Whether Heretics Ought to Be Tolerated?
Objection 1: It seems that heretics ought to be tolerated. For the
Apostle says (2 Tim. 2:24, 25): "The servant of the Lord must not
wrangle . . . with modesty admonishing them that resist the truth, if
peradventure God may give them repentance to know the truth, and they
may recover themselves from the snares of the devil." Now if heretics
are not tolerated but put to death, they lose the opportunity of
repentance. Therefore it seems contrary to the Apostle's command.
Obj. 2: Further, whatever is necessary in the Church should be
tolerated. Now heresies are necessary in the Church, since the Apostle
says (1 Cor. 11:19): "There must be . . . heresies, that they . . .
who are reproved, may be manifest among you." Therefore it seems that
heretics should be tolerated.
Obj. 3: Further, the Master commanded his servants (Matt. 13:30) to
suffer the cockle "to grow until the harvest," i.e. the end of the
world, as a gloss explains it. Now holy men explain that the cockle
denotes heretics. Therefore heretics should be tolerated.
_On the contrary,_ The Apostle says (Titus 3:10, 11): "A man that is a
heretic, after the first and second admonition, avoid: knowing that
he, that is such an one, is subverted."
_I answer that,_ With regard to heretics two points must be observed:
one, on their own side; the other, on the side of the Church. On
their own side there is the sin, whereby they deserve not only to be
separated from the Church by excommunication, but also to be severed
from the world by death. For it is a much graver matter to corrupt
the faith which quickens the soul, than to forge money, which
supports temporal life. Wherefore if forgers of money and other
evil-doers are forthwith condemned to death by the secular authority,
much more reason is there for heretics, as soon as they are convicted
of heresy, to be not only excommunicated but even put to death.
On the part of the Church, however, there is mercy which looks to the
conversion of the wanderer, wherefore she condemns not at once, but
"after the first and second admonition," as the Apostle directs:
after that, if he is yet stubborn, the Church no longer hoping for
his conversion, looks to the salvation of others, by excommunicating
him and separating him from the Church, and furthermore delivers him
to the secular tribunal to be exterminated thereby from the world by
death. For Jerome commenting on Gal. 5:9, "A little leaven," says:
"Cut off the decayed flesh, expel the mangy sheep from the fold, lest
the whole house, the whole paste, the whole body, the whole flock,
burn, perish, rot, die. Arius was but one spark in Alexandria, but as
that spark was not at once put out, the whole earth was laid waste by
its flame."
Reply Obj. 1: This very modesty demands that the heretic should be
admonished a first and second time: and if he be unwilling to
retract, he must be reckoned as already "subverted," as we may gather
from the words of the Apostle quoted above.
Reply Obj. 2: The profit that ensues from heresy is beside the
intention of heretics, for it consists in the constancy of the
faithful being put to the test, and "makes us shake off our
sluggishness, and search the Scriptures more carefully," as Augustine
states (De Gen. cont. Manich. i, 1). What they really intend is the
corruption of the faith, which is to inflict very great harm indeed.
Consequently we should consider what they directly intend, and expel
them, rather than what is beside their intention, and so, tolerate
them.
Reply Obj. 3: According to Decret. (xxiv, qu. iii, can. Notandum),
"to be excommunicated is not to be uprooted." A man is
excommunicated, as the Apostle says (1 Cor. 5:5) that his "spirit may
be saved in the day of Our Lord." Yet if heretics be altogether
uprooted by death, this is not contrary to Our Lord's command, which
is to be understood as referring to the case when the cockle cannot
be plucked up without plucking up the wheat, as we explained above
(Q. 10, A. 8, ad 1), when treating of unbelievers in general.
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