Trattato Utilissimo del Beneficio di Giesù Cristo Crocifisso (1543)
authorship disputed — traditionally Aonio Paleario; modern scholarship credits Benedetto da Mantova, revised by Marcantonio Flaminio
Small, anonymous, and read by more Italians than any priest of its generation ever preached to in a lifetime.
Every stat is a checkable fact about the actual book, not a designer's mood. Bars are drawn against the highest value any book reaches.
The game's own explanation, as a reader sees it in the backpack.
High. It was the most-read devotional book of the Italian Reformation, with tens of thousands of copies printed before Rome could stop it.
Justification by faith alone, argued entirely out of Paul, in plain Italian a layman could follow without a confessor standing over the page.
Anonymous on purpose, in a country where a name on the title page was an arrest warrant.
Small enough to hide, and it moved through Italy faster than the Inquisition could trace a single copy back to a printer.
The Benefit of Christ was published at Venice in 1543 and burned in public at Naples in 1553. It taught that a sinner is justified by faith in Christ alone, and that good works are the fruit of faith, never its price. It said this in plain Italian, for ordinary people, which is why the Inquisition wanted it stopped.
By levelling up. A book that develops keeps what it knew and learns the rest on its new schedule.
| Lv | Move | Type | Cat. | Pwr | Acc | PP |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Random Verse | Bible | Argument | 10 | 100% | 30 |
| 8 | Chapter… | Bible | Scripture | — | — | 12 |
| 12 | Affirm | — | Status | — | — | 1 |
| 20 | The Benefit of Christ | Soteriology | Argument | 90 | 100% | 10 |
| 26 | Nothing Can Separate | Soteriology | Argument | 76 | 100% | 10 |
| 32 | An Alien Righteousness | Soteriology | Argument | 90 | 100% | 10 |
| 42 | Sealed with the Spirit | Soteriology | Argument | 62 | 100% | 15 |
| 50 | Speak Italian | History | Status | — | 100% | 5 |
How to read these. In Scholar’s Dream, books argue with each other. Each thing a book can do in a debate is a move, and most moves carry a real quotation — the words the book puts on the table when it uses that move.
Strong against lists the opposing books and arguments a move was written to answer. Used against one of them, it hits much harder than usual: ×2 means twice the normal force, ×4 four times. It is the game’s way of saying: this is the sentence that answers that argument. Open an entry to read why.
“For in him we live, and move, and have our being. As some of your own poets have said.”
Acts 17:28 (WEB) — Paul at the Areopagus, quoting the Athenians’ own poets back to them.
In the gamePick the part of the opponent’s case that is true and affirm it. That point can no longer be used against you, and the opponent’s Defend falls sharply. It deals no damage. Affirm something false and you have only agreed with an error.
“Lo! how this good teacher St. Paul showeth evidently that faith maketh a man righteous without any works.”
Il Beneficio di Cristo, Chapter III (trans. Arthur Golding, 1573; text from the 1860 Philadelphia reprint, public domain). Authorship disputed: this edition’s own title page credits Aonio Paleario; Philip Schaff credits Juan de Valdés; modern scholarship generally credits Benedetto da Mantova, revised by Marcantonio Flaminio.public domain
In the gameThe most-read devotional book of the whole Italian Reformation — tens of thousands of copies before the Inquisition could stop it. Its whole case for justification by faith alone is built out of Paul, laid end to end, in plain Italian a layman could follow without a confessor standing over the page.
The bull cannot answer the book. It was never written to have an argument — only cardinals and a warrant.
“For I am persuaded that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing, will be able to separate us from God’s love, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”
Romans 8:38–39 (WEB) — the passage 𝔓46 attests.
In the gameThe list is long on purpose: Paul is trying to find something that could and running out. Strikes half again as hard when the book is nearly spent.
“Christ has fulfilled the law and undergone its penalty; those who believe in him have this vicarious – or, to use Luther’s terminology, alien – obedience credited to them.”
Carl Trueman, “Justification and the Protestant Reformation”, TGC Concise Theology, CC BY-SA 4.0.
In the gameLuther’s own word for it. The righteousness that saves is somebody else’s — fulfilled by Christ, credited to people who did not do it. Foreign, and therefore secure: what was never yours to earn is never yours to lose.
Not poured in. Credited — and the council has just told you that is the error.
Whose righteousness, and is it credited or infused? The article was written so that nobody had to say.
“In him you also, having heard the word of the truth, the Good News of your salvation—in whom, having also believed, you were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit,”
Ephesians 1:13 (WEB) — the passage 𝔓92 attests on its first surviving side.
In the gameThe seal is not the reader’s grip on God. It is God’s mark on the reader, and it holds — the book’s own Defend may rise.