Did Vatican II Reject the Completeness of Revelation? – Part II

In 1907 Pope Pius X condemned the Modernist claim that

Revelation… was not completed [completa] with the Apostles. (Lamentabili Sane 21)

The positive content of that teaching is the claim that revelation was completed by the death of the last Apostle.

A previous piece showed that that teaching of Pius X is echoed in the modern Catechism. (See “Was Revelation Completed by the Death of the Last Apostle? – Part I”.) However, there is a potential problem. In 1965 Vatican II said that:

the Church constantly moves forward towards the fullness of divine truth. (Dei Verbum 8)

Some people consider that that statement of Vatican II is doctrinally erroneous. They think that it conflicts with the teaching of Pius X (above), because

the Church’s tradition does not ‘progress’; it was complete with the death of the last Apostle. (Super Flumina, “The ‘Plenary Council’ Circus”)

This raises a question. Has Vatican II fallen into the doctrinal error of rejecting the completeness of revelation?

1. Revelation Completed at the Crucifixion

One possible answer to the question is provided by another text of Vatican II, from Dignitatis Humanae, which stated:

In the end, when He completed on the cross the work of redemption whereby He achieved salvation and true freedom for men, He brought His revelation to completion [revelationem suam perfecit]. (Dignitatis Humanae 11)

On the surface that text looks as if it is in full agreement with Pius X’s claim that revelation was completed by the death of the last Apostle, as it seems to say that revelation was completed at the Crucifixion.

However, if that text is indeed agreeing with Pius X, then it (allegedly) raises a new problem by being inconsistent with the Council of Trent. In 1547 Trent said that some aspects of revelation (concerning the Sacrament of Penance) were only revealed after the Resurrection. (See Session 6, Chapter 14.) So, (allegedly) if Vatican II avoids the doctrinal error of disagreeing with Pius X, it only achieves that by committing the doctrinal error of disagreeing with the Council of Trent. (See “The Principal Heresies and Other Errors of Vatican II”.)

But there is no need to read the texts of Vatican II in such a contradictory way. It is clear that after the resurrection Christ only appeared to select individuals and groups. (See Post-Resurrection Appearances.) Before his crucifixion Christ ministered to the wider public. So, there is a genuine sense in which the Crucifixion marked a completion of an aspect of his ministry of revelation, precisely as Vatican II states, above. That does not necessarily mean that there were no other types of revelation occurring after the Resurrection.

Vatican II makes precisely that point in Dei Verbum, when it notes that Jesus’ work of revelation continued through the Resurrection and Post-Resurrection events (i.e., after the Crucifixion). The Council stated:

Jesus perfected revelation [revelationem complendo perficit] by … manifesting Himself: through His words and deeds… but especially through His death and glorious resurrection from the dead and final sending of the Spirit of truth. (Dei Verbum 4)

This means that Vatican II is not contradicting the Council of Trent. However, if the text above from Dignitatis Humanae is not saying that ALL types of revelation were completed at the Crucifixion, then it is clearly irrelevant to the original question, which was about whether revelation was completed by the death of the last Apostle.

So, moving on, and returning to the original question…

2. Vatican II’s View of Revelation

To understand Vatican II’s views about revelation, it is important to focus upon Dei Verbum (DV), as that document explicitly claims that it is setting out authoritative doctrine on revelation. It states:

Following in the footsteps of the Council of Trent and of the First Vatican Council, this present council wishes to set forth authentic doctrine on divine revelation. (DV 1)

The Council explained what revelation is, by stating:

Through divine revelation, God chose to show forth and communicate Himself and the eternal decisions of His will regarding the salvation of men. (DV 6)

This explains that revelation is a communication which is intended to enable humans to achieve salvation. That understanding is so central to Dei Verbum, that it is repeated in several different ways. For example:

By this revelation…, the deepest truth about… the salvation of man shines out… (DV 2)

[Jesus]… confirmed with divine testimony what revelation proclaimed, that God is with us to free us from the darkness of sin and death, and to raise us up to life eternal.  (DV 4)

This is an important explanation of revelation, as it has implications for understanding some historical controversies. If the good news of revelation (i.e., the Gospel) is about salvation, then it is not a communication about how planets move in the sky, nor about geological timescales nor evolutionary processes. It is not a message about snakes and apples or floods and dinosaurs. Revelation is purely and simply a communication to help humans achieve salvation. Appealing to revelation to settle other matters is to fundamentally misunderstand what it is, and what it is for.

3. How Revelation Is Communicated

Dei Verbum (DV) also explains how revelation is communicated to Christians.

Christ the Lord… commissioned the Apostles to preach… that Gospel… This commission was faithfully fulfilled by the Apostles who, by their oral preaching, … handed on what they had received from the lips of Christ… or what they had learned through the prompting of the Holy Spirit. The commission was fulfilled, too, by those Apostles and apostolic men who… committed the message of salvation to writing. (DV 7)

The reference to oral apostolic preaching and to written texts is explained a few lines later as referring to:

Sacred tradition and Sacred Scripture [which] form one sacred deposit of the word of God … (DV 10)

The original Latin text capitalizes the “Tradition” which communicates revelation. So, we can summarize Vatican II’s position as the claim that revelation is communicated through (Sacred) Tradition and Scripture. (See also “Did Vatican II Reject Two Sources of Revelation?”)

This view embeds an important historical consequence. If (Sacred) Tradition consists ONLY of the oral preaching of the Apostles, then after the last Apostle died it became impossible to change or add anything to (Sacred) Tradition. This means that (Sacred) Tradition is immutable. It is, what it was, at the time of the death of the last Apostle; as of course Scripture also is, what it was, when it was first written.

4. Interpreting Revelation

Recognizing that revelation is communicated in (Sacred) Tradition and Scripture leads immediately to a problem of interpretation. People can, and do, disagree about what (Sacred) Tradition and/or Scripture means, so there is an ongoing need to clarify the meaning.

Dei Verbum (DV) addressed that issue, in the following words:

The task of authentically interpreting the word of God, whether written or handed on, has been entrusted exclusively to the living teaching office [vivo Ecclesiae Magisterio] of the Church… This teaching office [Magisterium]… teach[es] only what has been handed on… explaining it faithfully… with the help of the Holy Spirit. (DV 10)

That text makes three important points:

1. The Magisterium is the only divinely authorized interpreter of revelation, i.e., of (Sacred) Tradition and of Scripture.
2. The Magisterium cannot add to, or otherwise change, the original revelation. It can only transmit what “has been handed on.”
3. But the Magisterium interprets the meaning of revelation, as it is divinely assisted to “explain it faithfully,” by publishing clarifications.

This raises a question. What is the status of those “clarifications?” Can they become part of the Church’s tradition?

5. Tradition and tradition

Dei Verbum mentions the word “tradition” thirteen times. It mentions “Sacred Tradition” eight times, which it describes as communicating revelation. But in addition to that, there is another version of tradition which is called “living tradition” (twice) and sometimes just “tradition” (three times).

To keep the two ideas of tradition distinct, I shall henceforth refer to the two versions as (Sacred) Tradition and as living tradition.

We can see the significance of the distinction if we reflect on an historical example from the Council of Nicaea. In 325 Nicaea (magisterially) clarified the meaning of revelation by interpreting Scripture as teaching that Jesus is God. To make that point clear, the council published a creed which described Jesus as:

God from God, Light from Light, true God from true God, begotten not made, consubstantial with the Father. (Nicene Creed)

Those words constitute an infallible dogmatic teaching.

However, those words are not part of revelation. That sentence was not spoken by an apostle, so it is not part of (Sacred) Tradition. Nor does it appear in the Bible, so it is not part of Scripture. Instead, those words are a magisterial clarification which have become part of the “living tradition” of the Church.

That “living tradition” is so authoritative, that Dei Verbum insists that it must be taken into account, and used as a hermeneutical principle when interpreting other texts of Scripture. It states:

Holy Scripture must be… interpreted… [according to] the content and unity of the whole of Scripture… The living tradition of the whole Church must [also] be taken into account along with the harmony which exists between elements of the faith. (DV 12)

What this means is that there are two different concepts of tradition in Dei Verbum. One concept describes the information which consists of the immutable (Sacred) Tradition of revelation. But the other concept (living tradition) describes the information which also contains the Magisterial clarifications of revelation. That second type of tradition is not immutable. Its content grows and progresses over time, whenever the Magisterium has to clarify a point of revelation, as occurred of course, at the Council of Nicaea.

6. Progress and Growth

The idea that there can be growth and progress in the Church’s theology is not a new idea. It was explained initially by St. Vincent of Lérins (died c. 445). He said:

Shall there, then, be no progress [profectus] [in understanding] … Certainly… Yet on condition that it be real progress, not alteration [permutatio] of the faith. For progress requires that the subject be enlarged [amplificetur]…, alteration, that it be transformed [transvertatur] into something else. [So, let]… intelligence, knowledge, [and] wisdom, in the course of ages… increase and make much and vigorous progress; but… only…in the same doctrine, in the same sense, and in the same meaning. (Comminitory 23; Latin text)

At the heart of St. Vincent’s position is a distinction between an acceptable progress (profectus) in the understanding of revelation (i.e., an accurate clarification of the meaning), and an unacceptable alteration (permutatio) of revelation, which changes the meaning of revelation. The last clause of the paragraph above explains how to tell the difference between progress and alteration.(For more details, see “Theological Meaning: Understanding ‘Eodem Sensu Eademque Sententia’”.)

St. Vincent’s views were taken up by Vatican I, in 1870. The Council paraphrased his words, as follows:

May understanding, knowledge and wisdom increase [crescat] as ages and centuries roll along, and greatly and vigorously flourish [proficiat], in each and all, in the individual and the whole church: but this only in its own proper kind, that is to say, in the same doctrine, the same sense, and the same understanding. (Dei Filius 4 14; Latin text)

Vatican I made the same point as St. Vincent, albeit in slightly different language. Vatican I believed that over time, theological knowledge will increase or grow (crescat) and it will flourish, or become more completed (proficiat). But the Council did not name the process whereby it happens, although St. Vincent himself referred to it as “a progress” (profectus). Modern theologians tend to refer to it as a “development of doctrine.”

7. Vatican II

When Vatican II reflected on the issues of revelation and the clarification of its meaning, it essentially combined the insight that there are two distinct models of tradition (see section 5), with the idea that there can be a “progress and growth” in understanding (see section 6). Dei Verbum (DV) stated:

This tradition which comes from the Apostles develops [proficit] in the Church with the help of the Holy Spirit. For there is a growth [crescit] in the understanding of the realities and the words which have been handed down. (DV 8)

In this paragraph Vatican II chose its language carefully to precisely echo the words of Vatican I.

Vatican I used the verb proficere in its subjunctive form (proficiat) to say “may there be flourishing (or progress)” in understanding (see section 6). Vatican II used precisely the same verb in the first sentence above, but it used it in its indicative form (proficit) to assert that there is indeed a development (or progress) in understanding.

Vatican I also used the verb crescere, in its subjunctive form (crescat) to say “may understanding grow.” Vatican II used precisely the same verb to assert that understanding does grow (crescit).

The difference between Vatican I and Vatican II (on this issue), consists in what is said to be progressing and growing. Vatican I described it as “understanding.” Vatican II described it as “tradition.”

If Vatican II had said that “Sacred Tradition” progresses or grows, then it would clearly have erred, as we saw that the revelation of Sacred Tradition cannot change (by growing or progressing). (See section 3.)

In the text above, from Dei Verbum, Vatican II does not refer to “Sacred Tradition.” It refers just to tradition. That means that Vatican II is referring to the living tradition which includes Sacred Tradition PLUS the Magisterial clarifications of that Sacred Tradition (such as the statements of councils like Nicaea). The living tradition can, of course, progress and grow, as Church Councils add authoritative clarifications of revelation to the Church’s understanding. (See section 5.)

With that understanding of what Vatican II is stating in the paragraph above, then it becomes immediately clear that there is nothing unorthodox or doctrinally erroneous in what Vatican II is saying.

8. Conclusion

Vatican II described revelation as being conveyed through (Sacred) Tradition and Scripture. It also said that “the tradition which comes from the Apostles” continues to grow throughout time.

That comment is not a rejection of the doctrine that revelation was completed by the death of the last Apostle. This is because Vatican II was referring to two different types of tradition.

When it said that tradition continues to grow, it was referring to the “living tradition” which contains the original revelation of (Sacred) Tradition, as well as the Magisterial clarifications which have explained its meaning (such as the decrees of councils like Nicaea). The Council said that it (i.e., living tradition) comes from the Apostles, because living tradition has its origins and foundations in the (Sacred) Tradition which it reflects on, whenever the Magisterium acts to clarify its meaning. So, of course the Church’s living tradition grows throughout time. And it will continue to do so for as long as there is a changing world for which the Church must constantly interpret and clarify the meaning of revelation.

However, the fact that there is a “living tradition” (consisting of revelation + clarification), does not mean that it cannot also be the case, as Pius X said, that there is an immutable and unchangeable original revelation, which was completed by the death of the last Apostle.