Commentaria in I Regum (I Samuelis)
Tropologically, learn here that in the whole world there is no true rest except in God and in the love and worship of God. For this will bring forth rest of conscience, rest with neighbors, rest with enemies, rest from temptations. Hear Dionysius the Carthusian: “Let us strive to rest in God; for he is our end, to whom we ought always to look and aspire; in whom alone true and saving rest consists, and in him through faith, wisdom and virtues we are fixed. For it is best to establish the heart with grace.” Hebr. chap. 13, verse 9. “But the wicked walk round about.” Psalm 11, verse 9: “Because they cling to vain, perishable and changeable things, rather than to the highest and unchangeable good. And this very clinging, so inordinate, is sin, and an agitation of the mind. For as virtues steady and quiet the mind in God, so passions and vices render it restless, wavering and wandering.”
3. PREPARE YOUR HEARTS FOR THE LORD.—Hear St. Gregory: “He prepares his heart for the Lord who not only separates his mind from unclean thought, but also illumines it with the splendors of holy thoughts and virtues, so that, as though the idols were cast out and broken to pieces, he makes himself a temple of God; while he erects the seat of divine grace there, where he did not allow reprobate spirits to remain through depraved desires.”
It is proper, he says, to perfect men to dedicate the whole heart to God and to consecrate the whole mind to him. For he who divides his thoughts between mammon and God, between Christ and gold, between the present life and the future, cannot truly say: “I will praise thee, O Lord, with my whole heart.”
5. GATHER ALL ISRAEL TO MASPHATH, THAT I MAY PRAY TO THE LORD FOR YOU.—For Maspha was a high place, the seat of the kingdom, inasmuch as Samuel judged there, that is, gave judgment, and therefore it was famous for the assembly of men, and accordingly suited for assemblies, preaching and prayer. Whence Maspha in Hebrew is the same as watch-tower, such as is usually on a mountain or tower. Here, therefore, Samuel renews and restores the covenant of the people with God.
6. THEY DREW WATER AND POURED IT OUT BEFORE THE LORD,—as a sign of the penance by which they renounced idolatry and sins perfectly, as if to say: As we pour out this water, so also we pour out our heart, and all its vices, before the Lord, professing that we detest and repent of them, and pour out this water in place of tears. Whence the Chaldee: they poured out their heart in penance; the Rabbis: they drew tears from the well of their heart. “What is it,” says St. Gregory, “to draw water, but to bring forth streams of tears from the deep confusion of a penitent mind? For we draw water as it were, when, considering into how deep an iniquity we have fallen, we lament.” They poured out water, then, for tears, as if to say: We would wish to pour out for our sins as many tears as there are drops in a bucket; but because we cannot do this, nor have tears in our hand, therefore we pour out water for them.
So also Abulensis, Cajetan, Vatablus, Sanchez and others, who explain it thus, as if to say: We are before thee like water poured out. This pouring out of water was therefore a sign of candid and sincere contrition, as if to say: We have stained the whole land with our crimes; we wish therefore to wash it with this water, signifying that we wish to pour out from a contrite heart such a force of tears as would suffice to moisten and cleanse the whole earth. So David says, Psalm 6:7: “I will wash (in Hebrew asche, that is, to make to swim) my bed every night, and water my couch with my tears.”
Again, by the pouring out of this water he signifies that he wishes their sins to be wholly blotted out and perish, as poured-out water perishes, so that not even a drop of guilt or punishment may remain in them.
Wrongly, therefore, do some Rabbis think that the Hebrews made a libation of this water, that is, sacrificed it to God. Others say that this water was cursed with certain imprecations, so that when it was drunk the lips of idolaters would cleave together and could not be torn apart, and thence Samuel recognized the idolaters and punished them with death: so that this water would have been like the water of jealousy, Num. 5. Others think that the Hebrews with this water washed off the ashes sprinkled on the head as a sign of mourning and penance.
AND THEY FASTED.—Behold here three acts of penance, namely contrition, signified in the pouring out of the water; confession, when they say: “We have sinned against the Lord”; satisfaction, when they fast. For this fast was not Onasin, that is, of compulsion, or commanded by the law, but Conasin, that is, voluntary and undertaken freely by the penitents. For as St. Gregory says: “While the mind is pierced with compunction by weeping, it is necessary also that the flesh, which has been subject to delights, be afflicted.” Hear St. Jerome, book 2 Against Jovinian: “Samuel,” he says, “having gathered the people at Masphath, by a fast proclaimed strengthened them and made them stronger than their enemies.”
And St. Leo, serm. 1 On Lent, where speaking of the Hebrews fasting in this place: “That they might overcome their enemies,” he says, “they restored the strength of mind and body by a fast proclaimed to themselves.” And after a few words: “Abstaining, therefore, from food and drink, they applied the rule of a severe chastisement to themselves, and that they might conquer their enemies, they first conquered in themselves the allurement of gluttony.”
And Tertullian, book On Fasting, chap. 7: “In the drawing of water at Maspha,” he says, “the people gathered by Samuel so immediately blotted out their offense by fasting that they escaped the danger of battle at the same time,” nay, obtained the victory. For as Tertullian adds: “They cut down the fed, being themselves unfed, the armed, being unarmed: such was the strength of those fasting for God; heaven fights for such as these: you have the form of battle necessary also in spiritual wars.” Hear again St. Leo, serm. On the Fast of the tenth month: “Fasts,” he says, “make us stronger against sins, conquer concupiscences, repel temptations, bend down pride, soften anger, and nourish all the affections of good will to the maturity of every virtue.”
Moreover St. Athanasius, book On Virginity: “See,” he says, “what fasting does: it heals diseases, dries up the humors, puts demons to flight, drives out evil thoughts, makes the mind brighter, the heart purer, the body healthier, and sets man before the throne of God.”
Finally St. Ambrose, book On Elias and Fasting, chap. 2: “What is fasting,” he says, “but the substance and image of heavenly things? Fasting is the refreshment of the soul, the food of the mind. Fasting is the life of the Angels: fasting is the death of guilt, the ruin of offenses, the remedy of salvation, the root of grace, the foundation of chastity.”
WE HAVE SINNED AGAINST THE LORD.—Admirably St. Ambrose, book 2 On Penance, chap. 8: “The Lord,” he says, “knows all things; but he awaits your voice, not to punish, but to pardon: he does not wish the devil to insult you, and, you concealing your sins, to accuse you. Anticipate your accuser; if you accuse yourself, you will fear no accuser: if you denounce yourself, even if you were dead, you will live again.”
The same, book 2 On Abel, chap. 9: “Confession,” he says, “is a shortening of punishments.” The same on Psalm 35: “The just man,” he says, “knows how to loose the bonds of his sins, and does not wait for an accuser, but anticipates him, that by confessing he may lighten every offense of his, and have nothing for his adversary to charge. For he snatches the voice from the adversary, and, as it were, binds by the confession of his sins certain teeth made ready for the prey of a hostile accusation.”
AND SAMUEL JUDGED THE CHILDREN OF ISRAEL IN MASPHATH.—“He judged,” that is, he exercised the power of judging, settling disputes by law, rebuking the dissolute, punishing the guilty, composing quarrels, resolving doubts, etc. Whence the Hebrews in St. Jerome say: he judged, that is, he punished idolaters with death.
Furthermore, the cities called Masphath were four. The first in the tribe of Gad, Josue 13:26; the second in the half tribe of Manasses at the foot of Hermon, which was the country of Jephte, Judges 11; the third beyond the Jordan in the land of Moab, of which 1 Kings 22:3; the fourth this one of ours on the border of the tribes of Juda and Benjamin, in which there was a place of prayer, and therefore the Hebrews frequently gathered to it. Elsewhere it is called Maspha or Masphe. This place Asa king of Juda afterwards fortified with buildings, and in it Godolias dwelt, 4 Kings 25; and Jeremias the prophet, chap. 40, verse 41. Note: the ark was not in Masphath, as some conjecture from these assemblies of Samuel held there, but in Cariathiarim, as I showed at the beginning of the chapter.
Mystically St. Gregory: “In Maspha,” he says, “the priest judges, when he follows not human judgment, but divine,” etc. And before: “The affliction of penance is then at last fit to blot out sins, when it has been imposed by the judgment of the priest, when, the acts of the confessing having been examined by him, the burden of affliction is decreed for him according to the measure of the crime.”
7. THE PRINCES OF THE PHILISTINES WENT UP AGAINST ISRAEL,—that is, against Israel, namely with a strong army to overthrow it and to scatter the assembly; because they suspected that the Hebrews wished to rebel against them and to shake off the yoke, as in fact they did shake it off through Samuel. So Dionysius and Cajetan.