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Cronos, you are again responding to me as if i made the literacy rate claims in the Roman Empire, which i did not, so you should take them up with whoever did.

As for Chrysostom, i am amazed that you continue to contend that he could not have been referring to personal reading, but to communal hearing, when his overall exhortations indicates the opposite. This does not mean he expects all in society to be able to have a Bible, but it is presumptuous to disallow that his hearers could not generally do so, or that communal hearing would enable them to study the Scriptures and achieve the literacy he scolded them for not having.

While in Matthew he does refer to hearing of the Scriptures, he also chastens the laity for presuming "the reading of the divine Scriptures" appertains to such as monks, while they needed it more, and marginalizing them was" far worse than not reading."

The context of the exhortation in Ephesians is the home life, and he says not "hear" but "study the Scriptures," while in Col. 3:16 he is exhorting them to "get you at least the New Testament, the Apostolic Epistles, the Acts, the Gospels, for your constant teachers..." for "the reading of the Scriptures and that not to be done lightly, nor in any sort of way, but with much earnestness."

I know of no official RC teaching on this, and no further response is needed if you want to continue to contend this means communal hearing, which is your private interpretation as much as you think the opposite is.

I am referring to your post 352 which was taken from the Schaff-Herzog encyclopedia and where the authors of that encyclopedia got their conclusions wrong. It starts off on the discussion of "personal Biblical literacy among the laity" and quotes Jerome and Chrysostom. however, in both cases, the exhortations are primarily to the COMMUNAL reading and hearing of Scripture, because the vast majority of adherents would not be able to pick up the Bible that was freely accesible in Church and read because the vast majorty of adherents were illiterate.

If one reads Chrysostom's various volumes it is clearly apparent that he tells all that they must STUDY and KNOW scripture, that it must be READ regularly, yet one cannot make the presumption that this was to pick up and read as an individual. To make that presumption is to put the logic of a written culture on the mores of an oral culture.

There is this brilliant description of the interaction between Thamus, the king of Thebes and Theuth the egyptian god who created writing described in Phaedrus by Plato

Theuth came to exhibit his arts to him and urged him to disseminate them to all the Egyptians. Thamus asked him about the usefulness of each art, and while Theuth was explaining it, Thamus praised him for whatever he though was right in his explanations and criticized him for whatever he thought was wrong.

When it came to writing, Theuth said "O King, here is something that, once learned, will make the Egyptians wiser and will improve their memory; I have discovered a potion for memory and for wisdom that is writing"

Thamus, however replied: "O most expert Theuth, one man can give birth to the elements of an art, but only another can judge how they can benefit or harm those who will use them. And now, since you are hte father of writing, your affection for it has made you describe its effects as the opposite of what they really are. In fact, it will introduce forgetfulness into the soul of those who learn it: they will not practise using their memory because they will put their trust in writing, which is external and depend on signs that belong to others, instead of trying to remember from inside, completely on their own. you have not discovered a potion for remembering, but for reminding" you provide your students with the appearance of wisdom, not with it's reality. your invention will enable them to hear many things without being properly taught, and they will imagien that they have come to know much while for the most part they will know nothing. And they will be difficult to get along with, since they will merely appear to be wise instead of really being so

An oral culture which is what the world was until Gutenburg printed his first Bible on the printing press, was one in which learning and studying, indeed "reading the scripture" did not depend on literacy but rather on read the word communally.

In Matthew John Chrysostom refers to hearing of scripture thusly:

For if you would learn how great is the profit of the Scriptures, examine yourself, what you become by hearing Psalms,
I will give them, says He, not a famine of bread, nor a thirst of water, but a famine of hearing the word of the Lord. Amos 8:11
Let us not therefore despise the hearing of the divine Scriptures. For this is of Satan's devising; not suffering us to see the treasure, lest we should gain the riches. Therefore he says that the hearing the divine laws is nothing, lest he should see us from the hearing acquiring the practice also.
your very own quote from paragraph 10 "your supposing that the reading of the divine Scriptures appertains to those only, when you need it much more than they." goes on to say "what you become by hearing Psalms" and I will give them, says He, not a famine of bread, nor a thirst of water, but a famine of hearing the word of the Lord. Amos 8:11 and Yes, for a word from the divine Scriptures, made to sound in the ear, does more than fire soften the hardened soul, and renders it fit for all good things.

Chrysostom would not tell the 75% of the population who were illiterate that they must pick up the Bible and read it, rather that they must learn it, HEAR it, READ IT COMMUNALLY, they must quote from scripture, know it and memorise it. He would not say this to a majority illiterate society.

Indeed in paragraph 9 he says

For indeed both eyes and mouth and hearing He set in us to this intent, that all our members may serve Him, that we may speak His words, and do His deeds, that we may sing unto Him continual hymns, that we may offer up sacrifices of thanksgiving, and by these may thoroughly purify our consciences.

He does not exhort the illiterate to read when they could not, but says to study the scripture, which even the illiterate could do by communal reading of scripture and hearing the Word of God.

In Ephesians, the very link you gave has this:

Hear the Scripture that saith, “The bee is little among such as fly, but her fruit is the chief of sweet things.”4
424 [Note that Chrysostom here quotes the Old Testament Apocrypha as Scripture: ἄκουε τῆς γραφῆς λεγούσης. Dr. Schaff says: “He accepts the Syrian Canon of the Peshito, which includes the Old Test. with the Apocrypha,” &c. Prolegomena, p. 19.—G.A.]
Hear how the Scripture saith, “And it ceased to be with Sarah after the manner of women.” (Gen. xviii. 11.)
Then mingle also with your discourse the Apostle’s words, that “thus God would have our affections blended together; for listen to the Scripture, which saith
and attentively study the Scriptures, in most things we shall derive instruction from them.

In 4 out of 5 references to scripture in that document, John Chrysostom refers to HEARING, in the 5th he refers to STUDYING, which if you read in the same paragraph above, he says Thus then, by thine own language, teach her never to speak -- this is apparent in an Oral culture where the majority were illiterate.

This is not my interpretation but 4 out of 5 references to HEARING scripture and tie that in to a culture where 75% were illiterate and John Chrysostom did NOT mean everyone go and learn to read and then read the Bible (which is complex language in itself not for someone who just learnt a b c) -- he realised the limitations of his audience but wants ALL, literate and illiterate to STUDY scripture and hear it.