Fourfold Sense of Scripture
One text, four windows: literal, allegorical, moral, and heavenly senses of Scripture
The fourfold sense is the medieval way of reading Scripture in four layers: the literal meaning, the allegorical pointing to Christ and the faith, the moral or tropological guiding how to live, and the anagogical lifting the mind toward heavenly things. Drawing on earlier figures such as John Cassian, this approach shaped medieval exegesis, treating the sacred text as richly multivalent, with each sense disclosing a different dimension of its meaning.
How it traveled
- Treatise on Sacred Doctrine (Q[1])Paris · c. 1274 CEexplains
Key passages(20)
Each passage is tagged by what it does with the idea: explains it, applies it in practice, redefines it with a new meaning, or challenges it. Relevance shows how directly the passage is about this idea.
On the Profit of Believing · Augustine of Hippo
5. All that Scripture therefore, which is called the Old Testament, is handed down fourfold to them who desire to know it, according to history, according to ætiology, according to analogy, according
Tap to expand
The Conferences of John Cassian. Part II. Containing Conferences XI-XVII · John Cassian
For apart from that loss, which we have said that a monk incurs who wants in light-mindedness to pass from one pursuit to another, there is a risk of death that is hence incurred, because at times thi
Tap to expand
Treatise on Sacred Doctrine (Q[1]) · Thomas Aquinas
I answer that, It is befitting Holy Writ to put forward divine and spiritual truths by means of comparisons with material things. For God provides for everything according to the capacity of its natur
Tap to expand
Treatise on Sacred Doctrine (Q[1]) · Thomas Aquinas
Reply to Objection 1: The multiplicity of these senses does not produce equivocation or any other kind of multiplicity, seeing that these senses are not multiplied because one word signifies several t
Tap to expand
Jerome and Gennadius. Lives of Illustrious Men · Jerome
Chapter XVII. Rufinus,Recognitions of Clement of Rome, the Church history of Eusebius of Cæsarea in Palestine, the Sentences of Xystus,Sentences of Evagrius and the work of Pamphilus Martyr Against t
Tap to expand
A Commentary on the Acts of the Apostles · John Chrysostom
Say, what are the Scriptures for? For as much as in you lies, it is all undone. What is Is. xxx. 10), we read, they said of old to the Prophets: but ye do worse, saying, Speak:1 Tim. iv. 13.) For it i
Tap to expand
Commentary on the Apocalypse of the Blessed John · Victorinus
1. “And I saw in the right hand of Him that sat upon the throne, a book written within and without, sealed with seven seals.”] This book signifies the Old Testament, which has been given into the hand
Tap to expand
The Homilies of St. John Chrysostom · John Chrysostom
But He not only encouraged them, but also led them off secretly and unsuspectedly from the customs of the Jews. For if there is not to be a change afterwards, and the temple is not to stand, it is qui
Tap to expand
24. Touching Jacob, however, that which he did at his mother’s bidding, so as to seem to deceive his father, if with diligence and in faith it be attended to, is no lie, but a mystery. The which if we
Tap to expand
Expositions on the Book of Psalms · Augustine of Hippo
11. For it follows, “All the beasts of the wood shall drink” (ver. 11). We do indeed see this also in the visible creation, that the beasts of the wood drink of springs, and of streams that run betwee
Tap to expand
The Church History of Eusebius · Eusebius of Caesarea
Origen was not the first to interpret the Scriptures allegorically. The method began among the Alexandrian Jews some time before the Christian era, the effort being made to reconcile the Mosaic revela
Tap to expand
The Harmony of the Gospels · Augustine of Hippo
Chapter LXXVII.—Of the Harmony Subsisting Between the Three Evangelists in Their Narratives of the Discourse Which He Delivered on the Mount of Olives, When the Disciples Asked When the Consummation S
Tap to expand
The Harmony of the Gospels · Augustine of Hippo
Chapter XXVIII.—Of the Raising of the Daughter of the Ruler of the Synagogue, and of the Woman Who Touched the Hem of His Garment; Of the Question, Also, as to Whether the Order in Which These Inciden
Tap to expand
The Harmony of the Gospels · Augustine of Hippo
47. Let such impious pertinacity therefore perish, and let it be believed that the Lord Jesus Christ was crucified at once at the third hour by the voice of the Jews, and at the sixth by the hands of
Tap to expand
The Harmony of the Gospels · Augustine of Hippo
Chapter III.—Of the Manner in Which It Can Be Shown that No Discrepancies Exist Between Them in the Accounts Which They Give of the Words Which Were Spoken by the Lord, on to the Time of His Leaving t
Tap to expand
City of God · Augustine of Hippo
Chapter 27.—Of the Ark and the Deluge, and that We Cannot Agree with Those Who Receive the Bare History, But Reject the Allegorical Interpretation, Nor with Those Who Maintain the Figurative and Not t
Tap to expand
On the Resurrection of the Flesh. · Anti-marcion
Chapter XXX.—This Vision Interpreted by Tertullian of the Resurrection of the Bodies of the Dead. A Chronological Error of Our Author, Who Supposes that Ezekiel in His Ch. XXXI. Prophesied Before the
Tap to expand
Reply to Faustus the Manichæan · Augustine of Hippo
5. I give unceasing thanks to my teacher, who prevented me from falling into this error, so that I am still a Christian. For I, like you, from reading this verse without sufficient consideration, had
Tap to expand
Reply to Faustus the Manichæan · Augustine of Hippo
93. It requires closer examination to see the meaning of the first action of Moses in burning the calf in fire, and grinding it to powder, and sprinkling it in the water for the people to drink. The t
Tap to expand
On Christian Doctrine · Augustine of Hippo
Chapter 16.—The Knowledge Both of Language and Things is Helpful for the Understanding of Figurative Expressions. 23. In the case of figurative signs, again, if ignorance of any of them should chance
Tap to expand