those girls to whomever they wish to be wives; for a forced union provides a path to disjunction. He commands [them] to marry within their own tribes, so that there may not be confusion of the tribes, just as he also forbids above marrying gentiles or heathens, taking care that the people not be mingled with the impious.
COMMENTARIES ON DEUTERONOMY
A What is repeated by Moses in this present book, we have [already] committed to the preceding narrations. But if anything should perhaps require a peculiar interpretation, it will not be passed over by us with silence. Moreover, since this book gets its name from the law, the boundaries of the law must be set forth. Therefore, law is a discourse which commands what must be done, and forbids what must not be done. For example: "Honor your father. You shall love the Lord." Item: "You shall not kill, you shall not commit adultery." Or thus: It is a discourse commanding or forbidding regarding the political nature of an animal. For every man is political by nature, for it is innate to him by nature to obey the laws of the divine republic, concerning which it is said: "Glorious things are spoken of you, O city of God." Furthermore, he is political because, when he has tempered his own will to nature, he is zealous and also capable of speaking. But our republic exists in the heavens. Or thus: Law is the definition of a statesman concerning things to be done or omitted; for a statesman is a legislator, such as Moses was. Item, the Savior Himself, of whom it is said: "Let the nations be judged before you." Item: "Appoint, O Lord, a legislator over them." To whom also it is said: "Direct me in your law, O Lord, by your way." Or thus: It is a discourse commanding or forbidding concerning all the actions of life, [specifying] what, when, and how they occur evilly and with harm. B Moreover, to this definition conform the examples of the lives of the just, who were not delighted without their own advantage, and had constituted the law for themselves, just as is clear from this: "Tell me, you who know the law and do not hear the law." For it is written that Abraham had two sons, and the rest. Furthermore, there is also the account of the lives of delinquents, concerning the fact that when they had acted evilly, they also suffered evilly. Such was the son of that Egyptian who was about to curse the Israelite. Item, the son of the Israelite woman in Leviticus. Item, [the case of] him who had practiced fornication with the Midianite woman in Numbers. Or thus: It is the norm of the just and the unjust. For just as those who build according to an architectural norm produce a sound structure, so too those who practice justice according to the norm of the just. Or thus: The measure of the just and the unjust is not so much of men as of things, for these, defined by the law, fall under measurement. C Moreover, according to the law that measure comes to individuals by which they themselves have been measured, shaken for the just, and overflowing; but for the unjust, it is appropriate, since his iniquity will fall back upon his own head. Or thus: It is a discourse teaching how it is fitting to administer the republic, which definition will suit him who refers all his actions to the heavenly republic. Or thus: It is a discourse which, in general and commonly, commands what must be done and forbids what must not be done. Or thus: It is the decree of a king, and the king is Christ, who by His own decrees made the commands of the literal law void. Or thus: It is a discourse banning the royal science, which Christ, the Wisdom of the Father Himself, imparts to all who, by His guidance, strive for the kingdom of the heavens or of God. Or thus: It is the consensus of a city concerning things to be done or not done, provided the city is a gathered body in harmony with the Church concerning things to be done or otherwise. D Or thus: It is the determination of those things which are right to do toward men, and God, and divine virtues. Moreover, the law extends over ecclesiastical magistrates, tribunals, war against opposing actions, mutual peace, sound dogmas concerning God, marriages, the upbringing of children, preparation for the migration from life, and finally the [rites for the] just deceased. For in each of these, everyone is involved either lawfully or unlawfully. Furthermore, the Pentateuch is also called the Law, the definition of which is such: It is a political commentary concerning sacred and holy things. But for what reason it is called Deuteronomy, Moses himself instructed us when he said: "These are the words of the covenant which the Lord commanded Moses to set before the sons of Israel in the land of Moab, besides that covenant which He made with them in Horeb."
"Satis sit vobis habitare in monte isto" [1, 6]. Nowhere is this explicitly foretold, except according to the Samaritan exemplar only, in Numbers, after the law of the two trumpets; but in the Jewish [copies], it is understood by implication. For in saying after the trumpets, "And the sons of Israel moved on," it is an argument that God forbade [them] to linger there any longer.
COMMENTARIES ON DEUTERONOMY
A "I shall not be able to bear you myself." This is added in the Samaritan copies of Exodus, at the time when his father-in-law advised him to appoint more subordinate leaders—and, in general, that those things which are said to be spoken, but not openly recorded, are found in the Samaritan copies; and so too with the matter of the sons of Israel, as though they themselves were the ones who spoke to Moses about the scouts. For it is probable that, as they were revolting from God, they desired to learn about the land. Thus, even when Moses asked God, He said with indignation, "Send yourselves men, and let them scout the land," as though he were distrusted.
"And the Lord was angered against me on your account." For I myself, he says, did not disobey God, but being unable to endure your contradiction and disobedience, I was disposed lightly toward you, and uttered words that provoked this judgment against me.
"You shall not add to the word." And after a little he will say, "You shall not turn aside to the right or to the left." And in Proverbs it says: "Do not add to the words of God, that he may not convict you, and you be found a liar." For the words of the Lord do not receive an addition, being inherently perfect. It is said, therefore, concerning Christ: "When he had finished his words in their ears."
"For this is your wisdom and understanding." For the keeping of the commandments of the Lord belongs to the wise and understanding. And the statement, "in the sight of the nations," is in harmony with: "Let your light shine before men, so that they may see," and the rest.
B Thus one draws nearer to God. This is also hinted by what follows, lest because of their sins he depart to a distance. "For your sins," he says, "make a gap between me and you." And again: "Contend with me; and I will contend with you, and while you are yet speaking, I will say: Behold, here I am."
"You shall not make for yourselves a graven image." [V, 8.] Similarly in Exodus, where He even speaks about the stars, how He distributed them to the nations. For he who does not prohibit something out of long-suffering is the author of it. Since, therefore, He chose Israel, there is place for the expression "He distributed," which hints at the concession made on our account, such as that which says: "He delivered them to a spirit of error, He gave them eyes not to see, and ears not to hear." Similar is what will be said later: "God did not give you understanding, nor eyes to see, nor ears to hear," even though He had said before: "You have seen all that the Lord did in the land of Egypt." Wherefore it is well said in Job: C "The impious, however, he does not preserve beyond their own will." For He does indeed command us to receive strangers, if we have impiously misinterpreted that expression about the hereditary bounty of God: "who wishes all men to be saved, and to come to the knowledge of the truth."
A He predicts for them what evils will occur from transgression, and how it will be possible to return to salvation through repentance. He also puts them in mind of the signs, and of the appearance that He made in Sinai. And [he mentions] that "He hath not dealt so with any nation: and His judgments He hath not made manifest to them," just as David says.
"The Lord made not this covenant with your fathers, but with you," etc. [3.] For Abraham and his descendants had no need of the covenant ratified by the ministry of Moses. For the law was not made for a righteous man. B Therefore, the righteous who existed before Moses did not keep the law of Moses.
"These are the precepts, rites, and judgments which the Lord your God commanded me, that I should teach you to do them in the land whither you go." [VI, 1.] For the law could not be observed by those who dwell outside the land, nor did the written law befit all nations.
He wishes them to meditate on the law always, and to teach those sprung from them. For regarding every righteous man, David says: "The law of his God is in his heart, and his steps shall not be supplanted." For the custody of the heart is the observance of the law.
"For you are very few." [VII, 7.] Not unsuitably was that said to those who were destitute of the inheritance: "You are fewer than all people," and similarly to this: "Few are they that are saved." Likewise to this: "Strive to enter by the narrow gate."
"Thy corn, thy wine, and thy oil." [13.] For to the legitimate children of God, the participation in the mysteries of Christ and the anointing which occurs through the Holy Spirit will yield holiness and happiness. Who, indeed, are free and immune from the ailments of the soul. Moreover, the soul studious of God is most fertile in these things, which, however, it repels and dissipates by the works of virtue.
"For this nation is greater than I." [17.] C In Exodus, when He was encouraging them, for they feared the power of the Egyptians, He said: "The Lord will fight for you, and you shall hold your peace." Here, however, He brought back the memory of those who had already been defeated by the power of God.
"All these commandments." [VIII, 1.] They are not different from the former ones, but they derive their luster from this. For the rest, by presenting their own infirmity, they avert one from sensible and temporal things.
"And thou shalt remember all the way through which the Lord thy God has led thee." [2.] If you have remembered Him, you will not easily fall in the remaining temptations. For David, when he was firm in God, said: "Prove me, O Lord, and explore my heart." Item: "You have proved us, and tested us, as silver is tested." And to David, God says: "Do you think that I have dealt with you in any other way than that you should appear righteous?" He asserts that those are such who have built their houses upon the rock, who indeed, having emerged through fire and water, have striven for the place of refreshment, and have received the spiritual manna. They understood, indeed, that man lives not by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth from the mouth of God. For this was said there, but it was brought forward by the Savior in the struggle against the devil, the Savior, I say, who sanctioned both the old and the new law. But before the fruition of the manna, it is necessary to be afflicted and hungry, having taken former food. Now the word was manna, although it was also bread, just as Moses also answers those who ask: "This is the bread which the Lord hath given us to eat." That is the word which the Lord has sanctioned, whence it is rightly called fine and white. For the word is refined, D and is such that it passes through all intelligent, pure, and most tenuous spirits. Moreover, wisdom itself is also an intelligent, holy, unique, ample, and refined spirit.
"It was like coriander seed." [VIII, 3.] They report that the nature of coriander deeply corresponds to the seed, so that even if the coriander seed is cut, it does not lose its virtue, so that it is no longer suitable for sowing. Such is the word altogether, of which every particle is by nature suited to the cultivation of the earth, if it be committed to a convenient and good earth, that is, the soul. Furthermore, it is white. For the word is light and is splendid, and for that reason it is also white to him who understands and is nourished by it. It is likewise like a rock. For it is knotted, and in no way flaccid, nor flowing, but rocky. For it is a heavenly word, and it promises us heavenly things.
A He did not say, "but also in every word," but "without the 'also';" as if He were saying: "Not in that, which you alone think, but in this." And it is clear that the manna coming forth from the mouth was a word; since the manna has something in common by which we are taught that man should not live by bread alone, but by the word of God, by which we live.
B *Thy garment has not worn out from upon thee; thy feet have not been blistered.* [VIII, 4.] To the preceding statements he immediately adds this, lest those who have a mind to live in security should draw from this a cause or testimony. Indeed, the Savior in the Gospels, acting toward men who were superstitiously clinging to the law, made use of it. *For if you believed Moses,* He says, *you would perhaps have believed me also.* Whence, He turns them away from worry by setting forth the birds of the sky and the lilies of the field. For people of old did not need shoes, because no roughness of the road wore away their feet; and they also possessed garments not worn out, and manna, and the water from the jagged rock—all things sufficient for life. But a superfluous and useless desire brought destruction upon them, just as it encompasses carnal things for us as well. *For you cannot,* He says, *serve two masters.* But if, for a short time, for the sake of discipline, we are deprived of necessary things, then it becomes apparent how greatly we have embraced all divine things. For satiety is the father of insolence, and insolence the father of pride, and pride of a fall and destruction.
*Of Him who led thee through that vast and horrifying desert.* [15.] *Where there is the biting serpent and the scorpion.* C Just as they, after they had crossed the Red Sea, in which the Apostle says they were baptized into Moses, traveled through the horrifying desert, where there is a biting serpent and a scorpion, which bears the figure of the spiritual serpent, whom the Lord also granted us to trample upon; so also, after true baptism, the faithful are led through temptations into the desert, to be tempted by the devil, whose figure Christ sustains; with whom they say to the tempter: *Man shall not live by bread alone.*
*In a good and broad land.* [7.] The former indicates fertility, the latter the length and breadth of the region. For Egypt is not so great, if it be compared to it. Furthermore, distinguishing it again, he says it has water from heaven and from springs, for that land has none except what is brought in. Then, when he had made mention of the plains, and since this land has this in common with Egypt, he added mention of the mountains. Moreover, after he had spoken of common things, for example of wheat and barley, he immediately introduces the peculiar fruits of that land. By which indeed he wishes to indicate that that land is to be compared with this one, but not the other way around. D Furthermore, Egypt is lacking in oil, inasmuch as it is not at all suited to the nature of oil, and likewise in the vine.
But now, so that I may not leave out the work of making bricks, you will not have to exert yourself much, since you have stones that are hard and suitable for buildings. A It has also, he says, mines of copper, or rather, it long ago had them. A proof of this is the immunity of the copper-bearing Jews that has lasted even until now in Palestine. And the measure of the land was perhaps supplied to the ancient miners of copper.
In general, he signifies that they would abound in all good things, and that the Giver of them should be praised and celebrated. In place of these things, Christ has granted to us the kingdom of heaven and the earth of the meek, of which Christ himself is also the torrent. "You will water them with the torrent of your delights" [Ps. xxxv, 9]. Item: "The channels of the river gladden the city of God" [Ps. xlv, 5]. He also calls himself the fountain of life, and adds: "If anyone is thirsty, let him come and drink, for from the belly of the one who drinks will flow rivers of living water springing up into eternal life" [John vii, 37, 38]. Furthermore, the judgments of the Lord will be known, which are a vast abyss, and a deep vein of divine riches, wisdom, and knowledge; for the abyss is his wall [Jonah ii, 6]. But waters flow through the open fields of humble and fertile men, and likewise through mountains raised up by the sublimity of heavenly contemplation. There is the grain that strengthens the heart of man. Item: barley, which nourishes men of a lower sort, and many as well. For that satisfied five thousand in the Gospel, and this one seven thousand [Matth. xiv, 21; xv, 38]. There is the true vine, concerning which the Savior says: "I am the vine, you are the branches" [John xv, 5]. There is the oil of the saints that anoints heads. Thus also there are streams bearing sweetness within them, and flowing round the outside of the harshness of civil life. There is the fig, which brings forth the sweetness of the spirit in great abundance, not that which has withered on account of sterility or the empty ornament of leaves. There is honey: the sweetness of the Savior’s lips, desired, which the lips of the Bride in the Canticles will also distill. "Your lips, O spouse, will distill honeycomb," he says [Cant. iv, 11]. There are the iron stones, rolling holy upon the earth, as it has been said, and unbroken by temptations [Deut. viii, 9]. For neither heat nor rapid torrents have consumed them. Item elsewhere: "Into the holy land, stone is not imported, for its stones are of iron" [Deut. viii, 9]. Moreover, God himself declares to Jerusalem that He would bring iron instead of stones [Isa. lx, 17]. This is so that it might not be handed over into the hands of the enemies of Israel, but to a people that has God known; when, of course, he says that swords are to be beaten into plowshares, and spears into sickles [Isa. ii, 4]; then, on the contrary, plowshares into swords, and sickles into spears. For both were enjoined upon the Israelites by the prophets in their own time. There are the copper mines from which they forged spiritual armor, about to fight against hostile powers. But the head or the sum of all these things is, properly, that they should praise and celebrate God. Furthermore, in order to commend piety to them, he brings back into memory their liberation from Egyptian servitude. Item, the provision of all things necessary which He made for them in the desert, so as to compel them to such a confession: "By the help of our God we shall acquire strength from weak things. And He himself will crush our enemies." Item: "Not by our own strength have we obtained the lot of the land, but by your arm and the light of your countenance." But if, having committed all these things to oblivion, you shall have turned to the worship of idols, he says, I call to witness the heavenly and earthly powers, and the very elements themselves, which along with you plundered Egypt and the remaining enemies, and which also were commanded to pour forth an abundance of all good things for you by the Creator of all, that destruction is about to overtake you, and you are about to suffer all the things that I have brought upon the inhabitants of the land. Which, indeed, happened when the land was taken from them on account of their impiety during the Roman siege.
"For not because of your righteousness" [Deuteronomy ix, 4]. He turns them away from pride through these things; and he shows that what was said before to Abraham has come to pass [Gen. xv, 16]. For the sins of the Amorites have finally been filled up. But that these things did not come to them on account of his righteousness, he reminds them of all the things in which they have sinned, from the time they went out from Egypt—not in sequence, but as in a summary for what is useful, leading them by the hand toward piety with threats and promises of good things. B "For not because of your righteousness" [IX, 4]. He removes their boasting, and shows that what he had predicted to Abraham beforehand has come to pass. For the sins of the Amorites were finally completely filled up. But that these things did not happen to them on account of their own righteousness, he reminds them of all the sins which they committed immediately upon their departure from Egypt, not indeed in order, but in a summary, as it were. Furthermore, by these threats of punishments and promises of rewards, he leads them by the hand, as it were, to the path of utility, namely, to piety.
"And now, Israel, what does the Lord ask of you except that you fear the Lord your God?" [X, 12]. This is what John says: "His commandments are not grievous" [1 John v, 3]. Item, Christ in the same manner: "For my yoke is good, and my burden is light" [Matth. xi, 30].
He now passes over in silence the sensible circumcision, since they were uncircumcised; C for Joshua circumcised them at Gilgal.
But he put forward the circumcision of the heart as being more valuable, A in place of it.
"God of gods." [17.] This must be understood concerning judges. For the Apostle also asserts that those who are called gods are neither in heaven nor on earth; but they are called gods by their worshippers or adorers. Now, that Scripture calls judges Gods, Symmachus and Aquila give evidence, who, in that passage where it is written, "you shall bring him to the tribunal," interpreted it, "you shall bring him to the gods."
Again, he has inculcated in their memory the things done in Egypt and in the desert, and thus he has striven sedulously to keep them from forgetting them, after the example of Paul, who says: "Brethren, to sing the same song to you constantly is not grievous to me, but is useful for you" [Philipp. iii, 1].
"And they moved from Beroth." [6.] Above in Numbers, when he was recounting the stations and migrations of the children of Israel, he made no mention of this place. For he only said that Aaron had departed this life on Mount Hor. For there, touching upon all things briefly and in summary, he omitted to commemorate the places and times in their order. For before they had come to Mount Hor, and Aaron had died, they came to Gadgad and Etebatha. But here he enumerates in reverse order. And he returns again to earlier things, when he says: "At that time the Lord divided the tribe of Levi" [Deut. x, 8]. This he did on Mount Sinai, where he also prayed for forty days and nights for the people who had fallen. B
"Where you sowed your seed, and watered it with your feet, like a vegetable garden." Then he adds: "For God looks upon the land continually," or "explores it," according to other interpreters. He also says that "the eyes of the Lord God are upon it from the beginning of the year even to the end of the year." By these things, indeed, the childish Israel is governed, but for us they must be extended according to the rule of the Spirit. For God himself is the Maker of the whole fabric of the world, and the earth is filled with His mercy. He more often looks upon the earth on account of the piety of its inhabitants. But the spiritual earth is moistened with heavenly rains, and takes no part from the earthly wisdom of the world, which lies under His feet on account of its lowliness and abjectness. C Therefore, it is the Church that God looks upon continually from the beginning of the chosen year, according to Isaiah [lxi, 2], until its end. In which, like rain, the Word of God has descended upon the earth, who also looks upon all who dwell in His Church: "For His eyes are intent upon the just, and His ears are open to their prayer" [Ps. xxxiii, 16]. D
"The early and the latter [rain]." [14.] But for us who are more perfect, the early [rain] was indeed the one through the prophets, and the next page begins: τῆς αὐτοῦ ἐνσάρκου παρουσίας ὄψιμον ἐκπεμφθέντα ἐπ' ἐσχάτου τῶν ἡμερῶν. Οὕτω γ...
late [rain] was that sent forth at the last of the days in the time of His presence in the flesh. In this way, we too shall enjoy spiritual gifts.
"But if you transgress," He says, "He will withhold the rain," according to Isaiah, [who says] He will command the clouds not to give rain. For see, now among them there are no prophecies, no spiritual gifts, but a famine of good things; and they have perished from the land, having long ago been delivered to the Babylonians because of [their] idolatry, and now because they delivered Christ to the cross.
A *And it shall be a perpetual memorial before your eyes.* [XI, 18.] "For blessed," says David, "is he who will meditate on the law day and night." [Ps. I, 1, 2.] Likewise, he says of the just man: "The law of his God is in his heart." [Ps. XXXVII, 31.] Likewise: "I will teach the unjust your ways, and the ungodly shall turn to you." [Ps. L, 15.] It is necessary, however, that an accurate imitation should also be added to diligence for the law, and this of itself will suffice for gaining the victory over spiritual and sensible nations. For we, too, have a struggle against powers and principalities and the rulers of darkness. But "Without me, you can do nothing,” [John XV, 5] He says; for they are stronger than we are.
B *And it dwells from the desert as far as Antilibanus and the Euphrates.* [24.] In the souls of those suffering under ignorance of God and addicted to idols.
*And your terror.* [25.] For what is more terrible to men or demons than a just man? "With whom," He says, "even the wild beasts are at peace, recognizing the mark of the divine image." [Job V, 23.]
*The blessing and the curse.* And elsewhere: "Life and death." [Deut. XXX, 15.] For even through fire He spoke to them, indicating that if they obey, there is light; but if they disobey, there is fire.
*And you shall place the blessing upon Mount Garizim, and the curse upon Mount Gabal.* [29.] Garizim, if you interpret it, is "mountain of the redeemed," or "cutting off of their dwelling." Gabal, however, is "frustrated mountain," or "of their sorrows." Nor is it absurd that the blessings were issued upon the former, and the curses upon the latter. These mountains are situated on the eastern side of Jericho, beyond the place called Galgal. The Samaritans, however, think that they are adjacent to the city of the Sicimites, which is also called Sichem, where the Lord conversed at the well with the Samaritan woman. It is now called Neapolis, and is also called Samaria; since that mountain, which they call Garizim, belonged to Somer, who had a son named Somoron. The name was confirmed after those sent by the king of the Assyrians were settled in the land. The nations of the local inhabitants, however, turned the heart of the Samaritans C so that when they prayed, wherever they were, they looked toward that mountain, as if the land of the mountain held a scale and a position for those praying. For the priests of the seventy nations, knowing that Ezra had arrived—he who abhorred idols and held the law of God which commands that the idolater be stoned—hastened and took the idols from the high houses and hid them in a certain recess of Mount Garizim, as the tradition holds. And lying… D
under the idols, even though they were ignorant of it, they worshiped turned toward them. For the Scripture cannot lie, which says: "They continued doing the law of God, and worshiping their own idols." A Furthermore, having built a temple upon that mountain which they supposed to be Garizim, they used to offer their prayers there. And yet, if Garizim and Gæbal were the mountains adjacent to Neapolis, which are most lofty, how could the blessing or the curse, when proclaimed from above in their immense height, as is even now to be seen, possibly be heard from below? For to that which is called Garizim by them, the ascent is, as they say, six hundred and one steps. Moreover, the series of the Book of Joshua holds that these two mountains were situated to the east of Jericho, where the place called Galgala also is, which is distant from the city by two milestones. But Sichima verges more toward the north and west of Jericho, and is distant from it by fifty-two milestones.
B "But that place which the Lord your God shall choose." [XII, 5.] Once this place was later taken away, at the same time they also ceased from the offering of victims, which He had granted from the beginning because of the custom that had taken root among the Egyptians, and which they could not abolish by a precipitous change. For He confers salvation with counsel and by good grace, not by violence.
"Whatsoever you do here this day." [8.] Even while Moses was still surviving, they were transgressing, and yet they obtained pardon, for He says: "For you are not as yet come to the rest." Whence, while in uncircumcision [the state of transgression], they were not refused to keep the law, nor was it permitted to offer victims everywhere. But now, according to the prophet: "In every place incense is offered to My name, and a pure sacrifice." [Malach. 1, 11.]
C "But in every desire of thy soul thou shalt kill and eat flesh," [15.] etc. It is clear that there are no such distinctions or sacrifices before the Lord God. But, He says, you shall cook and eat as you please. The unclean among you, and the clean alike, shall eat both the roe-buck and the hart. For the sanctified, as He said above, the clean alone shall eat. But some have supposed the roe-buck and the hart to be cleaner than the rest of the animals. But He implies the contrary. For those who were of a cleaner life did not eat them. What then does He intend to say? This, namely, that those who wished to feed on sheep or ox or any of that kind, brought that very thing to be sanctified at the altar, and thus eventually ate of it. But the roe-buck or the hart it was not permitted to kill or offer; for they offered to none except where the temple and also the ark were in the city. Furthermore, over the roe-buck or hart it was simply forbidden to be sanctified, how much more to sacrifice. Whatever, therefore, happened to be slaughtered outside the tabernacle or temple was subject to the freedom of eating, yet it differed in nothing—even if they were perchance of the priests—from the unclean. And indeed it was lawful to eat those things in any place. But sacred things were only in the place chosen by God.
D That expression He frequently repeats: "Attend to thyself." Which indeed those of external philosophy translated and turned into the trite and, as it were, peculiar proverb: "Know thyself." In the same way, that is also said in Scripture: "Wise are they who know themselves," and again: "If thou knowest not thyself, O fairest among women." And this truly God assiduously inculcates, as He who is not ignorant that the heap of sin is increased in the very motion of the intention. For the understanding is
A the speech of one who turns his eyes toward himself, from whom the eye of him who looks outward is estranged. "For they burned their sons and their daughters in the fire." It is indeed demoniacal to trample upon natural affection toward one's offspring. For God created all things that they might exist, and likewise the generations that they might preserve the world; nor is the kingdom of Pluto upon the earth. But it is the envy of the devil that has brought death into the world.
"You shall not add to it, nor shall you take away from it." B There is a twofold falling into sin: either by falling short of or by exceeding the commandments. For some men, who are self-restrained, by making the standard of their life too great, have alienated themselves from the Church; while others, interpreting the matters regarding marriage and food more loosely, by having made the standard for themselves too small, will not attain to the kingdom of God. Are you bound to a wife? If you make the standard for yourself great, you do not care for your wife; but take heed that your chastity, for which Christ died, does not perish. Both of these are a falling away from the measures of righteousness. C "And if your brother, of your father, entreats you." When faith is being wronged, let nature and kinship be set aside. Such is that [saying] of the Savior: "He who loves father or mother more than Me is not worthy of Me." It is also good to harmonize with these things the words spoken to the blessed Jeremiah, which are as follows: "Let each take heed of his neighbor, and do not trust in your brothers, for every brother will utterly supplant, and every friend will walk deceitfully; each will walk against his friend, exalting himself, and they will not speak the truth."
"You shall not use divination." The word is derived from Greek custom. For they tell myths of a certain god, Apollo, saying he is the same as the sun, whom they name Phoebus, intending to signify, forsooth, the pure one. D The word therefore signifies not to purify oneself. For the purification of the body does not know how to wash away the defilements of the soul. Nor does a corpse, or a woman after childbirth, or such things as these, know how to defile the fundamental part of a man. But it is the prerogative of God alone to purify the soul and to give remission of offenses. This Christ has done, having gifted us with the divine baptism. For just as if someone, having transgressed a worldly law, would not escape the penalty unless a merciful king granted forgiveness; so one...
who approaches the God who is such by nature, will hear Him saying, "I am He who blots out your iniquities, and I will not remember." What then shall we say regarding the purifications according to the law? First, that they are a type of a better purification; and further, that they differ from the Hellenic ones, which used to be performed with incantations, salts, laurel, barley, the sea, and passing through fire. Regarding these, the term *phobēsete* is properly used. For the matter is one of idolatry. A
"For there is no poor man in you." [XV, 4.] Luke also has this in the Acts: "And grace was upon them all; for neither was there any poor person among them," speaking of those who had believed. The law commands giving or calling back debts from a stranger, but to kindly grant remission to fellow citizens in the seventh year, which by its revolution signifies the consummation of the present age. To this the resurrection of the eighth day is near, by which Christ, having become incarnate, has indeed forgiven the debts of faith to his own household, but has held the unbelievers guilty. Whence he said to his own disciples: "That if you persist in my word, you may know the truth, and the truth will set you free." But to those who were aliens he said: "If you do not believe that I am he, you will die in your sins." Therefore he compares us to debtors of money, and encourages us in his prayer to seek the remission of debts.
"And let not your heart be grieved when you give to him." [7.] So also the Apostle in the second book to the Corinthians: "Not with sadness, or by compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver."
"He shall serve you six years." [12.] Before the Savior's advent, Israel was bound to the law of servitude, and was under discipline. But in the final times, when he had assumed human nature, the spirit of servitude was taken away, and they were adopted as sons spontaneously and gratuitously. For it was not by the works of the law, but through the viaticum of faith having been received, that the immaculate victim was brought in for our sake, led from the sheep—the lamb, I say, led to the slaughter. Also wheat and wine, his holy flesh and blood, and through these we have obtained freedom.
But if it was fitting to free a carnal brother according to the law, how much more does it befit us to free a spiritual brother? And it is necessary to associate with such as with free men, and to regard them as most beloved to their masters, not being ashamed of a servant, but pursuing virtue in whatever form they may be found. Those who set them perfectly free are better, according to the words: "You shall send him out free from you," not in any fixed period of time. For the spiritual is superior to time, and for them the consummation of the world is always at hand. B
"And you shall bore his ear at the doorpost, and he shall be your servant forever," etc. [17.] Whoever, after the remission of sins, could not reach the dignity of freedom, and did not circumcise their ear with a sincere affection toward the Lord, but nonetheless wish to be in an inferior condition under him at the doorpost—for they have never presumed to depart from their present servitude—their ear is bored with an awl. Taught by this hole, they will be able to serve well until, the time of servitude having been completed, they enroll themselves among the hirelings and thrust themselves into the dignity of sons. For Christ first makes those who are free, by calling them brothers and friends: "For the servant knows not," he says, "the will of his master." But he who desires to serve is instructed so that he might be able to say: "The discipline of the Lord opens my ears." Perhaps also, as someone who has considered present things as good, the ear is bored, so that, if he hears the voice only through a natural opening, he might someday receive the word of freedom, though he is not worthy to acquire the perfect hearing by which he might draw in hidden discourses. He indicates that it is not fitting to impart more sublime discourses to the ears of such men. For it is fitting to feed them with milk, not with solid food, according to the word: "Do not cast pearls before pigs." Furthermore, he calls the life of each person "forever." Such is that saying of Paul: "I would not eat meat forever." Perhaps indeed he signifies that time in which they agree concerning servitude, when he calculates something as eternal and the life he leads as that time in which he passed from servitude to the work of a hireling, and from there to the dignity of sonship.
"You shall not be able to sacrifice the passover in any of your cities." C
A For there is one type, and one city, the catholic Church, which also has lawful ministers, but who do not seize the honor for themselves as do those who apostatize from the Church. These, like certain arrogant bulls, are carried away by their own opinions. This city, therefore, is the only one suitable for the sacrifice of the passover. For the sheepfolds of the heresies are rejected by the law.
Now, in Egypt, it was commanded that they should sacrifice only the lamb; but here, and in Numbers, he added oxen and sheep. B That directive, "You shall boil and roast," does not refer to the lamb; for he said that the meat of those is to be eaten roasted only, but it refers to the rest, which were sacrificed at that time along with the lamb and the remaining victims, and were intended for private consumption.
"And they shall not respect persons." For it befits the judge to preserve the image of Christ.
"And they shall stone them." C For when impiety is present, may God heal it through the necessary severity of piety.
"If any matter be too hard for you in judgment." [8.] These things are for the judges in the city. But the phrase "between blood and blood" must be understood as concerning a fight that has proceeded to blood, or wounds, and slaughter, which is adjudicated differently by the judges. This is what the phrase "between judgment and judgment" clarifies; that is, having spoken of a specific case, and then having returned to the general category, he again orders it more specifically, saying "between stroke and stroke"—as if someone in a fight had attacked his neighbor and struck the first blow. Likewise "between controversy and controversy," as if to say, if a logical dispute should arise regarding, perhaps, a legal inquiry, or one tending toward1 D insults.
"You shall come," he says, "to the priests the Levites, and the judge." For the judge bore the image of Moses, and the priests the Levites [that of] the elders, to whom they referred the weightier matters of judgment. In harmony with the present passage is also that which says, "Ask your father, and he will tell you, your elders, and they will tell you."
A And according to the sentence which they shall say to you, you shall do. For everyone who has been entrusted to judge the people holds the rank of the lawgiver and judge of all. Wherefore the insult of disobedience is referred to God.
He says, "Whoever rebels against the minister of the Lord shall die." For God's assistance or approval is very honorable. Even if he leads a life unworthy of himself—for man often falls from his own mind—he nevertheless performs divine things. Nor should divine things be spurned because of human things, since the Savior says to us: "The scribes and Pharisees have sat upon the chair of Moses; all things therefore whatsoever they shall say to you, observe, but do not imitate their works" (Matt. XXIII, 2–3).
And you shall say, "I will set a prince over me" (Deut. XVII, 14). For we, having repelled all idolatry and having made our march toward faith as if toward a certain land of promise, it is necessary to elect a unique leader, Christ, according to that which was said by Him; for David says: "But I am appointed king by him over Sion his holy mountain, preaching his commandment" (Ps. II, 6). When the Jews rejected Him, they created for themselves as prince the son of perdition, the Antichrist, an alien and a stranger to the blood of Israel. To whom Christ says: "I am come in the name of my Father, and you receive me not; if another shall come in his own name, him you will receive" (John V, 43). For he went forth into the glory of God the Father, but not he, for he is placed in the house of God, when he had declared himself to be God.
Wherefore he shall not multiply horses for himself (Deut. XVII, 16). Others have interpreted: "Nevertheless he shall not multiply." Perhaps moved by this saying: "He has thrown the horse and the rider into the sea" (Exod. XV, 1), which events bring extreme ignominy. Wherefore he says: Avoid an alien prince, who might lead you back to spiritual Egypt, and to its prince, Satan, the Pharaoh who seeks you out. Which, he says, the Lord prohibited. For according to the Apostle, "It is impossible for those who were once illuminated and have fallen away from the light to be renewed again unto penance" (Hebr. VI, 4). Nor shall he multiply wives for himself, he says. For that is a pollution which proceeds from intemperance and the depravity of the author of all impiety, if indeed the wives are foreigners, which certainly happened to Solomon.
But neither shall he multiply silver or B gold for himself exceedingly, but moderately; to be sure, in order to avoid excessive expenses. But on the other hand, avarice from unjust revenues, or an inhuman mind that does not correct indigence with necessary things, nor places its hope in God, is of this nature; according to that, "Behold the man that made not God his helper, but trusted in the abundance of his riches" (Ps. LI, 9).
He shall meditate upon Deuteronomy day and night. [18.] Which, indeed, Scripture testifies of no one else but King Josiah, who, when the book was with difficulty found in the house of God and read, tore his garment because they had lived enormously, and read the book in the hearing of all the people.
Divining a divination. [XVIII, 11.] He forbids every kind of demonic divination. For the knowledge of future things belongs to God alone, just as the creation of the world, just as the vivification and power over all things. And certainly he is impious who attributes it to Satan. Of whom Christ says: "When he speaks a lie, he speaks of his own, for he is a liar and the father thereof" (John VIII, 44). Wherefore, when the law wished to establish the truth of divination through Christ, it inferred: "The Lord thy God will raise up to thee a prophet from among thy brethren like unto me" (Deut. XVIII, 15). Isaiah also attributes divination to God alone, saying: "Remember the former things from all ages, for I am God, and there is none other, and he who declares the last things before they come to pass" (Isa. XLVI, 9–10). Therefore, even if Satan often speaks the truth, yet he does not speak it from his own store. Wherefore both Christ and Paul rebuke demons, even if they seem to have spoken the truth, as if by mixing honey they were taking away the sense of bitterness. That Christ was indeed that prophet about whom it is spoken in the present, and not Joshua the son of Nun, is manifest from that which is said toward the end of Deuteronomy: "There arose no more a prophet in Jerusalem like unto Moses" (Deut. XXXIV, 10). And elsewhere: "And he hath already raised him up, and set him before the whole assembly" (Num. XXVII, 18). However, there was no lawgiver like Moses, nor did he obtain equal grace, but received only a part of his own.
A That it points to no other of the prophets is clear from the fact that many prophets arose, yet he is spoken of as one by way of excellence, whom Moses also says will arise after him. The Jews, looking for this very one after so many prophets had appeared, asked John, "Are you the prophet?" He says, "I am not," even though he was a prophet. How then is Christ like Moses, and even greater than he? Moses indeed set free one people from the Egyptians, but Christ set free the whole earth from the tyranny of the devil. Having all men under his hand, he spoke in a youthful spirit: "I will take hold of the whole world with my hand like a bird's nest, and I will gather it as eggs that are left; and there is no one who will escape me, or say otherwise."
B Furthermore, the one led the people through the Red Sea and submerged the Egyptians; the other led all nations through baptism, having submerged the demons along with the devil—a fact which the crossing of the Jordan also illustrates, saving the pious but destroying the impious who pursued them. The one gave sensible manna; Christ, however, gave himself, the bread that came down from heaven. Moses was an intermediary between the Israelites and God, but Christ is for all nations and God the Father. He was a lawgiver serving God, but the latter, being God, rightfully legislates by his own authority, saying, "You have heard that it was said to those of old, 'You shall not murder'; but I say to you, do not even be angry without cause," and what follows.
C To these it is added that all were astonished at his teaching. For he was teaching them as one having authority; his legislation even the Gentiles have accepted. Therefore David prophesies, "Appoint, O Lord, a lawgiver over them. Let the nations know that they are but men." This, Moses did not ignore, for Christ is God and the lawgiver. For even though he said concerning his own laws, "It is not permitted to add, and it is not permitted to take away from them," having contemplated the superiority of the Lord's dignities, he leaves instructions, saying, "Him you shall hear in all things whatever he speaks to you," that is to say, even if he wishes to change the law given through me. But so that the word might not appear to be Moses' alone, the Father confirms it, saying, "Rightly have all things that you have spoken been said; I will raise up a prophet for them like you, and I will put my word in his mouth."
D But someone will say that he also provided a word to the other prophets. But they indeed, performing a servile ministry, would say, "Thus says the Lord"; but he, as being God by nature, says to the leper, "I will; be cleansed"; to the dead young man, "To you I say, arise"; and to Lazarus, "Come out." And as the Creator, he rebuked the sea and the spirits, saying, "Be silent, be muzzled." You see, therefore, [it is] partly [his] essential Word, and partly by divine doctrine in part. Paul therefore says, "Upholding all things by the word of his power from the Father." And Moses added the reason for the incarnate presence...
A in that he shows that the children of Israel, because they had declined the manifestation of God at Sinai through fire, having said to Moses: "Speak you with us, and let not God speak to us, lest we die." Wherefore God, having accepted their reverence, says: "I will raise up a prophet for them." For, as being weaker than the superior vision, He promised them the human manifestation. But since it is prophesied that the prophet is to be raised up for those of the circumcision, the Savior fitly says: "I was not sent but unto the lost sheep of the house of Israel." Wherefore He also instructed the apostles: "Go not into the way of the Gentiles, and into the city of the Samaritans enter not. But go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel," declaring that He had been sent to them primarily according to the prophecy. Accordingly, since they did not receive Him, He reproves them in other places, saying: "Because I came, and there was no man; I called, and there was none that would hear." And He says to them: "The kingdom of God shall be taken from you, and shall be given to a nation bringing forth the fruits thereof." B And He commands the disciples: "Going, teach all nations."
Concerning the prophet, that whoever speaks in the name of other gods shall die.
C "And whoever shall speak in the name of other gods, that prophet shall die." Wherefore the Lord everywhere assigns His own words to the Father, saying: "I speak nothing of myself; I received a commandment from my Father" (96).If a prophet has spoken in my name, and the word has not come to pass. [22.] In Jeremiah likewise it is said: "The prophet who has a dream, let him tell his dream; and he in whom my word has come to pass, let him declare my word in truth." What, then, shall we say about Jonah, who predicted what did not happen? Or about Isaiah, who predicted that death was before the doors for Hezekiah, and it did not come to pass? You will find these and many things of this sort; yet the word itself is not a liar, but the very things of which the word consists undergo change. For the Ninevites, along with Hezekiah, with a changed mind, broke out into weeping. Moreover, a physician says to a sick man that he will perish unless he bleeds him, but often, a spontaneous evacuation having occurred, he is saved. Nor does his art deceive him, but the change lies with the subject. And for those men, what had been predicted would have necessarily happened if they had not changed their minds. Indeed, the prediction was made for the sake of that very change.
"One witness shall not rise up to give testimony against his neighbor." [XIX, 15.] Whatever man he calls a neighbor. For it was not at all right against those who are removed in place. Nor indeed in other matters than those seen. For in hidden matters D God is the witness, and the conscience, these two. And there are three witnesses, the holy Trinity, by whose seeing and hearing Abel, even though dead, still speaks. For God is a faithful witness, who says: "Shall anything be hidden from me?" "For all things are naked and opened unto the eyes of God," with even the thoughts accusing. NOTE. (96) A portion of what precedes, which is casually inserted, having almost no connection with what goes before.
A And there is no respect of persons with God, nor does He delight in the destruction of the living. But a faithful witness does not lie, as Wisdom says, but the false shall perish. As happened to the unjust judges and witnesses in the case of Susanna. For a false witness shall not go unpunished, as it says in the Proverb: "For he has dug a pit and uncovered it, and shall fall into the pit which he wrought."
"Eye for an eye." [21.] Christ corrected this law as if it were foolish, when He said: "But I say unto you, that ye resist not evil; but whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also." Likewise: "Except your righteousness shall exceed," and the following. B Jeremiah also showed the purpose of this law, saying: "It is good for a man that he bear the yoke in his youth. He will put his mouth in the dust, if so be there may be hope; he will give his cheek to him that smiteth him; he shall be filled with reproach. For the Lord will not cast off forever." Such also is the saying: "Thou shalt love thy neighbor, and hate thine enemy." For he who abolished the things of the child David, and if any one was similar to him, having Saul as an enemy, did not hate him. Wherefore he also says in an evangelical manner: "If I have rendered to them that rendered evil unto me, then I shall fall empty from mine enemies."
"Man that hath built a new house, and hath not dedicated it." [XX, 5.] No one despises a terrestrial house. But not so one who, being an inhabitant of the earth, has conceived in his mind the heavenly dwellings, such as Abraham was, who, while he dwelt in tents, continually changed place for place. Likewise David, who says: "How amiable are thy tabernacles, O Lord of hosts! My soul longeth, yea, even fainteth for the courts of the Lord." Concerning C which the Savior says: "I go to prepare a place for you, that where I am, there ye may be also." He who does not investigate these things builds a house here, and bestows the greatest industry upon it. Just as the covetous man plants a vineyard; likewise the delicate man seeks a wife to the detriment of all his goods. Wherefore, to those who do not wish to despise earthly things for the sake of piety, the sacred warfare is forbidden. Furthermore, the Scripture accommodated itself to the fears of the faint-hearted for the aforementioned reasons, and brought in the fear born of these causes only after the causes themselves had been set forth. To these, those used as a pretext in sins are not unlike, and to others also is a cause of coldness of zeal provided. "For evil communications corrupt good manners." Paul rebukes the like, and says: "What mean ye to weep and to break mine heart? for I am ready not to be bound only, but also to die for the name of the Lord Jesus Christ." D Such also were those who had made an excuse for themselves regarding the lordly nuptials, and had said: "I have bought a piece of ground, and I have married a wife, and I cannot come." Of this sort also were the spies of Moses, Joshua and Caleb excepted.
"And it shall be, if they make thee a peaceful answer." [11.] Of this kind also are those things which Christ commanded His disciples, namely, that they should be peaceful with all who receive their peace; but from those who do not receive it, having shaken off the dust from their feet, they should depart. He wishes to obtain peace first. "For the servant of the Lord must not strive; but be gentle unto all men." It is, however, peaceful to respond, to receive the word of piety, and to be tributary to piety. This Paul writes to the Philippians: "Work out your own salvation in my absence." And again: "I have received, and I have enough, after I have received of Epaphroditus the things which were sent from you." "For it is no great thing," he says again, "if we have sown unto you spiritual things, we should reap your carnal things." Furthermore, "The city which has chosen war, the Lord thy God shall deliver into thine hands." "For from the face of the saints," says David, "he himself hath subdued the peoples under us, and the nations under our feet." That which he says, that every male shall be slain with the sword, signifies that the power opposed to the Word of God in a manly way is to be destroyed: by which the disciples cut down Simon, and Elymas, and dogmas even stronger than these. But they saved the women, that is, those who are able to say: "We have conceived in the womb because of the fear of thee, O Lord." Infants also, that is, who in malice and wickedness, according to the dictum of Paul, are children. "And the cattle."
A he says, the Lord will save, thus calling those who are simpler, cattle. Therefore Cornelius was also a "beast" according to the vision that appeared to Peter concerning the four-footed animals. Of such beasts Luke says in the Acts: "And the Gentiles hearing were glad, and glorified the word of the Lord: and as many as were ordained to life everlasting believed." Furthermore, "Thou shalt utterly destroy," he says, "all things that are in the city." According to that saying: "Bringing into captivity every understanding unto the obedience of Christ."
"So shalt thou do," he says, "to all the cities which are far from thee," which indeed are the ordinances of heretics. From these, nothing living is to be taken. For what use is there in them? Indeed, they are not even worthy of the use of anathema. For what is devoid of common sense is harmful. "For evil communications corrupt good manners."
"You shall not eradicate its trees." [XX, 19.] Lest the enemy’s land become useless to the victors. For the enemy’s tree is not, he says, such that it resists those attacking the city. B
"But as many trees as are sterile, you must cut down," he says, "that they may serve for the construction of a rampart." But you shall understand those fruitful trees of which Isaiah says to the Babylonian: "Every land rejoices with a joyful voice, and the trees of Lebanon have rejoiced over thee, and the cedars of Lebanon say: Since thou hast slept, there is none that hath come up against us." Also of such a sort is that tree of which the Prophet speaks in the psalms: "Which indeed is near the streams of water, which shall give its fruit in its due time." Cornelius was a fruitful tree, for Peter plucked from his fruits. For the food of the believing righteous is salvation, as it is of the Savior himself, who says: "I have meat to eat which you know not," speaking of the believers in Samaria. But concerning those who do not yield fruit, Zechariah says: "Open thy gates, O Libanus, and let fire devour thy cedars; howl, O fir tree, for the cedar is fallen, for the mighty are greatly laid waste; howl, O ye oaks of Basan, for the fenced forest is cut down." He says that barren trees contribute to the storming of cities; and such indeed were the Athenians. For they were at leisure for nothing, except for the empty display of words and for hearings. Wherefore Paul, assaulting and overturning the impiety of the Athenians: "Ye men of Athens," he says, "in all things I perceive that you are somewhat superstitious; I found also an altar on which was inscribed: To the Unknown God. That God, therefore, whom you worship without knowing him, I announce unto you." You see, therefore, how great a rampart was demolished for them and by them. Through which, although he did not capture their whole city at once: "But certain men adhered to him, of whose number was also Dionysius the Areopagite." Finally, Jeremiah was even established for the rooting up of peoples, and for the planting of trees, both barren and fruitful, concerning which he also speaks. "For who plants a vineyard, and does not eat of its fruit?" according to the divine Apostle.
"If anyone be found wounded in the earth." [XXI, 4.] Christ is indeed wounded for our sins. Delivered indeed by the Father, but afflicted by the Jews, who certainly would never have killed him, unless it had seemed so to God. Which indeed he says to Pilate: "Thou shouldst not have any power against me, unless it were given thee from above." In the psalms also he says to the Father: "For whom thou hast struck, they have persecuted." Also: "And they have added to the pain of my wounds." But the Jewish people did not know the prince who struck him. C He is wounded, therefore, in Judea. But among the Gentiles his mystery is perfected. For a heifer is taken, which represents Christ, for in so far as he is man, he was under the yoke. But again he is above it, in so far as he exists as God by nature. He is led into a valley that is both rugged and uncultivated, for having been wounded on the cross, he moved to the soil of the Gentiles, which had heretofore lain arid and uncultivated, and was so vast, because it lacked that fertility which God requires. To which Isaiah says: "Rejoice, O desert land, and its village; let the desert exult, and flourish like the lily." In which land Christ is wounded by divine priests. For we make the preaching of his passion and resurrection the consummation of his mysteries. But as many as have withdrawn far from the impiety of the Jews, and have been found to be capable of living far from that city in which he was wounded and tormented, they indeed withdraw into the Church, previously uncultivated, and there, their hands being dipped in Christ himself for his death, they wash. And they surely obtain the remission of sins, confessing that they have no part with the impiety of the Jews who said: "His blood be upon us, and upon our children." But being cleansed by baptism, they say: Our hands have not shed this blood. And even if they were from the Jews, they have nevertheless renounced their whole community. Which indeed the disciples, and those who believed them, did. To whom, therefore, one might worthily show the person of reverence which receives its own dignity from faith.
"And you shall see among the captives a woman beautiful in form." [11.] He orders the head and eyebrows to be shaved, and also her household to be mourned for thirty days, by which desire sits through the great deformity of her appearance, and at the time of lamentation love is cast out. For one is not to approach lusts with an unbridled mind. So also God, when he had attacked the Egyptians, saw the Jewish Synagogue, originating from the fathers, beautiful, and for its cultivation...
adapted to A his own. And before he had fixed his tabernacle, and introduced her, and led her through shadows to the truth, he stripped, as it were, her mind, after it had been purged of idolatrous thoughts, saying: "There shall be no other gods for you besides me," and other things of that kind. For there was need of a renewal of thoughts for them, and, as Paul says, to be transformed by the renewing of the mind, so as to approve the good, serene, and perfect will of God in a certain way. Furthermore, the casting away of longer nails denotes the removal of the filth that follows such things. By cleansing the soul from like filth, he says: "You shall not kill, you shall not steal," and what follows. Moreover, the captive’s garment represents a servile state and a relapse into malice, according to the saying: "Having put off the old man with his deeds, and having put on the new," which is Christ, whom we put on through divine baptism, casting away the garments of the captivity of Satan, and offering thanks or praises to God, we say: "My soul shall exult in the Lord, for he has clothed me with the garment of salvation, and the tunic of gladness." Which Paul also felt when he said: "Having put on our Lord Jesus Christ, make not provision for the flesh, to fulfill its lusts." B It remains, however, that she should cohabit with God in the manner of a bride, having first lamented her progenitors; for it is enough if those who are called remember carnal things only for a short space of time. Then, being purged from the memory of these, they may be able to cohabit purely with God. Therefore, those who had gone out from Egypt desired it again, and said: "Would that we had died stricken by the Lord in the land of Egypt!" They also cried out against Moses: "Why have you brought us into this desert?" Therefore, that expression, "she shall weep," does not have the force of a command, but, on account of their infirmity, of permission. For He himself knows what kind of clay we are. But that expression, "She shall sit in your house," signified a perpetual custom; which David had in his desires to attain, when he said: "One thing I have asked of the Lord, that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life," and what follows. Urging the Church of the nations toward this, he says: "Hear, O daughter, and see, and incline your ear, and forget your people and your father’s house, because the king has desired your beauty." By spiritual C unity, however, we are joined to the Lord: "For he who is joined to the Lord is one spirit." "But if it does not please you, grant her her liberty and dismiss her." But money shall not be received under the spear. Wherefore, when the Synagogue of the Jews had failed concerning Christ, it is indeed loathed, yet not so that it should be entirely handed over to Satan. For it did not devote itself to the worship of idols after it had fallen away from familiarity with God, but still persists in His worship, and seems to practice the law. For it has not spurned that which it previously chose. Furthermore, by the state of virginity, it denotes humility, or at least the mode of spiritual conjunction.
"He shall not be able to make the son of the beloved the firstborn, having despised the son of the odious." [XXI, 16.] Two women have had dealings with God: both the Synagogue of the Jews and the Church of the Gentiles. The former of these is loathed, for as Jeremias says: "You have played the harlot with many shepherds, and have returned to me, says the Lord." And again: "You have not called me as Lord, and as father, and as the master of your virginity." The firstborn son of this wife were Abraham and those who were his, although their fathers rendered them justice; and as many as are like them before grace. As for the Church of the Gentiles, David says: "Hear, O daughter, and see, and incline your ear," and what follows. Likewise blessed Paul: "I have espoused you to one husband, that I may present you as a chaste virgin to Christ." D When, therefore, he shall render to each according to his works, he will not disregard the firstborn of the loathed one, since they have set forth the evangelical polity, and through faith have obtained testimony, which is to rest in their bosom for all, according to the saying of the Savior. Paul also says: "And he received the sign of circumcision, a seal of the righteousness which he had by faith while uncircumcised, that he might be the father of all them that believe being uncircumcised, that to them also justice might be imputed, and that he might be the father of circumcision, not to them that are only of circumcision, but to them also that follow the steps of the faith that is in the uncircumcision of our father Abraham." Do you see, therefore, that he had a double portion from the father, although he was the son of the loathed wife, so that he might be the father who is rightly called the father of both the nations and those of the circumcision.
How, then, does this stand with the denarius, which both the last and the first received in the parable, when the firstborn is said to receive a double portion of his former wife? Or how, in another parable, does one receive the authority over ten cities, while another receives five? And yet the denarius is received for the new salvation. But salvation does not differ from salvation, just as life does not differ from life. For all obtain it equally. For they are not bound hand and foot, nor are they cast into outer darkness, who receive a glory different from others. "For there is one glory of the sun, and another glory of the moon, and another glory of the stars. And star differs from star in glory." Thus, in the resurrection of the dead, the authority over ten cities is a more excellent glory than having five. For God grants to each according to their dignity, and quantity, and quality, and time, and in sum, He adjudicates to all what is fair and just.
But if there is to anyone a disobedient son [XXI, 18], and elsewhere it says: "Whoever strikes his father or his mother shall be put to death." Item: "Whoever curses his mother or father shall be punished with death." Indeed, he who offends against parents is punished just as he who offends against God. But he who has spurned a divine precept is condemned to death without pardon. And he who offends against parents is overwhelmed with stones. "For remember," he says, "that you received the beginning of life from them." Jacob also says: "For if the fear of my father Isaac had not been in me." Moreover, the author of the Proverbs also execrates, saying: "The eye that mocks at his father, and neglects the aging of his mother, let the ravens of the torrents pick it out." However, Christ’s saying does not abrogate this reverence for parents: "He that loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me." Nor does that which He said to the man desiring to bury his father: "Leave the dead to bury their own dead." But He teaches that the duty owed to God is more ancient. Consider, also, how great is the force of grief by which the bowels and nature of parents have been overcome for so long.
A "For everyone who hangs on a tree is cursed by God" [25]. Aquilas and Theodotion explained it as "the curse of God is the one hanging." But the divine Apostle, in mentioning this passage to the Galatians (98), whom he calls foolish, says neither "by God" nor "of God." And perhaps he omitted it for this reason, as the addition was beyond them. Or perhaps someone, as if it were blasphemous, removed it from the older books.
ὕστερον πρότερον (hysteron proteron): It is a *hysteron proteron*: "And he dies, and you shall hang him on a tree." For no one is crucified after death, but he dies by means of the cross. B But why did he call death by the cross alone "cursed," even if it happens by the oblique judgment of judges? When, in similar or even worse cases, other punishments are sometimes justly inflicted? And what, indeed, is the matter? Could not this statement appear to someone to be absurd and foreign, that for this reason he must be taken down from the cross and buried, because he is cursed by God? As if he would have had to remain there if he were not cursed, when, on the contrary, it was fitting for it to happen otherwise. Furthermore, since He has not yet established the punishment of the cross for any sin or impiety, how did He bring this forward now? But it is concluded from all these things that this word was spoken only on account of Christ, who was to become a curse for us, who, because He was God, was deservedly called the curse of God. For since He was God, He endured the curse for our sake. C For the fact that the cross is called a curse in no other way is shown by that which was said about Peter: "This He said, signifying by what death he would glorify God." For if it is a curse by nature, why did He say "he will glorify God" and not simply "he will die"? For that which is by nature terrible and a curse of God is not the glory of God.
For if it is a curse by nature, He says, he will celebrate God with some event, and will not simply die. For it is not the glory of God that which, by nature, is difficult and a curse of God.
A If you see your brother's calf or his sheep wandering, do not overlook it. [XXII, 1.] He constrains us to mutual love and affection. For if one denies humanity to a beast of burden, how much more will he do so to the masters of the beasts, and to those who are consorts of the same nature? For this reason, He repeatedly calls the brother a neighbor, even if he were an enemy. For everywhere He forbids the recalling of evils. According to that saying: "Do good to those who hate you, and pray for those who despitefully use you." For He Himself also, when pelted with stones, instructed them to walk the right path, saying: "While you have the light, walk in the light, lest darkness overcome you."
Let there not be armor of a man upon a woman. [5.] He forbids men and women from using mutual customs. For He wishes a decorous custom to be observed, just as the Apostle also, who says: "A man, if he has his head covered while praying or prophesying, dishonors his head." Concerning a woman, however, he says the opposite: "For it behooves neither the man to be soft, nor the woman to be bold."
But if you chance upon a bird's nest. [6.] The nest of birds is, as it were, the nest of the virtues of the soul. Furthermore, any one of them can surely be called the mother of its own effects. Whoever, therefore, happens to enjoy the goodness or patience of another, let him not damage their virtues by laying snares for the masters of them. For it is a violence against virtue if snares are laid for the masters of it.
A You shall make a parapet for your roof. [8] He says that walls are to be built upon the flooring, so that the house, encircled by battlements, may have the figure of a palace. It is necessary, moreover, to fortify the virtues that lead to the heights with humility. For pride is the fall of the soul.
You shall not sow your vineyard with diverse seeds, that the fruit may not be sanctified. [9.] Just as everything that is consecrated to God is called anathema, this word is also used for the abominable and the execrable, because he who touches any of the anathemas is to be execrated; and because, on the one hand, something is set apart as holy, so that it may not be touched by anyone, and on the other hand, as detestable; thus the "holy" is also spoken of in a dual sense. And as for the good sense, it is superfluous to demonstrate. But that some, even when they are impious, are yet called "holy" because they are separated to a service is attested by Zephaniah, saying: "Fear before the face of the Lord God. For the day of the Lord is near, for the Lord has prepared His sacrifice, He has sanctified His called ones," calling the Babylonians thus. Micah also says: "He has sanctified war against him." And that: "But I give commandment, and I lead them. They have been sanctified, and I lead them. Giants come to fulfill my anger," speaking of the soldiers who campaigned with Cyrus against Babylon.
Verily, however, Scripture calls the vineyard Israel, and also any man individually, as is evident from the Song of Songs: "Catch us the foxes, the foxes, I say, the little ones that spoil the vineyards"; thus calling the useless ones, and those that do not bear mature fruit. He says, therefore: "You shall not sow with diverse seeds." Partly because it harms the vineyard if it is sown meanwhile while the moisture turns into seed; for what becomes fruitful happens in shifts, as He said regarding the vine. And partly, by these words, He teaches us to detest the diversity of morals, as if such a one were unworthy to be received into the divine winepresses. Perhaps, indeed, by this narration He wishes to constrain the one planting the vineyard with such plants by fear, and to drive him away from fraud and insatiability.
You shall not plow together with an ox and an ass. [10.] The ox is sacred to sacrifice and food, while the ass provides the use of neither. Therefore, one who is tilling the soil of his own soul, so that it may become suitable for receiving the divine seed, must in no way receive the instruction of profane and ignorant teachers, namely, of heretics or Greeks. Rather, he should say with David: "The iniquitous have told me of delights, but not as Your law, O Lord." But let the ass be changed and become clean, according to that saying in Isaiah: "Blessed is he who sows upon the water where the ox and the ass have trodden." For what is that water upon which one ought to sow the good seed? One ought to sow upon the mystery of the laver of regeneration, where the Israelites go, and also the Gentiles who have received a part of the mystery.
A *“You shall not wear a garment of wool and linen mingled together.”* [11.] Aquila rendered this as "counterfeit," and as "opposite." Symmachus rendered it as "of a different kind."
It is not fitting at all that those who have put on Christ and the wool of the true sheep should also at the same time put on that earthly linen. Such a one is the rapacious wolf who exists under the guise of a sheep, both in the sense of his mind and in his deeds. For the Lord places in His house those who are adorned with the simplicity of morals, as David says: *“He has scattered the bones of those who court human breath.”*
*“Make for yourself tassels upon the four fringes.”* [XXII, 12.] To promote the memory of the law, it is said elsewhere: *“You shall bind them as a sign upon your hand,”* and here: *“You shall make yourself fringes upon the wings of your garment of twisted hyacinth,”* so that the sight might effect the memory. B
If a man is found lying with a woman who has cohabited with another man, then—[22.] the greatest of the crimes committed against a woman is adultery, which severs spouses. The same principle must also be held regarding the soul that is united to God by faith and the Spirit: *“For he that is joined to the Lord is one spirit.”* If, therefore, any soul, having received human seed, is corrupted by those who have fallen away from God, it perishes together with the corrupter. But we must understand the "virgin soul" as one called to the principles of sincere knowledge, not yet perfectly united with God, nor having progressed to the marriage, which is the grace of baptism, but endowed with the instruction of that thing as a pledge. Thus, when Paul was bringing the Church of the Gentiles to Christ, he said: *“I have betrothed you to one man, that I may present you as a chaste virgin to Christ.”* And the Bridegroom Himself says by the voice of the prophets: *“I will betroth you to Myself forever in justice, in judgment, in mercy, and in compassions.”* Also: *“I will betroth you to Myself in faith, and you shall know the Lord.”* If there is any corruption in her, He says that this is a demonstration of adultery; for she who is betrothed is already in the hands of the future bridegroom. But if in the city—that is, in the Church, the city of the living God, which angels and men, the patrons of the endangered, and the judges who can prevent fraud inhabit—the crime has been committed, 452 death awaits both the virgin and her ravisher, because she did not disclose the fraud to those in whose power the judgment lay. But if that event occurs in a place far removed from masters or judges, where no one could bring help, pardon is granted to the virgin. Note that he calls the neighbor's wife "betrothed," and this on account of the holy Mary.
*“But if someone discovers a virgin maiden who is not betrothed.”* [28.] He imposes penalties worthy of the sins. For if someone has corrupted and destroyed a soul not yet bound to Christ by faith—as heretics who sometimes snatch men from the Gentiles and from the Jews are wont to do—he shall render an account of the offense to the Father of spirits, that is, to God, in the form of a deduction of monies. But the words, *“She shall be his wife,”* are worth considering. For the law is twofold, carnal and spiritual. And to this statement—*“What therefore God has joined together, let not man put asunder”*—there is a response: *“He shall not be able to put her away all his days.”* So great is the excellence of virginity that the violation of it is called destruction.
*“A eunuch or a castrated man shall not enter into the assembly of the Lord.”* [XXIII, 1.] For there is a twofold kind of eunuch, besides those whom nature produces. One kind is of those whose virile parts have been entirely cut off; another is of those who bear the form of castrates, but have only lost their genital power. Now these represent a soul that is either wholly effeminate and given over to carnal pleasures, or one that, though it may wish to be mighty in virtue, does not resist pleasures. Although their effort and intent are different, they arrive at the same end. Likewise, the son of a harlot—that is, the soul that has conceived a wicked mind from demons—is barred. And on account of the son, the mother herself is also cast out. Furthermore, the Ammonites and the Moabites, who, as long as they remain such, maintain the form of idolaters—men who rushed at us with their utmost force and efforts and exercised the greatest cruelty against us. The Idumeans, moreover, are an image of heresies, for they were descended from Esau and were kin to the Israelites by blood. Yet they also desire the children of the heretics to be called Christians. But the punishment established for them is not as great as that for the idol-worshippers. For he says that they shall be received in the third generation. Just as Isaiah warns the Idumeans, beginning from the vision that came in Arabia: *“In the thicket in the evening you shall lie down in the way of Dodanim: bring water to the thirsty, you who inhabit the land of Theman: meet the fugitives with bread, lest because of the multitude of the slain, they should do as the Moabites did before.”* In like manner, he says that the Egyptians are also to be received. They perhaps signify those who are not altogether hostiley disposed toward Christians from among the Gentiles. *“For you were strangers among them,”* he says. Nevertheless, this decree concerning the Moabites finds its end in Ruth the Moabite woman, and this is common to every nation, according to the word: *“In every nation, he who fears the Lord is acceptable to Him.”*
A He says that a sharp stake, attached to the belt, must be carried for the sake of the body’s need, by which we understand that the throat is the end of all carnal pleasures. For those who satisfy in a casual way the need of any untimely desire, drape over it an indecency. It is clear from every side that God would not have given commands concerning natural excrement. B The places of Israel are the knowledge of piety and the practice of virtues. Others, however, rendered it, “In one of your gates,” more appropriately. For those who have recently arrived will not be said to dwell in the places, but properly in the gates. The phrase, “You shall not afflict him,” refers to not imposing a burden upon him; for instance, by circumcising one who does not wish it, or compelling him to observe the rest of the Law. *“For it seemed good,”* say the apostles, *“to the Holy Spirit and to us, to lay upon you no greater burden than these necessary things: that you abstain from things sacrificed to idols, from blood, from things strangled, and from fornication.”*
“There shall be no harlot of the daughters of Israel, and there shall be no sodomite of the sons of Israel.” For it signifies those who are pimps and who collect taxes from such earnings. Therefore, He has removed the pretext for this, by banning fornication from Israel. And the phrase, “the price of a dog,” signifies unrestrained fornication. For it does not allow one to believe that he who pays out matters of demons has paid a tax, just as it does not allow one to be considered immune who usurps the freedom of the prohibitions attached to both; neither does it allow for the idea that it is said of the daughters that they are taxable, but of the young men that they are immune. But as for this argument…
A can it not also be said of men who hire themselves out that the rule regarding those who pay and those who receive payment applied to fornication? For they commit harlotry against God. And Scripture calls the Gentiles dogs, as in the passage: "It is not good to take the children's bread and give it to the dogs." For thus it called the Syrophoenician woman, who was a Gentile. Therefore, no ecclesiastical dogma should be exchanged for a Gentile one. Regarding women, he speaks of what is "effective" (that is, in witchcraft), for in most cases women were addicted to such sorceries. A And what of men who act as catamites?
"And he shall write her a bill of divorcement." [XXIV, 1] He commands that a woman may be put away for any cause, because he understood the madness and insanity of the Jews, and he foresaw that they might otherwise murder her and thereby ruin themselves as well. For it is not the will of God that this should be so, who from the beginning made them male and female, according to the word of the Savior. That which is in Jeremiah is also according to the Law: "If a husband puts away his wife, and she departs from him and becomes another man's wife, let her not turn back to him again," and so forth.
"If any man has lately taken a wife, he shall not go out to war." [5] He takes this precaution lest he perhaps fall in battle, leaving no seed behind him; he also takes pity on her, that she should not immediately become both a bride and a widow. Thus, he who has begun to practice virtue is not yet capable of fighting on its behalf; for he is not yet able, in accordance with perfect wisdom, to refute false dogmas, nor is he—owing to the fact that he is not yet perfectly mild—able to resist anger, and so it is with other things likewise.
Furthermore, it is neither necessary nor useful for those who have recently come to the faith to seek out the fellowship of persecutions, lest (as may happen) they trip up in the piety with which they have decided to spend their lives. In the same way Solomon also speaks of wisdom: "I have said to wisdom, that she is your sister, and gain for yourself understanding as a kinswoman." For we hunt for virtues because we hope to receive the fruits from them. Moreover, the apostles, when they had removed the burdens of the Law from those who had come from the Gentiles, decreed that they should abstain only from fornication, from things strangled, and from blood.
"You shall not take the lower and upper millstone to pledge." [6] Since he has pledged his soul, as it is in Ecclesiastes, he calls the letter of the Law a millstone because of its weight, its hardness, and its burden of condemnation. For just as in the spiritual and sensible sense there is condemnation and punishment, so also is there in drawing and grinding at the millstone. Of this sort also is what Isaiah says: "You shall no longer be called tender and delicate; take the millstone and grind meal." In this mill the synagogues of the Jews have remained. But they will cease to grind, as says Ecclesiastes: namely, at the time of the consummation, if they receive Christ after the Gentiles.
D Furthermore, in this place the Old Testament seems to be called the lower millstone, and the New the upper. From both of which the true grain of wheat is ground for the making of bread.
The faithful grind the bread. For one will not grind without the other. Therefore, neither do the Jews, receiving only the old, nor the children of heretics, grinding only the new, taste the heavenly bread. Wherefore the Lord, in the discourses concerning the end of the world, speaks of those who grind well or badly: «There shall be two women grinding at the mill; one is taken, and one is left.» Therefore, neither is to be pledged, nor cast away. For both nourish the soul with spiritual foods.
If a man is caught stealing a soul from among his brothers, that is, a kidnapper. [XXIV, 7.] In the same way, heretics who use force against souls desiring to think rightly, and who lead free minds into servile opinions, suffer death worthy of a judge. Hence Paul says that there is no salvation for such men, not that he irritates them, but because he knows that the sheep can never convene with the wolf: «For what fellowship has the faithful with an unbeliever?» he says. And: «Evil communications corrupt good manners.» They lead them away from the Church, as from a father’s house, into the assemblies of lost men.
B And remember what the Lord thy God did unto Miriam. [9.] For if she, having spoken against me before all, was branded with the affliction and cast outside the camp, how much more shall the same happen to you if you despise the Lawgiver even after that example?
Since he is poor and has his hope in Him, etc. [15.] This law also requires humanity, which the New law performs more perfectly: «Sell your possessions,» it says, «and give alms.» «And behold, all things shall be clean unto you.» Which when many did, they placed the prices at the feet of the apostles, and it was distributed to each, according as anyone had need.
The fathers shall not die for their children. [16.] Not understanding what is written in Exodus: «The sins of the parents upon the children,» they accused God of injustice. Wherefore He added an exposition. Those who were held in captivity by Nebuchadnezzar also cried out again, as if no mention of this had been made here: «Our fathers have eaten sour grapes, and the children’s teeth are set on edge.» Wherefore He explained it again through Ezekiel, who said: «The soul that sins, it shall die.»
And thou shalt remember that thou also wast a bondman. [18.] For in joy it is safe to remember the labors of taskmasters. For in turn, the span of festive days does not allow one to forget the evils endured in poverty.
C And they shall beat him with the number of forty stripes. [XXV, 3.] And in Ezekiel also He says: «After forty years I will gather the Egyptians from the nations whither they were dispersed.» For the people who sinned against the God of the week, and against the mystery of the Sabbath, are punished by the number of seven tens. But the Egyptian and worldly multitude, having knowledge of nothing beyond bodies and the four elements—which are four in number—rightly receive their sins in forty years. And since the number forty is the punishment of the Egyptians, I think that for this reason an Israelite, or any other sinner, receives forty stripes save one. And the law further declares: «Thou shalt not add more stripes, lest thy brother be dishonored.» For it was a dishonor for an Israelite inhabiting the holy land to be punished by the number D of the Egyptians. The people also wandered for forty years in the desert. For it was fitting that he, having gone out of Egypt, should cast off the reproach of Egypt by the number forty.
When forty years had been completed, the Lord said to Joshua, "Sit and circumcise the sons of Israel." After the circumcision, he says to him, "Now I have taken away from you the reproach of Egypt." And concerning the descendants of Abraham, it is also said that they will enslave them and afflict them for four hundred years, which is a number of four hundreds, or forty decades; and everywhere in the Scriptures, the number forty is associated with affliction. Thus, after forty years had passed, the Lord spoke to Joshua.
B "The husband's brother shall go in unto her." Since the resurrection had not yet been revealed, this posterity and the preservation of the family through it served as a comfort to the ancients; meanwhile, it also obtained a figure of the resurrection. When Onan neglected this and was unwilling to sleep with Tamar, his seed was justly poured out in an unusual place. But when Booz observed this and took Ruth, he obtained something similar to a prodigy, in that he was to be an ancestor of Christ, having begotten Jesse, the father of David, by which he imitated the future promise with his own mortal generation. For it was fitting that He who bestowed upon us the resurrection should trace His lineage through those who had preserved its type according to the flesh, and that He in whom C all types ceased should present to us the truth itself.
Regarding him who refused to marry his brother's wife, he was to be brought to the gate, spat upon by the woman, and cast off one of his sandals, as one who was limping concerning both the law and brotherly affection, and who had cast off from his mind the memory of the dead. He says, "In the gate." For there the ancients used to hold their assemblies, and there, as if wishing to hunt for strangers in order to receive them, they would welcome them, as is made manifest in the example of Lot, who was even deemed worthy of the arrival of angels. It was also, in another way, fitting for the Israelites, who were being led toward piety through shadows, that they should sit in the gates D rather than in the middle of the city.
"And extending her hand, she shall take hold of his private parts." For she is worthy of punishment both on account of the violence and for her shamelessness.
This also argues that even if minds were to be set against one another—whether the goods of this world or those of heaven ought rather to be chosen—since the rule of heavenly goods avails by command, it has cast the mind into generation and corruption; for the genital members intimate this.
14 "A large or small weight." He declares to us the modes by which an exact rule of justice can be obtained, if the soul has determined to keep its equilibrium. But, in truth, more excellent things have been handed down through Christ. For the end of the just is good. Wherefore He says: "Unless your justice abounds more than that of the Scribes and Pharisees, you shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven."
A "You shall blot out the name of Amalec." 19 It was commanded to Saul through Samuel that he should do this, but because he did not execute it in all its numbers, he fell from the kingdom.
"And you shall raise up for yourself great stones." [XXVII. 2.] The stones are indeed the apostles, placed on high, who, being conspicuous for their virtues and opinions, are set above us. Concerning whom Christ says: "You are my friends." He also calls them the light and the salt of the world. Finally, He also designated them as physicians, saying: "Heal the sick, cast out demons, cleanse the lepers, raise the dead; freely you have received, freely give." Of whom it is reported: "The holy stones are rolled upon the earth." For wandering everywhere, they promulgated the truth. Those who crossed the Jordan raise these stones—that is, those who are enriched by the grace of holy baptism; they placed over themselves masters who would divulge the precious stone, the pearl. For they, having been sprinkled with the dust of Scripture, possess the law. For contemplations of the law exist clearly among the apostles, and they are not obscured by any shadow of the letter. Wherefore, not obscurely, the text adds this too: "And let there be an altar of stones not hewn." For Christ is the cornerstone, who is placed in the foundations of Sion, for upon Him, having leaned as living stones, we are built up into a spiritual house, into a holy temple. We are rendered an altar, however, through spiritual unity, if we instruct our faith in Christ with the food of virtues. And according to Paul, we present our bodies as a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, our rational service; not divided into parts of the world, nor displaying the wounds of sins, just as Christ also is not divided—simple and truthful, such as Paul is, when he says: "For to me, whether I live or die, Christ is gain." As if, therefore, we were happy to have [it], we rejoice if we perceive spiritual food in the eyes of the Lord, just as it is written here, and as we do in the Churches. But the Samaritan example has [the stones] placed not on Mount Ebal, but on Garizim, and perhaps not without reason, namely, since there too He commanded blessings to be made: "But on Ebal [there shall be] curses." How then would it be consistent for it to be established on this altar? Furthermore, the Book of Judges names Mount Garizim, which is near Neapolis, which the Samaritans worship. Upon which, when Jotham, the surviving son of Gideon, had climbed, he cursed those who had created Abimelech, the son of Gideon by a handmaid, as king over them—he who killed his brothers. Unless one asserts that Ezra, or the collector of the Scriptures, or some other person, had been the one who imposed new names upon places, translated from the places of his own administration. Just as, for instance, he calls Jerusalem what was called Jebus in antiquity, and Bethlehem what was Ephrata.
"They shall stand to bless the people on Mount Garizim." 12 From the three [tribes] that conducted themselves excellently from the exodus out of Egypt, they are appointed to blessing by God. But those which have lapsed are for a curse.
"Cursed be whoever makes a graven or molten work by the hands of an artisan, and places it in secret." 15 Since in the preceding [verses] he had rejected the worship of idols in various ways, but it was not dissimilar that someone might strive to be hidden because of the fear of punishment, to him he adapted this execration. And those of this kind are they who, while they feign the integrity of life, have a mind beset by affections.
B By the name of idols you may understand any fabricated and faked theology. Likewise, the sirens of the mind, or if you prefer, persuasions which can deceive even the sagacious, might be called molten works of gold or silver; but the implausibly foolish dogmas, [these are the] carved ones. Yet these very works are said figuratively to be of the hands of an artisan, placed in the hidden [place], as if they were being handed down in a mystery, if we understand them to be handed down in a certain mystical way.
"Cursed be he who moves the boundary." 17 Everyone who transfers someone from the true worship of God and from a right way of life into different things. And also he who exceeds the measure of virtues either by more or by less, and has defected to vice joined on either side.
"Cursed be he who makes the blind wander or stumble." 18 Everyone who leads the blind astray on the journey is he who...
or the Jew who not yet having the light of knowledge, draws him into heresy outside the apostolic way. Or perhaps he might do this to any of the faithful who has not yet acquired understanding. Furthermore, he calls those who are not yet, even if they be believers, willing to approach, and having indeed bidden farewell to the spirit of Satan, have not yet put on Christ, "strangers, orphans, and widows." Such souls are widows, who, having turned away from the sower of error, have not yet embraced Christ after the manner of chaste virgins, whose judgment he who has delivered an illegitimate doctrine averts.
"Cursed is every man who does not remain in all the words of this law to do them." [27.] That expression, "in all," which is placed by the Septuagint, is confirmed by the Samaritan copy, in which we found the word *chol*, which means "all" or "everything," carried over. With this agrees also the Apostle, saying, "For as many as are of the works of the law are under a curse." Whence, if those from the circumcision are convicted of being under a curse for not doing everything. A
"It is written, 'Cursed is every one who does not remain in all things written in the book of the law to do them.'"
"Blessed shalt thou be in the city, and blessed in the field." [XXVIII, 3.] In the Church, where he who acts, sows and reaps fruit unto eternal life. But the fruits of the womb are pious thoughts. For Isaiah says: "Because of thy fear, O Lord, we have conceived in the womb, and have been in pain, and have brought forth; we have wrought the spirit of thy salvation upon the earth." The same also are portions of the land, according to the word: "A sower went out to sow; and some fell by the wayside, and some upon thorns, and some upon rock, and some upon good ground, and it yielded fruit, some an hundredfold, some sixtyfold, some thirtyfold."
"Thy herds of oxen and flocks of sheep." [4.] For those which are brought to the altar must be clean, of which we have spoken many times.
"Thy storehouses, and thy remnants." [5.] He calls "storehouses" not those where the moth consumes, nor which thieves break through, B but those which provide us provision for the kingdom of heaven. And "remnants" are the future and final things. For so have the others expounded this saying: "The remnants of the ungodly shall be destroyed," which is spoken in the thirty-sixth Psalm.
"When thou comest in and goest out." [6.] With this David also agrees, saying: "The Lord shall keep thy coming in and thy going out." For it is necessary for him who departs from impiety to prepare the way toward piety by his own hand. Furthermore, we must also go forth to war against the enemies of God. By "coming in," you may understand the accurate keeping of knowledge. By "going out," that departure by which all cleverness is left behind, and there is submissiveness toward the weak. To which he adds: "And the Lord thy God shall deliver thy enemies who have resisted thee, broken before thy face," according to the word of the Apostle: "And the Lord shall crush Satan under our feet shortly."
"They shall go out by one way, and flee by seven ways from before thee." [7.] For the Lord will dissipate their wicked conspiracy and the covenants formed against you, according to the word: "Scatter the nations that desire wars." C
"And in thy storehouses, and in all to which thou shalt set thy hand." [8.] For if we observe the commandments of God with all our might, both secret thoughts and manifest actions will be consecrated to happiness, both those things which are diminished and those which tend toward increase. For David says: "Cleanse me from my secret faults." And the Savior: "Without me ye can do nothing."
"The Lord shall establish for himself a holy people, as he swore unto thy fathers." [9.] For theirs is the adoption, and the testament, and the worship, from whom Christ was born according to the flesh. To them also the word of God was first to be announced. But when they rejected it, all blessing was transferred to the Gentiles, as is evident from the words of Christ: "Go, teach all nations." And also of the Apostles, who say: "We turn to the Gentiles." Whom he also calls a holy nation, a royal priesthood, a peculiar people. After the return, however, the same testament [is established] with the Lord by the subscriptions and signs of all the priests, [and] the people, and the rulers.
A And it desires the priests, the Levites, and the princes in the second book. Wherefore even now they are bent upon the law with their whole heart, driven by the fear of transgression. For they are ignorant that Christ underwent the curse for us, and delivered us from the curse of the Law. Since, therefore, He Himself has enriched us with spiritual blessedness of every kind, and has delivered us from the curse, concerning the blessings indeed it is said: "Fiat, fiat" (So be it, so be it). But concerning the curses, by no means. For He was not made [a] "no," as it is said to the Corinthians: "But it was 'yes' in Him; for all the promises of God are 'yes' in Him: wherefore through Him also the Amen."
A "May the Lord open to you His good treasure, the heaven, to give rain to your land." [XXVIII. 12.] And who is this "good treasure"? Surely He with whom all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge are hidden. For He also gives instructions to the clouds, that is, to the prophets, to provide the heavenly rain. "For He will give goodness, and our land shall yield its fruit." You shall lend to many nations the refined silver, but you shall not borrow. For there is no knowledge or understanding among them.
"And you shall rule over many nations." It is spoken to the sons of Israel, but it applies strictly to the disciples of Christ; as they say: "For this reason He has subjected peoples to us, and nations under our feet."
This they now uniquely suffer from. B "For they go about," he says, "seeking the word of God, and they shall not find it." For He does not threaten them with a famine of bread, although this too happened once, nor a thirst for water, but a famine of hearing the word of the Lord. Instead of the word *eklimian* (famine), Symmachus rendered it *achortasian* (insatiability). "For they study vain things, enjoying none of the things that are spoken."
[Regarding] "An inspection before your enemies," that is, one who breaks and strikes, as the others have rendered it.
And "you shall be groping in the midday." [29.] For now, while the nations live in the light, Israel lives in darkness, and like the blind gropes for the wall, [and gropes for] the Law given to them, according to Isaiah: because they were unwilling to admit the rays of light of the knowledge of Christ, and to say with David: "Uncover my eyes, and I will consider wonderful things out of Your Law." Wherefore he adds: "The sojourner who is with you shall ascend above you, and you shall descend," speaking of the nations.
[48.] "And He shall put a yoke of iron upon you." He speaks of grievous servitude. And therefore He preferred to put iron rather than wooden ones. Blessed Jeremiah also, for this reason, is commanded to put it upon himself, that he might signify to them the burden of captivity. Concerning which he now prophesies, and says: "He shall bring against you a nation from afar." By which words Jeremiah and the other prophets signaled the Assyrians and Babylonians. Moses symbolized the swiftness and strength of these enemies by the flight of an eagle. He [symbolized] their impudence by a face that spares no age. Furthermore, "it shall devour," he says, "the fruit of your womb." Which Jeremiah laments in the Lamentations, and Josephus in his narrative has revealed that this was done by the Romans.
[54.] "Soft in you and delicate." He who is accustomed to delicacies, he says, will return to food alien to all humanity. Nor will his spirit allow him to share anything of this with his own intimate ones. For he who has slaughtered one of his children will not share it with his brother, nor with his wife, nor with his other children.
And the Lord A will strike you with new (or unexpected) blows. [59.] Either by intensifying the customary ones, or by devising newer ones.
And your life will hang before your eyes [66]. This means that he who sees death before his feet is in doubt and in danger of destruction. It can also be applied to Christ, who says: "I am the life," whom, when they saw him hanging from the wood, they did not receive through faith.
And the Lord will bring you back to Egypt by ships along the way of which I spoke to you: "You shall not see it again," etc. [68.] He did not bring them back himself, but did not prevent those returning. This is a proof of what I said to you: "You shall not see it again." For since that return is viewed in the place of a fault, how could he have been the author of it? Therefore, they returned of their own accord; now having sought help for themselves against the Assyrians, and now having been carried off as captives by Necho, Pharaoh, and other Egyptian kings; bringing evils upon themselves. Wherefore God accuses them through the prophet: "Who go down," he says, "by ships into Egypt, that they may obtain help from Pharaoh, king of Egypt. But me they have never consulted on this matter." And again: "What is it to you regarding Egypt, that you should drink the waters of Geon?" Of this kind also is what follows: "And the Lord God did not give you a heart to understand, nor eyes to see, nor ears to hear, even until this day." For why would he have granted these things to those whom he had destined to receive them, but who had turned away out of deliberate malice? Indeed, it is said that God gives nothing to such people. Just as a general is said to betray an army when, the conflict already intensifying, he departs having abandoned it, namely, by this very fact, that he deprives it of his aid. A similar statement is: "He gave them up to the fall of ignominy, and the desires of their own heart." If, therefore, the present saying also is not understood in the same way, it will be the contrary of what precedes. For he had said: "You have seen all that the Lord did." How, then, did he not give them eyes to see? Or with what kind of eyes did they see? Or how did they see, if it seemed otherwise to God? They did indeed see with physical eyes, but they deprived themselves of the vision of the mind, rejecting the knowledge of piety, by whose assistance they had seen the wonders, and not acknowledging their author. Wherefore, in order to make them more cautious, he often refreshes the memory of their benefits and signs. He also declares that the root of bitterness must be plucked out from themselves, according to that: "Purge out the old leaven, that you may be a new lump." But if anyone is treacherous, he says, let him be separated from your company, lest any holy man should, as it were, slip along with him, and I myself also walk in the perversity of my heart, and at the same time, being empty of sins, lose him also: "For a little leaven leavens the whole mass."
And the later generation of their children who shall rise from you, and the stranger who shall come from a remote land. [XXIX, 22.] He calls the other generation an assembly gathered from the Gentiles. Just as David also says: "Declare to another generation that he himself is your God." And again: "A people also that shall be acquired shall praise the Lord." And again: "A generation to come shall be enkindled for him, and they shall declare his righteousness to the people that shall be born, whom the Lord has made." And Moses added what this generation or this people might be, saying: "And all the nations shall say: Why has the Lord done thus to this land?"
But it is not to be understood as sensible earth. For there exists in history no land, except that of Sodom and Gomorrah, which has suffered the afflictions of fire and salt. But as to that which is spoken of by way of figure, which, although it was formerly fertile, was turned into salt because of the wickedness of its inhabitants, it was also consumed by fire. For the Lord commanded the clouds not to irrigate it with rain. Likewise, the unclean spirit, as if it were arid and deserted by God, traverses it. And it will neither be sown nor will it sprout, even if any green thing or the new sprout of the evangelical polity is cast into it, the birds of the air snatching away the seed.
It shall indeed be as Sodom and Gomorrah, nay rather, it shall be more tolerable C for them in the day of judgment than for that land. Which those who come from a distant land behold, that is, the pagans who were once far from God, with the idolaters contemplating and inquiring, because they abandoned the covenant of the Lord, they will say: "Neither did he distribute to them," or as Symmachus says: "Nor was it consistent for them."
And he cast them into another land. [28.] Formerly, for a time into Assyria, but now into the whole world, and that perpetually.
A "The secret things belong to the Lord our God." What Christ, when he had come, set forth as an addition to the law. For example, "Love your enemies," and such like. Things which were once hidden to the Israelites, for which reason Moses’ face was covered with a veil, as Paul also testifies in the second epistle to the Corinthians.
And again, he will gather you from all the nations. [XXX, 3.] This happened upon the return made under the auspices of Cyrus. And also in our case, according to the spirit: for he himself healed the wounds of our sins, and had mercy on us. He gathered us likewise from all the nations into which he had dispersed us—not, indeed, willingly, but he permitted it to those of us desiring it. Furthermore, he gave us the land of our fathers, when he had cleansed it with the laver of regeneration. But, lest he drive us to despair, he rightly added:
"That you may live." [8.] For eternal life is to be pure in heart, and to love God with all confidence. When he even brings evils upon our enemies, so that we may sing with David: "I will confess to thee, O Lord, for thou art good, and hast delivered me out of all affliction. And mine eye hath looked down upon mine enemies; and he himself shall render evil to my enemies," meaning the spiritual ones.
"This commandment is very near to thee, in thy mouth, and in thy heart." [14.] When Paul had brought these things forward, he subjoined: "This is the word of faith which we preach," using in relation to faith what was said concerning the commandment. Concerning which Job likewise speaks in the tenth chapter, and calls it knowledge and wisdom. He said indeed to man: "Behold, the fear of God is wisdom; and to abstain from sins is knowledge." Furthermore, in Baruch, Jeremiah says concerning wisdom: "Who hath ascended into heaven and taken hold of her? Who hath brought her down from the clouds? Who hath crossed the sea, and found her, and compared her to pure gold? There is no one who hath known her way, or who hath considered her path. But he who knows all things knows her through his own prudence." The commandment, therefore, is not immense, for he has nourished us like infants with milk. Ought it then to be any wonder, when John also asserts that the commandments of Christ are light? Nay, he himself even says: "My yoke is good, and my burden is light," how much more so the commandment of the pedagogue which concerns sensible things.
C "I call heaven and earth to witness this day, that I have set before you life and death." [16.] Wherefore, when they had offended by the false worship of idols, it is said in the book of Judges: "And the hand of the Lord was against them for evil, as the Lord had spoken to them, and as he had sworn to them."
The tree of life, therefore, is nothing other than the love of God. Disobedience, therefore, and the tree of death correspond to one another. For this reason he calls the love of the Lord life, and not a length of sensible days. When the wise man desired to put these on, he said: "Woe is me that my habitation is prolonged!" But rather those goods of which the saints partake, and receive excellent gifts, and pass from life to life, from faith to faith, from virtue to virtue. Those of long life, therefore, do not merely extend their days, but rather they who increase them by the greatness of a noble action. Wherefore Jacob, offering a confession as it were, says: "Few and evil are my days."
"Be a man and act courageously." [XXXI, 7.] Moses gives way to Joshua. By the decree of God, the law gives way to grace; the servant to the Lord; for Joshua bears the figure of Christ. After he came into the world, let there be no regard for shadow or figures. It concerns the ignominy of the divine government, and renders those who are its authors alien from grace. Wherefore Paul says to the Galatians: "Are you so foolish, that whereas you began in the spirit, you are now made perfect by the flesh?" And again: "You are made void of Christ, you who are justified in the law; you are fallen from grace."
Set, therefore, the law which accuses concerning sin, and is the ministry of condemnation: "And that is through which God has shut up all things under sin, that he might have mercy upon all." Moses was not ignorant of the majesty of the Savior, nor that the whole force of the demons was about to be subject to him, the Father himself subjecting their dominion, for these things are indicated by a small significance. Nor indeed [was he ignorant] that He himself was to bring us into the land that is truly holy, into the heavenly abodes. But He is said to bestow greater labor because of his humanity. Just as that also has it: "You will not leave my soul among the dead."
At the end of seven years, at the established feast of the year of remission, in the solemnity of Tabernacles. [XXXI, 10.] The septenary number represents the span of time completed before the advent of Christ. As that: "The barren has borne seven." Item that: "Do not trust in your enemy, for there are seven wickednesses in his heart." Item that in Proverbs: "A just man shall fall seven times and shall rise again." For this number everywhere in Scripture denotes a multitude. Therefore, before the advent of Christ, although the law was read, it was not done so that it might be learned; for they did not know the law as they ought, and perfectly. But when Christ, by His advent among us, granted us the remission of sins, and liberated us from servitude, as was the custom in the year of remission. When also the time of the resurrection—the figure of which the solemnity of Tabernacles presented—by which our bodies are strengthened from the earth, was evolved: then He restored his humanity to the integrity of its own nature, and said to his disciples: "Receive the Holy Spirit." When also the eyes of our mind were opened, that they might understand the law which once was hidden from them. They were gathered also in that place which He pointed out, namely, in the Church. For there the disciples of Christ declared it, Paul saying: "For if the blood of goats and oxen, and the ashes of a heifer, being sprinkled, sanctify the defiled to the cleansing of the flesh, how much more the blood of Christ?" And again: "For our Pasch is sacrificed, Christ, that is to say." And again: "Tell me, you who desire to be under the law, do you know or do you read the law? For it is written: Abraham had two sons," and what follows.
Behold, you shall sleep with your fathers. [16.] It is to be noted in passing that death in the Old Testament is called rest or sleep. By fathers, however, it is to be understood as the ancestors in spiritual kinship.
Write the words of this canticle. [19.] By the finger, as it were, it is shown here A what was to happen, as in the Gospel: "Whoever shall break one of these least commandments." The canticle, however, is theology, which is founded upon true and right dogmas, which the soul of the just has destined for God alone with great study and care. Or at any rate, it is a voice rendered sharply and neatly, without the accompaniment of an organ. For whatever things are comprehended by bare and abstract contemplation and theology, they obtain this name.
A Put this book, when received, into the side of the ark of the covenant. [26.] Furthermore, the law yields into the middle, an indication that the new oracles to be edited through Christ would not long be wanting. For it would also be fitting to receive the law in sacred assemblies, and by no means to reject it. Nevertheless, it is not deferred to the first.
Gather to me all the princes of your tribes. [28.] The voice of God is indeed one towards all, as many as submit themselves to the authority of the same virtues and dogmas. But in the first place, it pertains to those who excel B others in dignity. Whom, therefore, He deigns to convene, that by this saying He might make them more obedient. For it was fitting that obedience should depend upon their countenance.
He sends forth his testimony, by which God exempts himself from the guilt of future evils, and indicates that they can be avoided by a change of mind.
Hear, O heaven, for I will speak, and let the earth hear the words from my mouth. [XXXII, 1.] That the words of God might be perceived, He invokes heaven, which has received divine virtues, and also the earth, the seat of mortals. For they can render those endowed with that mind astonished. But since eyes are more precious and sharper than ears, He attributes [the power to] attend to the superior, but to the mortals [the faculty to] hear; for the faculties of the mind perceive as a single eye; or because these oracles happened after long ages, but the mortal is not long-lived, He invokes the divine and immortal virtues—that is, the long-lived parts of the earth—as witness to future things.
For elsewhere God speaks through Moses in the same way, and invokes the creator of all things. But whether such voices are uttered only against the Jews, I do not know; heaven and earth—
A are rightly invoked, indicating the nations dwelling throughout the whole world, and those who are worthy of heavenly dwellings.
"Let my speech flow as rain" [Deut. XXXII, 2]. Since Moses was like a cloud, he uses this mode of speech. For this is what the saints are called. Regarding such, it is written: "Thy truth reacheth even unto the clouds" [Ps. XXXVI, 5]. For who would consider the unreasoning clouds to be capable of perceiving the sense of truth? It is also said that they are commanded by God to bring rain to the earth. They are moved by the sense of His divine command, and they know where there is less need for watering. With these words, He exhorts them to prepare a place in themselves to receive those sayings, just as farmers are accustomed to prepare the soil, so that no water may escape.
Next, He indicates the gentleness and modesty of the words, which gradually subside and render the heart softer and fertile, by proposing them under the name of dew. Such is that [dew] which, according to David, descends upon the mountains of Sion, because there the Lord has promised life in eternity [Ps. CXXXII, 3]. Therefore, they also, who receive the words like dew, shall be gifted with happiness.
B Furthermore, *agrostis* (couch-grass) is a certain herb that creeps over the earth, and with deep roots, fine and many and thick, it embraces the earth, as if with certain bands, as though it were resisting the rainfall, so that it might not be washed away, but is always taking deeper root. Thus, then, He deigns to send the intellectual rain into the depth of the mind, lest those who do not receive it should wither, and, like dry couch-grass, be consumed by fire, according to the voice of Isaiah [Isa. IX, 18].
Perhaps, indeed, because of the barrenness of the hay and couch-grass—also because they grow in uncultivated places—He hints at the barrenness and roughness of those who are to hear, and for this reason He also adjures them.
"Ascribe greatness to our God" [v. 3]. Do not conceive anything lowly or similar to a creature regarding Him. Furthermore, David also says: "Magnify the Lord with me, and let us exalt his name together" [Ps. XXXIII, 4]. For if His works are magnified, how much more is the creator of them Himself!
C For from the magnitude and beauty of the works, their maker is rightly perceived. And Isaiah also says: "Lift up your eyes, and see who hath showed all these things" [Isa. XL, 26]. But there is no bodily magnitude in Him, but such as consists in His immense efficacy and virtues. Since even a man small in body is called great by reason of wisdom.
"And all his ways are judgment" [v. 4]. That is, the reasons of His providence are full of wisdom and judgment, even if they do not seem just to us. With these, He pervades the whole fabric, as if having within Himself an abyss of riches and wisdom; His judgments, finally, as it is with Paul, are "unsearchable" [Rom. XI, 33].
"God is faithful, and there is no iniquity in him" [v. 4], having faithfulness joined with equity itself: who does not establish a false judgment, and keeps the truth in his promises, not violating the promise. But "faithful" in the divine Scriptures has a double mode. For it either signifies "worthy of faith," as in the holy mysteries, which is said properly only of God. Just as that saying: "Faithful is He that promised" [Heb. X, 23]; D just as that also which is found in Peter: "Wherefore let them that suffer according to the will of God commit their souls to a faithful Creator" [1 Pet. IV, 19]. But the one who believes is also "faithful," as Abraham was faithful, because he believed the one speaking.
For this reason we too are called faithful. But a false god is faithless, both in being and in promising. Concerning whom it is said: "Faith did not prevail among them, and they are lying water." A
"They have sinned; they are not his children, but blameworthy." [5] Aquila rendered: "They acted corruptly toward him, not his children"; but Symmachus: "They acted corruptly toward him, not his children in general." B
Both mean this: They denied their own adoption. In a corporeal manner, because, having been brought forth from nothing, they worshiped the creature according to the likeness of the Creator, while neglecting the Creator. And after they came out of Egypt, having fashioned a calf, they again consecrated themselves to Beelphegor. In a spiritual manner, because "everyone who sins," as the Savior pronounced, "is born of the devil." Just as he who thinks rightly and speaks correctly becomes conformable to God. As Paul also said that he suffers labor pains for those who have fallen away from piety, that they might receive the form of piety. Furthermore, the following shows the approach to life: "This is the book of the generation of men."
"A perverse and crooked generation." Just as it is born from the serpent, Satan, so too its nature represents his perversity, and it does not walk in a straight path. Concerning whom the Proverb says: "O you who have left the straight paths to walk in the ways of darkness, who take pleasure in wicked pursuits and rejoice in twisted malice. Their paths are perverse and their ways crooked." According to David, however, a sincere generation will obtain happiness. Such, therefore, were those who brought reproach upon the lineage of their fathers.
"Do you thus pay back the Lord?" [6] Who brought you into light; who chose you, who delivered you out of Egypt, who led you through the sea, in which he submerged your enemies. And for other acts of beneficence and miracles of this kind?
So foolish and unwise a people. Obviously because they were of such great imprudence and ignorance that they did not understand that the reason they were both brought forth and educated, and showered with benefits, was through the kindness of the Creator. And yet, surely, "the ox knows its owner, and the donkey its master's crib," as it says in the prophet.
Is he not himself your father, who acquired you? who made you? and who created you? etc. For he who snatched a slave from the hand of enemies rightfully holds the one he ransomed. But he has delivered you from fictitious C gods, yet he does not call himself the master of a slave, but the father of a son. Therefore he is named the first-born, with the Father himself saying: "Israel is my son, my first-born."
But what is greater, he has added, "he made you and created you." Which denotes his work as a craftsman. But he also deigns to be called Father by his name. Although "he made and created" are placed together, they distinguish [the work] from the Son according to nature. And it is added as something else, so that it might be understood that he is Father by grace, not by nature. In the progress of the chapter, having said "he begat," he did not place the name of Father before it, but [the name] of God, saying: "You forsook God who begat you." So that the begetting might not signify the natural condition of sons. And John also, he says, does not state "they were born" before he had first stated that it was by grace, having said: "He gave them power to become children of God. Who were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God." Therefore, let not heretics act craftily by D bringing the generation into equality with the making and creating, thinking that the Son who is [the Son] by nature is a creature. But "making" and "creating" are also spoken of in the sense of transformation, apart from the creation of substance from the beginning, according to what is in the Psalms: "And a people being created shall praise the Lord." And again, [next page begins]
to create in me, God.” And again Paul says to the Ephesians: “Having abolished the law of commandments in ordinances, to make in himself of twain one new man, so making peace; and that he might reconcile both unto God in one body by the cross, having slain the enmity thereby... created in righteousness and true holiness.” A And Isaac also says to Esau: “Behold, I have made him thy lord.” But it is desirable to be transformed, and to be called a possession of God, according to that which is in Isaiah: “O Lord our God, take us for thy possession.”
“Remember the days of old.” [XXXII, 7.] You have convicted them of ingratitude, because they rendered evil for good to you. Just as David also says: “He rebuked them from that time when he chose them out from other nations.” Consider, he says, if such things have happened to any nation from the beginning of all human life; for it has been called the son of God, his people, the sheep of his pasture, whether it has been made worthy of the sight or voice of God. But if you young men offer ignorance of these things as an excuse, I am a father to you, and as a prince of prophecy I have deemed you worthy, I who am the mediator between you and God. I, who know how this universe has been constituted. How truthful his knowledge is, has been abundantly declared by signs. For often, though he had predicted things long before, the signs did not deviate so much as a hair's breadth from the most certain event of things. Inquire, therefore, and you shall know. Of which matter the elders also, filled with the divine spirit, are present as witnesses. Thereafter, he introduced how the first things were offered to Israel from the beginning.
“When the Most High divided the nations.” [8.] The beginning of the division of nations, in the dispersion of the sons of Adam, made according to the number of the angels of God, seems to have had its occasion in the confusion of tongues which happened during the construction of the tower. B Since the list of the sons and grandsons of Noah is not far described. Which comprises the institutions of the nations, which exist in the number of seventy. But also the sons of Jacob and his grandsons, who descended into Egypt, are concluded into the number of seventy. Just as it is written in the present book: “Thy fathers went down into Egypt with seventy souls.” C Thus indeed the other interpreters also rendered it: according to the number of the children of Israel.
But how did the election of Israel come about? From Adam to Noah, the tenth from him, in about two thousand four hundred and forty-two years, no one is recorded as having turned aside to the error of polytheism; but they perished because of other various transgressions, the flood having been brought upon them. But to the descendants of Noah, scattered everywhere to the parts of the earth, nine hundred and forty-two years having passed, Arbelus was the first to rule over the land of the Assyrians, an arrogant man, and the first to receive the name of God from his subjects, whom they worshiped, and to whom they offered sacrifices. From whom Ninus, or Ninyas, is born, whose name the city of Nineveh has acquired, which Semiramis, his wife, fortified with an unbroken wall. After Ninus, however, was Abram, a good man, and one who loathed the common impiety of the Assyrians. Wherefore he was snatched from the midst of them by God, who led him to himself, and chose his descendants for himself. D
A What then is meant by, *according to the number of the angels of God*? God ordered the spiritual powers to protect the nations and to lead them to the worship of himself, and by these he procures the greatest benefit for them, leading them to salvation. B *And the Lord’s portion became his people, Jacob.* [XXXII, 9.] A portion comes to be God’s by rendering it worthy of his choice, and for this reason one cries out with David: *The Lord is my portion.* [Ps. CXVI, 57.] For by election they became beloved for the sake of their fathers; for God says through one of the prophets: *I found Israel like a grape in the desert, and I saw their fathers as a first-ripe fig on a fig tree* [Osee IX, 10], denoting a thing unexpected, and that those found were most desired, although all were sacrificing to idols in Assyria. But those who are partners with Demons are called portions of foxes in the Psalms. [Ps. LXII, 11.] C For by a measuring line they used to make measurements of the land. In this way the land was measured and divided among the sons of Israel. From this custom, therefore, the term "measuring line" was used. *He sufficed him in the desert.* [10.] Aquila and Theodotion rendered it *He found him*, according to the saying: *I found Israel as a grape in the desert*, in a thirst of heat and in a waterless place. For it did not have the river that gladdens the city of God, nor the fountain of life, nor the torrent of delights. [Ps. XLV, 5.] Therefore, when he had found it, he assisted its necessity. For no other sufficed for them, and it was more suited to their faith. Furthermore, Symmachus explained it still more clearly: *In a desert uncultivated, vast, dark.* For what order is there among those who, having despised the Creator, serve the creature? Such an one is deserted by the Holy Trinity. For it does not dwell in a body weighed down by sin, in men practicing lawlessness. D But the desert is not such by nature, but was laid waste by the opposing power. It could also be understood in this way: *He sufficed him*, for he made them sufficient, having prepared them to lack nothing in a desert suffering from the need of all things. *He led him about, and instructed him.* For he tested their fathers with many tribulations, now from
A Assyria to Canaan, then moving them to Egypt, and again from Egypt to Canaan, and surrounding them with countless trials, wishing to instruct them. He even led Jacob to Mesopotamia and caused him to serve, so that through patience and hope in God they might effect their own salvation. As Jacob says: *The angel who delivers me from all my evils.* And again: *If the God of my father Abraham had not been with me, and the fear of Isaac, you would now have sent me away empty.*
But He also surrounded those who were listening at that time for forty years in the desert, as Moses says: *And you shall remember all the way which the Lord your God has led you these forty years in the desert, that He might afflict you, and test you, and that what was in your heart might be known, whether you would keep His commandments or not.* And again: *As if a man were to instruct his son, so shall the Lord your God instruct you.* B
*As an eagle protects its nest.* [XXXII, 11.] This animal is a lover of its own young; when it has brought them to a monstrous height and teaches them to fly, and they look with opened eyes at the sun set before them, if one of them is unable to endure the brightness of the sun, it considers it a bastard and condemn it. Thus, He leads true worshippers to the height of spiritual contemplation, of whom Isaiah says: *They will lift up wings like eagles. They shall run and not grow weary.* And the Savior indicates who those are that run: *Where the carcass is, there the eagles will be gathered.* Whose youth, indeed, by divine anointing, will be renewed like the eagle's. But if anyone has become a citizen of heaven, he will hear: *The shadow of His wings will protect you, and under His wings you will hide your hope. For they shall be taken up on shoulders, and shall be lifted up on an arm.* That He declares such great care toward them, the Savior Himself also indicated in the similitude He used toward Jerusalem: *How often did I want to gather your children, as a hen is wont to gather her chicks under her wings, and you would not!*
*There was no foreign god with them.* [12.] For what communion, as Paul testifies, has light with darkness? Or what concord of Christ with Belial? C *He raised them up over the strength of the land.* [13.] He has exalted them above the inhabitants of the earth. In the same way, Aquila also says: *He brought them to the high place of the land.* He means that He made them higher than earthly things, wishing for them to conceive of nothing lowly or groveling.
Following the history, he speaks of this as the land of promise, taking things future as having happened, even if they had already stepped onto a part of it. The following verse agrees: *He fed them with the produce of the fields.* For they had not yet eaten of the produce of the land; they were being fed with manna before crossing the Jordan. Neither had they yet gathered wild honey, nor the olives which take delight in rocks and mountains. One could say, by way of allegory, that they had been fed with the produce of those filled with spiritual fragrance whom the Lord has blessed. D
"Butter of cows, and milk of sheep." A This food is also suitable for infants, as the Apostle says: "I fed you with milk, as infants in Christ." He speaks of oxen, regarding whom Paul himself says: "Is it for oxen that God is concerned? Or does he speak entirely for our sake? For he who plows and threshes does so in the hope of partaking." Moreover, the Savior sends his disciples as sheep in the midst of wolves. The children of Israel drank the milk of these. Or was not Moses an ox, threshing and plowing the souls of the children of Israel, as were Aaron, Eleazar, Phinehas, Joshua the son of Nun, and the seventy elders? And Moses was also a sheep, being the meekest of all men. Furthermore, they were also lambs because of their infancy in Christ, and rams and bulls—leaders of the flock—and sons of bulls, being heifers, and submitting their neck to God.
"With fat of kidneys of wheat, and the blood of the grape you drank wine." He says that they partook not only of the spiritual teaching of Christ, and the spiritual rock, and the teachers who led them, but they were also deemed worthy of the mystical blessing, as partaking through a type. For the fat B of the kidneys of wheat is the spiritual bread which strengthens the heart of man; and the blood of the grape is the wine, the producer of gladness, which comes from the true vine.
"And Jacob ate, and was filled, and kicked, the beloved one." It is said by the wise Solomon: "A soul that is filled tramples on honeycombs." And again he advises: "If you have found honey, eat as much as is sufficient, lest you be filled and vomit it up."
For they did not digest the teaching within themselves so as to concoct it by the Spirit. Instead, their heart became thick and fat, as the body flourished and became weighed down by excessive flesh; and they kicked like swine, trampling upon the beautiful pearls, and like horses that have shaken off the bridle, C casting aside those who wished to restrain them on the way. For by distancing themselves from Him, they cast themselves into destruction, neither recognizing Him as Creator, nor as Savior and Re-
Adeemer.
*Irritarunt me diis alienis.* [XXXII, 16.] Having spoken of strange gods, he adds: *And they sacrificed to demons, not to God.* For though their substance is indeed of God’s own making, their impious purpose is alien to God. Those who cling to these, having abandoned the fountain of life, provoke God to their own just punishment. Where, using human language, it is said of the wrath of God: *For they exchanged Him for gods of yesterday or the day before, fashioned by hands*, whom neither Abraham nor his ancestors recognized.
*And the Lord saw, and was angry.* [19.] Human affection is again attributed to the natural goodness of God, whereby He desires all men to be saved and to reach the knowledge of the truth, and not to be agitated by the deceptions of demons, and those who have admitted such things to be recalled to the way by condign punishment.
*And He was irritated because of the provocation of His sons and daughters.* For both sons and daughters from Israel were equal, exceeding all other nations in their creation and intimacy with God. But it is written thus, *of their sons and daughters*, because they likewise acted as guides to their children in the same error. And indeed, he prophesies concerning those who afterwards crucified Christ, of whom the prophet also says: *Your hands are full of blood.* Who were certainly worse than their parents and suffered the punishment they deserved.
*Because it is a perverse generation, sons in whom there is no faith.* [20.] The Savior used these words in the Gospels as well, saying to them: *O faithless and perverse generation, how long shall I be with you? How long shall I endure you?* For the saying *“I will turn my face away from them”* means nothing else. For the generation is faithless, having no faith, and turned away from the truth. But let us cry out with the Psalmist: *Turn not Thy face away from me.* B For the eyes of the Lord are turned toward the just.
*And I also will provoke Him in that which is not a people, etc.* [21.] I will provoke them against a barbarous nation. For it is not so much servitude, dispersion, or the loss of the temple that pains them, as the piety and dignity of the nations—namely, those who were previously rude and were not deemed worthy to be reckoned among the number of the peoples. Just as the Apostle testifies when he says: *For we once were foolish, stubborn*, and the rest. Indeed, He does not even deem them worthy of the name of a nation, because they are faithful, gathered from all nations. And He asserts that the nation which has believed in Christ is not one and distinct, but rather that the nation or people of God is to be measured by the proximity or kinship of doctrines, not by a division of nations made from the beginning.
*For a fire has been kindled from My fury, and it shall burn to the lowest hell.* [22.] For our God is a consuming fire, punishing the impious, exacting retribution from those who resist, when they are unwilling to turn from His forbearance and long-suffering. C In these words, He predicts the final destruction of the Jews, which they suffered at the hands of the Romans after their outrage against Christ, and the calling of the nations.
*For they heap up wrath for themselves in the day of wrath.* — *Walk, he says, in the light of your face, and in the flame that you have kindled.*
Furthermore, in these words, one must ponder the final slaughter accomplished by the Roman nation, by which their land was laid waste and inflamed, and the foundations, or roots, of their mountains were scorched by fire.
A Furthermore, there is another divine fire which consumes every earthly sense, from which, clearly, fornication, adultery, the worship of idols, and other things of this kind arise. For these are the fruits of the land within us. And the foundations of the mountains—those mountains, figuratively speaking, that exalt themselves against the knowledge of God—He will burn, and He will destroy the prince of this world and the wicked powers beneath him.
*I will heap mischiefs upon them; I will spend mine arrows upon them.* [Deut. 32:23.] By this the patience of God is indicated, that He is said to heap up evils against the disobedient—evils which those who have not obeyed bring upon themselves. For all the grain is threshed in them, who drain the cup of undiluted wrath, and every punishment is expended upon them. B And the arrows of the Lord are those things which are brought forward for conversion and for discipline, as Job also says: *The arrows of the Lord are in my body, whose fury drinks up my blood.* For *flesh and blood shall not inherit the kingdom of God.*
One might also say in reference to the events in the desert, that this is spoken of the eating of birds, when it was changed into bile for those who ate. C Opisthotonic tetanus is a contraction of the muscles in the spine, which pulls the whole body backward and makes it like a bent bow. And these things are both sufferings of the soul, showing the turning away from God and offering no hope of salvation to those who suffer them. For we shall understand the famine as the state where the word of God is not among them; and the eating of birds as those empty words, flitting in vain through the air. For they will not cease to study these things in vain, as David says: *They have meditated on vain things,* D going backward without returning.
No one who has put his hand to the plow and turned back is fit for the kingdom of heaven. This, indeed, because Lot’s wife had let it slip, she became a pillar of salt, because she had desired to return to evil.
*I will send the teeth of wild beasts upon them.* He said "I will send," or "I will promise," in order to admonish them again of those into whom...
A they had desired to return to evil. He points out that the enemies have invaded after the manner of wild beasts. Or, for the purpose of representing the dereliction of God, by which, being abandoned to their own passions, they were absorbed by spiritual beasts (13).
*Foris orbabit eos gladius, et in penetralibus terror.* [XXXII, 25.] He touches upon the tragic state of the siege, in that they fell outside, while at home they set themselves in place amid seditions. Furthermore, the sword of God, cutting away depraved actions, also restrains through fear the thoughts that give birth to them, so that they no longer give birth to such things. For the word of God is sharper than a two-edged sword and is a discerner of thoughts.
*Tam juvenem quam virginem, lactantem cum constantis ætatis sene.* For since they sinned together, they also perished together. For God says to Jeremiah: "Seest thou not what they do in the cities of Juda, and in the streets of Jerusalem? The children gather wood, and the fathers kindle the fire, and the women knead the dough, to make cakes for the queen of heaven" B (Jerem. VII, 18). Let us consider the differences of the souls according to age.
*Dixi: Dispergam eos, et delebo ex hominibus memoriam eorum.* [26.] For those who were dispersed were blotted out from the book of the living, and are no longer called the people of God. But they did not perish entirely, for the sake of the Gentiles. For if they had remained in their impiety, they would have attributed their slaughter to their own gods, and not to the sins of those who were destroyed.
Wherefore, when those with Jeremiah heard the Babylonians boasting in such a way, they said: "We are confounded, because we have heard reproach; shame hath covered our faces: for strangers are come upon the sanctuaries of the Lord" (Jerem. LI, 51). To whom He answers, saying: "Therefore, behold the days come, saith the Lord, and I will execute judgment upon her graven things" (ibid. 52). For these reasons, therefore, and because of the covenant made with their fathers, not all perished. And Goliath too, having reproached C the camp of the living God, was killed like a dog by a young man. Moreover, the Philistines also announced the death of Saul to their idols with great joy.
*Quoniam gens est quæ perdidit consilium, nec est eis intelligentia aliqua.* [28.] For the counsel that is divine, through which...
A David says in the seventy-second Psalm: "You held my right hand, and with your counsel you did guide me." Of this, Isaiah says: "And he shall be called the Angel or Messenger of the Great Counsel." For in him was the spirit of counsel and of power, which the Israelites lost, just as they lost knowledge. Respecting this Solomon says: "For he is an interpreter of divine knowledge." He calls wisdom an interpreter. Job, admiring this, says: "But what is the place of knowledge?" Even this the Israelites did not possess, since they did not receive Christ, the wisdom of God, and the counsel of the Most High, in whom are the treasures of knowledge and the science of all things.
*O that they were wise, that they understood this, that they would consider their latter end!* [XXXII, 29.] Aquila expounded it thus: "There is no understanding in them; would that they were wise so as to know it. May they be instructed in their latter end." For since they did not want to understand what was said to them, in the last days—when the nations are called and they themselves are rejected—they will be found to have been rejected because they denied faith in Christ, B who is the knowledge and counsel of the Father.
*How shall one chase a thousand?* [30.] For, stripped of divine protection, they were put to flight by one as much as by many. The opposite would have happened had they devoted themselves to piety. For it is incredible to say how much the Philistines oppressed them through the help and power of their own idols. For there is no likeness that corresponds to our God; and those who worship them are so insane that they say to a piece of wood, "You are my father," and to a stone, "You have begotten me." I could, indeed, also recount the victories of the Israelites who once cultivated piety, which they often achieved without breaking a sweat.
*For their vine is of the vine of Sodom.* [32.] Through Jeremiah, God also says: "I planted you a fruitful vine; how have you turned into a bitter, alien vine?" But since they followed in the footsteps of the Sodomites and Gomorrahites, they are said to draw their lineage from there. Just as, conversely, the sons of Abraham are not inappropriately called sons of Abraham because they emulate his faith and works; [so too might those who zealously strive for the terrible practices of the Sodomites C become descendants of the apostate devil.]
*Behold, are not all these things stored up with me, and sealed in my treasuries?* [34.] For God endures sinners until the measure is full, from which point punishment is before their feet. Such as that saying: "The sins of the Amorites are not yet completed." For after completion, the time and day of vengeance accelerates, if anyone has turned aside from the straight path.
Some, however, interpret this in the manner of a prophecy, D as if God were saying: "Behold, I foresee the future slaughter of the Savior; nevertheless, I grant room for man's free will, and I await the outcome."
A For, He says, I shall exact vengeance when they choose not to walk in the straight path, but instead turn aside from the straight road and draw near to shedding blood.
Through the prophetic spirit, things that were to happen much later are viewed as if they were present and imminent, He says, speaking of the nearness of their day of destruction, and that the calling of the nations was to be most ready. For He passes judgment upon His own people, He says, "And He shall judge His people, and be comforted in those who from the nations believe"; for he calls them His servants; or perhaps He will also have mercy on the Israelites, and will not utterly cast off His people.
But perhaps the discourse still concerns those who were before the coming of Christ, when He called them back from captivity? It is evident from His reproach regarding the idolatry they practiced before that time, saying: "Where are their gods?" For after that, they do not appear to have practiced idolatry anymore.
"Let them arise and help you." He presented these things (and the other prophets, especially Jeremiah, for the refutation of their impiety, as a reproach), for He says: "Therefore thus says the Lord: Behold, I bring evil upon them, from which they will not be able to escape; and they shall cry out to Me, and I will not listen to them. And those who dwell in the cities of Judah and Jerusalem shall go and cry out to the gods B to whom they offer incense, but they will not save them in the time of their affliction," and the rest.
"See, see that I am He." That is, your apostasy shall discipline you, and your wickedness shall reprove you. And since, while doing well, you did not recognize the benefactor and the giver of good things, in being punished, learn C to recognize He who brings upon you the unavoidable blows, from which none of those you supposed to be gods rescued you.
Verily, it is not without cause that I punish you; for I do this for your own sake. For I will kill that I may restore you to life; I will wound that I may heal. For He Himself stirs up the pain, and again restores to health once He has cured the maladies of the soul. Moreover, the time of medicine arrives when He lifts His hand to heaven. For after the manner of men, He has exalted His Son, who stands and is called at His right hand, because He is of the same essence and co-eternal with Him. Therefore, He also swears by Him. For He could not swear by any greater, as the Apostle testifies. David also says concerning this: "The right hand of the Lord has wrought power." And again: "My right hand has taken hold of me." With which He is said to live forever. But that right hand shall be lifted on high when your wrongs against it are brought to account. For thus you will understand that the Son submitted Himself, and of His own will took upon Himself death, and accepted judgment against all. "Wherefore," He says, "My hand shall hold fast to judgment." For He handed over judgement to the Son, as it is written that He said. And then indeed the efficacy of His vengeance shall be conspicuous, which He calls a sword, of which the prophet has said: "The sword of the Lord has glowed in heaven." Concerning which He now adds: "For My sword shall eat flesh, and My weapons shall be steeped in blood." For He delivered them to Caesar, whom they had designated as their own king. The swords of the Romans also devoured their living flesh, and consumed whomsoever they encountered, when they were wounded and taken captive. Thus, He indeed subjected them partly to a physical sword, and partly to a spiritual one—which is, by the testimony of Paul, the word of God, who says: "And the sword of the Spirit." The chief of the nations, that is, Satan; for the impious forces of the nations were subjected to him. Isaiah also says: "On that last day, the Lord shall bring a holy, great, and strong sword against the dragon, the wicked serpent." For the living word of God is sharper than any two-edged sword. When He had come into the world, He subdued the invisible powers and won a triumph over them upon the Cross, and recovered our liberty. Furthermore, this sword has also lopped off our carnal sins.
A Rejoice, O heavens, with Him. [XXXII, 43.] For if joy arises in heaven over one sinner who is saved, how much more so because of the salvation of all, when the tyranny of the devil has been abolished? On behalf of whom, together with the angels, all who have been enrolled as children of God and who participate in the heavenly city are also offering prayers. Furthermore, another Scripture also says, "All the angels of God." Just as Paul also adds: "When He brings the firstborn into the world, He says: And let all the angels of God worship Him." They always worship Him as their God and Creator, but then they offer praises on account of His humanity.
Rejoice, O nations, with His people. Although He says that He came for the lost sheep of the house of Israel, yet He Himself also said: "I have other sheep which are not of this fold; them also I must bring, and they will hear My voice, and there shall be one flock and one shepherd." And the divine Apostle also said: "That He might create the two peoples into one new man, making peace, and reconciling both in one Spirit unto the Father." And Aquila, instead of "Rejoice," says: "Unify, O nations, His peoples."
Let them be strengthened by all His angels. Paul also says somewhere: "Are they not all ministering spirits sent forth to minister for the sake of those who are to inherit salvation?" Similarly, David also says: "The Angel of the Lord encamps round about those who fear Him, that He might deliver them." Indeed, another Scripture has: "All the children of God," etc. By which it is indicated that they could have assisted the apostles with divine precepts, the spiritual bread that strengthens the heart of man having been set before them.
For He will avenge the blood of His children, and will take vengeance. For Christ says, speaking to the Jews in the Gospels: "Behold, I am sending to you prophets, and wise men, and scribes; and some of them you will kill and crucify." To which He subjoins: "That upon you may come all the righteous blood shed upon the earth, from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zechariah, son of Barachiah, whom你 you murdered between the temple and the altar." B Indeed, all these things followed as a punishment after the fury incited against Christ, when the Temple itself was destroyed for them.
C Furthermore, vengeance was also brought upon the invisible enemies: against whom we have taken courage, having been cleansed by the divine blood and the laver; so that, having become clean earth, we might bring forth fruit, some thirtyfold, and sixtyfold, and a hundredfold, no longer bringing forth thorns and thistles, having been made free from the ancient curse.
And Moses came and spoke all the words of this law in the ears of the people, he and Joshua the son of Nun. [44.] After the leaders, it was finally announced to the people, to whom Moses entered into the camp. Joshua, likewise, who bears the person of Christ, who fulfilled the Law and the Prophets. They are ordered, when they themselves have observed them, to also teach those who come after them, according to the saying: "Whoever shall do and teach one of these least ones, he shall obtain a great name in the kingdom of heaven."
And let not this word be vain for you, because this is your life, etc. [47.] For a truthful word brings life; according to the saying: "And this is life, that they may know Thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom Thou hast sent." Which those who have crossed the true Jordan have attained.
A *And die in the mount into which thou goest up.* [49.] For when the people was about to cross the Jordan, God willed to put an end to the law.
*This is the blessing wherewith Moses the man of God blessed the children of Israel.* [XXXIII, 1.] Not only do things of money come to men by hereditary right, but spiritual blessings also come to the children of the holy ones who depart from the living. Wherefore, when Isaac had reached an advanced age, he desired to bless Esau himself. Jacob, likewise, while dying, blessed the children of Joseph and as many others as were worthy. And now, finally, Moses does the same for the tribes. For fathers who are departing used to transmit the gift that was peculiar to themselves into a common heritage. For from the one principle, God extends His grace to all—a principle which truly represents Christ, who, after He migrated to heaven, transmits His gift to His own, namely, the divine Spirit, through whom He makes them children of God from men, and renders His disciples images of Himself, so that through them He might be present to us. According to the saying: "He who receives you, receives Me." Wherefore, to His mother also concerning His disciple, He speaks in these words: "Behold thy son." For He committed him to her as if it were Himself, whom He also entrusted to her faith no otherwise than His own self, and in turn He said to the disciple: "Behold thy mother." Those, therefore, who have founded a single house pour their own goods into it; who, moreover, transfer one nation into another. Thus Christ also established in him who was most similar to Him, not a carnal genus, but one subject to Him. Jacob, therefore, while dying, promised that he would foretell future things, nor did he pronounce merely auspicious words for them. For he cursed others of the tribes, such as Levi and Simeon. But Moses calls his own words blessings, as he rendered Jacob's execrations void. But what else is a blessing than the dissolution of an execration? And this indeed 472 bore the figure of Christ who was about to free Israel from the curse of the law. For in Him is the horn of plenty. Indeed, in the law, as it says, there is no perfection. Which certainly it was fitting for Israel to know, namely, that the execration might pass into blessing, and not to reproach Christ, who transferred them into a blessing, with the cross and suspension from a tree. Wherefore, at the beginnings of his blessings, Moses set the Savior. Who is the head of both the former and the latter blessings, not of those only which regard Israel, but also of those which concern all other kingdoms.
*The Lord came from Sinai, and dawned for us from Seir.* [2.] He speaks of the appearing of the Lord, which He performed on the mountain when He gave the law, with a host of angels, through whom He promulgated the law and commended to Moses the excellent fortune of Israel. Concerning which it is written: "He has not dealt so with any nation: nor has He made His judgments known to them." Then He uttered a prophecy concerning Christ, such that the Lord Himself is the One who gave the law, and He exists as King of the beloved people, with whom He will also bless all nations, who are signified by the name of princes. Just as David also said: "The princes of the people are gathered together with the God of Abraham." For when the law was being sanctioned, there was not yet sincere obedience to His kingdom. For since the law takes the place of a pedagogue, it was not sufficiently suitable for reconciling them to God, until the Lord Himself gave Himself to the kingdom and to the administration of Jewish and Greek affairs. But regarding the fact that He says some things of Him and other things to Him, He either did this simply, or He wishes to demonstrate His twofold person, and to join the Son to the Father as coessential: just as Zechariah also, speaking from the person of God, indicated His affliction and death; for he says: "They shall look on Him whom they pierced." In another place, too, one person is shown to be the one who sends, and another the one who is sent. The Lord of the angels is also heralded, through whom He also gave the law, according to the saying: "Ordained by angels in the hand of a mediator." And Stephen says: "You received the law by the injunctions of angels, and have not kept it."
B Sina is a mountain of Pharan, which is in Arabia, as Paul says. And Pharan is Cades, as he says in Numbers. And Seir and Edom is Esau. Whose boundary is near Pharan. "From Sina," he says, "the Lord has come," but not "into Sina"; and "He dawned from Seir," revealing His birth according to the flesh, of Him who also appeared in Sina in the form of fire and gave the law to them. For He delivers this lesson as necessary and saving for them, that He who is Seir—which is Edom (and Edom is "the earthly")—will be seen. "And He hastened," he says, "from Mount Pharan," hinting at the end of the law. For He no longer speaks only to the former people, but now also to all the nations. And it is also written, "and He rested," which indicates His eagerness to leave.
the shadow for the truth. A But Aquilas rendered it, "He appeared." For He appeared from the people who received the law. "For from Judah the Lord has sprung forth," according to the divine Apostle. Therefore also the Savior says, "If you believed Moses, you would believe Me; for he wrote about Me." And it is written again, "That salvation is from the Jews."
He says, moreover: "With ten thousands, at His right hand are angels with Him," by which He indicates that He is the Lord of the holy hosts. For Aquilas says still more clearly: "From ten thousands of the sanctuary, at His right hand." For when He had left the supernal majesty by reason of the incarnation—since He was at the right hand of the Father—He offered Himself to us; He spared the people, and saved the alien people, who are now God's—those, I say, whom the mercy of God had not apprehended, but now does apprehend, just as the great apostle Peter says. But under His hand He holds all the sanctified like a king, by whose ministry, indeed, they stand no otherwise than B do those of a father: "For He has put all things under His feet." Furthermore, the law speaks also of Him who, through the intercession of Moses, was given especially to the synagogues of Jacob, that is, to Israel. It will be "a prince in the beloved," from which it is permitted to estimate that the Father rules us through His beloved Son. "For He is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased." It is permitted nevertheless to consider the apostles in the place of princes, of whom David says: "He has subdued peoples to us, and nations under our feet."
"Let Ruben live and not die." [XXXIII, 6.] He removes C the singular curse of Jacob from the tribe, partly indeed weakening it, but partly leaving it in its state. For he says: "Do not boil," that is, do not grow heated toward begetting offspring. Which he surely broke in merit because of the love with which he was connected to his brother Joseph. But that which follows, "Let not the tribe of Jacob rule," he left unmoved. For the saying exists among the Septuagint: "Strong to endure, hard, stiff-necked, and what follows." Which Aquilas has thus: "You received superfluously, and because of your superfluous strength you boiled like water, and therefore you shall not luxuriate anymore." By which he indicates that the prerogative and excellence of empire is denied to him. Just as also the Savior: "I came," He says, "that they might have life, and have it abundantly." But the fact that he execrates the house of Ruben as a superfluous strength has its cause: because he was prone to lust and defiled his father’s bed. Of this kind also is that of David, when Nathan says: "You shall not surely die," and he relieves him from the condemnation of the law, but leaves to him the threats and the sting of blood. Although David even prayed to be delivered from this: "Deliver me from bloodguiltiness, O God, O God of my salvation." For the measure of punishment is not equal regarding all.
"Hear, O Lord, the voice of Judah." [7.] D He passed over Simeon, who along with Levi had received the curse because of the devastation of Shechem; on account of which Jacob uttered: "I will divide them in Jacob, and scatter them in Israel." But Levi, indeed, removed the curse by the name of the priesthood, and rendered the dispersion that was to be endured throughout the tribes happy and blessed. For he dwells as a stranger in the tithes of the tribes, that is, among those who have matured in Christ, and he is a stranger and sojourner. For before his birth he was consecrated to God by Jacob, who said: "And of all that You shall give me I will tithe it to
A Him." And the tenth from the last son is Levi, the end having been established as the beginning through Christ, who showed that the end is the beginning, having come at the end of the age and having introduced the blessing from the end. But Simeon is left to the Lord, and his correction is He who through grace restores all that was lacking in the Law. Just as God—not having brought back the ten tribes, called Ephraim, during the remission granted by the Lord—promises through Jeremiah to bring them back, namely through Christ, with the benefit being extended to all. This He signaled beforehand, saying, "The Lord has created a new thing on the earth; a woman shall compass a man." For it was indeed a new thing for a man to be conceived without a father, through whom we all have been renewed. B And so, Simeon, having been passed over in silence along with the other tribes, was also omitted. For there is a common promise regarding the nation that Israel will not cease to be a nation before God. Some say that since Moses was bestowing blessings, he would not have left his own tribe unblessed. But God blessed the tribe for his sake, just as for the sake of the brotherly love of Reuben. But Simeon had no pretext to receive a blessing. Indeed, they suspect him of having been the ringleader of the conspiracy against Joseph, and for that reason Joseph released the others but kept him confined. Some also say that Simeon was the ringleader in the prostitution with the Philistines, at the time when Phinehas was justified through his zeal. Others say that he was blessed together with the tribe of Levi. For just as the words of a curse are common, so too the words of a blessing can be communal. Moses, therefore, having passed over Simeon in silence, does not proceed in order to Levi, but to Judah, C because He does not lead this tribe from a curse to a blessing, as He does the Levitical one, and because the Lord’s body was to spring not from priests, but from kings. And since there are two dignities in the Law, the royal was preferred over the priestly because of this. But according to Jacob’s prophecy, he was dispersed just as Levi and Benjamin, having received an oblique place, running through all the tribes in succession.
Now, what is said by Moses concerning Judah is in agreement with what was said before by Jacob. For He gives the king help in wars, as David says, who inherited the kingdom: "He who subjects my people under me." Similar to the, "Judah, your brethren shall praise you," is that, "You shall lead him forth over his people," according to Symmachus; and to that, "Your hands shall be on the backs of your enemies," is the, "His hands shall fight for him." D The help from heaven, pointed out by Jacob, Moses briefly states thus: "He shall be a helper against those who rise up against him." And what is said concerning Christ is confirmed by Zechariah, who said: "Salvation from our enemies."
"Give to Levi his manifestations, and his truth to the holy man." In the midst of the twelve stones [upon [...]]
A, the light was the truth, represented by two other stones. They set forth the prophecies revealed through this tribe, and the ministry, or sacred counsel, perpetually decreed for it, which abandoned its own lineage and chose God before itself, and also the exact knowledge of the laws, by which they sometimes instructed those judges who were unskilled. To whom it was said: "Carry out the law with the utmost diligence, as the Levitical priests shall announce it to you." Furthermore, by their sacred work they averted the punishment hanging over the people as well. Wherefore B truly: "Bless his strength," he says; for sacrifices are without efficacy if they lack power. Through them also the strength of the enemies was sometimes cast down. For whatever happens to the people is referred to the leading race. Just as it is said also to Moses, the prince of the Levites: "I shall by no means ascend with you, because the people are stiff-necked." And conversely, he ascribed to the tribe what had happened to the leaders. For Symmachus clearly made this manifest by rendering it thus: "Your perfection, and your teaching to the holy man, whom you tested in examination. You tested him by the waters of contention." For Moses was not ashamed to declare, as much concerning himself as concerning his brother, that he had been tested at the waters of contention, and that they had been condemned not to enter into the land of promise. This, however, which is among the Seventy, may be thought to be said concerning Christ as well. Concerning whom Paul says: "For it was fitting that we should have such a High Priest, holy, innocent," and what follows. And again: "Consider the Apostle and High Priest of our confession, Jesus Christ, who is faithful to Him who appointed Him." For He is graced with this title on account of His humanity. To Him, therefore, he says, give the manifestation and the truth. Wherefore he also clarified this to those who followed, saying: "To the holy man." For He did not commit sin, as is evident from the words of the Apostle as well. And if he said "man," he demonstrates Him to be God, saying: "As they tested Him," just as David also says after the provision of the waters: "And they tested Him in their heart, and spoke against God," and what follows. Which Paul having also understood, says: "And they drank from the spiritual rock that followed them; and the rock was Christ." For He existed both before the flesh and after it. C And this having been declared, Moses added: "Who says to his father and to his mother, I have not seen you, and he did not recognize his brethren." He prophesies the same things which are established in the Gospels; for when someone of the disciples had said to Christ: "Behold, your mother and your brothers stand outside, desiring to see you," He answered: "My mother and my brothers are these who hear the word of God, and do it." D
A The ancient Levites, who were devoted to God, were a figure of the holy apostles, as Peter says: "But we will devote ourselves to prayer and to the ministry of the word," because that pertains more closely to the spirit than the things that were offered by the Law. For their speech was not about judgments and legal cases, but about explanations of the mysteries that had been hidden from eternity by God.
B And to Benjamin he said: "The beloved of the Lord shall dwell in safety; and God shall shadow him all the days, and he rested between his shoulders." [XXXIII, 12.] This is a prophecy concerning the glory of Jerusalem. For it falls to the lot of Benjamin. Truly, in Jerusalem is the temple and the abode of God, of which David says: "The Lord has chosen Zion, He has desired it for His habitation." And elsewhere: "God has established it for eternity." To which this also corresponds: "And shall shadow him all the days." Furthermore, there is that saying: "Arise, O Lord, into your rest; you and the ark of your sanctuary." Moreover, to other parts of Israel the kingdom was also joined, which is properly the Lord's. Concerning this, the psalm next says: "There I will bring forth a horn to David, I have prepared a lamp for my Christ." And so that the constancy of this kingdom might be denoted: "His seed shall remain for ever," he says: "And his throne shall be as the sun before me, and as the moon established for ever." Therefore, the place of Jerusalem is joined to both the kingdom and the priesthood, because the kingdom was given to the tribe of Judah, but the priesthood to Levi. He makes mention of both of these together in what follows. C But after both those tribes, Benjamin is blessed, even though Jacob had prophesied concerning Benjamin last in order: "Benjamin is a ravening wolf," and so on. But Jacob indeed prophesied concerning the inhabitants of the places, whereas Moses prophesied concerning the place itself, as though God were to rest in it, just as the heavenly Cherubim were harnessed to Him. For such also is that: "He rested between his shoulders." This is similar to the passage in Hosea: "Ephraim is a heifer taught to thresh; but I will go up upon the beauty of her neck." And the Lord, sitting on an ass, entered into Jerusalem, indicating the preeminence of the nations that had been unclean.
D After the place, he further prophesies concerning the tribe itself, and illustrates the skill of that tribe in military matters, which shone forth from the warriors in Ramah, which is a city in the tribe of Benjamin. Therefore, he compares it to a ravening wolf, which tears away the goods of its enemies and distributes them. But even if he leaves behind that small significance or mystery, that saying: "He rested between his shoulders," may nevertheless be referred in the mind to Paul, who, born from the tribe of Benjamin, indeed tore apart the Church, but later, with the demons as the declared enemies, divided the spoils: that is, men extracted from the empire of the demons, and attributed to the princes of the Church. Just as the Lord also declared that He would bind the strong one, and divide his spoils. For the reason that, as is evident, it stands written in the Acts: "For he shall carry my name before the nations."
Joseph item dixit: Benedicta est a Domino terra ejus, etc. [XXXIII, 15.] Symmachus rendered this more obscurely. A Jacob placed Benjamin before Joseph, because he observed the sequence of time; but Moses placed him after, to accommodate the place to both kingdom and priesthood. And indeed, the former set forth the snares laid for Joseph and the divine aid, and to these he finally joins the blessing as the reward for his clemency toward his brothers. But the latter puts the blessing first, in which he prophesies the fertility of the land, by which the crops are nourished both by dew from above and by subterranean springs, by the heat of the sun, and by the moisture of the moon; and the mountains and meadows bring forth fruit, as it seemed good to God, who was seen by him in the bush through angelic vision, having accepted his clemency toward those who plotted against him, in accordance with which he, when sold, did not take revenge, but instead treated those who acted as enemies as brothers. B Furthermore, he indicates that his future martial strength would be as if it were of horns. He also located his settlement both on this side of the Jordan and across it, as far as the extreme borders of Judea; for on this side is Ephraim and the half-tribe of Manasseh, but on the other is the remaining half. Jacob, however, persisted in the order whereby he preferred Ephraim to Manasseh, since the junior was preferred before the two peoples; but Moses, as a prophet, foresaw both the future kingdom and his seat, as well as the lot of Joseph and what would befall the whole tribe.
Rejoice, Zabulon, in your going forth.
[18.] He rightly bids him to rejoice, in that he was to enjoy both land and sea. For he advanced to the sea so as to reach the harbors and shores of the seas, just as Jacob prophesied. These things, however, will come to him if he worships God.And Issachar in your tents.
He also bids him to be of good courage. He holds the middle portion between the maritime Zabulon and Nephtalim—those, I mean, who, with respect to the continent and to Joseph, who inclines toward the east, lean more toward the west. Consequently, he made use of both, for he possesses fertile land and is devoted to agriculture, just as Jacob foretold.Blessed is he who dilates Gad.
[20.] Jacob also made it manifest that the tribe would be warlike and would overcome enemy forces, but Moses foretold that a prince would arise from it. And the prince is the overseer of justice, whose leader is God Himself. Therefore he added that the Lord wrought justice and judgment with Israel.And to Dan he said: A lion’s whelp, and he shall leap out of Basan.
[22.] As we have in the book of Judges, he acquired the maritime region through war, when they also brought in the ephod and the carved image taken from the house of Micah.Nephtalim satietas.
[23.] For here he D both with earthly andmaritime abundance, because he dwells by the sea; and Galilee lies to the south of him, according to the Law (28). A
He likened softness and the delicacy of things to oil; and as for iron and bronze, he says that they will serve them for the purpose of footwear, as things imported by sea, and that their strength will remain with him for all time. It should be known that the holy Fathers provide especially for spiritual gifts. For the lots of the tribes upon the earth have become shadows of the various mansions in heaven according to the condition of men, representing the heavenly [estate] of which it is written: "Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth." Paul also, signifying this, says: "You have been enriched in him in all speech and knowledge," and Christ says: "There are many mansions in my Father's house." Yet the good things that are bestowed upon the earth also proceed from God the Creator. B
*There is none like unto the God of the beloved.* [26.] This is a hymn of God bringing into [the context] the power derived from Him, even the good things previously mentioned for Israel. And he calls the aether his dwelling, because of its purity, above all powers, which he calls eternal arms subject to God. This signifies that Israel is not placed under ministering powers as other nations are, but belongs to the God over all. This applies even more to the Church of Christ. C Which fits the Church of Christ even better, according to that word: "He appointed him head over all things for the Church, which is the beginning of all power and all authority."
*And Israel shall dwell in safety, alone.* [28.] David also says similar things: "He cast out the nations before them, and measured out an inheritance for them by line, and made the tribes of Israel to dwell in their tents." When, namely, he dwelt alone, he had a secure habitation. D
*Blessed art thou, O Israel: who is like unto thee, O people saved by the Lord?* [29.] In the first place, he is proclaimed blessed because of the power and honor received from God, which Israel possessed at that time. Habakkuk also says the same regarding his descendants, prophesying: "Upon the necks of mine enemies constitute me." For God has appointed the struggle for the righteous in this life, and He mounts men upon their heads, so that if they contend lawfully, they may receive the crown. And while suffering the things befitting the righteous, they do not turn away from justice because of their sufferings, that they may receive a just reward for their righteousness.
*It is similar* to the saying: "There is none like unto the God of the beloved," to that in the prologue: "And there shall be a king in the Beloved." And just as here: "Underneath him are the eternal arms." Thus also there, and more clearly indeed: "All the holy ones are under thy hands, and they are under thee." [alt-version omitted]