Quintum capitulum, quod justitia quae est in judiciis debet conformari Tronis, spiritibus scilicet beatis.
The Duty of Advocacy and the Use of Evidence
After the oath of office, advocates must serve faithfully and judges must rely on proper evidence—witnesses, testimonies, and instruments—following the example of Solomon's divinely guided judgment.
. Once the oath has been sworn, then, the duty of advocacy must be faithfully fulfilled, without injustice to either party. For the contest must not be carried on with taunts but rather with reasoned arguments. To examine the evidence, however, in both civil and criminal cases, it is necessary to use documentary instruments. Now all the means by which cases are built — whether witnesses, testimonies, or anything of that kind — are called instruments. But witnesses are preferred to testimonies, because witnesses can be examined, whereas testimonies are always the same before everyone. Sometimes, however, judges rely on presumptions and probable inferences, as in the trial of Solomon.✦ For the sword revealed the true mother's love.✦
From Procedure to the Angelic Model of Judgment
Having observed proper judicial procedure, the judge must now execute judgment in conformity with the blessed spirits called Thrones.
Once you've observed what was properly to be kept in mind, anything that goes beyond the scope of this matter must proceed to the execution of judgment. In this, the judge ought to be conformed to those good spirits whom we read are called Thrones.
The Thrones: Earthly Seats and Heavenly Judgment
Drawing on Psalm 9 and Pseudo-Dionysius, the Thrones represent an angelic order whose unshaken, impartial judgment—free from partiality, compassion, or impulse—serves as the divine pattern for all human courts.
About these things in the Psalm: You sit upon the throne, who judge with justice.✦ For the throne is the material seat of the judge, raised above others, lifting the judge upward and removing him from the earth, set firm and unshaken, in which the order of the blessed spirits called Thrones is designated for us by their own godlike qualities, in which the Lord sits, through whom he arranges all things by judging all things. From which, as if from a solemn courtroom, the knowledge of judging is administered to angels and to human beings. The material thrones of those who rule and those who judge are seats, and if authority belongs to the king, truth belongs to the one judging, serenity belongs to the one sitting, and stability belongs to the seat. Judgment ought to be authentic and right, unchanging and tranquil, in which four things both fall short and the judgment itself profits. And as far as I can understand from the books of blessed Dionysius, that order is inflexible by reason of the truth of judgment, or by reason of the acceptance of persons, or by reason of remiss compassion, or by any impulsive motive interior or exterior that could violate the rectitude of judgment, bearing itself upward in an incorporeal and immaterial way, and striving to conform itself in all things and through all things to the divine judgment. And while these Spirits are conformed to God in the rectitude of judgment, they themselves are confirmed in the fullness of truth. Therefore they do not turn aside from the rectitude of judgment on account of any outward impulsive cause, nor on account of any inward deficient cause.
How the Thrones Illuminate Just Judgment
The Thrones, filled with divine light, not only receive the ray of just judgment but expand it to others, having first turned wholly toward the first light and praised the upright Judge.
In judging, accepting persons is called a relaxation of one's own timidity, not a judgment. So these spirits, filled with the light of just judgment, bring the working of divine knowledge to others: they not only receive the rays of light poured into them for just judgment, but they open and expand themselves by a fierce stretching and a burning longing, in order to serve God in what they have received, carrying out their ministry.1 I mean that their ministry is a just and right judgment. Therefore, just as in their first conversion, having set aside lower things and all creatures, these blessed spirits, simplifying the eye of the mind, turned themselves toward the first light according to their strength, and in the justice of that chosen one, they praised the upright judge in their own judgments, understanding him clearly.2 From this they also received the ray of light of just judgment, and are confirmed in the rightness of judgment.
The Judge Must Turn to the True Judge
Every human judge must keep the true Judge before their eyes, for without divine illumination—received either immediately as by the Thrones or mediately through angelic ministry—judgment easily goes astray.
So anyone who passes judgment needs to turn, in every judgment they make, toward the true Judge — the One they should always keep before their eyes. Otherwise, if the rule by which one should simply be directed is abandoned, that person will easily go astray in judgment and be deceived. That's why judges who rely on their own prudence are frequently deceived. So therefore, from what has been contemplated and from the divine ray that has been received, the rectitude of every judgment takes its origin. For just as color does not change the eye unless it has received the light of the sun, so a creature does not truly judge unless it has received the ray of the divine act of indication — either immediately, as in the case of the Thrones, who without any medium contemplate the essence of the divine light, or mediately, as in our case, to whom the sentences of right judgment are divinely brought through the mediating ministries of angels.
Read the original Latin
. Post praestitum igitur sacramentum, sine injuria partium munus patrocinii fideliter est implendum. Non est enim probris sed magis rationibus contendendum. Ad examinandas autem probationes, tam in civilibus quam in criminalibus causis, uti necesse est instrumentis. Omnia autem quibus causae instruuntur, sive testes, sive testimonia, et omnia hujusmodi, instrumenta dicuntur. Sed testes, quia examinari possunt, testimoniis, quia apud omnes semper sunt eadem, praeferuntur r. Quandoque autem utuntur judices praesumptionibus, et probabilibus conjecturis, sicut in judicio a/>paruit Salomonis. Gladius enim affectum repperit verae matris.
Observatis igitur quae fuerunt rite servanda, quae supergrediuntur quarttitatem hujus negotii, procedendura est ad executionem judicii. In quo debet judex illis bonis spiritibus quos Thronos legimus conformari.
De quibus in Psalmo : Sedes super thronum qui judicas justitiam. Est enim tronus materialis sedes judicis, super alias elevata, sedentem judicem sursum ferens et a terra removens, inconcusse et stabiliter collocata, in quo nobis ordo beatorum spirituum qui Throni dicuntur suis deiformibus proprietatibus designantur, in quibus Dominus sedet, per quos subjecta omniajudicando disponit. Unde quasi de quodam solemni auditorio angelis et hominibus judicandi scientia ministratur. Troni autem materiales regnantium et judicantium sunt sedes, et si ad regem pertinet auctoritas, ad judicantem veritas, ad sedentem serenitas, ad sedem stabilitas. Débet esse judicium autenticum et rectum, immutabile et tranquillum, in quibus quatuor et deficit et proficit ipsum judicium. Et quantum ex libris beati Dionisii possum intelligere, ordo iste est inflexibilis a judicii veritate, aut personarum acceptione, aut remissa compassione, aut aliquo impulsivo interiori vel exteriori quod possit rectitudinem judicii violare, incorporaliter et immaterialiter se sursum ferens, et divino judicio nitens se in omnibus et per omnia conformare. Et dum hii Spiritus Deo in rectitudine judicii conformantur, ipsi in veritatis plenitudine confirmantur. Ergo nec déclinant a rectitudine judicii propter causam exterius impulsivam, neque propter causam interius defectivam.
IUud in judicibus appellatur personarum acceptio, illud vero propriae pusillanimitatis remissio. Hii ergo repleti justi judicii lumine deferunt ad alios actum divinae scientiae, qui non solum suscipiunt infusos eis radios luminis justi judicii, sed ut eos suscipiant se aperiunt et dilatant vehementi dilatione, expansione fer vends desiderii, ut ex susceptis Deo famulentur in executione sui ministerii. Dico autem eorum ministerium justum et rectum judicium. Ergo sicut in eorum conversione primaria, rejectis inferioribus et creaturis omnibus, hii beati spiritus mentis simplificantes oculum se ad primum lumen pro viribus converterunt, et in ipsius candelectati justitia, judicem rectum in suis judiciis intelligibiliter laudaverunt. Unde et radium luminis justi judicii receperunt, et in rectitudine judicii confirmati sunt.
Sic omnis qui judicat necesse est ut in omni suo judicio ad verum judicem se convertat, quem semper prae oculis habeat. Alioquin, dimissa regula qua simpliciter dirigatur, faciliter errabit in judicio et falletur. Unde fréquenter falluntur judices qui propriae prudentiae innituntur. Sic igitur ex inspecto similiter et suscepto divino radio ducit originem omnis judicii rectitudo. Nam sicut color oculum non immutat nisi suscepto solari lumine, sic creatura vere non judicat nisi suscepto radio actus indications divinae, vel immédiate, sicut in Tronis qui sine medio divini luminis essentiam contemplantur, vel médiate, sicut in nobis ad quos mediantibus angelorum ministeriis recti judicii sententiae divinitus deferuntur.
Scripture echoes
- ↩1Kgs.3.16-1Kgs.3.28 — Then two prostitutes came to the king and stood before him. 1Kgs.3.17 — Then one woman said, "My lord, this woman and I live in the same house, and I gave birth while she was in the house." 1Kgs.3.18 — And on the third day after I gave birth, this woman also gave birth. We were together; there was no stranger with us in the house, only the two of us in the house. 1Kgs.3.19 — And this woman's son died during the night, because she lay on him. 1Kgs.3.20 — And she rose in the middle of the night and took my son from beside me — your maidservant was sleeping — and laid him in her bosom, and her dead son she laid in my bosom. 1Kgs.3.21 — When I rose in the morning to nurse my child, he was dead. But when I examined him closely in the morning, behold, it was not the son I had borne. 1Kgs.3.22 — Then the other woman said, 'No! My son is the living one, and your son is the dead one.' But this one said, 'No! Your son is the dead one, and my son is the living one.' So they argued before the king. 1Kgs.3.23 — Then the king said, "This one says, 'This is my son, the living one, and your son is dead,' while that one says, 'No! Your son is dead, and my son is the living one.'" 1Kgs.3.24 — And the king said, "Bring me a sword." And they brought the sword before the king. 1Kgs.3.25 — Then the king said, 'Cut the living child in two, and give half to one and half to the other.' 1Kgs.3.26 — Then the woman whose son was the living one said to the king, for her compassion had been stirred for her son, and she said, "Please, my lord, give her the living child, and by no means put him to death." But the other said, "It shall be neither mine nor yours; divide it." 1Kgs.3.27 — And the king answered and said, "Give her the living child, and do not put it to death — she is its mother." 1Kgs.3.28 — And all Israel heard the judgment that the king had rendered, and they stood in awe of the king, for they saw that the wisdom of God was within him to do justice.
- ↩1Kgs.3.24-1Kgs.3.25 — And the king said, "Bring me a sword." And they brought the sword before the king. 1Kgs.3.25 — Then the king said, 'Cut the living child in two, and give half to one and half to the other.'
- ↩Ps.9.8 — But the LORD sits enthroned forever; he has established his throne for justice.
Notes
- 1 ↩The phrase 'vehementi dilatione, expansione fer vends desiderii' is textually uncertain. 'fer vends' is obscure in the manuscript; the rendering 'a burning longing' is a plausible guess from context (fervēns / feruor + desiderium) but should be checked against the Latin source.
- 2 ↩'candelectati' is textually uncertain. It may be a corruption of 'candidati' or a rare form related to 'candor' (brightness/purity). The rendering 'chosen one' is tentative and should be reviewed against the Latin manuscript.
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