I HATE the "Material Sufficiency" Debate

Some Quotations

INTRODUCTION

Constitutive tradition is the kind of tradition that presents truths of the faith that are not present in Sacred Scripture. Material sufficiency, as commonly defined, is the denial of constitutive tradition.

The terminology here is frustratingly vague and a multitude of clarifying questions could be answers that would turn this seemingly simple question into an entire affair requiring multiple theses to resolve.

First, when you speak of something being “present” in Sacred Scripture, do you mean that it is present in an explicit manner, or is it also said to be “present” when it is virtually included? Some want to distinguish constitutive tradition from “declarative tradition” which means that the answer to this is “in neither mode.”

Second, how far are you extending Sacred Scripture? Are you including the spiritual senses or are you only including the literal sense?

Third, when you speak of tradition as “constitutive,” are you simply referring to tradition as making something apt for the assent of faith, or are you saying that it is the sole material conduit of such Divine Revelation?

If I sat around longer, I could think of other questions as well (as I did in a video from May 2024).

The point is that nobody should pretend that the question of the sufficiency of scripture is somehow a yes or no question, easily answered in a single formula. Much less should a certain form of sufficiency become THE apologetic against Protestants.

In this article, I want to collect some quotes from late medieval and reformation era theologians on related issue...I just find it to be fun, there really isn’t some bigger purpose in doing this since I find all the primary sources to be vague on this (something stating that x doctrine is in scripture, other times denying it, as St. Augustine did long ago in his battles with the Donatists).

ARTICLE

As I have spoken of some times before, the easiest way to do research on Medievals is to find where the dispute would be found in their Sentences Commentary. That is a very good place to begin. Bl. Scotus made sure that this question was most commonly treated right in the beginning, the Prologue to the Sentences.

In his Ordinatio, the sole question of the second part of his prologue is “Whether the supernatural knowledge necessary for the wayfarer is sufficiently handed on in Sacred Scripture?” While answering yes, he clarifies that “many necessary truths are not express in Sacred Scripture, although they be virtually contained there as conclusions in the principles; about the investigation of which was the labor useful of doctors and expositors.” (n. 123)

Johannes Capreolus (d. 1444), as defender of the Thomistic school against any of its enemies, needed to comment on this question as well.