Commentaria in Deuteronomium
“my prayer,” is the same as what follows: “And let my cry come to thee;” and so in very many others. So here: “Let my doctrine gather as the rain,” is almost the same as what follows: “Let my speech distil as the dew, as a shower upon the herb, and as drops upon the grass.” Note secondly, that the word of God is aptly compared to drops and dew: because like dew it soothes the soul, moistens, fattens and makes fruitful. Hence Abbot Pimenion, to one complaining that, though he held the word of God with great desire, he could not embrace it, answered: “The nature of water is exceeding soft, but the hardness of stones is great; yet when it falls drop by drop upon the hard flint, at length it pierces it: so also the word of God is soft and sweet, but our hearts are hard, and less capable of it. But the heart of him who frequently and diligently hears the word of God, it at length so softens, Where note: Moses says the same thing in many synonymous words, or almost synonymous, both for emphasis and for the sake of Hebraism. For the Hebrews are wont, especially in poetic song, in the second hemistich to repeat the same, or nearly the same, in other words, which they had said in the first;
thus: “Incline unto my aid;” for this is the same as what he subjoins: “O Lord, make haste to help me;” thus: “To thee is the poor left,” the same almost as what follows: “Thou wilt be a helper to the fatherless;” thus: “O Lord, hear my prayer” … that he may fully perceive its sweetness and fruit.” Nay, Horus Apollo too, book I of the Hieroglyphics, xxxv: The Egyptians, he says, when indicating doctrine, painted a heaven pouring forth dew, because as dew softens and fructifies herbs, not rocks, so doctrine softens and imbues the docile, not the dull, hard and indocile.
3. BECAUSE I WILL INVOKE THE NAME OF THE LORD, as if to say: I will worship, praise and celebrate the majesty of the Lord; wherefore do you also, O Hebrews, GIVE MAGNIFICENCE TO OUR GOD,—by proclaiming His greatness and praise. For so this phrase is taken in Genesis xiv, last verse. Hence, conversely, for the name of God to be invoked upon someone is for God to be worshipped by him, and for him to be God’s and to be called His servant or people, as I said chap. xxviii, verse 10.
4. THE WORKS OF GOD ARE PERFECT,—as if to say: God is to be invoked and magnified because His works are in every way perfect, so that in no part can they be blamed, reproved or amended; and specially this work, by which He promised to your fathers to give the land of Chanaan, He has already done so faithfully and magnificently, and almost completed, that He has brought you to the entrance of that land; as if to say: The works of God are not like those of men, frail, defective, incomplete and faulty, in which almost always something is wanting; but are stable, complete and perfect. Again, when man has begun some work, he often does not finish it, but changes his plan and counsels; likewise when he has promised something, he often does not fulfil it: but God never recalls His counsels once begun, nor His promises, but always perfects and fulfils them; thirdly, God, O Israel, O man, did not create thy works imperfect and faulty, as He did not create thee a sinner.
or crag; for such is God, both for stability, immutability and fidelity in fulfilling promises, and because He most firmly fortifies and strengthens those who trust in Him.
AND ALL HIS WAYS (all His works are) JUDGMENTS,—that is, are just and equitable: for the Hebrews often use the abstract for the concrete, especially where there is emphasis.
Note here seven epithets and attributes of God: first, that He is magnificent; secondly, that He is tsur, that is, an immutable rock; thirdly, that He is perfect in all His works, that thou mayest learn from God that saying of the Wise Man: “In all thy works,” even the small, “be excellent;” fourthly, that He is just; fifthly, that He is faithful; sixthly, that He is without any iniquity, that is, most holy; seventhly, that He is right, who is turned aside from what is right and equitable neither by favour, nor hatred, nor gifts, nor flattery. Let the Saints imitate this, as sons of God, that they may be perfect, as their heavenly Father is perfect.
5. THEY HAVE SINNED AGAINST HIM, AND ARE NONE OF HIS CHILDREN IN THEIR FILTH.—The Interpreter has clearly rendered the Hebrew, which is involved, and says that the Hebrews sinned against Him, and therefore are not His children, who wallow in the filth of their sins; but have utterly denied their adoption, and therefore are a wicked and perverse generation. The Hebrew literally has: “This perverse and crooked generation hath corrupted to itself (namely its ways and actions, who) are not His children in their blemishes.”
The Septuagint read the Hebrew by transposition; for they render, they have sinned, not against Him; to which the Chaldee also alludes, they have scattered themselves, and not Him, the children who served idols. St. Augustine, explaining this, Question LV, says: They have sinned not against Him, because he who sins does not hurt God, but himself; or not against Him, understand as submitting themselves to Him as to a physician, because they would not do penance for their sins, nor return to Him.
A WICKED AND PERVERSE GENERATION.—The Chaldee renders otherwise: the orders of the world are perverted on account of it; as if to say: The whole harmony of this world is dissolved by reason of sins, as I showed on Genesis vi, 7.
6. IS THIS THE RETURN THOU MAKEST TO THE LORD, O FOOLISH AND SENSELESS PEOPLE?—He is foolish, says Abulensis, who acts
For since there are three, as Aristotle says at the beginning of book VI of the Ethics, principles of human acts, namely intellect, will and sense; if sense and sensual allurements deprave the intellect, this will deprave the will, which is the efficacious and proximate cause of all human actions; and so these likewise will be depraved.
IS NOT HE THY FATHER, THAT HATH POSSESSED THEE, AND MADE THEE, AND CREATED THEE?—For “hath possessed thee” may be rendered from the Hebrew, hath acquired, or bought thee, namely by redeeming thee from the Egyptians and taking thee to Himself to be the inheritance of the Lord, so that here there is a climax, or gradation; for God, first, redeemed thee; secondly, made thee, that is, formed thee at Sinai into His Church, people and commonwealth; thirdly, created thee, in Hebrew, established and made firm thee and thy kingdom. So also the Septuagint.
Abulensis takes “created” properly; whence he infers: “Moses,” he says, “proves here that God is to be worshipped by seven reasons: the first is by reason of creation, which attests the true God, and infinite power, to which latria is most truly due, and to no other thing.” But in this way “created” ought to precede “possessed.” The sense therefore which I have given from the Hebrew seems more genuine; especially since Moses here gives a peculiar title to the Jews, by which, chosen before other nations, they were bound to God, as is plain from what follows.
7. REMEMBER THE DAYS OF OLD,—of former days, in Hebrew, days of the age: which may also be taken of the days of the world, as if to say: Recall to memory the days since the world began, and thou shalt find that God created all men, and thee and thy parents, and showed Himself a father to them and to thee, and chose thee out of all nations, and prepared for thee this excellent inheritance of Chanaan.
8. WHEN THE MOST HIGH DIVIDED THE NATIONS, etc., HE APPOINTED THE BOUNDS OF PEOPLE ACCORDING TO THE NUMBER OF THE CHILDREN OF ISRAEL.—Procopius and Lyranus explain it thus: When God at Babel divided and dispersed the nations, He established as many nations as there were persons in the people of Israel who entered Egypt with Jacob, namely seventy: for the Hebrews reckon seventy tongues, as well as nations divided and dispersed, at the division of tongues and dispersion of nations at the tower of Babel. But that there were not seventy, but many fewer, I showed elsewhere.
The sense therefore is: When God dispersed the nations at Babel, He fixed the boundaries of regions and lands for them all, and this to the end that He might mark off and set apart for the children of Israel, not yet born but to be born, so much space of land for dwelling, as He knew was required and sufficient for their number and the convenient habitation of each; as if to say: From that time God designated and bounded the land of Chanaan, that it should not be occupied by others than the Chananeans, who were to be destroyed and expelled by the Hebrews. So Oleaster and Cajetan, whom see. Note here what great care God had of His people from ancient times.
Anagogically, Rupert: God decreed, he says, that the human race should endure until the term and number of the elect be filled.
The Septuagint render, he fixed the bounds of the nations according to the number of the angels of God, as though the children of Israel were here called angels, that is, children of God, since Israel means ruler, or strong prince: