Commentaria in Judith
Chapter 4
Synopsis of the chapter.
The Jews, through fear of Holofernes, fortify themselves, and, clothed in haircloth and ashes, call upon the help of God. The high priest Eliachim consoles them and promises the help of God, if they persevere in prayer.
1. And when the children of Israel, that dwelt in the land of Juda, heard these things, they greatly feared him. 2. And a dread and horror seized upon their minds, lest he should do the same to Jerusalem and the temple of the Lord, that he had done to other cities and their temples. 3. And they sent into all Samaria round about, as far as Jericho, and seized upon all the tops of the mountains: 4. And compassed their towns with walls, and gathered together corn for provision for war. 5. And Eliachim the priest wrote to all that were over against Esdrelon, which faces the plain near Dothain, and to all by whom there might be a passage, 6. That they should take possession of the ascents of the mountains, by which there might be any way to Jerusalem, and should keep watch where the way was narrow between the mountains. 7. And the children of Israel did as the priest of the Lord, Eliachim, had appointed them. 8. And all the people cried to the Lord with great earnestness, and they humbled their souls in fastings and prayers, they and their wives. 9. And the priests put on haircloths, and the little children they laid prostrate before the temple of the Lord, and the altar of the Lord they covered with haircloth: 10. And they cried to the Lord the God of Israel with one accord, that their children might not be made a prey, and their wives carried off, and their cities destroyed, and their holy things profaned, and that they might not be made a reproach to the Gentiles. 11. Then Eliachim the high priest of the Lord went about all Israel, and spoke to them, 12. Saying: Know ye that the Lord will hear your prayers, if you continue with perseverance in fastings and prayers in the sight of the Lord. 13. Remember Moses the servant of the Lord, who overthrew Amalec trusting in his own strength, and in his power, and in his army, and in his shields, and in his chariots, and in his horsemen, not by fighting with the sword, but by holy prayers: 14. So shall all the enemies of Israel be, if you persevere in this work which you have begun. 15. So they being moved by this exhortation of his, prayed to the Lord, and continued in the sight of the Lord: 16. So that even they who offered to the Lord holocausts, offered the sacrifices to the Lord girded with haircloths, and with ashes upon their head. 17. And with all their heart they all prayed to God, that he would visit his people Israel.
2. “A DREAD AND HORROR SEIZED UPON THEIR MINDS.”—The Greek has more fully: And they feared greatly before his face, and were troubled for Jerusalem and the temple of the Lord their God, because they had lately come up from captivity, and lately all the people had been gathered from Judea, and the vessels, and the altar, and the house (of God, that is, the temple) had been sanctified after profanation. Many, as I said in the preface with Bellarmine, Salianus and others, refer this to Manasses king of Juda, who, taken captive with his people into Babylon, was released into his kingdom, and, repenting, purged the temple profaned by himself with idols and restored it to the worship of the true God. But that also was the captivity and liberation of king Manasses, not of the whole people. Add that no mention is made of king Manasses in this whole book, which surely ought to have been made, since it belonged to him, as king, rather than to the high priest Eliachim, to fortify Judea against Holofernes and to occupy the passes before a garrison was sent in. Wherefore others better refer these things to the times of Xerxes, when the temple profaned and burned by the Chaldeans had now been rebuilt.
You will say: How had the Jews, lately returned from captivity, so great strength and courage as to dare to oppose themselves to so numerous and strong a camp? I answer that it was done through fear of captivity, whose bitterness and hardships they had lately felt in Babylon, and through fear of losing the true religion; for Nabuchodonosor threatened God and the temple with destruction, because he wished to be adored alone as God. This seemed intolerable to the Jews, worshippers of the true God, so that they preferred to die rather than permit it. Finally the offspring of the Jews was innumerable, and their multiplication by generation was like that of frogs and fishes, as it was in the time of Moses, Exodus 1. For Josephus, book XI *Antiquities*, chapter 4, numbers the grown men returned from the Babylonian captivity in the second year of Darius Hystaspis at four thousand thousand and besides 620 thousand, and that from the tribes of Juda and Benjamin only, to whom very many from the other ten tribes joined themselves. And so they could easily raise a numerous army to oppose Holofernes, especially in the passes and steep places of the mountains, where one man can resist ten enemies.
4. “AND THEY GATHERED TOGETHER CORN.”—For their fields had lately been reaped, as the Greek adds: “Other mishaps,” says Vegetius, book III, chapter 3, “can be remedied in time: fodder and provisions in time of necessity have no remedy unless laid up beforehand.” And therefore the old discipline of the Romans, “in most towns, for the use of the whole year, kept laid up vinegar, corn, bacon, barley and straw,” says Capitolinus in *Gordian*. For, as Vegetius says, book III, chapter 3, “more often want than battle consumes an army, and hunger is crueller than the sword. In every expedition there is one chief counsel, that food suffice for you, and want break the enemy. Before the war is begun, therefore, a careful reckoning should be made of supplies and expenses, so that fodder, corn and the other kinds of provisions which custom demands from the provincials may be exacted in good time, and in places convenient for conducting the matter, and most strongly fortified, a larger store than is spent may always be gathered.” And chapter 26: “He who does not provide corn and necessary supplies is conquered without the sword.”
5. “ELIACHIM THE PRIEST,”—who is also called so by our author in chapter 15, verse 9. For these two names signify the same, “God the establisher” or “stayer,” who namely made the Jewish lines stand against Holofernes. For God is called both El and Ia, which is an abbreviation of Jehova. Hence it is plain that this happened in the time of Xerxes. For then the high priest was Joachim, as I said in the preface, who, the king being absent, administered the commonwealth: for, as Josephus says, book II *Against Apion*: “The constitution of the Jewish commonwealth entrusts to the priests in common the administration of all the greatest matters. But over all it appoints the High Priest, and over the other priests again he has the principate.” And briefly: “The priests,” he says, “are the overseers of all, the judges of things doubtful, the avengers of things condemned.”
8. “AND ALL THE PEOPLE CRIED TO THE LORD WITH GREAT EARNESTNESS.”—Note here the use, manner and force of public prayer and penance in public calamity, to be imitated by Christians, that in like manner they may turn away their calamities. Namely, first, all the people cried with great earnestness; second, they humbled their souls in fastings and prayers; third, they put on haircloths; fourth, they laid the little children prostrate before the Lord and the temple; fifth, they covered the altar with haircloth, that by the public mourning, as it were, of religion, justice, the temple and the altar they might provoke God to pity and to help; so as, by a kind of band gathered and force applied, as Tertullian says in the *Apology*, to compel Him. The Ninivites did the same, and deserved to be heard by God and delivered.
The Greek has more fully: The people were fasting (and in fasting praying) for many days in all Judea and Jerusalem before the face of the Holy Places, namely of the Holy and the Holy of Holies, that is, the temple. For those who were in Jerusalem, about to pray, went to the temple; those who were abroad turned their faces toward the temple.
11. “THEN ELIACHIM THE HIGH PRIEST OF THE LORD WENT ABOUT ALL ISRAEL,”—that he might exhort all to constancy, confidence and perseverance in prayers and fasts, promising them victory if they did so. “The precepts of Christ,” says St. Ambrose, sermon 86, “are arms for Christians, and divine fear drives hostile terror from us. And these are our arms, with which the Saviour has furnished us: prayer, mercy and fasting. For fasting protects better than a wall; mercy delivers more easily than plunder; prayer wounds farther than an arrow. For an arrow strikes the adversary only in close sight; prayer wounds the enemy placed farther off.” The Greek has more fully here: Joachim the high priest, and all the priests who stood before the Lord, and the rest who ministered to the Lord, girded with sackcloth about their loins, offered that continual holocaust and the vows and the voluntary gifts of the people, and dust was upon their tiaras, or mitres, and they cried to the Lord with all their strength, for good; or that He would visit the whole house of Israel to do good and to help. Let bishops and princes imitate this high priest: let them go about the peoples committed to them, visit, encourage, instruct, correct.
Moreover the matter is ready to hand for those who with Bellarmine teach that he was high priest in the times of Manasses, between Jonas, who was high priest in the time of Ezechias, Isaias 22:15, and Helcias, who exercised the pontificate in the time of Josias, IV Kings 22:4.
13. “REMEMBER MOSES THE SERVANT OF THE LORD, WHO OVERTHREW AMALEC,” etc.—See the history of Exodus 17, where I explained it. Note: Eliachim, like Moses, commands two things here for war: first, that they call upon God, and ask and await victory from Him; second, that they fortify their cities, occupy the passes, and gather all human aids for resistance. For God does not help the idle, but those who labour and fight. The heathen Cato saw this in Sallust, in the *Catilinarian War*, saying: “Not by vows, nor by womanish supplications are the helps of the gods obtained; by watching, acting, taking good counsel, all things turn out prosperously”; namely:
The Thunderer helps not him who thunders, but him who strives.