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Library / Commentaries and Disputations on Genesis, Volume I

Book Two — the heavens and the stars

That the stars are not only not causes, but not even signs, of future things. CHAPTER FOUR

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That the stars are not only not causes, but not even signs, of future things. CHAPTER FOUR.1

Non modo astra non esse causas, sed nec esse signa rerum futurarum. CAPUT QUARTUM.

BEATUS Augustinus libro 5 de Civitate Dei capit. 1 tradit fuisse opinionem quorumdam non mediocriter doctorum hominum, quibus visum est non esse quidem astra causas humanorum eventuum, sed esse tamen eorum vera et certa signa. Origenes quidem certe in tomis suis super Genesim (sic enim memorat Eusebius libro sexto de praeparatione Evangelica capite nono), cum explanaret verba illa quae[...]
Blessed Augustine, in the fifth book of the City of God, chapter 1, relates that there was an opinion of certain not-mediocrely learned men, to whom it seemed that the stars are not indeed causes of human events, but are nevertheless their true and certain signs. Origen indeed, certainly, in his tomes on Genesis (for so Eusebius records, in the sixth book of the Preparation for the Gospel, chapter nine), when he was explaining those words which[...]2
...[verba illa] quae sunt in primo capite libri Geneseos, Et erunt in signa (e quibus videlicet verbis huius nostrae disputationis argumentum pertexuimus), prodidit astra esse a Deo posita in caelo ut per varios aspectus et coniunctiones praesignificarent quae consequentibus temporibus, tum universe tum sigillatim, eventura essent, non tamen ea efficerent. Itaque caelum esse dixit velut quendam librum in quo Deus depinxit atque descripsit quaecumque in toto mundani aevi decursu, suo quaeque tempore, futura sunt. Ad hoc probandum citat Origenes librum quendam cui titulus erat Narratio Ioseph, olim apud multos in auctoritatem et fidem receptum: in quo Iacob Patriarcha inducitur filios suos alloquens hunc in modum, Legi, inquit, in tabulis caeli quaecumque contingent vobis et filiis vestris. Plotinus autem condiscipulus Origenis idem sensit, idque docet in libro qui inscriptus est, Verum stellae aliquid agant; in libro autem de Fato cap. 6 hunc praeterea stellarum usum esse tradit, ut qui illas suspiciant et quasi litteras considerent (qui nimirum huiusmodi litteraturam noverunt) futura legant, ex ipsis figuris comparatione quadam analogica eorum significationem et intellectum solerter indagantes. Quin Porphyrius affirmat, cum ipse de se interficiendo vehementer cogitaret, Plotinum hoc caelitus providisse et a tanto facinore eum prohibuisse.
...those words which are in the first chapter of the book of Genesis, And let them be for signs (from which words, namely, we have woven the theme of this our disputation), he set forth that the stars were placed by God in the heaven so that, by their various aspects and conjunctions, they might presignify the things which, in the succeeding times, both universally and singly, were to come to pass—yet not bring them about. And so he called the heaven, as it were, a certain book in which God has painted and described whatever things, in the whole course of the world's age, are to be, each in its own time. To prove this, Origen cites a certain book whose title was The Narration of Joseph, once received among many into authority and credit: in which the Patriarch Jacob is brought in addressing his sons in this manner: I have read, he says, in the tablets of heaven whatever things shall befall you and your sons. And Plotinus, the fellow-disciple of Origen, held the same, and teaches it in the book which is entitled, Whether the Stars Do Anything; and in the book On Fate, chapter 6, he relates that this, besides, is the use of the stars: that those who look up at them and consider them as letters (those, namely, who know literature of this kind) may read the future, skillfully tracing out their signification and meaning from the figures themselves by a certain analogical comparison. Porphyry even affirms that, when he was vehemently thinking of killing himself, Plotinus foresaw this from heaven, and kept him from so great a crime.3
HANC sententiam Iulius Sirenus libro 9 de Fato cap. 35 minime damnandam censet, et, quo probabilem esse ostendat, aliquot ex divina Scriptura productis sententiis eam ornat atque confirmat. Hoc enim, inquit, non obscure indicat Esaias, cum ait in cap. 34, Complicabuntur sicut liber caeli. Qua oratione significatur caelos post diem iudicii convolvendos esse atque complicandos, quasi nunc caeli instar cuiusdam libri sint explicati et aperti nobis, haud dubie ad legendum. Eodem pertinet illud quod est in Psalmo 25, Annunciabunt caeli iustitiam eius; et in Psalmo 18, Caeli enarrant gloriam Dei; et quod est in 1 capite libri Genes. de stellis, Ut sint in signa; et in Psal. 88, Confitebuntur tibi caeli mirabilia tua Domine. Nec vero, inquit Origenes, haec opinatio tollit liberum hominis arbitrium, non magis profecto quam praedicta futurarum rerum a sanctis Prophetis edita, vel praescientia omnium rerum quae est in Deo. Plotinus scientiam astrorum, ea ratione ut astra signa sunt humanorum eventuum, contingere homini aiebat vel singulari quodam Dei munere, vel propter eximiam Astrologiae peritiam: ad eam enim comparandam opus esse acerrima indagatione summaque solertia.
This opinion Julius Sirenus, in the ninth book On Fate, chapter 35, judges by no means to be condemned; and, that he may show it to be probable, he adorns and confirms it with several sentences brought forward from the divine Scripture. For this, he says, Isaiah indicates not obscurely, when he says, in chapter 34, They shall be folded together like the book of heaven. By which saying it is signified that the heavens, after the day of judgment, are to be rolled up and folded, as though now the heavens, after the manner of a certain book, were unrolled and open to us, doubtless for reading. To the same purpose belongs that which is in Psalm 25, The heavens shall announce his justice; and in Psalm 18, The heavens declare the glory of God; and that which is in the first chapter of the book of Genesis concerning the stars, Let them be for signs; and in Psalm 88, The heavens shall confess thy wonders, O Lord. Nor indeed, says Origen, does this opinion take away the free will of man—no more, surely, than the predictions of future things put forth by the holy Prophets, or the foreknowledge of all things which is in God. Plotinus said that the science of the stars (in this respect, that the stars are signs of human events) comes to a man either by some singular gift of God, or on account of an extraordinary skill in Astrology: for to acquire it there is need of the keenest searching and the highest cleverness.4
IULIUS autem Sirenus ne Augustinum quidem ab hac opinione abhorruisse putat, quippe in 2 libro contra Manichaeos cap. 21, cum is ageret de hominibus quorum, dum sunt in corpore mortali, occulta sunt corda, ita scribit:
But Julius Sirenus thinks that not even Augustine abhorred this opinion, since in the second book Against the Manichaeans, chapter 21, when he was treating of men whose hearts, while they are in the mortal body, are hidden, he writes thus:5

For we must not believe that in those celestial bodies thoughts can lie hidden as they lie hidden in these bodies of ours; but, just as some movements of the soul appear in the countenance, and especially in the eyes[...]6

Neque enim in illis corporibus caelestibus sic latere posse cogitationes credendum est, quemadmodum in his corporibus latent, sed sicut nonnulli motus animorum apparent in vultu, et maxime in oculis[...]

...in the hidden eyes—so, in that transparency and simplicity of the celestial bodies, I do not think that the movements of the soul can lie hidden at all. Thus Augustine there.7

...[in] oculis occultis, sic in illa perspicuitate ac simplicitate caelestium corporum omnes omnino motus animi latere non arbitror. Haec ibi Augustinus.

VERUM, si quis locum hunc non prorsus inconsiderate legat, plane comperiet Augustinum per caelestia corpora non intelligere orbes caelestes, sed corpora beatorum hominum post resurrectionem caelesti gloria et immortalitate donata; et ponere eum discrimen inter homines in hisce caducis corporibus viventes, et eosdem post resurrectionem in glorificatis corporibus immortalem et beatam vitam agentes: quod illi arcana cordium multiplici simulatione callide tegant et occultent, ideoque saepe alios fallant; in his vero manifesta erunt omnium corda omnibus, omnisque prorsus aberit simulatio, fictio atque deceptio. Atque hunc esse verborum Augustini germanum intellectum ex proxime consequentibus eius verbis palam est: haec enim subtexuit:
But, if anyone read this passage not altogether inconsiderately, he will plainly find that Augustine, by celestial bodies, does not understand the celestial orbs, but the bodies of the blessed men, after the resurrection endowed with celestial glory and immortality; and that he sets a distinction between men living in these perishable bodies, and the same men after the resurrection, leading an immortal and blessed life in glorified bodies: namely, that the former cunningly cover and hide the secrets of their hearts by manifold simulation, and therefore often deceive others; but in the latter the hearts of all will be manifest to all, and all simulation, fiction, and deception will be utterly absent. And that this is the genuine sense of Augustine's words is plain from his immediately following words: for he subjoined these:8

And so those will merit that dwelling and the change into the angelic form, who, even in this life—although they could hide lies beneath their garments of skin—yet hate them, and are versed with a most ardent love of truth, and conceal only that which those who hear cannot bear; but they tell no lies. For the time comes when nothing at all shall be covered over: for nothing is hidden which shall not be made manifest. Thus Augustine.9

Itaque illi merebuntur habitationem illam et commutationem in angelicam formam, qui etiam in hac vita, cum possint sub tunicis pelliceis occultare mendacia, oderunt tamen ea, et callent flagrantissimo amore veritatis, et hoc solum tegunt quod ii qui audiunt ferre non possunt; sed nulla mentiuntur. Venit enim tempus ut nihil etiam contegatur: Nihil est enim occultum quod non manifestabitur. Sic Augustinus.

Quare cum Augustinus satis explicate et aperte loquatur de corporibus hominum glorificatis, non autem de caelis vel astris, demiror sane Iulium Sirenum tam incogitanter et oscitanter legisse hunc locum, vel ut propter eum maxime Augustino affinxerit huiusmodi sententiam, cuius nec ullum eo loci vestigium apparet, et extat apud eundem in libro quinto de Civitate Dei copiosa et gravis confutatio. CAETERUM, astra esse signa rerum futurarum censeo equidem non solum esse alienum a vera philosophia, sed etiam sacris litteris contrarium. Ac licet complures earum rationum quas superiori capite tractavimus etiam valeant ad hoc probandum, novis tamen aliquot argumentis quae proprie eiusmodi sententiam refellant hoc loco utendum est. Principio, quod est naturale signum alicuius rei, id vel eius rei causam vel effectum esse, vel utrumque ab eadem superiori et communi causa proficisci necesse est: nam quod praeter haec quartum membrum fingi posset (videlicet, ut illud signum necessario sit coniunctum cum causa rei ab illo significatae), id non est diversum a tertio membro: talis enim connexio et coniunctio non aliter esse potest quam ut causa illa prius ex se pariat id quod est signum, deinde id quod est signatum; aut ut idem quod causam excitat vel admovet ad agendum, simul etiam adhibeat et applicet id quod est signum ad praesignificandum: utrumque autem horum ad omnem causam refertur. Hinc igitur argumentari licet ad hunc modum: Si caeli et sydera sunt signa omnium rerum sublunarium, vel sunt earum rerum causa (sed hoc negat ista opinio), vel sunt effectus (quod nec illi dicent, nec ullus hominum sanae mentis audebit dicere), aut, quod tantummodo reliquum est, tam caelestia quam sublu[naria]...
Wherefore, since Augustine speaks explicitly and openly enough of the glorified bodies of men, and not of the heavens or stars, I marvel indeed that Julius Sirenus read this passage so thoughtlessly and drowsily, or that on its account he chiefly fastened upon Augustine a sentence of this kind, of which not even any trace appears in that place—while in the same author, in the fifth book of the City of God, there exists a copious and weighty refutation of it. Moreover, that the stars are signs of future things I judge to be not only foreign to true philosophy, but even contrary to the sacred writings. And although several of those reasons which we treated in the previous chapter also avail to prove this, yet some new arguments, which properly refute a sentence of this kind, must be used in this place. First: that which is a natural sign of some thing must be either the cause of that thing, or its effect, or both must proceed from the same higher and common cause: for as to a fourth member that might be feigned besides these (namely, that the sign be necessarily conjoined with the cause of the thing signified by it), that is no different from the third member: for such a connection and conjunction can be in no other way than that that cause first of itself produces the thing which is the sign, then the thing which is signified; or that the same thing which rouses or moves the cause to act, at the same time also employs and applies the thing which is the sign for presignifying: and both of these are referred to the cause. Hence, then, one may argue in this manner: If the heavens and stars are signs of all sublunary things, either they are the cause of those things (but this the said opinion denies), or they are the effect (which neither will they say, nor will any man of sound mind dare to say), or—what alone remains—both the celestial and the sublu[nary]...10
...[sublu]naria ab eadem superiori et communi causa proveniant: quemadmodum Iris signum est serenitatis, non quia sit eius causa vel effectus, sed quia eadem est communis utriusque causa. At causam communem caelestium corporum et sublunarium necesse est esse vel corpoream vel incorpoream: corpoream quidem nullam (opinor) ponent isti, nullum enim corpus superius caelis est; relinquitur igitur omnia referant ad causam incorpoream, hoc est vel Deum vel Angelos qui movent caelos: ita ut, dum Angeli caelos movent, in ipsorum caelorum statu habituque, et in syderum positu et conformatione, quasi quibusdam suis nutibus et tanquam notis atque signis inibi descriptis, eventa rerum humanarum praenotent atque praemonstrent. At enimvero id multis de causis non est credibile. Etenim qui sic opinantur, fateri eos oportet induci homines ab Angelis ad maxima scelera et execranda flagitia.
...both the celestial and the sublunary proceed from the same higher and common cause: just as the rainbow is a sign of fair weather, not because it is its cause or effect, but because the same thing is the common cause of both. But the common cause of the celestial and the sublunary bodies must be either corporeal or incorporeal: corporeal indeed none (I suppose) will these men posit, for no body is higher than the heavens; it remains, therefore, that they refer all things to an incorporeal cause—that is, either God, or the Angels who move the heavens: so that, while the Angels move the heavens, in the state and condition of the heavens themselves, and in the position and configuration of the stars (as if by certain nods of their own, and as by marks and signs there described), they would foreknow and foreshow the events of human affairs. But in truth this, for many reasons, is not credible. For those who think thus must confess that men are led on by Angels to the greatest crimes and execrable misdeeds.11
Ad hoc, Philosophia docet, necnon et Theologia idem tradit, Angelorum nullam esse actionem quam vocant transeuntem, et quae proxime ab ipsis provenit, aliam quam motum localem; nec Angelos posse quicquam proxime agere praeterquam movere motu locali. Angelos vero qui circumvolvunt orbes caelestes non aliter circa res sublunares operari censent Philosophi et Theologi quam per motum et lumen caeli: nam influentias a lumine omnino diversas paulo superius sustulimus. Per motum et lumen caeli omnes futuros effectus rerum sublunarium clare, distincte certoque praemonstrari nemo dicet qui verisimilia et credibilia loqui velit. Deinde, cum eiusdem causae duo effectus se invicem necessario indicant, ut ab eadem causa sic eodem quoque modo ab illa provenire debent; alioquin fieri non potest ut se invicem certo indicent. A Deo autem et Angelis quae in corporibus caelestibus fiunt, ea necessario et invariabiliter se habent; quae autem in his quae sunt infra lunam, valde mutabiliter, et ut ita loquar, defectibiliter contingunt.
To this, Philosophy teaches, and Theology likewise hands down the same: that there is no action of the Angels which they call transient, and which proceeds proximately from them, other than local motion; nor can the Angels do anything proximately except move by local motion. And the Angels who revolve the celestial orbs, the Philosophers and Theologians judge, work upon sublunary things in no other way than through the motion and light of the heaven: for influences altogether diverse from light we did away with a little above. That through the motion and light of the heaven all future effects of sublunary things are clearly, distinctly, and certainly foreshown, no one will say who wishes to speak likely and credible things. Next, since two effects of the same cause necessarily indicate each other [only when], as from the same cause, so also in the same way, they ought to proceed from it; otherwise it cannot happen that they certainly indicate each other. But the things which are done by God and the Angels in the celestial bodies hold themselves necessarily and invariably; whereas the things which happen in those that are beneath the moon happen very mutably, and (so to speak) defectibly.12
HINC alia quoque subtexuntur argumenta. Etenim, quomodo astra, quae sunt certo numero comprehensa et semper unius modi et necessario ac immutabiliter ita se habent, signa esse possunt omnium rerum futurarum, quae propemodum infinitae sunt multitudine ac varietate et inter se plurimum differentes atque discrepantes? quomodo eadem syderum positura et conformatio, sub qua vel Gemini vel alii quamplurimi eodem puncto temporis nascuntur, potest esse certum signum proprie et distincte praesignificans tot tamque varios ac dissimiles casus et eventus qui in illis cernuntur? quare, si astra sunt signa rerum futurarum, earundem quoque causas esse fatendum est; quod si causas esse negamus, etiam signa esse negandum est. Dices, cometas qui in sublimi aëre generantur signa esse quae insignes admodum casus futuros portendant, quorum tamen cometae nec causae sint nec effectus: quare idem quoque astris accidere respectu rerum sublunarium non esse incredibile. At ego[...]
Hence other arguments too are subjoined. For how can the stars—which are comprehended in a fixed number, and are always of one manner, and hold themselves necessarily and immutably—be signs of all future things, which are well-nigh infinite in multitude and variety, and most greatly differing and discrepant among themselves? how can the same position and configuration of the stars, under which either twins or very many others are born at the same point of time, be a certain sign properly and distinctly presignifying so many and so various and dissimilar chances and events as are seen in them? wherefore, if the stars are signs of future things, it must be confessed that they are also their causes; but if we deny that they are causes, it must also be denied that they are signs. You will say: comets, which are generated in the upper air, are signs that portend very notable future chances, of which, nevertheless, the comets are neither causes nor effects: wherefore the same may also befall the stars with respect to sublunary things, and this is not incredible. But I[...]13
cometas certa signa humanorum casuum et eventuum nunquam concedam, licet hoc tam vulgo persuasum sit quam est a Sapientibus improbatum. Quod si hoc, cum vulgo consentiens, opinarer, dicerem cometas a stellis rerum futurarum effectricibus excitari, ut eas res antegressi praemonstrent. De stellis autem secus est, his enim nulla est corporea causa superior. SED quid multis moror? coguntur istius opinionis Auctores (quanquam id minime velint) Fati necessitatem inducere, et sane magis etiam quam qui stellas faciunt causas rerum sublunarium. Etenim, ut stellae causae sint eorum quae fiunt infra lunam, non ideo tamen Fati necessitas exsistet: quod enim illarum afflatu defluxuque in terris esset efficiendum, id posset vel contrariis materiae affectionibus vel obstantibus causis particularibus impediri. At si astra naturaliter futurarum rerum signa sunt, omnino evenire necessarium est quod ab illis significatur, alioquin essent signa inania et fallacia. Et cum Deus ea instituisset ad significandum, et in caelo tanquam in quodam volumine ea descripsisset veluti notas futurarum rerum indices, si eventus rerum cum illarum significationibus non congruerent, vel Deus earum auctor et institutor ignorans esset futurorum eventuum, vel fallax. Denique, si astra praesignificant quae futura sunt, aut praemonstrant quae facienda sunt a causis particularibus, non quidem omnibus sed aliquibus tantum (sed hoc improbabile est ac figmenti simile: cur enim stellae praenotent futuros effectus aliquarum particularium causarum potius quam aliarum? vel cur non similiter praemonstrent omnes, cum omnium similis ratio sit?); aut stellae praesignificant omnes futuros effectus causarum omnium particularium: hoc si est, nullae profecto reliquae fient causae per quas, quo minus eveniat quod a stellis praesignificatur, impediri et prohiberi queat. Ex quo fit necessario ut omnia quae infra Lunam fiunt immutabili necessitate Fati nexa vinctaque teneantur: quod nec istius sententiae defensores sentiunt, et id sentire impium est.
I will never grant that comets are certain signs of human chances and events, although this is as much persuaded to the vulgar as it is disapproved by the Wise. But if I held this, agreeing with the vulgar, I would say that comets are excited by the stars, the producers of future things, so that, going before, they foreshow those things. But concerning the stars it is otherwise, for to these there is no corporeal cause superior. But why do I delay over many things? The Authors of that opinion are compelled (although they least wish it) to introduce the necessity of Fate—and indeed even more than those who make the stars causes of sublunary things. For, granting that the stars are causes of the things that happen below the moon, not for that reason will the necessity of Fate exist: because what was to be effected on earth by their breathing and influx could be impeded either by contrary affections of the matter, or by obstructing particular causes. But if the stars are naturally signs of future things, it is altogether necessary that what is signified by them come to pass, otherwise they would be empty and fallacious signs. And since God had instituted them for signifying, and had described them in the heaven as in a certain volume, like marks indexing future things, if the outcomes of things did not agree with their significations, either God their author and institutor would be ignorant of future events, or deceitful. Finally, if the stars presignify the things that are to be: either they foreshow the things that are to be done by particular causes—not by all indeed, but by some only (but this is improbable and like a fiction: for why should the stars foreknow the future effects of some particular causes rather than of others? or why should they not foreshow all alike, since the reasoning of all is alike?); or the stars presignify all the future effects of all particular causes: and if this is so, there will surely be no remaining causes by which it could be impeded and prohibited that what is presignified by the stars should come to pass the less. From which it follows necessarily that all things which happen below the Moon are held bound and fettered by the immutable necessity of Fate: which neither do the defenders of that opinion hold, and to hold it is impious.14
TESTIMONIUM autem illud Esaiae productum est 34 cap., Caeli sicut libri complicabuntur, quod, inter cetera Scripturae testimonia paulo superius commemorata, solum habere aliquid difficultatis et nonnihil negocii facessere videtur: varie interpretatum reperio, ita tamen ut nulla interpretatio quae modo vel probati sit Auctoris vel sit ipsa probabilis quicquam illi sententiae suffragetur. Iustinus martyr, respondens ad quaestionem nonagesimam quartam Orthodoxorum, qua quaerebatur quemadmodum intelligendum esset quod dicitur ab Esaia fore ut caelum aliquando velut liber complicaretur, sic ait:
But that testimony of Isaiah which was brought forward, in chapter 34, The heavens shall be folded together like a book, alone, among the other testimonies of Scripture mentioned a little above, seems to have some difficulty and to cause some little trouble: I find it variously interpreted, yet so that no interpretation—which is either of an approved Author, or is itself probable—gives any support to that opinion. Justin Martyr, answering the ninety-fourth question of the Orthodox, in which it was asked how that should be understood which is said by Isaiah, that the heaven would one day be folded up like a book, speaks thus:15

Just as the divine Scripture compares the creation of the heavens, by a likeness, sometimes with the stretching out of a skin, saying, Who stretches out the heaven like a skin; sometimes with firmed smoke, The heaven, it says, is firmed like smoke; sometimes with the roundness of a vault, Who stretches out, it says, the heaven like a vault: so, conversely, it compares the dissolution of the heavens, by a comparison, with[...]16

Quemadmodum caeli creationem divina littera per similitudinem conferunt aliquando cum pellis extensione, dicentes, Qui extendit caelum sicut pellem; aliquando cum firmato fumo, Caelum, inquit, ceu fumus firmatum est; aliquando cum rotunditate camera, Qui extendit, inquit, caelum velut cameram: sic e diverso caeli dissolutionem per comparationem conferunt cum[...]

...it compares with other things: as in Isaiah, with a scroll to be rolled up and folded together; as in David, in Psalm 101, with a garment growing old and being changed. Thus Justin.17

...[per comparationem conferunt] cum aliis rebus: ut apud Esaiam cum volumine involvendo et implicando, sicut apud Davidem Psalmo 101 cum vestimento veterascente et commutando. Sic Iustinus.

Hieronymus vero super illis verbis haec scribit:
But Jerome writes these things upon those words:18

It must be considered that he does not say that the heavens perish, but that they are rolled back or folded together like a book: so that, after all sins have been opened and re-read, those which had before been opened may be folded together, that the offenses of the many be no longer written in them. For in Scripture the heavens are said to announce the justice of God, to reveal His wrath, and to prove and testify the crimes of men.19

Considerandum quod non dicat interire caelos, sed replicari sive complicari quasi librum: ut, postquam omnia peccata aperta fuerint et relecta, complicentur qui prius aperti fuerant, ut nequaquam ultra scribantur in eis delicta multorum. In Scriptura enim dicuntur caeli annunciare iustitiam Dei, revelare iram eius, et probare ac testificari hominum scelera.

SANCTUS Thomas et Nicolaus de Lyra aliter exponunt. Complicabuntur, inquiunt, caeli tanquam liber, hoc est, non exercebunt ultra Ethnici Astromantiam suam, nec posthac ex astris divinare audebunt eventa hominum, quasi legerent in syderibus descriptos casus et eventus futuros. Alii sic interpretantur: Non patebit amplius introitus in regnum caelorum, sed ianua caelestis clausa erit. Sunt etiam qui explanent hoc modo: Ministerium et usus caelorum atque syderum exhibitus homini ante diem iudicii, postea esse desinet: nam licet non prorsus interibunt caeli, alio tamen statu erunt, et quibus nunc funguntur ministeriis et obsequiis hominum causa, ab illis post diem iudicii quoquo modo vacabunt; quae vocatio pulchre declaratur ab Isaia similitudine libri, quem, posteaquam eo usi sumus nec amplius nobis usui futurus est, complicare et claudere solemus.
Saint Thomas and Nicholas of Lyra expound it otherwise. The heavens shall be folded together, they say, like a book—that is, the heathen will no longer practice their astromancy, nor henceforth will they dare to divine from the stars the events of men, as though they were reading in the stars the chances and events written there. Others interpret thus: An entrance into the kingdom of the heavens will lie open no more, but the heavenly door will be closed. There are also those who explain it in this way: The ministry and use of the heavens and stars, exhibited to man before the day of judgment, will afterward cease: for although the heavens will not utterly perish, they will yet be in another state, and from the ministries and services which they now perform for the sake of men, they will after the day of judgment in some way rest; which cessation is beautifully declared by Isaiah through the likeness of a book, which, after we have used it and it is to be of no further use to us, we are wont to fold up and close.20
NEC displicet mihi interpretatio eorum qui aiunt illa similitudine declarari tantam fore divinae irae et vindictae demonstrationem adversus gentes de quibus illic Esaias loquitur, tantam rerum omnium perturbationem et confusionem, tantam denique hominum tristitiam dolorem et conflictationem, ut prae magnitudine moeroris atque doloris et prae animi perturbatione et oppressione videantur hominibus caelestia lumina restringui, stellae de caelo cadere, motusque earum conturbari, denique caelum complicari et recedere: nam quod hic dicitur complicari, in Apocalypsi dicitur recedere vel abire. Sic enim habes in capite sexto, Et caelum recessit sicut liber involutus.
Nor does the interpretation of those displease me who say that by that likeness is declared that so great will be the demonstration of divine wrath and vengeance against the nations of whom Isaiah there speaks, so great the perturbation and confusion of all things, and finally so great the sadness, grief, and distress of men, that, through the magnitude of mourning and grief, and through the perturbation and oppression of mind, the heavenly lights seem to men to be restrained, the stars to fall from heaven, and their motions to be disturbed, and finally the heaven to be folded together and to recede: for what is here said to be folded together, in the Apocalypse is said to recede or depart. For so you have it in the sixth chapter, And the heaven departed like a scroll rolled up.21
SED, quo planior sit et facilior ad intelligendum etiam non valde doctis similitudo libri qua usus est Esaias, sciendum est apud Hebraeos antiquitus libros sacros diversa forma scribi et compingi solitos esse quam nunc scribuntur libri apud nos. Habebant enim unum duntaxat folium sive membranam oblongam, quae circa cylindrum sive axem ligneum circumplicabatur, instar lineae telae radio textorio circumvolutae. Videbantur autem huiusmodi libri aliquam referre caelorum similitudinem et imaginem: quia, sicut axem illum ligneum qui in medio voluminis est complures ipsius membranae ceu spirae, altera super alteram, ambiunt et circundant, ita hanc terram, quae medium totius universi axem tenet, caelestes orbes alter super alterum, collocati in orbem, circumplectentur. Verum de testimonio Esaiae satis dictum sit: cuius cum an[...]
But, that the likeness of a book which Isaiah used may be plainer and easier to understand even to the not very learned, it must be known that among the Hebrews the sacred books were anciently wont to be written and bound in a different form than the books are now written among us. For they had only a single leaf or oblong membrane, which was folded around a cylinder or wooden axis, after the manner of a linen cloth wound around a weaver's beam. And books of this kind seemed to bear some likeness and image of the heavens: because, just as several coils, as it were spirals, of the membrane itself encircle and surround, one over another, that wooden axis which is in the middle of the roll, so the celestial orbs, set one over another in a circle, would encompass this earth, which holds the central axis of the whole universe. But let enough have been said of the testimony of Isaiah: whose [expositions], although [many]...22
...[cuius cum] an multae ac variae sint expositiones, nulla earum tamen mirificos istos astrorum Lectores, interpretes ac Vates adiuvat.
...whose expositions, however many and various they are, yet none of them aids those marvelous Readers, interpreters, and Prophets of the stars.23

Translator’s notes

  1. The fourth chapter, refuting the milder view that the stars, though not causes, are at least certain signs of future events. ↩
  2. Augustine (City of God 5.1) records the opinion of certain learned men that the stars are not causes but true and certain signs of human events. Origen (in his Genesis commentaries, per Eusebius, Praep. ev. 6.9), expounding Gen 1:14 (‘and let them be for signs’)... Continues onto the next page (catchword ‘quae’). ↩
  3. Marginal gloss: "Liber qui inscribebatur Narratio Ioseph, ab Origene citatus." Origen, expounding Gen 1:14 (‘let them be for signs’—the disputation's theme), held the stars set by God to presignify future events by their aspects and conjunctions, not to cause them—heaven being like a ‘book’ in which God described all that will happen. He cites the (apocryphal) ‘Narration of Joseph,’ where Jacob says ‘I have read in the tablets of heaven whatever shall befall you.’ Plotinus (the Neoplatonist) held the same (‘Whether the Stars Do Anything’; On Fate ch. 6—the skilled read the future from the star-figures as from letters); Porphyry says Plotinus foresaw and prevented his own suicide-plan from the heavens. ↩
  4. Julius Sirenus (De Fato 9.35) defends this view with a Scripture catena: Isaiah 34:4 (‘folded like a book’—the heavens lie open like a book to be read); Ps 50:6/Ps 19:1/Gen 1:14/Ps 89:5. Origen: this does not destroy free will, any more than the Prophets' predictions or God's foreknowledge do. Plotinus: the science of the stars-as-signs comes either by a singular gift of God or by extraordinary astrological skill. ↩
  5. Julius Sirenus claims even Augustine did not reject the stars-as-signs view, citing Augustine, De Genesi contra Manichaeos 2.21 (on men whose hearts are hidden while in the mortal body): ↩
  6. Augustine, De Genesi contra Manichaeos 2.21 (cited by Julius Sirenus). The block quote spans printed pp. 271–272. Continues onto the next page (catchword ‘oculis’). ↩
  7. Conclusion of the Augustine quotation (De Gen. c. Manich. 2.21): just as the soul's movements show in the face and especially the eyes, so in the transparency of the ‘celestial bodies’ no movement of the soul can lie hidden. (Pererius will argue these ‘celestial bodies’ are the glorified human bodies, not the heavens.) ↩
  8. Marginal gloss: "Excutitur locus Augustini." Pererius corrects Sirenus: Augustine's ‘celestial bodies’ are not the heavenly orbs but the glorified bodies of the blessed after the resurrection. He contrasts men in their perishable bodies (who hide their hearts by simulation) with the same after resurrection (whose hearts are manifest, all deception gone)—as the next words show: ↩
  9. Augustine, continuing (De Gen. c. Manich. 2.21): those merit the heavenly dwelling and ‘change into the angelic form’ who, though they could hide lies beneath the ‘garments of skin,’ hate them and love truth, telling no lies—for ‘nothing is hidden that shall not be made manifest’ (Luke 8:17). This confirms he means glorified human bodies, not the stars. ↩
  10. Marginal gloss: "Astra non esse certa signa rerum futurarum." Pererius rebukes Sirenus for misreading Augustine (who refutes the stars-as-signs view in City of God 5). His own thesis: the view is foreign to philosophy and contrary to Scripture. First argument (the natural-sign disjunction): a natural sign must be the thing's cause, or its effect, or both must spring from a common higher cause. So if the stars are signs of all sublunary things, they are either their causes (the opinion denies this), or their effects (absurd), or—the only remaining option—both proceed from a common higher cause. Continues onto the next page (catchword ‘luna’). ↩
  11. The natural-sign argument concluded: if stars are signs of sublunary things via a common higher cause—like the rainbow, a sign of fair weather not by causing it but because both share a common cause—that common cause must be incorporeal (no body is above the heavens), i.e. God or the Angels moving the heavens. So the Angels, moving the heavens, would inscribe human events in the star-configurations as signs. But this is incredible: it would make the Angels lead men into the greatest crimes. ↩
  12. Two further arguments: (1) Angels' only ‘transient’ action is local motion, so the heaven-moving Angels work on sublunary things only by the heaven's motion and light (‘influences’ being already disproved)—and no credible person says all sublunary futures are clearly foreshown by motion and light. (2) Two effects of one cause indicate each other only if they proceed from it in the same way; but what God and the Angels do in the heavens is necessary and invariable, while sublunary events happen mutably and ‘defectibly’—so the heavens cannot be certain signs of them. ↩
  13. Marginal gloss: "An Cometae signa sint humanarum rerum." Further arguments: how can the stars—fixed, uniform, immutable—be signs of future things almost infinite in variety? how can one star-configuration (shared by twins, or many born at once) distinctly presignify their many diverse fates? So if stars are signs, they are causes too; deny the causes, deny the signs. An objection (to be answered): comets, neither causes nor effects, are signs portending great events—so why not the stars? Continues onto the next page (catchword ‘cometas’; signature M). ↩
  14. Marginal gloss: "Qui astra futurarum rerum certa faciunt signa, eos necessario Fatum inducere." Pererius's reply to the comets objection: he never grants comets are certain signs (a vulgar belief disproved by the wise); if he did, he'd say comets are excited by the star-causes and so foreshow events—but no corporeal cause is above the stars. The decisive argument: the stars-as-signs view forces Fate-necessity even more than the stars-as-causes view. Causes can be impeded (by contrary matter or particular causes), but a natural sign must infallibly signify—else God (who ‘wrote’ the stars as signs) would be ignorant or deceptive. And if the stars sign all the effects of all causes, nothing can impede them, so all sublunary things are bound by immutable Fate—which the defenders deny and which is impious. ↩
  15. Marginal gloss: "Explicatur locus Isaiae ex cap. 34." The Isaiah 34:4 testimony, ‘The heavens shall be folded up like a book,’ alone of the Scripture proofs cited for the stars-as-signs view has some difficulty. Variously interpreted, yet no interpretation (of an approved author, or probable in itself) favors that view. Justin Martyr (Quaestiones et responsiones ad Orthodoxos, q. 94) answers how Isaiah's ‘heaven folded like a book’ is to be understood: ↩
  16. Justin Martyr, Quaestiones et responsiones ad Orthodoxos, q. 94. The block quote spans printed pp. 274–275. Scripture likens the heavens' creation now to a stretched skin (Ps 104:2), now to firmed smoke (Isa 51:6 LXX), now to a vaulted roof (Isa 40:22). Continues onto the next page (catchword ‘cum’). ↩
  17. Marginal glosses: "Psalm. 103. Esaiae 51. Iuxta 70 (Interpretes). Esaiae 40. Iuxta 70 (Interpretes)" — keying the Septuagint readings cited (Ps 104:2; Isa 51:6; Isa 40:22; Ps 102:26). Conclusion of Justin's answer: as Scripture likens the heavens' creation to a skin, smoke, or vault, so it likens their dissolution to a rolled-up scroll (Isaiah) or a garment grown old and changed (Psalm 102:26). ↩
  18. Lead-in to Jerome's exposition of Isaiah 34:4. ↩
  19. Jerome, Commentary on Isaiah (on 34:4): he does not say the heavens perish, but are folded like a book—so that, when all sins have been opened and re-read, they are folded up, that the crimes of the many be written in them no more. (The heavens in Scripture ‘announce God's justice, reveal His wrath, and testify men's crimes.’) ↩
  20. Three further expositions: (1) Aquinas and Nicholas of Lyra—‘folded like a book’ means the heathen will no longer practice astromancy or read events ‘written in the stars.’ (2) Others—entry to the kingdom of heaven will close. (3) Others—the heavens' ministry to man (before Judgment) will cease afterward; they will not perish but rest from their services, ‘folded’ like a book we close when done with it. ↩
  21. Pererius's preferred reading: the simile declares so great a demonstration of divine wrath against the nations (of which Isaiah speaks) and so great a confusion of all things that, through grief and dread, the heavenly lights seem dimmed, the stars fall, their motions disturbed, the heaven ‘folded up’ and receding—‘folded’ in Isaiah being ‘departed’ in Revelation 6:14 (‘the heaven departed like a scroll rolled up’). ↩
  22. Marginal gloss: "Antiquus mos Hebraeorum scribendi." A digression on the ancient Hebrew scroll: a single oblong sheet rolled around a wooden axis, like cloth on a weaver's beam. Such a scroll resembled the heavens—as the membrane's coils encircle the central axis, so the celestial orbs, set one above another, encompass the earth, which holds the universe's central axis. Continues onto the next page (catchword ‘an multae’). ↩
  23. Closing the Isaiah digression: however many its expositions, none of them helps the astrologers (sarcastically, those ‘marvelous Readers, interpreters, and Prophets of the stars’). ↩