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such questions) which we have to put forward in this matter, is that of our custom; a custom which has the force of a law, inasmuch as our rules have been transmitted down to us by holy men." "The custom established among us," "our custom," and still more, the Greek τὸ παρ’ ἡμῖν ἔθος, speak only of that which was local. There is not the least mark of universality about them. Παρ’ ημῖν can never signify "In the whole Church." Moreover, Basil does not even speak of it as a law of the Church, but only a custom, nor of the custom as having been handed down from the apostles, but by holy men. Had St. Basil known of any universal custom, it would have been much more to his purpose to have urged that universality, as being necessarily known to the person against whom he argued. Could he have adduced the practice of the Universal Church or the authority of the Apostles, he would hardly have confined himself to that of his own diocese and his predecessors. St. Basil's caution is to me a proof that his custom was not the practice of the Universal Church, and that he was aware of the fact.[1] All that is alleged after St. Basil's times down to the Council
- ↑ The interpolation of the additional curse, in Deut. xxvii. 23, according to the Vatican copy of the LXX, falls probably about the time of Basil. Tischendorf thinks that the Vatican Manuscript was written before the times of Jerome. It is of no use, therefore, in filling up the hiatus between the Apostles and the Council of Eliberis. If the curse, were genuine, it could only apply to him who married a wife's sister in her lifetime, as curses only fall on the transgressors of the law. But it is manifestly an interpolation. It was unknown to St. Basil. It is not found in the Alexandrian Manuscript, written in the home of the LXX version, nor in the versions made from it. Its citation by Siricius seems to point to a Western parentage. (See "An Expostulatory Letter to the Right Rev. N. Wiseman, on the Interpolated Curse," by the Rev. E. W. Grinfield, London, 1850.)
