Typology

Augustine, Bishop of Hippo (c. 354-430 A.D.):

But apart from great impudence who tries to interpret something expressed in an allegory in his own favor, unless he also has perfectly clear testimonies that cast light on the obscure passages?

(Augustine of Hippo, Letter 93.8.24 [To Vincent]; PG, 33:334 [CCSL, 31A:185]; trans. WSA, II/1:392.)

Thomas Aquinas: 

     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 things, but because the things signified by the words can be themselves types of other things. Thus in Holy Writ no confusion results, for all the senses are founded on one—the literal—from which alone can any argument be drawn, and not from those intended in allegory, as Augustine says (Epist. xlviii). Nevertheless, nothing of Holy Scripture perishes on account of this, since nothing necessary to faith is contained under the spiritual sense which is not elsewhere put forward by the Scripture in its literal sense.

(Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae, I.1.10; trans. The “Summa Theologica” of St. Thomas Aquinas: Part I: QQ. I—XXIV.: Second and Revised Edition, trans. Fathers of the English Dominican Province, [London: Burns Oates & Washbourne Ltd., 1920], Reply Obj. 1, p. 18.)

Note: See further: The Analogy of Faith (Analogia Fidei) in the Early Church (Scripture Interprets Scripture).


καὶ αὐτός ἐστιν πρὸ πάντων καὶ τὰ πάντα ἐν αὐτῷ συνέστηκεν ~ Soli Deo Gloria