38) [justitia suum cuique distribuit, "justice renders everyone his due"] and in his De Finibus, Bonorum et Malorum (V.67) [iusitian in suo cuique tribuendo, "justice [is] attributing to each his own."], as well as elsewhere. Indeed, one finds justice as suum cuique mentioned by the stoic Seneca (Epistulae morales 81.7) and by Aulus Gellius (Noctes Atticae, xiii.24), who informs us that the elder Cato understood such a formulation as an adequate notion of justice.

Derived mediately perhaps from the Roman jurist Ulpian, the maxim suum cuique was a central feature of pagan Roman justice, as its use by the Roman greats evidences. But like many things Roman, it was probably borrowed from, or at least informed by, the Greeks. In his Rhetoric, Aristotle describes justice as a virtue that assigns to each man his due in conformity with the law, and injustice as claiming that which belongs to others in opposition to the law. Rhetoric 1366b (ἔστι δὲ δικαιοσύνη μὲν ἀρετὴ δι᾽ ἣν τὰ αὑτῶν ἕκαστοι ἔχουσι, καὶ ὡς ὁ νόμος: ἀδικία δὲ δι᾽ ἣν τὰ ἀλλότρια, οὐχ ὡς ὁ νόμος); see also Nicomachean Ethics, 1132b32 ff. Before that, Plato has Socrates in his dialogue refers to the the poet Simonedes of Ceos as rightly describing justice (δικαιοσύνης) rendering to each person his due. Republic 331e ('ὅτι,' ἦ δ᾽ ὅς,' τὸ τὰ ὀφειλόμενα ἑκάστῳ ἀποδιδόναι δίκαιόν ἐστι'); see also Republic 433e-434a. Though it may originally hale from the Greek philosophers, it comes to us principally from Roman law. As Shakespeare has Marcus Andronicus state to Bassianus: "'Suum cuique' is our Roman justice." Titus Andronicus, Act. 1, sc. 1.

From pagan Rome, this natural law principle was adopted by the Christians, and, after being baptized so-to-speak, eventually became part and parcel of the Christian emperor Justinian's legal reforms, the basis of his vision of law and justice, his law's Rechtsprinzip and its Gerechtigkeitsprinzip. It remains a fundamental definition of the Western concept justice, and, indeed, is arguably universal. As the Dutch Philosopher, Andreas Kinneging, put it in his The Geography of Good and Evil: "Through Plato, Aristotle, Cicero, Augustine, Thomas Aquinas, and the Corpus Iuris Iustiniani, this Idea of justice [suum cuique tribuere] long remained a standard notion in Western thinking." Andreas Kinneging, The Geography of Good and Evil: Philosophical Investigations (Ineke Hardy, trans.) (Wilmington: ISI Books, 2009), 150.

In German, suum cuique is translated as Jedem das Seine. In his Cantata Nur jedem das Seine! (BWV 163) Johann Sebastian Bach addresses the Gospel story where Jesus is asked by the Pharisees whether a tax to Caesar is legitimate (Matthew 22:15-22). The Pharisees hoped to entrap Jesus with this question: "Is it right to pay taxes to Caesar or not?" Matt. 15:17. Jesus recognized the Pharasitic effort at entrapment, and asked to see the coin used to pay the tax. Whereupon they brought him a denarius, a Roman coin that bore the imprint of Caesar and his image.

Roman Denarius

Jesus asked them whose portrait and whose inscription was on the coin, to which they replied "Caeasar's." The Lord's answer quieted his interrogators, with both the depth of its wisdom and the wisdom of its depth: Reddite ergo quae sun Caesaris Caesari et quae sunt Dei Deo, render to Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and to God the things that are God's. Using this Gospel text as the basis for his Cantata, Bach stresses both the obligation to pay tax to the legitimate authorities (Obrigkeit), and the more important obligation to render to God what is due God, which is nothing other than the obligation to give him our all. The State, Bach reminds us, has not purchase on our hearts; those belong to God alone.


Doch bleibet das Herze dem Höchsten alleine.
But our heart continues to belong to the Almighty alone.


Ultimately, we must give God all that he owns, which is our entirety; there is no moieity title in us, part of which we own, part of which God owns. We are all God's. None is our own. What we have is all gift, for God, as Bach puts to music, is der Geber aller Gaben, the giver of all gifts.

Wir haben, was wir haben,
Allein von deiner Hand.
Du hast uns gegeben
Geist, Seele, Leib und Leben
Und Hab und Gut und Her und Stand!

We have what we have
Only from your hand.
You have given to us
Spirit, soul, body and life
And property and goods and honour and status!

But if God has given all to us, then what have we to give him?

Was sollen wir
Denn dir
Zur Dankbarkeit dafür erlegen,
Da unser ganz Vermögen
Nur dein und gar nicht unser ist?

What should we
Then to you
Pay in gratitude,
Since all our possessions
Belong only to you and are not really ours at all ?

What have we, then, to give to God when all we have is his gift, and those earthly goods that we have, those temporal benefits, are of no use to the infinite God? It is our very selves, our hearts that are the coin by which we render God his due.

Du bist, mein Gott, der Geber aller Gaben;
Das Herze soll allein,
Doch ist noch eins, das dir, Gott, wohlgefällt:
Herr, deine Zinsemünze sein.

You are, my God, the giver of all gifts;
But there is stll one thing, God, that is pleasing to you:
The heart alone shall be,
Lord, the coin to pay the interest we owe to you.

Yet even the coin of our hearts is marred, worn, horribly devalued; indeed devalued to the point of being almost as worthless tender as counterfeit coin.

Ach! aber ach! ist das nicht schlechtes Geld?
Der Satan hat dein Bild daran verletzet,
Die falsche Münz ist abgesetzet.

Ah, but alas! is it not worthless currency?
Satan has damaged your image on it,
the counterfeit coin has been put in circulation.

Though it be a worn coin, as it were with damaged image of its Maker, its value may be re-established by the Lord's cleansing. It is the Lord's numismatic work of the heart, the Lord's smelting, the Lord's re-stamping our heart's worn coin with his image anew.

Laß mein Herz die Münze sein,
Die ich dir, mein Jesu, steure!
Ist sie gleich nicht allzu rein,
Ach, so komm doch und erneure,
Herr, den schönen Glanz bei ihr!
Komm, arbeite, schmelz und präge,
Dass dein Ebenbild bei mir
Ganz erneuert glänzen möge!

Let my heart be the coin
That I pay you!
If it is at first far from pure,
Ah, then come and renew ,
Lord, its fine gleam!
Come, work on it, melt it and stamp it
So that your image in me
Completely renewed may shine forth!

Yet even our donation of our heart's flawed coin to the Lord's exchange for refurbishing is a matter of his Grace, so that there is nothing that is not ultimately God's own gift.

Ich wollte dir,
O Gott, das Herze gerne geben;
Der Will ist zwar bei mir,
Doch Fleisch und Blut will immer widerstreben.
Dieweil die Welt
Das Herz gefangen hält,
So will sie sich den Raub nicht nehmen lassen;
Jedoch ich muss sie hassen,
Wenn ich dich lieben soll.
So mache doch mein Herz mit deiner Gnade voll;
Leer es ganz aus von Welt und allen Lüsten
Und mache mich zu einem rechten Christen.

To you I wanted,
O God, to give my heart willingly;
I do indeed have the will
But flesh and blood are always striving against it.
So long as the world
Keeps my heart prisoner,
It will not allow its loot to be taken away.
I must indeed hate the world.
If I am to love you.
Therefore make my heart full of your grace,
Empty it completely of the world and all its pleasures
And make me a true Christian.

Recognizing our own resistance, our proclivity toward self-possession, our resistance to giving ourselves to God as gift, we pray God overcome these bonds that keep us from a just response.

Nimm mich mir und gib mich dir!
Nimm mich mir und meinem Willen,
Deinen Willen zu erfüllen;
Gib dich mir mit deiner Güte,
Dass mein Herz und mein Gemüte
In dir bleibe für und für,
Nimm mich mir und gib mich dir!
. . .
Führ auch mein Herz und Sinn
Durch deinen Geist dahin,
Dass ich mög alles meiden,
Was mich und dich kann scheiden,
Und ich an deinem Leibe
Ein Gliedmaß ewig bleibe.

Take me from myself and give me to you!
Take me from myself and my will,
To fulfill your will.
Give yourself to me with your goodness
So that my heart and mind
May remain in you for ever.
Take me from myself and give me to you!
....
Lead both my heart and mind
Through your spirit away from here
So that I may avoid everything
That can separate me and you
And so that in your body
I may remain a member for ever.

We are obliged in justice, under the principle of suum cuique, to give God our all. Any unyielding on our part, any holding back, any pretense at self-possession, any claimed autonomy from the Lord's law is unjust. It is not rendering to God his due. It is a graspingness, a pleonexia, an injustice to hold back from God what is his due.

Nur jedem das Seine!
Only to each his due!.

Under that principle, God is entitled to all.

Nimm mich mir und gib mich dir!
Take me from myself and give me to you!

Johann Sebastian Bach by Haussman

There is great wisdom in the legal maxim that justice is suum cuique. It may be said that suum cuique is part of the Natural Law. However, one must not forget that, as Msgr. Knox once stated, the Devil knows Latin. Likewise, the Devil speaks in the language of the Natural Law , though he plies it so as to deceive. The Devil loves to fool in what we may call Natural Lawspeak. He can cite principles of natural law as handily as he handled Scripture in the temptation of Jesus as recorded in the Gospel of Matthew.

So the Devil spoke in times past in justifying slavery, in justifying unjust war, in justifying colonialism, in justifying the law of the more powerful, even, modernly, in justifying the tyranny of the relative. The Devil's appropriation of Natural Lawspeak to deceive is not limited to times past. We hear the devil's accent in the "right to privacy" and the "right to choose" as slogans to support the murder of innocents. We hear the devil's natural law lilt in the claim to the right to homosexual marriage, as if marriage could ontologically even be between two members of the same sex. But the supreme aping of the Natural Law in recent history must be the use of suum cuique, Jedem das Seine, by the Nazi regime in a valley of beech trees. In what can only be characterized as a gross historical irony--Satan's sarcasm and Moloch's mockery--some Nazi bureaucrat chose the definition for justice--Jedem das seine--as the motto to be emblazoned on the gates of the Buchenwald concentration camp.

Let us always recall from this dreadful chapter in history that the Devil also quotes, though grossly misapplies, legal maxims and principles of the Natural Law.

Girolamo Zanchi on Human Law, Part 1

Girolamo Zanchi

ZANCHI CONTINUES HIS TREATMENT on the law in general by proceeding from his analysis of the natural law to human laws. Zanchi defines "human laws" as those both "conceived" and "promulgated" through and by humans and human ingenuity. So human laws include those where man is the source of the law, as well as those where man is but the conduit by which such law is made or enforced. Thus, the source of human law may be divine law, natural law, or law "conceived from . . . [men's] own heads." (337).

Zanchi divides human laws into those that are "right and just," and those that are "tyrannical." (337). For laws to be "right and just," they must be conceived by proper authority, and must derived either from divine law or the natural law. Additionally, these laws must exist for "the good and well-being of the State or the church." Zanchi groups good and right customs with "right and just laws" because customs have the force of law.

Laws may be tyrannical as a result of various defects. They may be enacted by someone without authority to legislate. Though promulgated by someone in authority, laws may still be tyrannical. This is the result if, for example, laws are not passed by properly constituted authority for the common good, but for self or private interests. "These laws," Zanchi insists invoking Aristotle, "are unworthy of the word law." (337) Sinful traditions and customs are equally tyrannical, and Zanchi groups these along with tyrannical laws.

Human laws are useful, indeed, necessary, and reliance on the natural law alone is not either practical or even possible. Laws that govern men within a polity, what Zanchi calls "political laws" are a necessity. These are intended to keep the populace from evil and promote the good, promote the common good, and protect the state. (338, Thesis 1). The need for human laws to supplement natural law arises for two reasons. First, because the natural law relates to "general principles," and not all people are able to make proper conclusions from the general principles. "Therefore," Zanchi concludes, "there is a need that wise and thoughtful people be stirred by God even within the nations themselves, who clearly explain their laws from natural law for the well-being and protection of their State." (338)

The second reason is built upon the reality that men, at least in the fallen state, need to be prompted to do good and avoid evil. Thus, if love of virtue or hatred of vice is not sufficient to motivate all men, the "fear of punishment" will motivate the remainder. Since the natural law has no "external punishments" (but only "teaches, inclines, and accuses" men in the internal forum), and since the natural law "has not been so effectively written on the hearts" of men (so as to render it sufficiently "effective to protect people from evil or to push them to do good"), Zanchi concludes that human laws are both expedient and needful. This is true even in Christian states, for though Zanchi suggests that the natural law's effectiveness is "retained . . . only in the born-again elect," that is true "only in part." (338) Zanchi finds scriptural warrant for these views, in Paul's letter to the Romans: "The authority . . . bears the sword . . . to execute wrath on the wrong-doer" (Rom. 13:4) and in Paul's first letter to his disciple Timothy: "The law is laid down not for the innocent but for the lawless and disobedient, et cetera" (1 Tim. 1:9). The Pauline teaching finds expression in Isidore who is cited by Gratian in his Decretum (4.1): "Laws, however, have been made so that human audacity might be restrained by the fear of them and so that there might be a safe innocence among human beings and that among the wicked themselves, their audacity and facility for doing harm might be curbed by a powerful punishment." (Factae sunt autem leges, ut earum metu humana coherceatur audacia, tutaque sit inter improbos inocentia, etin ipsis improbis formidato supplicio refrenetur nocendi facultas.)

Zanchi concludes: "Thus, the practice of political laws is necessary for keeping people from evil, or else human society could not be saved." (338) Laws are meant to prevent us from becoming beasts, as Aristotle observes in his Politics. Men who flee from law and justice, under the notion of corruptio optimi pessima, are "the worst of all beasts." (339) All political laws, therefore, that have been ordained to promote virtue, discourage vice, and punish the evil doer "agree with the Holy Scripture, the prophets, Christ, and the apostles in Romans 13 and 1 Peter 2[13-17]." (339)

In the next post, we will review Zanchi's continuing analysis of the relationship between the natural law and political laws, including whether human laws that contradict the natural law are in fact laws at all, the bindingness of political laws upon us, the difference between the natural law and political laws, and the construction or interpretation of human laws.

Gratian's Decretum

"Ode to Duty": Wordsworth on Law's Call

IN THIS ODE BY POET WILLIAM WORDSWORTH (1770-1850), the sentiments of a man tired of the anomie associated with individualism that rejects any claim of the universal or the common, tired of the excessive autonomy of modern man that has rejected the voice of God in his heart, prays for men to return to "duty," in fact, the natural law, the "stern daughter of the voice of God," our "light to guide," and a "rod to check the erring, and reprove."

It provides us an end, and so allows us to measure "victory," for without a bourne, without goal, there is no meaning to life, and "empty terrors overawe." We are freed from the vacuous lies, the apparent, but false, goods behind the siren calls of temptation. It brings men together in their common nature, and so reduces the "weary strife" of moral cacophony, where right is not based upon reason, but upon better access to the public media, marketing glitz, or the reigns of power. Our mores are fed by talking, if vacuous, heads; the gospel according to vacuous Brangelina hype. Pretty faces, however, do not necessarily mean good morals.

There are men of good will--those identified in the Gloria we have prayed in Christmas, Gloria in excelsis Deo, et in terra pax hominibus bonae voluntatis--who knowing not the God behind the natural law's voice, who in "love and truth" rely on the "genial sense of youth" associated with reason unguilded by grace. But with reason alone we dare not attend to the moral life. We fail, we sin, in thought, word, and deed--Confiteor Deo omnipotenti et vobis, fratres, quia peccavi nimis cogitatione, verbo, opere, et omissióne: mea culpa, mea culpa, mea maxima culpa--let us therefore flee to that "dread Power" that already has his arms around us cast.

What shall we then obtain? The fruits of serenity, happiness, satisfaction, of a conscience well and hale, bound by love to that unerring light, strengthened by the "spirit of this creed" that God has a course for us, a "blissful course" that leads to the eternal life with God in the fullness of his Glory.

It is time, as St. Paul might remind us, to put aside the childish, jejune, sophomoric philosophies and epistemologies and critiques, which rent asunder the bonds that united us to God and to our neighbor. All these based upon a false love of freedom which is slavery to self, a moral implosion caused by moral self-abuse, self-fornication of "being to myself a guide." Our modern theories of right are besot with the stain of what the prophet Hosea would call fornication against God. Obedience to that voice of God,that "mandate" which calls us to a law outside our self-law, ought no more to be deferred.

What mandate? The Lord's own! Mandatum novum do vobis: ut diligatis invicem, sicut dilexi vos! A new commandment I give to you: that you love one another, as I also have loved you! It is time for a social, philosophical, and moral Maundy Thursday.

"Me this unchartered freedom tires." I am tired of abortion's plague, divorces, the acceptance of serial polygamy, and the utter demise of family life. I am tired of a tax structure that penalizes traditional families, and fails to account for the raising and education of children. I am tired of homosexual marriage, and the incessant demands of legal recognition of perversion as if by right. I am tired of pornography, both subtle and not. I am tired of contraception, of in vitro fertilization, of the abuse of embryonic stem cell research. I am tired of scandal. I am tired of torture. I am tired of war. I am tired of terrorism. I am tired of those who kill for Allah, but are really followers of the devil. I repeat: "Me this unchartered freedom tires. I feel the weight of chance desires. . . . I long for repose that ever is the same."

Whence and how does our guidance come? The "stern daughter of the voice of God," that stern law from the "stern Lawgiver." But how stern are you, O God! You are benignant, good, kind. Powerful enough indeed to hold the stars in their courses. Gentle enough to inform the delicate folds of the daffodil, the tulip, the daisy: These and all flowers beside, "laugh before thee on their beds / And fragrance in thy footing treads." Flowers laugh as they bloom, flourish, languish, even seasonally die following your law. Ought we not laugh gently with them? Nay, this is not a stern lawgiver, but a loving father, who beckons his prodigal son. Let us join our voices not only with the laughing of the flowers, but with the simple joy of Brother Francis:

Most High, all-powerful, good Lord,

all praise is yours, all glory, all honor, and all blessing.

To you, alone, Most High, do they belong.

No mortal lips are worthy to pronounce your name.

All praise be yours, my Lord, through all you have made,

and first my lord Brother Sun, who brings the day;

and through whom you give us light.

How beautiful is he, how radiant in all his splendor;

Of you, Most High, he bears the likeness.

All Praise be yours, my Lord, through Sister Moon

and the stars; in the heavens you have made them,

bright, and precious, and fair.

All praise be yours, my Lord,

through Brothers wind and air, and fair and stormy,

all the weather's moods,

by which you cherish all that you have made.

All praise be yours, my Lord, through Sister Water,

so useful, humble, precious and pure.

All praise be yours, my Lord, through Brother Fire,

through whom you brighten up the night.

How beautiful is he, how cheerful!

Full of power and strength.

All praise be yours, my Lord, through our Sister

Mother Earth, who sustains us and governs us,

and produces various fruits with colored flowers and herbs.

All praise be yours, my Lord,

through those who grant pardon for love of you;

through those who endure sickness and trial.

Happy are those who endure in peace,

By You, Most High, they will be crowned.

All praise be yours, my Lord, through Sister Death,

From whose embrace no mortal can escape.

Woe to those who die in mortal sin!

Happy those she finds doing your will!

The second death can do them no harm.

Praise and bless my Lord, and give him thanks

And serve him with great humility.

St. Francis and his Sermon to the Birds

Let us then, in this 2010, order ourselves to fall under God's guidance, under his Eternal Law, as it is made manifest to us in the Natural Law. Let us shed our weakness, make us "lowly wise." Engender in us a "spirit of self-sacrifice." Batter our hearts O God! Turn us back from our non serviam. Would that we had never uttered the words of the devil. Let us now say thrice for every time we uttered oppositely: Serviam! serviam! serviam! I will serve, I will serve, I will serve! Except you enthrall us, Lord, we shall never be free. We place ourselves in your thrall, we want to become your slaves, so that we may be free. In the words of the Book of Common Prayer, let us know that it is to God "in whose service is perfect freedom" that we must turn. Or in the words of St. Augustine, let us know that we speak of a God that cui servire, regnare est, whom to serve is to rule.

May our prayers be those of the poet John Donne:

Batter my heart, three-person'd God, for you
As yet but knock, breathe, shine, and seek to mend;
That I may rise and stand, o'erthrow me, and bend
Your force to break, blow, burn, and make me new.
I, like an usurp'd town to'another due,
Labor to'admit you, but oh, to no end;
Reason, your viceroy in me, me should defend,
But is captiv'd, and proves weak or untrue.
Yet dearly'I love you, and would be lov'd fain,
But am betroth'd unto your enemy;
Divorce me,'untie or break that knot again,
Take me to you, imprison me, for I,
Except you'enthrall me, never shall be free,
Nor ever chaste, except you ravish me.

English Poet John Donne

Relying, then, on God, let us join in unison with Wordsworth's closing stanzas:

I call thee: I myself command
Unto thy guidance from this hour;
Oh! let my weakness have an end!
Give unto me, made lowly wise,
The spirit of self-sacrifice;
The confidence of reason give;
And, in the light of truth, thy Bondman let me live!

William Wordsworth

"Ode to Duty" by William Wordsworth

STERN Daughter of the Voice of God!
O Duty! if that name thou love
Who art a light to guide, a rod
To check the erring, and reprove;
Thou, who art victory and law
When empty terrors overawe;
From vain temptations dost set free;
And clam'st the weary strife of frail humanity!

There are who ask not if thine eye
Be on them; who, in love and truth,
Where no misgiving is, rely
Upon the genial sense of youth:
Glad Hearts! without reproach or blot;
Who do thy work, and know it not:
Oh! if through confidence misplaced
They fail, thy saving arms, dread Power! around them cast.

Serene will be our days and bright,
And happy will our nature be,
When love is an unerring light,
And joy its own security.
And they a blissful course may hold
Even now, who, not unwisely bold,
Live in the spirit of this creed;
Yet seek thy firm support, according to their need.

I, loving freedom, and untried:
No sport of every random gust,
Yet being to myself a guide,
Too blindly have reposed my trust:
And oft, when in my heart was heard
Thy timely mandate, I deferred
The task, in smoother walks to stray;
But thee I now would serve more strictly, if I may.

Through no disturbance of my soul,
Or strong compunction in me wrought,
I supplicate for thy control;
But in the quietness of thought:
Me this unchartered freedom tires;
I feel the weight of chance desires:
My hopes no more must change their name,
I long for a repose that ever is the same.

Stern Lawgiver! yet thou dost wear
The Godhead's most benignant grace;
Nor know we anything so fair
As is the smile upon thy face:
Flowers laugh before thee on their beds
And fragrance in thy footing treads
Thou dost preserve the stars from wrong;
And the most ancient heavens, through Thee, are fresh and strong.

To humbler functions, awful Power!
I call thee: I myself command
Unto thy guidance from this hour;
Oh! let my weakness have an end!
Give unto me, made lowly wise,
The spirit of self-sacrifice;
The confidence of reason give;
And, in the light of truth, thy Bondman let me live!