Chapter 5.—19. But as to the argument of those men who are unwilling that their impious deeds should be checked by the enactment of righteous laws, when they say that the apostles never sought such measures from the kings of the earth, they do not consider the different character of that age, and that everything comes in its own season. For what emperor had as yet believed in Christ, so as to serve Him in the cause of piety by enacting
laws against impiety, when as yet the declaration of the prophet was only in the course of its fulfillment, "Why do the heathen rage, and the people imagine a vain thing? The kings of the earth set themselves, and their rulers take counsel together, against the Lord, and against His Anointed;" and there was as yet no sign of that which is spoken a little later in the same psalm: "Be wise now, therefore, O ye kings; be instructed, ye judges of the earth. Serve the Lord with fear, and rejoice
with trembling."2498
| 2498
Ps. ii. 1, 2, 10, 11.
|
How then are kings to serve the
Lord with
fear, except by preventing and chastising with
religious severity all those acts which are done in opposition to the
commandments of the
Lord? For a man serves
God in one way in that he is man, in another way in that he is also king. In that he is man, he serves Him by living faithfully; but in that he is also king, he serves Him by enforcing with suitable rigor such
laws as
ordain what is
righteous, and
punish what is the
reverse. Even as
Hezekiah served Him, by destroying the groves and the
temples of the
idols, and the high places which had been built in violation of the
commandments of
God;
2499
or even as
Josiah served Him, by doing the same things in his turn;
2500
or as the king of the Ninevites served Him, by compelling all the men of his city to make satisfaction to the
Lord;
2501
or as
Darius served Him, by giving the
idol into the
power of Daniel to be broken, and by casting his
enemies into the
den of
lions;
2502
or as Nebuchadnezzar served Him, of whom I have spoken before, by issuing a
terrible law to prevent any of his subjects from blaspheming
God.
2503
In this way, therefore, kings can serve the
Lord, even in so
far as they are kings, when they do in His service what they could not do were they not kings.
20. Seeing, then, that the kings of the earth were not yet serving the Lord in the time of the apostles, but were still imagining vain things against the Lord and against His Anointed, that all might be fulfilled which was spoken by the prophets, it must be granted that at that time acts of impiety could not possibly be prevented by the laws, but were rather performed under their sanction. For the order of events was then so rolling on, that even the Jews were
killing those who preached Christ, thinking that they did God service in so doing, just as Christ had foretold,2504
and the
heathen were raging against the
Christians, and the
patience of the martyrs was overcoming them all. But so soon as the fulfillment began of what is written in a later psalm, "All kings shall fall down before Him; all
nations shall serve Him,"
2505
what sober-
minded man could say to the kings, "Let not any thought
trouble you within your
kingdom as to who restrains or attacks the
Church of your
Lord; deem it not a matter in which you should be concerned, which of your subjects may choose to be
religious or sacrilegious," seeing that you cannot say to them, "Deem it no concern of yours which of your subjects may choose to be
chaste, or which unchaste?" For why, when free-will is given by
God to man,
should adulteries be
punished by the
laws, and
sacrilege allowed? Is it a lighter matter that a
soul should not keep
faith with
God, than that a
woman should be faithless to her
husband? Or if those faults which are committed not in contempt but in ignorance of religious truth are to be visited with lighter punishment, are they therefore to be neglected altogether?
E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
