Commentaria in Deuteronomium
So Alphonsus, king of Aragon, hating pomp, walked without a band of guards or a crowd of attendants; and when others blamed this, and urged him to walk surrounded by guards after the manner of other princes, he answered: “I go not alone, as you think, but accompanied by innocence, and there is no reason why I, relying on the goodwill of my citizens, should fear.” So Agesilaus walked without pomp, saying that majesty and glory are to be gained by prudence and virtue; and being asked how a prince without guards can be safe, he answered: “If he rule his subjects as a father his children.”
Hence some think that the use of horses was forbidden to the Jews; whence Oriolanus, in his notes on the book of Machabees, opines that the Jews never used horses, but asses. But it is truer that not horses, but only abundance of horses, was forbidden to the Jews, both here and in Psalm lxxv, 7, and Isaias ii, 8, as St. Jerome, Procopius and Basil plainly teach there. Hence pious kings and princes of the Jews in wars used for the most part infantry, scarcely cavalry, as is plain in the Machabees; but impious kings used great cavalry, as is plain of Joram, 2 Paralipomenon xxi, 9.
NOR LEAD BACK THE PEOPLE INTO EGYPT, BEING LIFTED UP WITH THE NUMBER OF HIS HORSEMEN,—namely to make war on the Egyptians, and wish to occupy Egypt. The Hebrew has: he shall not cause the people to return to Egypt, to multiply horses; that is, to buy up many horses for himself in Egypt, say Vatablus, Cajetan and others. But for this it was not necessary to lead the people back into Egypt, but it sufficed to send two or three merchants thither to buy up horses; wherefore our Interpreter skilfully took “to multiply horses” thus, as if he said: That by multiplying horses, and lifted up and growing proud with the number of his horsemen, he may dare to invade Egypt, and lead the people back thither.
forbade the kings too great a number of horses, lest through the desire of keeping them the king should wish the province of Gessen for himself and as a country for his people. For that there was a marvellous abundance of horses in Egypt already appears from 2 Paralipomenon ix, 28; 3 Kings x, 29. Yet Moses did not forbid all use of horses, but did not wish We read of Plato, in his apophthegms, that when he once mounted a horse, he presently dismounted, saying that he feared to be seized with the pride of horsemanship. For the horse is a proud animal, and riding has something lofty and magnificent in it. For this cause of pride, therefore, God would not have the king of his people multiply horses; but say with David, Psalm xix, 8: “Some trust in chariots, and some in horses: but we will call upon the name of the Lord our God.”
ESPECIALLY SINCE THE LORD HATH COMMANDED YOU THAT YOU SHOULD NOT RETURN ANY MORE BY THE SAME WAY.—When and where the Lord commanded this is nowhere written. He commanded, however, that they should not return by the same way, namely that which leads into Egypt, partly because the Hebrews were prone to the vices and manners of the Egyptians; partly lest, seeing Egypt fertile from the inundation of the Nile, they should make little of the deliverance of God, who had brought them thence out of most miserable servitude.
17. NEITHER SHALL HE HAVE MANY WIVES, THAT MAY ALLURE HIS MIND.—The Hebrew is: that his heart turn not away, namely from the law of God. Hence we understand, says St. Augustine, Question xxvi, and Rabanus, that kings were then permitted to have more wives than one, as David had; but not many, as Solomon had, and this lest by multiplying them they should at length come to foreign women, who would lead them to idols, as happened to Solomon. Secondly, lest the people, imitating their kings, should dissolve into luxury and lust; for the whole world is fashioned after the example of the king, and as Pindar says: The king is the mind and manners of all. And another: The king is the heart of the people.
So when Convallus reigned piously among the Scots, religion and probity wonderfully flourished among them: so that St. Columban crossed from Ireland into Scotland to see it, and, returning, being asked what miracles he had seen there, answered: “I saw one equal to all, namely King Convallus, who in the midst of delights and incitements to sin contends with monks and bishops in holiness; for which cause he is so revered by his subjects that they dare neither wrong others nor let anything ill be said of the king himself. Whence it comes that the king’s virtue restrains the fierce people from their wonted crimes and seditions more than his authority does.” So relates Hector Boece, History of Scotland, book ix.
that great herds of horses should be kept by the kings, and a huge cavalry maintained for war, whose use in defending Palestine would have been small. As for carriage, in Palestine, with its mountains and steep valleys, the use of horses was rarer, that of asses more frequent, of which also the greater men of the Israelites were wont to keep great herds. This ancient manner of conveyance, received from their fathers, the lawgiver wished to be preserved by posterity also, suited to Palestine, unsuited to Egypt, that by the very manner of household and life he might keep the people in Palestine. Alphonsus, king of Aragon, when his men discoursed about the duties of kings, and the happiness of them and of their kingdoms, said:
St. Augustine has expressed it best in these words: “Kings and kingdoms will be happy, if, first, they rule justly; secondly, if amid the tongues of those who honour them loftily and the service of those who salute them too humbly they are not puffed up, but remember that they are men; thirdly, if they make their power the handmaid of God’s majesty, to extend his worship as widely as possible; fourthly, if they fear, love and worship God; fifthly, if they love more that kingdom where they fear not to have partners; sixthly, if they are slower to avenge and ready to forgive; seventhly, if they exercise the same vengeance out of the necessity of governing and protecting the commonwealth, not to satisfy the hatreds of enmities; eighthly, if they grant the same pardon not for the impunity of iniquity, but in hope of correction; ninthly, if what they are for the most part compelled to decree harshly they compensate by the gentleness of mercy and the largeness of benefits; tenthly, if their luxury is the more restrained as it could be the freer; eleventhly, if they would rather rule their own desires than any nations whatever; twelfthly, if they do all these things not from the ardour of empty glory, but from the love of eternal happiness; thirteenthly, if for their sins they neglect not to offer to their true God the sacrifice of humility, compassion and prayer. Such Christian kings and emperors we shall say are happy, and their kingdoms also.” So Panormitanus in the Life of Alphonsus.
NEITHER IMMENSE SUMS OF SILVER AND GOLD.—Namely, lest the king, from desire of gold and wealth, plunder his subjects, and lest from his wealth he break out into pride and luxury; in which also Solomon sinned, oppressing the people with excessive tributes for his luxury, 3 Kings xii, 4. Let kings hear him confessing his vanity: “I heaped together for myself,” he says, “silver and gold, and the wealth of kings and provinces,” etc. “And when I turned myself to all the works which my hands had wrought, and to the labours wherein I had laboured in vain, I saw in all things vanity and vexation of mind, and that nothing was lasting under the sun.”
The Emperor Trajan called his exchequer the spleen, because its excessive increase is the detriment of the subjects and the people, from whom the money of the exchequer is exacted: for when the spleen grows and swells, the other limbs and members waste away.
18. HE SHALL COPY OUT DEUTERONOMY, ETC., AND SHALL READ IT ALL THE DAYS OF HIS LIFE.—Not that he is bound to read it continually or daily; but let him read it so often that he may be mindful of what is written in Deuteronomy.
19. THAT HE MAY LEARN TO FEAR THE LORD.—For Deuteronomy inculcates the fear of God more than Exodus or Leviticus; for Deuteronomy is the burning and perpetual discourse of Moses, inciting the Hebrews to the worship of God. So Abulensis.