THERE IS OVERLAP BETWEEN NATURAL LAW AND DIVINE LAW. "The law of God," states Hooker, "though principally delivered for instruction in the one [supernatural duties], yet [is] fraught with precepts of the other [natural duties] also." I.12.1, 119. Hooker can be no more clearer: "The scripture is fraught even with the laws of nature." I.12.1, 119. This overlap between the natural law accessible by reason, and the divine law contained in revelation is what caused the great Canon lawyer Gratian to define the natural right as that which is contained in the Law (i.e., Decalogue or Ten Commandments) and the Gospel: Ius naturale est quod in lege et Evangelio continetur. Both the books of the Law and the Gospels contain, therefore, general duties that are incumbent upon all men, including those incumbent upon them as a matter of natural duty.
It is not fruitless for Scripture to repeat by revelation what would be known by reason, Hooker insists. The natural laws that are contained in Scripture include those which are readily known and those which may not be so readily known. With respect to those which are clearly known through reason, the "Spirit, as it were, borrowing them from the school of nature," uses these readily known precepts to prove requirements that are "less manifest," and so "induce a persuasion" of demands that may be "more hard and dark" without such clarification. Moreover, Scripture sometimes applies these well-known natural precepts in certain situations, and the application of such precepts in specific contexts is profitable to men's instruction. There is obvious advantage when Scripture includes natural law precepts that are not so readily known, since there is advantage "to have them readily set down to our hands." I.12.1, 120. In either event, whether the natural law precepts revealed in Scripture involve precepts readily known or not so readily known, there is comfort to be obtained from the confirmation of those precepts as a result of the "evidence of God's own testimony added unto the natural asset of reason." I.12.1, 120.
Additionally, Hooker states that we are confronted with variegated circumstances in our lives, many of which render it difficult to know the right way to act, and in fact would result in different judgments. In some cases, entire nations and cultures have been "darkened," so that they have failed to detect even "gross iniquity to be sin." As historical examples, Hooker cites the Jewish historian Josephus (Against Apion, Book II.38) who discusses the laws of the Lacedemonians so hostile against other nations and those contemptuous of marriage, the laws of the Eleans and Thebans which failed to condemn sodomy, and indeed provided for it in their laws. He also cites St. Thomas Aquinas's reference to Julius Caesar (IaIIae, q. 94, citing De Bello Gall., vi) who mentions that the German tribes did not consider robbery to be against their laws. Hooker also quotes Psuedo-Augustine's (Ambrosiaster's?) Quaestionis Veteris et Novis Testamenti, where he notes that ignorance and evil customs blinded men, and so it was that idolatry became rampant, fear of God left the earth, fornication became commonplace, and concupiscence was at large. Confronting blinded recipients, it was warranted that the natural law should be made manifest through Scripture.
There is, moreover, a systemic blindness, a self-interest or self-regard, that makes us weak judges in our own cause. We are "prone . . . to fawn upon ourselves." I.12.2, 121. In Freudian terms, we are habitual rationalizers, excuse-makers. An honest examen of conscience is very difficult to achieve. The law contained in Scripture is particularly well-suited to delve into our very abysses, the mountains of our mind, and ferret out and discipline even those errant thoughts, those whisps of wicked wandering wind-thoughts in the intimate parts of our psyche, in whose whorls we pause and take illegitimate pleasure.
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It is not fruitless for Scripture to repeat by revelation what would be known by reason, Hooker insists. The natural laws that are contained in Scripture include those which are readily known and those which may not be so readily known. With respect to those which are clearly known through reason, the "Spirit, as it were, borrowing them from the school of nature," uses these readily known precepts to prove requirements that are "less manifest," and so "induce a persuasion" of demands that may be "more hard and dark" without such clarification. Moreover, Scripture sometimes applies these well-known natural precepts in certain situations, and the application of such precepts in specific contexts is profitable to men's instruction. There is obvious advantage when Scripture includes natural law precepts that are not so readily known, since there is advantage "to have them readily set down to our hands." I.12.1, 120. In either event, whether the natural law precepts revealed in Scripture involve precepts readily known or not so readily known, there is comfort to be obtained from the confirmation of those precepts as a result of the "evidence of God's own testimony added unto the natural asset of reason." I.12.1, 120.
Additionally, Hooker states that we are confronted with variegated circumstances in our lives, many of which render it difficult to know the right way to act, and in fact would result in different judgments. In some cases, entire nations and cultures have been "darkened," so that they have failed to detect even "gross iniquity to be sin." As historical examples, Hooker cites the Jewish historian Josephus (Against Apion, Book II.38) who discusses the laws of the Lacedemonians so hostile against other nations and those contemptuous of marriage, the laws of the Eleans and Thebans which failed to condemn sodomy, and indeed provided for it in their laws. He also cites St. Thomas Aquinas's reference to Julius Caesar (IaIIae, q. 94, citing De Bello Gall., vi) who mentions that the German tribes did not consider robbery to be against their laws. Hooker also quotes Psuedo-Augustine's (Ambrosiaster's?) Quaestionis Veteris et Novis Testamenti, where he notes that ignorance and evil customs blinded men, and so it was that idolatry became rampant, fear of God left the earth, fornication became commonplace, and concupiscence was at large. Confronting blinded recipients, it was warranted that the natural law should be made manifest through Scripture.
There is, moreover, a systemic blindness, a self-interest or self-regard, that makes us weak judges in our own cause. We are "prone . . . to fawn upon ourselves." I.12.2, 121. In Freudian terms, we are habitual rationalizers, excuse-makers. An honest examen of conscience is very difficult to achieve. The law contained in Scripture is particularly well-suited to delve into our very abysses, the mountains of our mind, and ferret out and discipline even those errant thoughts, those whisps of wicked wandering wind-thoughts in the intimate parts of our psyche, in whose whorls we pause and take illegitimate pleasure.
Again, being so prone as we are to fawn upon ourselves, and to be ignorant as much as may be of our own deformities, without the feeling sense whereof we are most wretched, even so much the more, because not knowing them we cannot as much as desire to have them taken away: how should our festered sores be cured, but that God has delivered a law as sharp as the two-edged sword, piercing the very closest and most unsearchable corners of the heart which the law of nature can hardly, human laws by no means possible reach unto? Hereby we know even secret concupiscence to be sin, and are made fearful to offend though it be but in a wandering cogitation.I.12.2, 121.
Title Page of Of the Lawes of Ecclesiastical Politie There is, finally, the practical realities of differences among men. There are divergent intellectual and moral distributions among men. There are, moreover, few that are suited, by talent or with time, to undertake deep and dispassionate study of the natural law. Which of us could derive through reason the arguments supporting the soul's immortality? Which of us through reason could even "dream of" the resurrection of the flesh? With these questions, Hooker implies that the immortality of the soul and the resurrection of the flesh play important roles in determining what is right. Practical and intellectual limits justify the revelation of natural law.
We ought, therefore, be thankful that God has deigned to reveal large parts of the natural law in Scripture. And so Hooker concludes this section of his Of the Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity with a paean of thanksgiving followed by a synoptic coda. First, the praise and thanksgiving:
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We ought, therefore, be thankful that God has deigned to reveal large parts of the natural law in Scripture. And so Hooker concludes this section of his Of the Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity with a paean of thanksgiving followed by a synoptic coda. First, the praise and thanksgiving:
Whereby it appears how much we are bound to yield unto our Creator, the Father of all mercy, eternal thanks, for that he has delivered his law unto the world, a law wherein so many things are laid open, clear, and manifest; as a light which otherwise would have been buried in darkness, not without the hazard, or rather not with the hazard, but with the certain loss of infinite thousands of souls most undoubtedly now saved.I.12.2, 121. Hooker then concludes this part of his work with his recapitulation, the sum and substance of all he has been discussing before:
We see therefore that our sovereign good is desired naturally; that God the author of that natural desire had appointed natural means whereby to fulfill it; that man having utterly disabled his nature unto those means has had other revealed from God, and has received from heaven a law to teach him how that which is desired naturally must now supernaturally be attained; finally, we see that because those latter [supernatural means or laws] exclude not the former [natural means or laws] quite and clean as unnecessary; therefore, together with such supernatural duties as could not possibly have been otherwise known to the world, the same law that teaches them, teaches also with them such natural duties as could not by light of nature easily have been known.I.12.3, 121-22. Having addressed the issue of natural law or the law of reason in Scripture, Hooker then turns his attention to the divine law proper, and the benefits of such divine law being written, the role of Scripture in determining such law, and a brief discourse on the divine law contained in Scripture.
Portrait of Richard Hooker
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