Part III, Chapter XLII, 8

Of the five books he has written on this subject, the first deals with three questions. One asks which form of government is best in itself—monarchy, aristocracy, or democracy—and concludes that none is, but rather a government mixed from all three. Another asks which is the best government for the Church, and concludes that it is the mixed form, though with the largest share of monarchy. The third asks whether St. Peter occupied the place of monarch in this mixed monarchy. As for his first conclusion, I have already sufficiently proved (chap. 18.) that all governments which people are bound to obey are simple and absolute. In a monarchy only one man is supreme; all other people who exercise any power in the state hold it by his commission, at his pleasure, and exercise it in his name. In aristocracy and democracy only one assembly is supreme, holding the same power that belongs to the monarch in a monarchy; this is not a mixed but an absolute sovereignty. Which of the three kinds is best is not a matter for dispute where one has already been established. The existing government must always be preferred, upheld, and regarded as best, because both the Law of Nature and positive divine law forbid doing anything tending to overthrow it. Besides, unless a pastor holds civil sovereignty, the best kind of government has no bearing on his power. His calling is not to govern people by commands, but to teach and persuade them with arguments, leaving them to consider whether to accept or reject the doctrine taught. Monarchy, aristocracy, and democracy designate three kinds of sovereigns, not pastors; or, we might say, three kinds of heads of households, not three kinds of schoolmasters for their children.

His second conclusion, therefore, about the best form of government for the Church, has nothing to do with the question of the pope's power outside his own dominions. For in all other Commonwealths his power, if he has any, is the schoolmaster's alone, not the household head's.

For his third conclusion, that St. Peter was monarch of the Church, his chief argument is the passage in St. Matthew (chap. 16.18, 19.): “You are Peter, and upon this rock I will build my Church, etc. And I will give you the keys of Heaven; whatever you bind on Earth shall be bound in Heaven, and whatever you loose on Earth shall be loosed in Heaven.” Properly considered, this passage proves nothing more than that Christ's Church has only one article as its foundation: the article Peter professed on behalf of all the apostles, prompting our Savior to speak the words quoted. To understand this clearly, we must consider that our Savior, John the Baptist, and his apostles preached nothing but this article of faith: “that he was the Christ.” All other articles require faith only insofar as they rest on this one. John began first (Mat. 3.2.), preaching only, “The Kingdom of God is at hand.” Then our Savior himself preached the same (Mat. 4.17.). And when he commissioned his Twelve Apostles (Mat. 10.7.), no other article is mentioned for them to preach. This was the fundamental article, the foundation of the Church's faith. Later, when the apostles returned, he asked them all (Mat. 16.13), not Peter alone, “Who do people say I am?” They answered that “some say John the Baptist, some Elias, and others Jeremias or one of the prophets.” Then (verse 15.) he asked them all again, not Peter alone, “Who do you say I am?” Peter therefore answered for all of them, “You are Christ, the Son of the living God.” This, as I said, is the foundation of the faith of the whole Church. Our Savior took this as the occasion to say, “Upon this stone I will build my Church,” plainly meaning by the Church's foundation stone the fundamental article of its faith. But why, someone may object, does our Savior insert the words “You are Peter”? If the original text had been translated strictly, the reason would readily appear. We must consider that the apostle Simon was surnamed Stone, the meaning of the Syriac word Cephas and the Greek word Petrus. Thus after the confession of that fundamental article, our Savior alluded to his name and said, as it would be in English, “You are Stone, and upon this Stone I will build my Church.” That is to say, the article “I am the Christ” is the foundation of all the faith I require of those who are to be members of my Church. Nor are such allusions to a name unusual in ordinary speech. But it would have been a strange and obscure thing to say, if our Savior had meant to build his Church on the person of St. Peter, “You are a Stone, and upon this Stone I will build my Church,” when he could so easily and unambiguously have said, “I will build my Church on you,” preserving the same allusion to his name.

As for the following words, “I will give you the keys of Heaven, etc.,” they grant no more than our Savior also granted all his other disciples (Matth. 18.18.): “Whatever you bind on Earth shall be bound in Heaven, and whatever you loose on Earth shall be loosed in Heaven.” However this is interpreted, there can be no doubt that the power granted belongs to all supreme pastors, as all Christian civil sovereigns are in their own dominions. Even if St. Peter, or our Savior himself, had converted any such sovereign to belief in him and acknowledgment of his Kingdom, his Kingdom is not of this world. He would therefore have left the supreme care of converting that sovereign's subjects to the sovereign alone; otherwise he would have deprived him of sovereignty, to which the right to teach is inseparably attached. This is enough to refute Bellarmine's first book, in which he tries to prove that St. Peter was universal monarch of the Church—that is, of all Christians in the world.

The second book offers two conclusions: that St. Peter was bishop of Rome and died there, and that the popes of Rome are his successors. Both have been disputed by others. But even supposing them true, if by bishop of Rome is meant either monarch or supreme pastor of the Church, that bishop was not Silvester but Constantine, the first Christian emperor. Like Constantine, all other Christian emperors were by right supreme bishops of the Roman Empire. I say of the Roman Empire, not of all Christendom, since other Christian sovereigns possessed the same right in their respective territories, as an office inherently attached to their sovereignty. This will serve as my answer to his second book.

In his third book he considers whether the pope is Antichrist. For my part, I see no argument that proves he is, in the sense Scripture gives that name. Nor will I use the nature of Antichrist as an argument against the authority the pope now exercises, or previously exercised, within the dominions of another prince or state.

Clearly the prophets of the Old Testament foretold, and the Jews expected, a Messiah—that is, a Christ—who would restore among them the Kingdom of God which they had rejected in Samuel's day when they demanded a king like those of other nations. This expectation left them vulnerable to impostors ambitious enough to try to seize the kingdom and clever enough to deceive the people by counterfeit miracles, hypocritical lives, or plausible speeches and doctrines. Our Savior and his apostles therefore warned people against false prophets and false Christs. False Christs are those who claim to be the Christ but are not; properly speaking, they are Antichrists, in the same sense that, when a schism arises in the Church through the election of two popes, each calls the other Antipapa, or false pope. Antichrist in its proper meaning therefore has two essential marks: he denies that Jesus is Christ, and he professes that he himself is Christ. St. John states the first mark in his 1 Epistle, chapter 4, verse 3: “Every spirit that does not confess that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is not of God; and this is the spirit of Antichrist.” The other mark is expressed in our Savior's words (Mat. 24.5.): “Many shall come in my name, saying, I am Christ”; and again, “If anyone says to you, Look, Christ is here, or Christ is there, do not believe it.” Thus an Antichrist must be a false Christ, one who claims to be Christ himself. From the two marks, “to deny that Jesus is the Christ” and “to affirm that he himself is the Christ,” it follows also that he must be an “adversary of the true Christ,” another common meaning of the word Antichrist. But among these many Antichrists there is one particular one, O Antichristos, the Antichrist: one definite person, not indefinitely an Antichrist. Since the pope of Rome neither claims to be Christ himself nor denies that Jesus is the Christ, I cannot see how he can be called Antichrist. The word means not someone who falsely claims to be Christ's lieutenant or vicar-general, but someone who claims to be Christ himself. There is also some indication of when this particular Antichrist will come: when (Mat. 24.15.) the abominable destroyer spoken of by Daniel (Dan. 9. 27.) stands in the holy place, and there is such tribulation as the world has never known and never will again, so great that if it lasted long (verse 22.) “no flesh would be saved; but for the elect's sake those days shall be shortened,” made fewer. Yet that tribulation has not come. It is to be followed immediately (verse 29.) by the darkening of sun and moon, the falling of stars, the shaking of the heavens, and the glorious return of our Savior in the clouds. Thus the Antichrist has not yet come, whereas many popes have come and gone. True, by undertaking to give laws to all Christian kings and nations, the pope usurps a kingdom in this world, which Christ did not assume. But he does so not as Christ, but for Christ; in that there is nothing of the Antichrist.

In the fourth book, to prove that the pope is supreme judge in every question of faith and morals—which amounts to making him absolute monarch of all Christians in the world—he advances three propositions. First, that the pope's judgments are infallible; second, that he can make actual laws and punish those who do not obey them; third, that our Savior conferred all ecclesiastical jurisdiction on the pope of Rome.

For the infallibility of his judgments he cites Scripture, first Luke 22.31.: “Simon, Simon, Satan has desired to sift you as wheat; but I have prayed for you, that your faith may not fail; and when you are converted, strengthen your brothers.” According to Bellarmine's interpretation, Christ here gave Simon Peter two privileges: that his faith would not fail, and that neither he nor any of his successors would ever define any point of faith or morals erroneously or contrary to the definition of a former pope. This is a strange and highly strained interpretation. Anyone who reads that chapter carefully will find no passage in all Scripture more opposed to the pope's authority than this very one. The priests and scribes were seeking to kill our Savior at Passover; Judas had resolved to betray him; and the day for killing the Passover lamb had arrived. Our Savior celebrated the feast with his apostles, saying he would not do so again until the Kingdom of God had come, and also told them one of them would betray him. They began to ask which of them it would be. And since the next Passover their master would celebrate would be when he was King, they also fell to arguing over who among them would then be the greatest. Our Savior therefore told them that the kings of the nations ruled over their subjects and were called by a name that in Hebrew means beneficent. But I cannot be so to you: you must seek to serve one another. I ordain a Kingdom for you, but it is such a Kingdom as my Father has ordained for me—a Kingdom I must now purchase with my blood and shall not possess until my second coming. Then you shall eat and drink at my table and sit on thrones judging the twelve tribes of Israel. Turning then to St. Peter, he said: Simon, Simon, Satan seeks to weaken your faith in the future Kingdom by suggesting dominion in the present; but I have prayed for you, that your faith may not fail. So when you are converted—and note this—and understand my Kingdom to belong to another world, confirm your brothers in that same faith. St. Peter answered, as a man who no longer expected authority in this world, “Lord, I am ready to go with you not only to prison but to death.” Plainly, St. Peter was given no jurisdiction in this world; instead, he was charged to teach the other apostles that they too would have none. As for the infallibility of St. Peter's definitive judgment in matters of faith, this text establishes no more than that Peter would persist in believing one point: that Christ would return and possess the Kingdom on the day of Judgment. The text does not grant that constancy to all his successors, for we see them claiming the Kingdom in this present world.

The second passage is Matth. 16.: “You are Peter, and upon this rock I will build my Church, and the gates of Hell shall not prevail against it.” As I have already shown in this chapter, this proves no more than that the gates of Hell shall not prevail against Peter's confession which prompted those words, namely: Jesus is Christ, the Son of God.

Of the five books Bellarmine has written on this subject, the first asks three questions. First, which government is best in itself: monarchy, aristocracy, or democracy? He concludes that none of them alone is best, but rather a government combining all three. Second, which is the best government for the Church? He again favors a combination, though one with a larger share of monarchy. Third, did St. Peter occupy the monarch's position in this combined monarchy? As to his first conclusion, I have already proved sufficiently in chapter 18. that every government people are bound to obey is simple and absolute. Under monarchy one man alone is supreme. Everyone else who has any power in the state holds it by his commission, as long as he wishes, and exercises it in his name. Under aristocracy or democracy one assembly alone is supreme and holds the same power a monarch holds under monarchy. This is absolute sovereignty, not a mixture. Where one of these three forms is already established, there is no point in arguing which is best. The existing government must always be preferred, upheld, and considered best. Both the Law of Nature and God's positive law forbid anything that tends to overthrow it. Besides, unless a pastor also holds civil sovereignty, which form of government is best has no bearing on his power. Pastors are called not to govern people through commands, but to teach them and persuade them with arguments, leaving them to decide whether to accept or reject the teaching. Monarchy, aristocracy, and democracy describe three kinds of sovereign, not three kinds of pastor. We might say they describe three kinds of head of a family, not three kinds of schoolmaster for the family's children.

His second conclusion, about the best government for the Church, therefore has nothing to do with the Pope's power outside his own lands. In every other Common-wealth, any power the Pope may have is only that of a schoolmaster, not that of the head of the family.

For his third conclusion, that St. Peter was monarch of the Church, Bellarmine's chief argument comes from St. Matthew (chapter 16.18, 19.): “You are Peter, and on this rock I will build my Church,” and so on. “I will give you the keys of Heaven; whatever you bind on Earth will be bound in Heaven, and whatever you release on Earth will be released in Heaven.” Considered carefully, the passage proves only that Christ's Church has one foundation article of faith. It is the article Peter professed on behalf of all the apostles, which prompted our Savior to say the quoted words. To understand this clearly, we must consider that our Savior, John the Baptist, and the apostles preached only this article of faith: “He was the Christ.” Every other article requires faith only because it rests on that one. John began by preaching only this (Matthew 3.2.): “The Kingdom of God is near.” Our Savior then preached the same message (Matthew 4.17.). When he commissioned his Twelve Apostles (Matthew 10.7.), he mentioned no other article for them to preach. This was the fundamental article, the foundation of the Church's faith. Later, when the apostles returned to him, he asked all of them, not Peter alone (Matthew 16.13.), “Who do people say I am?” They answered, “Some say John the Baptist, some Elias, and others Jeremias or one of the prophets.” Then he asked all of them again, not just Peter (verse 15.), “Who do you say I am?” Peter answered on behalf of all: “You are Christ, the Son of the living God.” As I said, this is the foundation of the whole Church's faith. It led our Savior to say, “On this stone I will build my Church.” Clearly the Church's foundation stone means the fundamental article of its faith. Someone may object: why, then, did our Savior say, “You are Peter”? A strict translation of the original would make the reason clear. The apostle Simon was nicknamed Stone, which is the meaning of the Syriac Cephas and the Greek Petrus. So after Peter confessed that fundamental article, our Savior played on his name, saying, as it would read in English, “You are Stone, and on this stone I will build my Church.” In other words, the article “I am the Christ” is the foundation of all the faith I require of members of my Church. Wordplay on someone's name is common enough. But if our Savior had meant to build the Church on St. Peter himself, it would have been strange and unclear to say, “You are a stone, and on this stone I will build my Church.” He could plainly have said, “I will build my Church on you,” and still have played on Peter's name.

The words that follow, “I will give you the keys of Heaven,” and so on, grant Peter no more than our Savior gave the rest of his disciples as well (Matthew 18.18.): “Whatever you bind on Earth will be bound in Heaven, and whatever you release on Earth will be released in Heaven.” However we interpret this, there is no doubt that the power granted here belongs to all supreme pastors, including every Christian civil sovereign in his own lands. Suppose St. Peter or our Savior himself had converted a sovereign to faith in him and to recognition of his Kingdom. Because his Kingdom is not of this world, he would still have left that sovereign alone with supreme responsibility for converting his subjects. Otherwise he would have taken away the sovereign's sovereignty, to which the right to teach is inseparably attached. This is enough to refute Bellarmine's first book, which seeks to prove that St. Peter was monarch of the Church everywhere, meaning monarch of all Christians in the world.

The second book makes two claims: St. Peter was bishop of Rome and died there, and the Popes of Rome are his successors. Others have disputed both claims. But even supposing they are true, if “bishop of Rome” means either monarch or supreme pastor of the Church, that bishop was not Silvester but Constantine, the first Christian emperor. Like Constantine, every later Christian emperor was by right supreme bishop of the Roman Empire. I mean the Roman Empire, not all Christendom. Other Christian sovereigns had the same right within their own territories, because the office necessarily belongs to sovereignty. That answers his second book.

In the third book Bellarmine considers whether the Pope is Antichrist. I see no argument proving he is, in the sense Scripture gives that name. Nor will I use the character of Antichrist as an argument against the authority the Pope now exercises or has formerly exercised in another prince's or state's territory.

The Old Testament prophets clearly foretold a Messiah, or Christ, whom the Jews expected to restore God's Kingdom among them. They had rejected that Kingdom in Samuel's day when they demanded a king like other nations had. Their expectation exposed them to fraud by anyone ambitious enough to seek the Kingdom and clever enough to deceive the people with fake miracles, a show of holy living, or persuasive speeches and teaching. So our Savior and his apostles warned people against false prophets and false Christs. False Christs are those who claim to be the Christ but are not. Properly speaking, they are called Antichrists. This is like a split in the Church when two Popes are elected and each calls the other Antipapa, or false Pope. Thus Antichrist in its proper sense has two essential marks: he denies that Jesus is Christ, and he claims that he himself is Christ. St. John states the first mark in his first letter, chapter 4. verse 3.: “Every spirit that does not confess that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is not of God. This is the spirit of Antichrist.” Our Savior states the other mark (Matthew 24.5.): “Many will come in my name, saying, I am Christ.” And again: “If anyone says to you, Look, Christ is here, or Christ is there, do not believe it.” So an Antichrist must be a false Christ, someone who claims to be Christ. From these two marks, denying that Jesus is the Christ and claiming to be the Christ himself, it follows that he must also be an adversary of the true Christ. That is another common meaning of the word Antichrist. But among these many Antichrists is one particular figure, O Antichristos, the Antichrist: one specific person, not just an Antichrist in general. The Pope of Rome does not claim to be Christ or deny that Jesus is the Christ, so I do not see how he can be called Antichrist. That word means someone claiming to be Christ himself, not someone falsely claiming to be his deputy or chief representative. There are also clues about when this particular Antichrist will come. In Matthew 24.15., the abominable destroyer mentioned by Daniel (Daniel 9. 27.) will stand in the holy place. There will be suffering unlike any since the world began, or any that will ever happen again. If it lasted long, “no one could be saved; but for the sake of the chosen, those days will be cut short” (verse 22.). That suffering has not yet come. It will be followed immediately (verse 29.) by the darkening of the sun and moon, the falling of the stars, the shaking of the heavens, and our Savior's glorious return in the clouds. The Antichrist therefore has not yet come, while many Popes have come and gone. It is true that by claiming the power to make laws for all Christian kings and nations, the Pope seizes a kingdom in this world, which Christ did not claim. But he acts not as Christ, but on behalf of Christ. That does not make him Antichrist.

In his fourth book Bellarmine offers three propositions to prove that the Pope is the supreme judge in every question of faith and conduct, which would make him absolute monarch of every Christian in the world. First, his judgments cannot be wrong. Second, he can make actual laws and punish those who do not obey them. Third, our Savior gave the Pope of Rome all jurisdiction over the Church.

To support the claim that the Pope's judgments cannot be wrong, Bellarmine cites Scripture. His first passage is Luke 22.31.: “Simon, Simon, Satan has asked to sift you like wheat. But I have prayed for you, that your faith may not fail; and when you have turned back, strengthen your brothers.” According to Bellarmine, Christ here gave Simon Peter two privileges: his own faith would never fail, and neither he nor any of his successors would ever issue an incorrect ruling about faith or conduct, or one contrary to an earlier Pope's ruling. This is a strange and very forced interpretation. Anyone who reads that chapter carefully will find that this very passage opposes the Pope's authority more than any other in Scripture. The priests and scribes were seeking to kill our Savior at Passover. Judas had resolved to betray him. When the day came to kill the Passover lamb, our Savior celebrated the meal with his apostles and told them he would not do so again until God's Kingdom came. He also said that one of them would betray him. They wondered who it was. And since their master would celebrate the next Passover only when he became king, they began arguing about which of them would then be the greatest. Our Savior therefore told them that the kings of the nations rule their subjects and are called by a name that in Hebrew means generous. But, he said, this is not how it can be among you: you must try to serve one another. I give you a Kingdom, but it is the kind my Father gave me. I am now to buy it with my blood, and will not possess it until I return. Then you will eat and drink at my table and sit on thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel. Turning to St. Peter, he then said: Simon, Simon, Satan wants to weaken your faith in the future Kingdom by making you think you can rule now. But I have prayed that your faith will not fail. So when you have turned back—and note this—and understand that my Kingdom belongs to another world, strengthen your brothers in that same faith. St. Peter replied like someone who no longer expected authority in this world: “Lord, I am ready to go with you not only to prison but to death.” Clearly, Peter was not only given no jurisdiction in this world. He was also charged with teaching all the other apostles that they too would have none. As for Peter's supposedly infallible final rulings on faith, all this text tells us is that Peter would keep believing this one point: Christ would return and take possession of the Kingdom on Judgment Day. The text does not extend that promise to all his successors. Indeed, we see them claiming the Kingdom in the world as it is now.

His second passage is Matthew 16.: “You are Peter, and on this rock I will build my Church, and the gates of Hell will not prevail against it.” As I have already shown in this chapter, it proves only that the gates of Hell will not overcome Peter's confession, which prompted those words: that Jesus is Christ, the Son of God.