Père Lagrange (II)

Extract

Père Lagrange was inspired by a theological principle the rational consequences of which are from now on clearly in evidence. Inasmuch as the Bible is an inspired book it is wholly and essentially divine, therefore absolutely true and infallible as representing, with the necessary guarantee of authenticity, the very word of God Himself. At the same time, however, and precisely in virtue of the divine inspiration communicated to the human writers, it is no less integrally human by reason of its production by a human instrument who is both intelligent and free under the movement of God, the primary cause. Profound consideration of this co-ordination of the two causes had led Père Lagrange to a principle finely balanced, it is true, but as inevitable as it was freedom-giving: the distinction between what is characteristically divine—where there is no room for any defective element—and what is characteristically human—where there is room for limitations and imperfections. Whilst reserving always and most explicitly to the Church, the only living authority qualified by God for this purpose, the determination of the characteristically divine teaching or statement contained in a biblical passage, it then became possible to envisage the Bible in the human perspective of its inspired authors, to study it, that is to say, according to the rules of the most positive historic method.