Commentaria in Deuteronomium
Chapter the Twentieth. Synopsis of the Chapter
God commands that in war new builders of houses, vine-dressers, bridegrooms and the fearful be sent home. Secondly, vers. 13, he commands that in a city taken in war all males be slain, except infants: but in Chanaan he commands all, even women and infants, to be slain. Thirdly, vers. 19, he forbids the fruit-bearing trees of the enemy’s city to be cut down, but permits the barren ones to be felled.
1. If thou go out to war against thy enemies, and see horsemen and chariots, and the numbers of the enemy’s army greater than thine, thou shalt not fear them; because the Lord thy God is with thee, who brought thee out of the land of Egypt. 2. And when the battle is now at hand, the priest shall stand before the army, and shall speak thus to the people: 3. Hear, O Israel, you join battle this day against your enemies, let not your heart be afraid, fear ye not, give not back, do not ye dread them: 4. because the Lord your God is in the midst of you, and will fight for you against your enemies, to deliver you from danger. 5. And the captains shall proclaim, through every band, in the hearing of the army: What man is there that hath built a new house, and hath not dedicated it? let him go, and return to his house, lest he die in the battle, and another man dedicate it. 6. What man is there that hath planted a vineyard, and hath not yet made it common, whereof all may eat? let him go, and return to his house, lest he die in the battle, and another man execute his office. 7. What man is there that hath espoused a wife, and not taken her? let him go, and return to his house, lest he die in the battle, and another man take her. 8. After these words they shall add the rest, and shall speak to the people: What man is there that is fearful, and faint-hearted? let him go, and return to his house, lest he make the hearts of his brethren to fear, as he himself is possessed with fear. 9. And when the captains of the army shall hold their peace, and have made an end of speaking, every man shall prepare his bands to fight. 10. If at any time thou come to besiege a city, thou shalt first offer it peace. 11. If it receive it, and open the gates to thee, all the people that are in it shall be saved, and shall serve thee paying tribute. 12. But if they will not make peace, and begin war against thee, thou shalt besiege it, 13. And when the Lord thy God shall deliver it into thy hands, thou shalt slay all that are in it of the male sex with the edge of the sword, 14. excepting women and children, cattle and other things that are in the city. Thou shalt divide all the prey to the army, and thou shalt eat the spoils of thy enemies, which the Lord thy God hath given thee. 15. So shalt thou do to all cities that are at a great distance from thee, and are not of these cities which thou shalt receive in possession. 16. But of those cities that shall be given thee, thou shalt suffer none at all to live: 17. but shalt kill them with the edge of the sword, to wit, the Hethite, and the Amorrhite, and the Chanaanite, the Pherezite, and the Hevite, and the Jebusite, as the Lord thy God hath commanded thee; 18. lest they teach you to do all the abominations which they have done to their gods, and you should sin against the Lord your God. 19. When thou shalt besiege a city a long time, and compass it with bulwarks to take it, thou shalt not cut down the trees that may be eaten of, neither shalt thou destroy the country round about with axes: for it is a tree, and not a man, neither can it increase the number of them that fight against thee. 20. But if there be any trees that are not fruit-bearing, but wild, and fit for other uses, cut them down, and make engines, until thou take the city which fighteth against thee.
4. THOU SHALT NOT FEAR THEM (the enemy’s chariots and multitude), BECAUSE THE LORD THY GOD IS WITH THEE,—who is able to save, and to give victory as well in few as in many. Let the commanders of camps note this, and take care that their soldiers live Christianly and piously, and so have God with them: for then they will be invincible; for if God be for us, who is against us? Constantine, Theodosius, Charles, Godfrey of Bouillon, the Machabees, and in this age Ferdinand, Charles V, Albuquerque and others have proved it. “Soldiers,” says Constantine, “ought not to place their hope in arms or strength of body, but to acknowledge the God of the universe, the author of all good things and of victory itself,” as Eusebius relates, book iv of the Life of Constantine, chap. xix. Commanders and soldiers, therefore, that they may obtain victory, should observe that of chap. xxiii, 9: “When thou goest out against thy enemies to fight, thou shalt keep thyself from every evil thing,” as from fornication, drunkenness, plunder, brawls, oaths, blasphemies, duels, envy, etc.
This Josue did, who succeeded Moses, and therefore gained so many victories. This Narses did, the restorer of the camp of Italy, who was kind to the poor. And Procopius, book iii On the Gothic War, writes that the same man referred all success of affairs and all felicity in war to God alone; and exhorted the soldiers who were about to advance into the line to a like piety.
Hear a memorable example of a Moor. Cabaon, leader of the Moors around Tripoli, after he heard that the Vandals were making war against him, first commanded his subjects to abstain from all iniquity and from food that made for delicacy, and from all things, most of all from intercourse with women. And having pitched two camps, in the one he himself was with the men in arms, in the other he shut up the women, threatening the penalty of death if any of the women should enter the rampart. Then he sent spies to Carthage, with orders, if they saw any impiety committed by the Vandals in the churches of the Christians, to look on, and afterwards, when the Vandals had gone away, to restore it; and he added that he himself did not know the God whom the Christians worshipped, but that it seemed to him fitting, if (as was said) he was strong and powerful, that he should punish the despisers of his godhead and protect his worshippers. The spies, after they came to Carthage, saw a huge preparation of war. Then, following the army, they saw horses and beasts of burden brought into the churches of the Christians, wantonness and lust practised, priests beaten with stripes, and many other impious and horrible things done by the Vandals. They, after the Vandals’ departure, cleansed the churches, honoured the priests, and freely distributed alms to the poor. At length, the battle being joined, the Vandals were slaughtered to a man, and the Moors carried off the victory. So Evagrius, book iv, chap. xv, and Nicephorus, book xvii, chap. xi.
Lastly, Jovian, when after the death of Julian the Apostate he was chosen emperor, said: “I cannot rule the army of Julian, which is imbued with so pestilent a doctrine; for such an army, forsaken by God, will easily be overcome by the enemy.” Hearing this, the soldiers cried out with one voice: Doubt not; thou shalt rule Christian men, brought up in true piety. So Theodoret, book iv, chap. i.
5. AND THE CAPTAINS SHALL PROCLAIM, ETC.: WHAT MAN IS THERE THAT HATH BUILT A NEW HOUSE, AND HATH NOT DEDICATED IT?—“Hath not dedicated,” in Hebrew “hath not initiated,” that is, hath not begun to dwell in it. The Lord willed that these be sent back from the camp to their own, lest through desire of their own things, which they had not yet enjoyed, they should slacken in the battle and take to flight, to the scandal and danger of their comrades. For a soldier ought to be free and unencumbered in mind as well as in body. So Abulensis. St. Augustine, Question xxx, notes that this is said not so much by way of command as by way of trial and permission, to test the minds of the men: for those who manfully wished to overcome and lay aside this excessive attachment to their own things could remain in the camp; but those who could not or would not overcome this attachment went home, and in withdrawing from the camp betrayed their faint-heartedness, and that they were held by an excessive attachment to their own things.
6. WHAT MAN IS THERE THAT HATH PLANTED A VINEYARD, AND HATH NOT YET MADE IT COMMON?—who has not yet enjoyed its fruit? which came about only in the fifth year; for by the law of Leviticus xix, 25, in the first three years the fruits were counted unclean; in the fourth year they belonged to God, and were as it were sacred; in the fifth year they became common or profane, as the Hebrew has it, and anyone with the owner’s consent might eat of them.
Vers. 7.—7. WHAT MAN IS THERE THAT HATH ESPOUSED (to himself) A WIFE, AND HATH NOT TAKEN HER?—Tropologically it is signified, says Cyril in his Collections, that he who has lately received virtue dwelling with him ought not to be led out to labours and persecutions until he is plainly bound and attached to its love.
Vers. 8.—8. WHAT MAN IS THERE THAT IS FEARFUL?—So by this law Gedeon, about to go against the Madianites, cried out: If any man is fearful of heart, let him depart from the camp; and of thirty-two thousand fighting men, twenty-two thousand departed, Judges vii, 3. For in war three hundred resolute and spirited soldiers will do more than thirty thousand fearful and hesitating. Scipio Africanus, being asked by someone on what he relied that he dared to carry his army from Sicily to Africa against the Carthaginians, showed him three hundred men, adding: “There is none of these who, at my command, would not climb this tower and cast himself headlong into the sea.” So Plutarch in the Roman Apophthegms. Courage is therefore required in the soldier, especially in the captain and leader. The spirited Alexander, what did he not break through? He had few soldiers, the enemy innumerable: Parmenio advised that he should rush upon them secretly by night; to whom he said: “I will not steal a victory.”
Like him was Caius Fabricius, the Roman consul, to whom the physician of Pyrrhus promised by letter that, at his bidding, he would kill Pyrrhus with poison; Fabricius sent that letter to Pyrrhus. The spirited consul therefore would not overthrow the king by guile, but in open war: hence he also sent back to him as many captives as he himself had sent. So Plutarch in the Roman Apophthegms. It is therefore the part of a soldier in war not to be afraid, nor to fear death, but rather to wish for it; for, as Epaminondas said: “Most beautiful is death in war.” This is most true of the Christian soldier, who, living as a Christian, fights for God, for the Church, for justice. “More beautiful is the soldier slain in battle than safe in flight,” says Livy, book ii, decade 4. And Philemon: “The soldier,” he says, “is a victim, to be sacrificed for his country when the time comes.” The mothers of the Lacedaemonians used to tell them “either to return victors with their arms, or to be carried back dead upon them”: Valerius Maximus is witness, book ii, chap. vii. That was Caesar’s saying: “Learn to strike, learn to die.” One syllable, short or long, will vary thy fate: either thou shalt slay (occides) or thou shalt fall (occides). Show thyself ready for either, at all hours and in all places. Aratus said “it is the part of a soldier to make nothing of life.” Xerxes, hearing how bravely and successfully Artemisia had acted against his own men in the naval battle, said “that the women had become men to him, and the men women,” because they had acted but ill; Herodotus is witness, book viii. When, by the disorder of the ranks in Marcellus’s forces, Hannibal had come off victor, Marcellus, returning to the camp and calling together the army, said “that he indeed saw many Roman arms and bodies, but no Roman”: Plutarch is witness in the Marcellus.
10. IF AT ANY TIME THOU COME TO BESIEGE A CITY, THOU SHALT FIRST OFFER IT PEACE.—He speaks of a city which lay outside the land of promise, as is plain from vers. 15: for if this received peace on condition of tribute, all the inhabitants being saved, it became tributary to the Hebrews; but if it refused peace, it was stormed, and all the inhabitants by the law of war and by God’s command were put to death, except the women and infants: for to the cities lying in Chanaan the Hebrews could not offer peace; but had to kill all the inhabitants without exception, even women and infants, both because all Chanaan had been delivered by God to the Hebrews to possess; and because the Chanaanites were most wicked men, and as it were a corrupted and accursed seed, whom, if they had been spared, they would have drawn the Hebrews dwelling with them to their idols and vices, as is said vers. 18, and more fully Wisdom xii, 3 and following. Let princes here learn to offer peace before war, namely by peacefully demanding just satisfaction from the enemy. For, “The will ought to have peace, necessity war.”
19. THOU SHALT NOT CUT DOWN THE TREES THAT MAY BE EATEN OF ETC., FOR IT IS A TREE, AND NOT A MAN.—So also the Chaldee: wherefore take the Hebrew interrogatively, with the Septuagint, in this way: Is then the tree of the field a man, that it should come before thee into the siege? as if to say: The fruit-tree is useful to thee, and yet it cannot besiege thee, and may do thee harm: therefore it is not to be cut down, but preserved; but other trees, though they cannot harm, because yet they are unfruitful, will serve thee to construct warlike engines. So Abulensis.
Others, as Vatablus, thus render and explain the Hebrew: the trees of the fields are (understand: the life) of men; they are not to be cut down; this reason is given, that those trees are not men, and therefore cannot resist the Israelites about to besiege the city. Should not the same also be said of unfruitful trees?
Vers. 20. For “take the city” the Hebrew is “come down,” that is, fall, namely the walls falling.