With this sort of reasoning he finds profound meanings in the
number of furlongs mentioned in the sixth chapter of St. John.
Referring to the fact that the disciples had rowed about
"twenty-five or thirty furlongs," he declares that "twenty-five
typifies the law, because it is five times five, but the law was
imperfect before the gospel came; now perfection is comprised in
six, since God in six days perfected the world, hence five is
multiplied by six that the law may be perfected by the gospel, and
six times five is thirty."
But Augustine's exploits in exegesis were not all based on
numerals; he is sometimes equally profound in other modes. Thus he
tells us that the condemnation of the serpent to eat dust typifies
the sin of curiosity, since in eating dust he "penetrates the
obscure and shadowy"; and that Noah's ark was "pitched within and
without with pitch" to show the safety of the Church from the
leaking in of heresy.
Still another exploit--one at which the Church might well have
stood aghast--was his statement that the drunkenness of Noah
prefigured the suffering and death of Christ.
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