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Library / The Art of Expounding Scripture

Folio 149–152

The Third Method: the Syllabic Exposition

On the Syllabic Mode of Expounding — The Third Method

The Syllabic (ΣΥΛΛΑΒΙΚΗ), or Indicatory, Method — which composes the indices of books (called by the Greeks syllaboi) — is a most ancient invention, 1 as Marcus Tullius [Cicero], writing to Atticus, testifies. For since those studious men of old always desired to have a rich store of all things and of all words ready at hand, and with the greatest convenience, they devised for themselves indices arranged in alphabetical order, by which, with the least expense of labor and time, they might be led as if by the hand to whatever each one sought. Imitating their invention, the later lovers of letters — especially the Jurisconsults and the Theologians — reduced almost all the books of their profession into lists, syllabi, indices, tables, and most copious repertories; among which the first place is held by that most opulent Biblical Index, which they call the Greater Concordances of the sacred Bible, collected by Hugh the Cardinal [of St-Cher] and Conrad of Halberstadt the Monk, with five hundred monks of various monasteries assisting… 2 [continues p167]

[continuing from p166] …[with five hundred] monks [of various monasteries] — who gathered all the nouns, verbs, participles, adverbs, prepositions, and all the parts of speech (both declinable and indeclinable) comprehended in the whole body of the Bibles, and arranged them in alphabetical order, noting the books, the chapters, and the individual lines of the chapters, in which any word similar and concordant to the word sought might be had. And so great is both the convenience and the usefulness of this great Index, 3 that when the studious reader has first learned to handle it prudently and with judgment, and has begun to grow accustomed to familiarity with it, he immediately perceives that he has found in it a certain inexhaustible treasure — that is, a universal and most complete exposition of the whole of divine Scripture — from the use of which he may take no less fruit and delight than if he had unrolled innumerable commentaries of the expositors.

I remember that once, at the request of friends, I gave to this index a brief little commentary, entitled On the Use and Usefulness of the Concordances of the sacred Bible, comprising certain brief and clear rules, 4 by which the lovers of sacred letters, being instructed, might easily be able — from this one volume of Concordances alone, even without any commentaries of the expositors — to understand and explain the senses and the various and manifold understandings of almost innumerable passages obscure in the divine letters; and not only to explain [them], but (what is far more laborious) to procure for themselves, upon any sentence of divine Scripture, the amplest exposition, and, if there were need, even to find the matter for a whole and copious sermon. An example of this device I will set before you upon the beginning of Psalm 116, showing by what method one may, from this Index of concordances, gather a most abundant exposition upon the two first words of this Psalm; for the explaining of which, three things must first be performed by you.

First, the volume of the Concordances being opened, you will seek, under the syllable LAV, the word Laudare [to praise], and all the words likewise akin to that word — such as Laus, Laudatio, Laudans, Laudabilis, Laudandus, and the like; and you will immediately find, under these words, all the sayings, testimonies, authorities, and sentences of both testaments pertaining to the praise of God, cited by number — though with the periods truncated, and noted very strictly.

Secondly, out of so numerous a multitude of sentences you will gather only those, and copy onto a slip, which you shall see to be more distinguished, and which you shall recognize as apter and more accommodated to your purpose; and you will easily discern them among the others, and separate them, with little labor, from the less apt — if you have first been versed in the reading of the sacred letters, and are not utterly destitute of judgment. But it will be necessary, in copying out the aforesaid authorities, always to have the codex of the Bible before your eyes, so that, it being inspected, you may faithfully supply and restore to their pristine integrity those periods which you had found truncated in the Concordances.

Thirdly, after you have written out integrally the sentences suited to your purpose, run through them all again, from first to last, with a little thought, and weigh with yourself for a while the sense of each; and then — according to that common method of partition which the Dialecticians, the rhetoricians, and all the best writers are wont [to use], and which it was necessary you should first have learned in the schools — distinguish the now-collected forest of sentences, and reduce [them] into certain orders and classes; and in these orders, separately, and under diverse titles, [arrange] the individual authorities, as they shall have seemed to you more related among themselves in sense and scope; so that, from their very disposition, the whole series of the argument “On Divine Praise” may be unfolded — that is, that there may be gathered by you the definition, the causes, the effects, the parts, the offices, the modes, the places, the times, the necessity, the usefulness, the impediments, and the like, of divine praise, which the Dialecticians and Rhetoricians bid [us] inquire into in any proposed matter.

But, that you may understand these things more plainly, I will first set before your eyes the undistinguished medley of sentences of divine Scripture pertaining to divine praise, taken word for word from the book of Concordances with its own numbers; then I will distribute the same authorities into particular titles by that method, so that in them you may read an exact and copious explanation of the words with which Psalm 116 begins.

An Undistinguished Medley of the Sentences of Sacred Scripture pertaining to the Praise of God, transcribed word for word from the Index of Concordances

TO PRAISE (Laudare).

(The Psalm-numbers are the Concordance’s own, in the Vulgate reckoning.)

TO PRAISE (Laudare), continued:

NOT TO PRAISE (Non laudare):

PRAISING (Laudans):

LAUDATION (Laudatio):

PRAISEWORTHY (Laudabilis):

PRAISE (Laus):

The Methodical Partition of the aforesaid Medley

(distributed into various classes of sentences, and beautifully accommodated to the exposition of the two first words of Psalm 116.)

The theme to be expounded: PRAISE THE LORD.

Definition

To praise God is to declare the amplitude of the divine perfections, so far as it can be done by us.

Encomium

Praise is the most excellent sacrifice of all, in which God is most greatly delighted.

[That God made all things unto the praise of his glory:]

Necessity

All creatures — insensible, sensible, and intelligible alike — are bound by divine precept to the praise of God, according to their own measure.

Causes

God is to be praised by us for innumerable causes; but chiefly for his surpassing goodness, [and] the innumerable benefits daily bestowed on us out of the bounty of the divine Goodness and mercy.

Mode

God is to be praised first in the mind, then with the voice — with Psalms, canticles, and musical instruments — and above all with good works.

### Time God is to be praised not only at the appointed hours of day and night, in heart and mouth, but is to be celebrated through the whole time of life, in affection and in work.

Place

God is to be praised in every place, but especially in the church and the temple.

[That in the other life there are two eternal places — in one of which God is perpetually praised, in the other never:]

Utility

The rewards of those who praise God are: the help of divine grace, salvation from enemies visible and invisible, and a life eternally blessed.

Impediments

Sins impede us from the divine praises.

Conflicting Passages [to be reconciled]

That in the divine scriptures there are passages seemingly conflicting concerning the divine praise, which must be reconciled.

On the contrary:

Likewise this:

On the contrary:

You see here, ingenious reader, how great a store of sentences the volume of the Concordances has supplied to you — in the particular little index of one word only — and how copious a furniture of words and of things it has furnished for explaining the first word of this psalm. And if, taking up the codex of the Concordances again, you shall search out in it the words synonymous with the verb “to praise” 6 — such as celebro (I celebrate), magnifico (I magnify), glorifico (I glorify), benedico (I bless), exalto (I exalt), confiteor (I confess), canto (I sing), psallo (I sing psalms), prædico (I proclaim) — and shall gather, with like zeal, the fragments of the sacred sentences placed under those synonymous words, you will again enrich your exposition with a new and far richer abundance of speech. And finally, if you shall apply the same diligence to the individual words of the same psalm, so great an affluence of all things will present itself to you that you can scarcely find the ends of the exposition you have undertaken. And let these things be said sufficiently concerning the Syllabic Method.

Footnotes

  1. The syllabic method is most ancient. ↩

  2. The Concordances of the Bibles were collected by Hugh the Cardinal and Conrad of Halberstadt — with the help, nevertheless, of 500 monks. ↩

  3. The usefulness of the Concordances of the Bibles is very great. ↩

  4. Precepts to be observed in the use of the Concordances of the Bibles. ↩

  5. Here the Psalm actually reads “my justices” (iustitias), the Concordance having listed it under “Laudation.” ↩

  6. Words synonymous with “to praise.” ↩

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To cite this page

Sixtus of Siena, O.P., “The Third Method: the Syllabic Exposition,” in The Art of Expounding Scripture, English translation, Mind of the Church, https://mindofthechurch.com/works/bibliotheca-sancta-iii/007-the-third-method-the-syllabic-exposition/.

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