The Word and the Text: Allegorical Exegesis and the Christological Ontology of Scripture in the Middle Ages Factum audivimus; mysterium requiramus. “We have heard the deed; let us seek the mystery.” So says Augustine in his tractates on the Gospel of John. Sentiments such as this were the bedrock of Medieval hermeneutics regarding Scripture. The mystical interpretation of Scripture, particularly allegory, had been bequeathed to the theologians and scholars of the middle ages by giants