Answers from church history on today's questions
What Christian writers said, from about AD 303 to 1873.
27 passages · 7 writers · 7 centuries
Few writers in this collection treat jokes, parables, or fiction at length. Of the 27 passages here, 25 state a view and 2 mention the subject in passing, and Augustine supplies 13 of the 25 statements. The writers who state a view hold that a joke, a parable, or a figure of speech told with no intent to deceive is not a lie, either because the hearer is not deceived or because the words carry a further meaning (Augustine, c. 386 to 420; Aquinas, 1265; Calvin, 1540; Hodge, 1873). They differ on the jesting lie, a falsehood told for fun: Augustine and Aquinas call it a minor lie that is not free of fault, Aquinas adds that it is not a mortal sin, and Watson (1692) and Henry (1710) condemn it, with Henry saying that it teaches the tongue to lie in earnest. The statements after Aquinas are all from Reformed Protestant writers.
4 passages · 2 writers · 300s to 1200s
Writers on whether a joke is a lie, where the speaker and hearer both know it is not meant to be believed.
That first kind, in jest, is for this reason not very hurtful, because there is no deception. For he to whom it is said knows that it is said for the sake of the jest. But the second kind is for this reason the more inoffensive, because it carries with it some kindly intention. And to say truth, that which has no duplicity, cannot even be called a lie.
Augustine of Hippo, Expositions on the Book of Psalms 5
All the fallacious seek to mislead; but not every one who utters falsehood, wishes to mislead; for both mimes and comedies and many poems are full of falsehoods, rather with the purpose of delighting than of misleading, and almost all those who jest utter falsehood. But he is rightly called fallacious, whose purpose is, that somebody should be deceived. But those who do not aim to deceive, but nevertheless feign somewhat, are mendacious only, or if not even this, no one at least doubts that they are to be called pleasant falsifiers: unless you have something to object.
Augustine of Hippo, Two Books of Soliloquies 4
2. Setting aside, therefore, jokes, which have never been accounted lies, seeing they bear with them in the tone of voice, and in the very mood of the joker a most evident indication that he means no deceit, although the thing he utters be not true: touching which kind of discourse, whether it be meet to be used by perfect minds, is another question which we have not at this time taken in hand to clear; but setting jokes apart, the first point to be attended to, is, that a person should not be thought to lie, who lieth not.
Augustine of Hippo, On Lying 2
Yet not every lie is a cause of deception, since no one is deceived by a jocose lie; seeing that lies of this kind are told, not with the intention of being believed, but merely for the sake of giving pleasure. Hence again we find hyperbolical expressions in Holy Writ.
Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica II-II.Q110.A3
8 passages · 4 writers · 300s to 1700s
Writers who classify the jesting lie as a kind of lie, and who differ on how serious it is.
In fine, there are two kinds of lies, in which there is no great fault, and yet they are not without fault, either when we are in jest, or when we lie that we may do good.
Augustine of Hippo, Expositions on the Book of Psalms 5
Accordingly a jocose lie, from the very genus of the action, is of a nature to deceive; although in the intention of the speaker it is not told to deceive, nor does it deceive by the way it is told. Nor is there any similarity in the hyperbolical or any kind of figurative expressions, with which we meet in Holy Writ: because, as Augustine says (Lib. De Mend. v), "it is not a lie to do or say a thing figuratively: because every statement must be referred to the thing stated: and when a thing is done or said figuratively, it states what those to whom it is tendered understand it to signify."
Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica II-II.Q110.A3
On the contrary, Augustine says on Ps. 5:7, "Thou wilt destroy," etc.: "There are two kinds of lie, that are not grievously sinful yet are not devoid of sin, when we lie either in joking, or for the sake of our neighbor's good." But every mortal sin is grievous. Therefore jocose and officious lies are not mortal sins.
Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica II-II.Q110.A4
On the contrary, A gloss on Ps. 5:7, "Thou wilt destroy all that speak a lie," says "that there are three kinds of lies; for some are told for the wellbeing and convenience of someone; and there is another kind of lie that is told in fun; but the third kind of lie is told out of malice." The first of these is called an officious lie, the second a jocose lie, the third a mischievous lie.
Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica II-II.Q110.A2
There are, as Augustine says, two sorts of lies. … A jesting lie, when a man tells a lie in sport, to make others merry, and goes laughing to hell.
Thomas Watson, A Body of Divinity 3.10
Truth is too valuable a thing to be sold for a jest, and so is the reputation of our neighbour. By lying and slandering in jest men learn themselves, and teach others, to lie and slander in earnest; and a false report, raised in mirth, may be spread in malice; besides, if a man may tell a lie to make himself merry, why not to make himself rich, and so truth quite perishes, and men teach their tongues to tell lies, Jer. ix. 5 . If men would consider that a lie comes from the devil, and brings to hell-fire, surely that would spoil the sport of it; it is casting arrows and death to themselves.
Matthew Henry, Commentary on Proverbs 26.14
But it will prove dangerous playing with fire and jesting with edge-tools. … those are certainly to be condemned who are any way abusive to their neighbours, impose upon their credulity, cheat them in their bargains with them, tell lies to them or tell lies of them, give them ill language, or sully their reputation, and then think to excuse it by saying that they did but jest.
Matthew Henry, Commentary on Proverbs 26.14
Men could not arrive at such a pitch of impiety as to bear false witness (where to the guilt of a lie is added that of perjury and injury) if they had not advanced to it by allowing themselves to speak untruths in jest and banter, or under pretence of doing good. Thus men teach their tongues to speak lies, Jer. ix. 5 . Those that will take a liberty to tell lies in discourse are in a fair way to be guilty of the greater wickedness of false-witness-bearing, whenever they are tempted to it, though they seemed to detest it.
Matthew Henry, Commentary on Proverbs 19.5
4 passages · 2 writers · 300s to 1800s
Writers on whether stories that are not literal history, told to teach, are lies.
But now though it be a fiction, yet it is no falsehood. Why? Because the fiction has some further signification, it deceives thee not. It requires only one to understand it, and does not lead any one into error. And thus Christ wishing to convey this lesson to us, sought for fruit, and hereby set forth to us a figurative, and no deceiving fiction; a fiction therefore worthy of praise, not of blame; not one by the examination of which we might run into what was false; but by the diligent investigation of which we might discover what is true.
Augustine of Hippo, Sermons on Selected Lessons of the New Testament 41
Else will all things be lies which, on account of a certain similitude of things to be signified, although they never were done, are related to have been done. … Nor is it only in authors of secular letters, as in Horace, that mouse speaks to mouse, and weasel to fox, that through a fictitious narration a true signification may be referred to the matter in hand; whence the like fables of Æsop being referred to the same end, there is no man so untaught as to think they ought to be called lies: but in Holy Writ also, as in the book of Judges, the trees seek them a king, and speak to the olive, to the fig and to the vine and to the bramble. Which, in any wise, is all feigned, with intent that one may get to the thing which is intended, by a feigned narration indeed, yet not a lying one, but with a truthful signification.
Augustine of Hippo, Against Lying 28
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 shall call lies, all parables also, and figures designed for the signifying of any things soever, which are not to be taken according to their proper meaning, but in them is one thing to be understood from another, shall be said to be lies: which be far from us altogether.
Augustine of Hippo, Against Lying 24
It is not every enunciatio falsi which is a falsehood. … This we see in the case of fables and parables, and in works of fiction. No one regards the Iliad or the Paradise Lost as a repertorium of falsehoods. It is not necessary to assume that the parables of our Lord, are veritable histories. They were not designed to give a narrative of actual occurrences. Intention to deceive, therefore, is an element in the idea of falsehood.
Charles Hodge, Systematic Theology III.19.13
9 passages · 3 writers · 300s to 1500s
Writers on whether figurative sayings, symbolic acts, and feigning in Scripture are lies, including the sayings and acts of Christ and the patriarchs.
I am by no means of opinion that a figurative mode of expression can be rightly termed a falsehood. For it is no falsehood to call a day joyous because it renders men joyous, or a lupine harsh because by its bitter flavour it imparts harshness to the countenance of him who tastes it, or to say that God knows something when He makes man know it (an instance quoted by yourself in these words of God to Abraham, “Now I know that thou fearest God”). These are by no means false statements, as you yourself readily see.
Augustine of Hippo, Letters of St. Augustin 1.140
When a thing is either done or said figuratively, it is no lie. For every utterance is to be referred to that which it utters. But when any thing is either done or said figuratively, it utters that which it signifies to those for whose understanding it was put forth.
Augustine of Hippo, On Lying 7
42. It clearly appears then, all being discussed, that those testimonies of Scripture have none other meaning than that we must never at all tell a lie: seeing that not any examples of lies, worthy of imitation, are found in the manners and actions of the Saints, as regards those Scriptures which are referred to no figurative signification, such as is the history in the Acts of the Apostles. For all those sayings of our Lord in the Gospel, which to more ignorant minds seem lies, are figurative significations.
Augustine of Hippo, On Lying 42
Either what is believed to be a lie must be shown not to be such; whether it be where a truth is left untold, and yet no falsehood told; or where a true signification willeth one thing to be understood of another, which kind of figurative either sayings or doings abounds in the prophetical writings.
Augustine of Hippo, Against Lying 35
But if it be no lie, when things which signify one thing by another are referred to the understanding of a truth, assuredly not only that which Jacob did or said to his father that he might be blessed, but that too which Joseph spoke as if in mockery of his brothers, and David’s feigning of madness, must be judged to be no lies, but prophetical speeches and actions, to be referred to the understanding of those things which are true; which are covered as it were with a garb of figure on purpose to exercise the sense of the pious inquirer, and that they may not become cheap by lying bare and on the surface.
Augustine of Hippo, Against Lying 24
True things, not false, are spoken; because true things, not false, are signified, whether by word or by deed; the things that are signified namely, those are the things spoken.
Augustine of Hippo, Against Lying 24
As Augustine says (De QQ. Evang. ii), "To pretend is not always a lie: but only when the pretense has no signification, then it is a lie. When, however, our pretense refers to some signification, there is no lie, but a representation of the truth." And he cites figures of speech as an example, where a thing is "pretended," for we do not mean it to be taken literally but as a figure of something else that we wish to say.
Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica II-II.Q111.A1
As Augustine says (De Qq. Evang. ii), "not everything of which we make pretense is a falsehood; but when what we pretend has no meaning then is it a falsehood. But when our pretense has some signification, it is not a lie, but a figure of the truth; otherwise everything said figuratively by wise and holy men, or even by our Lord Himself, would be set down as a falsehood, because it is not customary to take such expressions in the literal sense. And deeds, like words, are feigned without falsehood, in order to denote something else."
Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica III.Q55.A4
Still, as insincerity of any kind is a sort of falsehood, the difficulty is not yet removed; more especially as this example is adduced by many to prove that they are at liberty to tell lies. But I reply, that Christ might without falsehood have pretended what is here mentioned, in the same manner that he gave himself out to be a stranger passing along the road; for there was the same reason for both. A somewhat more ingenious solution is given by Augustine, (in his work addressed To Consentius, Book II., chap. 13, and in the book of Questions on the Gospels, chap. 51,) for he chooses to enumerate this kind of feigning among tropes and figures, and afterwards among parables and fables.
John Calvin, Harmony of the Evangelists 1.48
1 passage · 1 writer · 1200s
A passage that names boasting for pleasure as a jocose lie.
Boasting does not always involve a mischievous lie, but only where it is contrary to the love of God or our neighbor, either in itself or in its cause. That a man boast, through mere pleasure in boasting, is an inane thing to do, as the Philosopher remarks (Ethic. iv, 7): wherefore it amounts to a jocose lie. Unless perchance he were to prefer this to the love of God, so as to contemn God's commandments for the sake of boasting: for then it would be against the charity of God, in Whom alone ought our mind to rest as in its last end. To boast for the sake of glory or gain seen to involve an officious lie: provided it be do without injury to others, for then it would once become a mischievous lie.
Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica II-II.Q112.A2
1 passage · 1 writer · 300s
A passage on how far poetic invention may go before it is false.
Poetic licence has this limit, not that it may invent the whole, which is the part of one who is false and senseless, but that it may change something consistently with reason. They said that Jupiter changed himself into a shower of gold, that he might deceive Danae .
Lactantius, The Divine Institutes 8.12
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