Commentaria in Leviticum
“From the Lord,” they say, that is, from the altar of incense, which was turned toward the propitiatory (which was as it were the throne of God), the fire came forth which devoured Nadab and Abiu; for they with their censers had already entered the Holy, and on the altar of incense had offered and burnt strange fire, as is said in verse 1; whence from the same altar the avenging fire burst forth; for they were punished for a sacrilege, not intended in mind but perpetrated in deed.
Where note: The fire fallen from heaven was carried from the altar of holocausts in censers to the altar of incense, daily, morning and evening, to burn the incense; wherefore the same heavenly fire was reckoned to belong as much to the altar of incense as to that of holocausts, and perhaps it had already actually been carried to the altar of incense, that the evening incense might be burnt: for these things seem to have happened, all the sacrifices of Aaron being completed, which easily occupied the whole eighth day, toward its evening, when it was time to burn the incense. From this altar therefore the sacred fire, not enduring the company of strange fire, leapt forth, and swallowed it up with the offerers. Observe: they are justly punished by fire who had sinned by fire; for in what a man sins, in that also is he punished.
Hence it is plain that it is a fiction which the Rabbis say, namely that Nadab and Abiu were consumed by fire because they had not washed their hands and feet according to the precept of Exodus 30:19, because they had not put on all the sacred garments but only the tunics, because they had refused to take wives, because they had taught about the law in the presence of Moses, against him. Mystically, this fire is the fire of divine examination and the fire of vengeance, 1 Corinthians 3:13. So Radulphus. Again, this fire is the excommunication of the Church, says Hesychius.
It devoured them—not by wholly burning them up and consuming them, but after the manner of lightning by blasting and slaying; for afterwards their bodies, whole, were buried; and God did this for the consolation of Aaron, and to mitigate their punishment. God willed to sanction the new law and the religion of the priesthood by so severe a vengeance, as an example to posterity. St. Peter set a like example to Christians in punishing Ananias and Sapphira, Acts 5. Hence Abulensis probably opines that God punished Nadab and Abiu with present death that they might escape eternal; and so either that they sinned only venially, or, if they sinned mortally, that they blotted it out by contrition before they breathed forth their soul; a sign of which is, first, that their bodies remained unharmed; secondly, that Moses commanded them to be buried in sacred garments; thirdly, that God commanded the whole people to lament them. Hence Radulphus: “Their death,” he says, “exhibited the figure rather than the truth of eternal death.”
Where note: God can justly punish venial sins also with death, even when scandal ceases, which a judge among men cannot do. For God is the absolute Lord of all, who has the supreme right and empire over the life and death of all. An illustrious example of which is 3 Kings 13:24, where the man of God and holy prophet was killed by a lion by God’s command, because, deceived by another prophet, he had taken food in his house, which God had forbidden him. In like manner God slew Oza, because he had steadied and touched the falling ark, 2 Kings, chapter 6, verse 6.
Verse 3. This is what the Lord hath spoken.—Where and when God said what follows is not known, because it is nowhere expressed or written. I noted the like in verse 1. Hence it is plain that many things were said and commanded by God to Moses and the Hebrews which are not written, but were handed down by tradition.
I will be sanctified in them that approach to me.— That is, in the priests who approach my sacred rites I will show that I am holy, and therefore that I will that those who minister to me be holy, I will declare by punishing the profane and sacrilegious (1). By punishment therefore and justice, as by clemency, God is sanctified, that is, shows Himself holy. Hence St. Augustine, Question 31: “God,” he says, “was sanctified in them, because by this vengeance fear of Him was commended to others.” For this reason Numa Pompilius instituted among the Romans that someone should cry out to those sacrificing: “Hoc age” (Do this), whereby they themselves and the bystanders might be admonished to attend to divine things with the utmost attention and reverence, lest they incur God’s offence and vengeance.
Verse 4. Brethren—kinsmen; for they were in the third degree of consanguinity. Like is Genesis 13:8, where Abraham calls Lot brother, that is, nephew by a brother.
Verse 6. Uncover not your heads.—The Septuagint render, “you shall not uncover your heads,” that is, you shall not bare the tiara, as if to say: You shall not lament the death of your brethren Nadab and Abiu, nor give signs of mourning, nor go forth to their funeral. It is strange that the Chaldee renders in the contrary sense, “you shall not multiply,” or “you shall not nourish the hair of your heads”; perhaps he took the Hebrew tiphrau in the contrary signification, so as to signify to wear hair, or to nourish hair, from the fact that its root signifies hair. So also in other places the version and the fidelity of the Chaldee wavers from time to time, when he himself rabbinizes with the Talmudists.
The custom of mourners was to rend their garments, and with heads bared to sprinkle dust, as is plain from Job 2:12. Therefore the priests, who ought neither to rend their garments nor to bare the head, are forbidden to lament the death of their brethren. For in the recency of their consecration the public honour and sanctification of themselves above all was to be provided for and spared, lest they either rend the new sacred vestments, or the pontiff lay aside from his head, which he had bathed with the sacred ointment (sprinkling it, perhaps, with dust through excess of grief), the adorned tiara, and so make this feast funereal. This reason God Himself gives:
Mystically, when strange fire, that is heresy, rises up, one must not bare the intelligible head, that is, one must not lay aside the whole faith concerning the divinity of Christ (for this is the head of Christ), nor rend the garments, that is, weaken or cut away the robe of Christ’s humanity and His deeds: for to this almost all heresies tend, namely to assail either the divinity or the humanity of Christ. So Hesychius.
Lest perhaps you die.—The word “perhaps” is not that of one in doubt; for they were certainly about to die if they did what is here forbidden, namely if they bewailed their brethren. Yet Scripture sometimes uses this phrase of doubt in things certain, to show that men have free will, and that the event is free and uncertain; for although this conditional proposition was certain, “If you mourn, you shall die,” yet the event, namely the death, was uncertain, because it was uncertain whether they would make the lamentation for which they would be punished with death. So St. Gregory, homily 9 on Ezechiel, Chrysostom and Jerome on Matthew, chapter 21.
And indignation come upon all the congregation—as if to say: lest the people be punished by God on account of the sin of the pontiff and the priests, as their princes and heads.
Verse 7. But you shall not go out from the door of the tabernacle—that is, from the door of the court of the tabernacle; for in the court the priests remained, but not in the tabernacle itself, or the Holy: so often in Leviticus and elsewhere the tabernacle is taken for the court of the tabernacle; for this was as it were the tabernacle and temple, both of the priests and of the laity.
For the oil of the holy unction is upon you—as if to say: You have just been anointed and consecrated priests, and in reverence of this new consecration I will that you abstain from all defilements, even of funerals, and likewise from lamentation and dust; because, as Radulphus says: “It is unworthy that those on whom so great a recompense of heavenly graces has been poured out should too immoderately bewail earthly losses.” Hence the people are here permitted to lament, but not the priests the death of their brethren. Let the priests and religious of the New Testament note this.
Verse 9. Wine and everything that can make drunk (the Hebrew is yayin and shechar, every strong drink, that is, every intoxicating thing) (1), thou shalt not drink, thou and thy sons, when you enter into the tabernacle of the testimony, lest you die. Under pain of death wine and strong drink are here forbidden to the priest about to perform the sacred rites, that he may escape sluggishness, forgetfulness, sleep, madness: for these are the offspring and issue of wine and strong drink, says Philo, book 2 On Monarchy; and that, being master of himself, he may have the knowledge of discerning between holy and unholy, between unclean and clean, as is said in verse 10, as if to say: that in ministering he may not err, but may distinguish the sacred from the profane; and may teach it to the children of Israel. Hence some suspect that Nadab and Abiu were punished because they had not guarded themselves against excessive drink, and thereby had taken profane fire for sacred; for why else should this one law of abstinence from wine be thrust in and sanctioned here, immediately upon their death? why else would they be commanded to separate the holy from the profane?
(1) “In the Hebrew speech, sicera is every drink that can intoxicate: whether that which is made of grain, or of the juice of apples, or when honeycombs are boiled down into a sweet and barbarous drink, or the fruit of palms is pressed into a liquor, and water, the grains having been boiled, is made thicker and coloured.”