CAPUT XXII. De secunda speculatione, et ejus proprietate
The Office of Naphtali
Naphtali kindles desire for eternal goods by setting rewards before the mind, just as Dan restrains vices by punishment.
But just as it is Dan's role to restrain rising vices by keeping punishment before the mind, so it is Naphtali's role to kindle good desires by considering rewards. For Naphtali wonderfully stirs up desire in our mind for those goods whenever he places the image of eternal goods before our mind's eye—something he usually does in two ways.
Two Modes of Speculation
Naphtali uses comparison and metaphor to infer invisible goods from visible ones, as shown by examples from light and other present goods.
For sometimes he uses metaphorical transfer, and sometimes comparison.1 By comparison, he gathers from the multitude or greatness of present goods how many—or how great—those joys of the life to come can be. For example: Often, looking at the brightness of the sun—bodily light, that is—he considers how great that spiritual light will be, if this bodily light is so great and so wonderful. For how great do you think that light will be that we will share with the angels, if this light we share with the beasts is already so great! What will the future light of the blessed be like, if this present light of the wretched is like this! Likewise, he infers the multiplicity of invisible goods from the multitude of visible goods.
From Visible to Invisible
Through a series of rhetorical questions, the soul moves from the multitude of bodily delights to the far greater delights of spirits and eternity.
So how many of those do we think there are? But who could count them? How many are the delights of the eyes, how many the delights of the ears and of the other senses? How many are the colors, how many the scents, how many the tastes? If, then, there are so many delights of bodies, how many will the delights of spirits be? If we possess such great things in time, how great are the things we await in eternity?
Metaphor and Spiritual Understanding
Naphtali transfers the description of visible things to invisible meanings, as when he interprets God's dwelling in light as divine wisdom illuminating the heart.
In this way, then, he uses comparison. He also uses, as has been said, metaphorical transfer, when he transfers the description of visible things to the meaning of invisible things.2 For example: He hears light named in the Scriptures, as it is written of God: He dwells in inaccessible light.3 So he asks what that incorporeal light is that God's invisible and incorporeal nature inhabits, and he finds that this light is God's own wisdom, because that wisdom is the true light.✦ For just as this outer light illuminates the eyes of the body, so that other light, without a doubt, habitually illuminates the eyes of the heart. See how Naphtali rises to knowledge of invisible things through the quality of visible things.
The Name Naphtali Explained
Naphtali is rightly called both comparison and conversion, because he turns all visible things toward spiritual understanding and constantly uses comparison.
So it's clear how rightly he is called Naphtali according to both interpretations. For Naphtali is interpreted as comparison or conversion.4 For he is accustomed to taking the nature of any visible thing he knows and turning it toward spiritual understanding. So because he turns almost everything he finds written toward spiritual understanding, he rightly received the name of conversion. And likewise, because he constantly uses comparison, as has been said, he is nonetheless rightly called Naphtali—that is, comparison.
Read the original Latin
Sed, sicut ad officium Dan spectat per repraesentationem poenae reprimere exsurgentia vitia; sic ad Nephtalim pertinet per considerationem praemiorum inflammare desideria bona. Mirabiliter enim animum nostrum Nephtalim ad eorum desiderium accendit, quoties aeternorum bonorum imaginem ante mentis oculos adducit, quod tamen duobus modis facere consuevit. Utitur namque aliquando translatione, aliquando autem comparatione. Comparatione, quando ex praesentium bonorum multitudine vel magnitudine colligit illa futurae vitae gaudia, quot vel quanta esse possint. Verbi gratia: Inspecta saepe solis claritate (corporeo videlicet lumine) considerat quanta futura erit lux illa spiritualis, si tanta tamque mirabilis est lux ista corporalis. Quanta namque putas erit lux illa quae erit nobis communis cum angelis, si tanta est ista quam habemus communem cum bestiis! Qualis erit lux futura beatorum, si talis est praesens lux ista miserorum! Item multiplicitatem bonorum invisibilium conjicit ex multitudine bonorum visibilium.
Quot ergo putamus ea esse? Sed quis ea possit dinumerare? Quot sunt oblectamenta oculorum, quot oblectamenta aurium caeterorumque sensuum? Quot sunt colores, quot odores, quot sapores? Si ergo tot sunt deliciae corporum, quot erunt deliciae spirituum? Si tanta possidemus in tempore, quanta sunt quae exspectamus in aeternitate? In hunc igitur modum utitur comparatione: utitur nihilominus, ut dictum est, translatione, quando rerum visibilium descriptionem transfert ad rerum invisibilium significationem. Verbi gratia: Audit in Scripturis nominari lucem, sicut de Deo scriptum est: Quia habitat lucem inaccessibilem.
Quaerit ergo quae sit lux ista incorporea quam inhabitat invisibilis et incorporea Dei natura, et invenit quia lux ista est ipsa Dei sapientia, quia ipsa est lux vera. Sicut enim lux ista exterior illuminat oculos corporum, ita illa absque dubio illuminare consuevit oculos cordium. Ecce quomodo Nephtalim per rerum visibilium qualitatem surgit ad rerum invisibilium cognitionem. Patet ergo quam recte secundum utramque interpretationem Nephtalim dicatur. Nephtalim namque comparatio vel conversio interpretatur. Solet namque cognitam quamlibet rerum visibilium naturam convertere ad spiritalem intelligentiam. Quia ergo pene quidquid scriptum reperit, ad spiritualem intelligentiam convertit, recte conversionis nomen accepit. Et item quia assidue, ut dictum est, comparatione utitur, recte nihilominus Nephtalim, id est comparatio, nominatur.
Scripture echoes
- ↩1Tim.6.16 — He alone has immortality, dwelling in unapproachable light, whom no one among human beings has seen or is able to see. To him be honor and eternal dominion. Amen.
Notes
- 1 ↩translatione is rhetorical translatio: transferring language about visible things to signify invisible ones (metaphor), as the next section makes explicit.
- 2 ↩translatio is the rhetorical figure of metaphor/transfer of meaning, not linguistic translation; rendered as 'metaphorical transfer' to keep the link with transfert.
- 3 ↩Latin quotation is abbreviated medieval form (Quia habitat lucem inaccessibilem); sense follows the traditional 1 Tim 6:16 witness of God dwelling in inaccessible light.
- 4 ↩conversio here is the traditional name-etymology ('a turning'), not primarily moral conversion; the next sentences define it as turning visible natures and written things toward spiritual understanding.
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