Commentaria in Isaiam
Not true and just wars, therefore, such as even the most pious Emperors have waged, but ambitious, unjust and tyrannical ones, by which out of lust of dominion innocent persons were invaded, does Isaias here foretell are to be crushed and abolished through Christ and the law of Christ, such as before Christ were waged by Nemrod, Nabuchodonosor, Alexander, Caesar; and other Assyrians, Chaldeans, Persians, Greeks and Romans: whose wars were not so much wars as robberies, as St. Augustine teaches, book 3 City of God, chapter 13 and following. Christians, therefore, who out of lust of dominion or of enriching themselves; or out of envy, lest namely a neighbouring prince become too great and powerful, make unjust war on him, are not so much Christians as Pagans.
Morally, learn here how great a good peace and concord is, as that for the sake of which Christ came into this world. This is what the Angels sang at Christ’s birth: “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace to men of good will.” Where “of good will” St. Ambrose and some others refer to “men,” in this sense, as if he said: Peace be to men, not to all men, but to those who are of good will; or, as St. Leo (sermon On the Nativity of the Lord), let there be peace to men, which shall make them be of good will. But because the Greek eudokia and the Hebrew ratson in Holy Scripture is almost always attributed not to men but to God, and signifies God’s grace, benevolence, good pleasure toward men; hence better Theophylact, Euthymius, Nyssen and others give this sense: “Peace be to men,” to men, I say, whom God with this grace, and good will and benevolence, without their merit, follows, that he may give them such a Savior and reconciler, who shall establish peace between men, God and the Angels, between heaven and earth. So men of good will are elsewhere called sons of love, that is, sons willed and beloved by God. See what is said on Ephesians 1, 9. For this cause again Christ, departing from the world, left us peace by testament, and appointed us in it heirs to himself and all his goods, saying: “My peace I leave unto you, my peace I give unto you.” This is what the Apostle says: “Let the peace of Christ rejoice in your hearts,” Colossians 3, 15. See what is said there. So Barnagasius, Prefect of the king’s army, when he made a covenant with the Portuguese Praetor, grasping the cross, resting on his knees: “The peace which Jesus Christ the Redeemer of mankind left to his disciples, let the same be between us, who profess the same worship and faith.” So our Maffei, History of the Indies, book 7. Alfonso king of Aragon used to say: “I am wont to give peace, not to sell it”: he would not, namely, for peace take from the Venetians a great sum of money which he could have extorted; but gave it freely. Frederick III, Duke of Saxony, a lover of peace, built no castles or fortifications, indeed levelled with the ground those built by others; nor did he amass money, but spent it on useful and pious uses. Asked why he did this, he answered: “Lest I, slightly offended at some time, trusting in my castles and money, too easily provoke my weaker neighbours to war, and break peace with them.” Which indeed he would not have been about to do, being destitute of castles and money, which is the sinews of war: for he knew, namely, that Peace is the best of things that man is given to know; peace alone is better than countless triumphs; peace has power to guard safety, and to make citizens equal.
The Emperor Jovian: “I hate,” he says, “every kind of contention, but concord alone I embrace and love.” So Socrates, book 3, chapter 21; namely:
There is no safety in war; we all ask peace of thee.
So Blessed Nazianzen, on account of rivals, for the sake of peace, resigned the Archbishopric of Constantinople: “If,” he said, “this tempest has arisen on my account, cast me out. I seek not wealth,” he says, “nor dignities, but I beseech to be freed of the Episcopate; let envy cease, let the Bishops cultivate peace; do you above all strive for this: suppress the war of priests, you who have restrained the boldness of barbarians, adorn the greatest trophy of your empire with one thing, namely the concord of Bishops; this gift I ask from you; grant this last favor.” So Gregory the presbyter in his Life.
Marcus and Marcellian, brothers, fastened to stakes, sang alternately that psalm: “Behold how good and how pleasant it is for brethren to dwell together in unity!” And when they mocked the torments, Diocletian blushed, and ordered both to be pierced with lances. Let Christians say the same, and by this concord and peace they will overcome Turks, heretics, and all enemies.
Do you want Gentiles also? The Emperor Probus used to say: “Soon we shall have no need of soldiers.” He hoped for so great a peace that there would be no need of an army. Would that God might put this mind into all the princes of our age! So Vopiscus.
Croesus, captured by Cyrus, preferred peace to war on this ground, that “in time of peace sons bury fathers, in war fathers bury sons.” Philo: “Peace,” he says, “even joined with great loss, is better than war. Peace is the greatest and a divine good, which no mortal can furnish.” Antoninus Pius used to cry out that saying of Scipio:
“I would rather save one citizen than slay a thousand enemies;” preferring peace to war, and even in war judging that this should be the first care of a leader, that victory be obtained with the least possible loss of citizens. So Julius Capitolinus.
The Emperor Otho, when he saw that either the empire must be laid down or defended by great slaughter of citizens, had resolved to die of his own will, and when friends and soldiers exhorted him not to despair so quickly of the outcome of the war, said that his life was not worth so much that for its sake a civil war should arise. Who would not wonder at this spirit in a heathen prince, and him thirty-three years old? Cicero, book 7 to Atticus, epistle 14: “Even an unjust peace,” he says, “is more useful than the justest war.” Livy, book 30: “Better and safer,” he says, “is a sure peace than a hoped-for victory. The former is in your hand, the latter in the hand of the gods.” Wherefore “do not so seek others’ things as to fight for your own.” For, as Homer says, Iliad 18: “Mars is common, and slays even the one who is slaying.”
Antisthenes said that the concord of brothers among themselves is a stronger defense than any wall.
Musonius used to say that no marriage is honorable without concord, nor any society useful. And that the wicked cannot cherish concord among themselves:
just as a straight stick with a crooked one, or two crooked sticks, cannot agree with each other.
Iseus, when the Spartans were thinking of building walls for the city, recited that line of Homer: “Shield pressed on shield, helmet on helmet, and man on man.” And added: “So stand for me, Lacedaemonians; and we are girt with walls.” So Philostratus in the Sophists.
Scilurus, having eighty male sons, at his death handed a bundle of javelins to each, and ordered them to break it. When each, as if impossible, refused, he himself took out the single javelins, and easily broke them all, warning his sons with these words: “If you are of one mind, you will remain strong and unconquered; but if we are drawn apart by dissensions and sedition, you will be weak and easy to overcome.”
King Micipsa, about to die, exhorted his sons to concord by this golden saying: “By concord small things grow, by discord the greatest fall to pieces.” So Sallust in the Jugurtha.
The Emperor Severus, dying, called his sons M. Antoninus and Geta, and said: “See that you agree among yourselves, enrich the soldiers, despise all others.” He advised rightly: for the one afterwards killed the other, and destroyed himself and his family. So Dionysius and Xiphilinus in the Life of Severus.
5. O HOUSE OF JACOB, COME YE, AND LET US WALK IN THE LIGHT OF THE LORD.—It is the voice of the converted Gentiles and Christians to the Jews: for that began at verse 3, and ends here, as Rupert holds, or rather it is the voice of the Prophet Isaias himself, inviting his descendants the Jews who will be at the time of Christ to the light of faith:
sons of the holy Patriarch Jacob, receive the light, that is, the Gospel of Christ: do not be inferior to the barbarian and idolatrous Gentiles: rather approach your Messias, that by him you may be enlightened with the light of faith, grace and salvation, as they are.