Scotus on the Abolition of the Old Law

One of the key arguments made against Hebrew Catholics is that the Old Law has been abolished by the full promulgation of the New Law. I think the force of this argument is often not fully appreciated by defenders of Hebrew Catholics, so I want to work on this problem more before coming to my own conclusions. However, strictly speaking, I don’t think this even pertains to the existence of Hebrew Catholics, but only what Jewish rituals can and cannot be practiced. Nonetheless, this is an important problem to consider.

The past treatments I have seen of this issue focus on either St. Thomas Aquinas or the magisterium. However, I have not seen anyone deal with Bl. John Duns Scotus, so I thought I would take a closer look at his discussion of this matter. To be clear, this Substack post is not intended as my final opinion on the matter. These are mostly notes for myself, but I thought I would make them public for anyone else who might be interested.

The classic formulation of this issue originates in a debate between Sts. Jerome and Augustine. In the New Testament, we see the apostles continuing to do certain acts pertaining to the Old Law as such, such as sacrifices and circumcision. St. Jerome argued that the apostles only pretended to do these things, as they had become abolished upon the passion of Christ. St. Augustine however demonstrated that this was exegetically impossible. Nonetheless, he wanted to defend the current practice of the Church in his day of refusing to allow converts from Judaism to continue Jewish practices. Thus, Augustine distinguished three periods. Before the passion of Christ, the Old Law was obligatory. Upon the passion of Christ, it becomes dead, but not deadly. The sacraments of the New Law are now the way to salvation, but one can still freely practice the Old Law. Upon some undetermined point, which Augustine called “the promulgation of the Gospel”, the Old Law became deadly, and it was a mortal sin to continue in Jewish practices. St. Augustine’s teaching won out and became the standard view which was then expounded upon in the Middle Ages. Since Peter Lombard included this disputed in the Sentences, every medieval doctor commented on it.

Scotus deals with it in Ordinatio IV, d. 3, q. 4. (I will be following Peter Simpson’s translation.) Here he considers “Whether the institution of baptism voids circumcision”.

Scotus first purposes the threefold division of Augustine. He suggests two biblical proof texts for it. In John 19:30, Christ says “it is finished,” referring to the Old Law. This made the Old Law dead. Then, St. Paul wrote, “If you are circumcised, Christ will profit you nothing” (Gal 5:2), showing that now circumcision had become deadly.

Scotus rejects this solution though for a few reasons. Firstly, Christ and the apostles began to baptize before the passion! This must be factored in. Scotus says that if a child had been baptized by an apostle before the passion but before circumcision, it would seem he would still be saved. Secondly, after the passion, it seems the apostles spoke about baptism in Acts the same way as they did in the gospels. Thus, nothing changed. Finally, through a chronology of the apostolic age he gets from Comestor (a medieval historian), he shows that Paul wrote Galatians before his encounter with James in Acts 21 where Paul denies that he has discouraged Jews from keeping the Old Law and even goes to offer a sacrifice at the temple himself to prove this.

There is an assumption made in this section that I think would definitely bug a Jewish reader: “no one imposed circumcision on his child save as to its being useful and necessary for him for salvation” (n. 163). While I have no objection to Scotus’s position that circumcision removed original sin in the Old Covenant, I do not think a Jew would say that is the only reason. Membership in the covenant God made with the Jewish people is would probably actually be seen as the primary reason by Jews. Nonetheless, since baptism also does this in the New Covenant, I do not think this would change Scotus’s reasoning to much.

Scotus thus seeks to create his own periodization of baptism and circumcision. He creates four periods. In the first period, there was only circumcision, and it was necessary. In the second period, Christ introduced baptism, and a Jew could chose either one of these. In the third period, baptism was necessary, and circumcision was licit. Finally, in the fourth period, baptism is now necessary and circumcision is forbidden and deadly.

Scotus is usually known for logic chopping, but he is surprising subtle with his exegesis for the beginning and end of each period. He first points out that the apostles did not start publicly preaching about the necessity of baptism until Pentecost. Before this, Jews would have had no way of knowing that baptism was any more than permitted. Thus, it was not the passion of Christ that began the third period, but Pentecost.

Scotus then distinguishes the start of the third and fourth period for Gentiles and Jews. For Gentiles, circumcision was forbidden by the Council of Jerusalem in Acts 15. However, we still see Paul practicing the Old Law in Acts 21. Thus, it must have been still permissible for Jews at the time. Perhaps though it could have ended very shortly after the council, but Scotus rejects this.

Nay, it is likely that [the third period for Jews] ran well beyond that time, because at the time of Paul’s purification the brothers in Jerusalem seemed to be approving of the observance of the Law and to be consulting Paul about it (n. 173).

Scotus is correctly anticipates the standard reading of this passage by modern scholars. Acts 21 gives no evidence of the Jerusalem Church as merely an acceptable transition. The Jewish Christians in Jerusalem are zealous for the Old Law.

Scotus then discusses how all of this is related to the confrontation between Peter and Paul in Galatians 2. Scotus here invokes the principle of St. Ambrose that one should conform themselves to the public customs of the local church when traveling. Thus, it was perfectly fine for Peter to keep the law entirely in Jerusalem, and to keep it in his private devotion in Antioch. However, when publicly fellowshipping in Antioch, since kosher laws would forbid him for eating with Gentile Christians. Thus, he should have conformed himself to local custom. A good modern analogy would be that if you visit a parish of another rite and they serve as a meal on what would be a fast day in your own rite, it is best to just eat with everyone else and conform yourself to that rite’s customs.

Following Comester, Scotus also points out that Galatians was written before the events in Acts 21. Thus, Galatians 5:2 cannot mean that it is forbidden for Jewish Christians to be circumcised.

Why then are Jewish Christians now forbidden from keeping the Old Law? Scotus treats this as a matter of Church teaching, following Gregory IX’s Dectreals III tit. 42, ch. 3. However, this decretal, taken from Pope Innocent III, invokes Galatians 5:2 as a proof text! Nonetheless, Scotus cuts the quote short of this citation to avoid appearing to disagree with a pope.

Nonetheless, Scotus accepts that there is not a single passage in scripture which forbids such a practice! Scotus suggests this is because Acts ends in AD 59, and so the complete abolition of the Old Law must have happened after this. Scotus mentions two possibilities, but rejects both of them: the destruction of Jerusalem in AD 70 and the scattering of the Jews in AD 135. Scotus does think the latter may explain practically how it ceased, with the Jews adopting the customs of the local church, although only “little by little” (n. 149). However, none of this, Scotus thinks, merits calling it a heresy, as he thinks the Church teaches, as it would simply be a practice that ceased. Scotus concludes that there must be some additional piece of divine revelation revoking it which no one has any record of. (No, I’m not exaggerating. That’s actually what he says at n. 196.)

In conclusion then, I think it’s interesting that Scotus is actually much closer in his exegesis to most modern readers of Paul than most other medieval. Scotus is still significantly outside the “Paul Within Judaism” camp (as am I to be clear), but is probably closer than any other medieval I have read.

Scotus, without having Eusebius, also correctly diagnoses the real reason Jewish Christianity fell away. There were Jewish bishops of Jerusalem until 135 AD when they were expelled by the Romans with the other Jews.

Nonetheless, Scotus’s answer is very unsatisfying. If Scotus had thought that “it’s only disciplinary” was a live option, I think he would have endorsed that. Nonetheless, the fact he accepts as an axiom that it is dogma (since all medieval did) should also be something that proponents of keeping the Old Law need to consider more seriously as well. Did the whole tradition err in such a grievous way for centuries, not merely in a disciplinary way but in confusing discipline for doctrine?

I will leave things here for further discussion. But I think Scotus’s treatment of this is very interesting.