The Sale of Religious Instruction = Simony

The History of Simony and Church Office for Sale

In the past, the church was often plagued with crooked deals for power and prestige. For a price, one could purchase ecclesiastical office, whether it be an Episcopal See or some title of lesser rank.

These were positions that came not only with power, but with pre-bend. That's a term for a regular stipend that was both substantial and secure. For the shrewd and unscrupulous, the upfront investment was small compared to the payoff.

Reformers in the church fought against this practice and even labeled it simony after Simon the Magician. Acts 8 .18 -19 says, When Simon saw that the Spirit was given through the laying on of the apostles' hands, he offered them money.

Give me this power as well, he said, so that everyone on whom I lay my hands may receive the Holy Spirit. This practice largely thrived during the post-Nicene era and then throughout the Middle Ages.

Modern Simony in the Marketplace of Christian Teaching

However, it still exists today, and it exists in a new form. Rather than restraining itself to backroom dealings, it happens in the open marketplace. Rather than being a matter of church office, it is a matter of the gospel itself.

Authors sell books on biblical topics at double-digit markups. Gospel conferences charge in the hundreds to hear solid preaching. Seminaries raise tuition to tens of thousands. And aspiring ministers pay this price in the hopes of becoming refined by the Spirit for the work of ministry.

Now, each of these activities may have some supposed justification. For example, they say people don't value what doesn't cost them anything, or the worker is worthy of his wages. And then the ever-present, well, we have to cover costs.

More on that last one in a moment. But the fact remains that this is a matter of modern-day simony. Treating the things of God as commodities to be commercialized, rather than as heavenly blessings to be offered graciously.

Objection 1: Simony Means Buying, Not Selling

Of course, this label on the sale of religious instruction may not be readily accepted by many. So, let's consider several objections. Objection 1. Simony refers to buying, not selling. In Acts 8, Simony is guilty of attempting to purchase the gift of the Spirit.

One might object that it is odd to use his name for an activity that regards selling when he only attempted to buy. But what was Simony's root sin? Was it merely attempting to purchase the gift of the Spirit?

Or was it rather his judgment that the gift of God was purchasable at all? Peter makes it clear that it is the latter, a matter of the heart. In Acts 8, 20 -23, Peter replies, May your silver perish with you because you thought you could buy the gift of God with money.

You have no part or share in our ministry because your heart is not right before God. Repent, therefore, of your wickedness and pray to the Lord. Perhaps He will forgive you for the intent of your heart, for I see that you are poisoned by bitterness and captive to iniquity.

Those who attempt to sell the gift of God are guilty of the very same sin. They openly regard spiritual things as items that may be exchanged for money. Moreover, even the historical definition of Simony extended to both buying and selling.

For example, consider this definition from Peter Lombard, the prominent medieval theologian.

He writes,.

Properly speaking, Simoniacs are those who, like Simon Magus, wish to put a price on a priceless grace. And those who, in the manner of Gehazi, receive money for some sacred ministry ought to be called Gehaziites.

And yet all, whether givers or receivers, are called Simoniacs, and both are struck down by the same sentence. In other words, theologians have historically used the term Simony as a single banner that included both the sin of Simon and the sin of Gehazi.

If you don't remember who Gehazi is, he was the servant of Elijah who accepted payment from Naaman for his miraculous healing in 2 Kings 5. Alright, objection number two. Simony refers to ordinations, not other religious things.

Objection 2: Ordinations and the Laying on of Hands

Ordination to church office involves the laying on of hands in 1 Timothy 5 .22. In biblical examples, we also see this associated with an impartation of the Spirit. For example, in Acts 8 .18 or 2 Timothy 1 .6.

While Protestants in general would correctly regard this feature of laying on hands as reserved to the apostles, the assumption that this gift of the Spirit continues to be communicated by the laying on of hands has led the purchase of ordinations in particular to be regarded as Simony.

Just as Simon tried to buy the gift of the Spirit through the laying on of hands, crooked men who had obtained their office illicitly were guilty of attempting the same. However, it should be clear that the heart of Simon's sin extends to more than just matters that involve the laying on of hands.

Rather, the purchase or sale of any spiritual thing freely given by God constitutes a sin of like character. Indeed, throughout history, theologians who addressed Simony agreed on this, regularly defining it as a desire to exchange spiritual things for material things.

For example, John Huss defined Simony as, an evil consent to exchange of spiritual goods for non-spiritual. Expositing Gregory the Great, one of the first to really campaign heavily against Simony and the Church, he summarizes, whenever anyone confers a spiritual gift improperly, either in consideration of service of material gift or human favor, he thereby commits Simony, contrary to the Scriptures and Christ's command, freely have ye received, freely give.

If you don't recognize that verse, that is Matthew 10 .8. Objection number three, Simony refers to spiritual things, not teaching. If Simony is a desire to exchange spiritual things for material things, one might readily object that teaching hardly fits into the category of spiritual things.

Objection 3: Teaching as a Spiritual Gift

Just as one may learn about science or literature, become an expert, and then charge students to receive instruction, one could do the same with the Bible. However, this view misses what the Bible says about the nature of teaching within the Church.

It is not a natural matter, but a spiritual one. 1 Corinthians 2 .12 -13 says,. We have not received the Spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we may understand what God has freely given us, and this is what we speak, not in words taught us by human wisdom, but in words taught us by the Spirit, expressing spiritual truths in spiritual words.

Any minister who seeks to instruct others about the things of God should not be seeking to impart human wisdom, but rather words taught by the Spirit. That is, successful Christian teaching involves a work of the Spirit who is freely given.

According to Matthew 10 .8, to charge for this would be discordant with the gracious gift of God. At this point, one might object on historical grounds, observing that past theologians did not regard the sale of religious instruction as Simony.

Indeed, while it was not common for works on Simony to even address the matter of teaching, we do have at least one example of a theologian who was hesitant to label the sale of religious instruction as Simony.

John Wycliffe writes the following,. In the same manner as a teacher should exchange knowledge eagerly with his pupils, so a preacher or minister of the sacraments should eagerly exchange a spiritual service or benefit for a small temporal stipend.

Therefore, there is no sin intrinsically in such an exchange. However, a few aspects of Wycliffe's argument should be considered before accepting it at face value. First, in context, he uses Isaiah 55 .1 as evidence that teaching could be bought because it encourages people to come and buy without money.

Yet the call to buy without money indicates that the grace of God should not be purchased at all, not that it should be purchased for a modest fee. Second, Wycliffe implies that even baptism or communion, the sacraments themselves could be bought and sold.

Third, Wycliffe is operating without the working distinctions that are necessary to account for a call to supply ministers without a reciprocal exchange. This last point is crucial. Scripture makes the distinction between reciprocity and co-labor.

You can read about this more on our website. While Jesus says that ministers should freely give in Matthew 10 .8, in the next two verses he commands that they be supported by kingdom citizens. While John says that missionaries should not charge those whom they are sent to in 3 John 7, in the next verse he also says that they should be supported by fellow workers.

This distinction between reciprocity and co-labor is present here in these two passages, but also elsewhere throughout scripture. Armed with this simple distinction, we are free to say that ministers should never charge for the work of ministry, though they should certainly expect God's people to support the work and even condition their continued labors on that continued support.

So what we see in Wycliffe is not a denial of this assessment, but rather his attempt to wrestle with the matter of ministry fundraising apart from this reciprocity-co-labor distinction. By and large, this is simply a product of the era in which he lived.

As the sale of ordinations ran rampant, he offers deep thoughts and distinctions on the matter. As the commercial sale of teaching was not a similarly common issue in his era, he settles for a minimal accounting of the matter.

We are in a different situation. We live in an era where the commercial sale of teaching is far more common. Therefore, we are called to a greater clarity. And if we think about this rightly with that greater clarity, it becomes obvious that the sale of religious instruction is indeed simony.

And believe it or not, others working with similar definitions as Wycliffe came to the conclusion that the sale of religious teaching is indeed simony. There was a famous counter-reformation theologian named Leonardo Alessius, and he attempted to follow the medieval definitions of simony all the way to their logical conclusions.

Albert Barnes, the famous Presbyterian Bible commentator, quotes him approvingly with the following translation. It is simony to teach and preach the doctrine of Christ and his gospel, or to give answers to quiet the conscience for money.

For the immediate object of these two acts is the calling forth of faith, hope, charity, penitence, and other supernatural acts, and the reception of the consolation of the Holy Spirit. And this is, among Christians, their only value.

Whence they are accounted things sacred and supernatural, for their immediate end is to things supernatural, and they are done by man as he is an instrument of the Holy Spirit. So just to summarize that, because Christian instruction should involve the Holy Spirit working in the hearts of the hearers, and something supernatural should not be traded for something material.

Objection 4: Material Fees and Annexed Spiritual Things

Objection number four, simony refers to immaterial things, not material things. In my introduction, I gave the examples of book prices, conference tickets, and seminary tuition. Each one of these has a material aspect.

Books are printed with paper and ink. Conferences, along with brick and mortar seminaries, require facilities. Should not ministers and ministries be able to charge for these things? First, it should be evident that ministries engaged in this practice rarely limit their fees to material things.

So in most cases, such an argument would be insincere. Digital editions of books are typically offered at prices which do not reflect the ease of distribution. Conferences and seminaries typically charge in order to pay the ministers involved, and not merely cover facility fees.

While it may be appropriate to charge for food at a conference or housing at a seminary, often charging for such material things is a proxy for charging for spiritual things. Thomas Aquinas is representative of medieval theologians when he asserts that scripture forbids not only the sale of spiritual things, but also the sale of material things that are annexed to spiritual things.

He writes,. A thing may be annexed to spiritual things as being dependent on spiritual things. Such things can by no means exist apart from spiritual things. Consequently, it is altogether unlawful to sell such things because the sale thereof implies the sale of things spiritual.

So to annex one thing to another is to attach it in such a way that the other cannot be independently obtained. For example, if you require someone purchase a physical certificate in order to be baptized, you have annexed that certificate to baptism because they have no way of obtaining that baptism apart from that purchase.

The Gratian Decretals, medieval canon law which extensively addressed the sin of simony, similarly recorded the following,. Not only those who receive spiritual things, but also those who receive temporal things attached to them at a price, are judged to be simoniacs.

Hence, Malachi, speaking in the person of the Lord, Who is there among you, he said, who will shut the doors and burn my altar for nothing? I have no will among you, says the Lord of hosts, and I will not accept a gift from your hand.

To shut the doors is not a sacred office of the officiating, but only an accessory to it. When one refuses to share his teaching, unless someone purchases a physical book, he has annexed a spiritual thing to a material thing.

The same applies to facility fees. For example, purants were quite common in western churches for nearly 200 years. One could argue that they were not selling anything spiritual, only space on a bench.

Yet today, we would look back and recognize this clearly as annexing a material thing to a spiritual thing, and wrongly charging for the Word of God. Objection 5. Simony Implicates the Buyer. It may seem that this argument proves too much.

Objection 5: The Buyer and the Ransom Analogy

If one has committed simony by accepting payment for religious instruction, then one also necessarily commits simony by purchasing it. Do we really want to argue that it is wrong for Christians to buy theology books, attend gospel conferences, pay seminary tuition, etc.?

Actually, this is not at all the logical conclusion of what has been argued here. It is a non-sequitur. While it is indeed simony to consider spiritual things to be matters of commerce, those who engage in that commerce for lack of an alternative do not necessarily condone or espouse this line of thought.

If something that should be given freely is withheld, those who use money in order to acquire it are clear from guilt. Consider Aquinas' explanation of a circumstance where it would be even right to purchase ordination to an office.

He says, it would be simoniacal to buy off the opposition of one's rivals before acquiring the right to bishopric or any dignity or pre-bend by election, appointment, or presentation since this would be to use money as a means of obtaining a spiritual thing.

But it is lawful to use money as a means of removing unjust opposition after one has already acquired that right.". Consider this analogy. Human people should not be bought and sold. To engage in the purchase or sale of humans is immoral.

Yet, if someone were kidnapped and held hostage, none would hold guilty a family member who pays the ransom. Now, depending on the circumstances, we might determine it unwise to pay the ransom. Perhaps it would confirm the criminal and his behavior or lead him to kidnap again.

Regardless, the one who chooses to pay the ransom remains innocent of the charge of human trafficking. The same may be said for those who buy religious instruction. There are times when it is wise to avoid such purchases in order to discourage this industry that commercializes God's word.

However, the one who buys teaching that is wrongly withheld from him is innocent of simony. So, in conclusion, this sale of religious instruction is rightly labeled simony. And this is true even though it's primarily a modern problem that takes a very different shape than that of the sale of ordinations.

Conclusion: Condemning the Sale of Religious Instruction

And because it is simony, it should be readily condemned. The contemporary church is saturated with this particular sin, but God is merciful to all who repent. Consider Acts 8 24. Then Simon answered, pray to the Lord for me so that nothing you have said may happen to me.

Now, we aren't given the details of what happened after that, but anyone who comes to God with true repentance will be forgiven. The gospel has been given freely and should therefore be freely given. The same is true for all revelation that has been handed down from on high.

To give such things freely is not a burden, it's a wonderful privilege. Consider what Paul writes in 1 Corinthians 9 18. He asks this question, what then is my reward? That in preaching the gospel, I may offer it free of charge and so not use up my rights in preaching it.