(1 Samuel 7:9) 1ST CATEGORY OT QUESTION
46. WAS SAMUEL ONE OF AARON'S CHILDREN,
AND SHOULD IT BE ADMITTED THAT HE WAS A PRIEST? — There are some among us who, busy
with worldly affairs or little zeal for the study of the Holy Scriptures,
support this erroneous view that Samuel was a priest, that is to say,
descendant of Aaron, whose sons, according to God's command, were born and did
not priests. They had only the privilege of offering incense on the altar.
Others push the error further; they admit that Samuel was not of the race of
Aaron, that is to say, he was not born a priest, and they do not fail to affirm
that he has fulfilled the priestly functions. It is to these that we must first
answer, for it is more absurd to affirm that Samuel fulfilled the priestly
functions without being born a priest than to maintain that he was a priest as
a descendant of Aaron. On one side there is only ignorance, on the other there
is unreason. When we have proved to those who think that Samuel was born a
priest that he was not of the race of Aaron, they will be convinced that he was
not clothed with the priesthood, for they seem to be ignorant that the children
of Aaron were permitted to perform the priestly functions, a truth of which
Scripture gives us clear evidence. Thus Korah, who was not Aaron's children,
who wanted to offer incense on the altar, the earth opened under his feet and
swallowed him up with those who had joined him. (Num. 16:31) And Uzziah the
king, who was also not of the tribe of Aaron, but of the tribe of Judah, having
dared to usurp the priestly offices by appearing before the altar, was struck
with leprosy on the forehead and remained leprous until the day of his death.
(2 Kgs. 15:5; 2 Chron. 26:21) As for those who claim that Samuel, without being
a priest by right of birth, did not fail to fulfill his functions, their
opinion is rather unreasonable, and it is not a mediocre job to persuade the
truth to a fool. What, indeed, is their folly to maintain that it is night
while the sun pours streams of light on the earth? They read, and not in one
right, that God established by law that the functions of the priesthood would
be exclusively reserved for Aaron and his children, and they stubbornly
maintain that Samuel was a priest. They do not understand that if Samuel
fulfilled the priestly functions, without holding this right of his birth, he
is a usurper, because God has established that this right would come from birth,
and not from the will of men. It is even more than boldness to conceive this
opinion of Samuel. How can one suppose, indeed, that a man so worthy of esteem,
so commendable to the very testimony of God, would have dared to seize
functions which he knew were forbidden to him? Besides, he does not know with
what rigor God has more than once celebrated this recklessness. He could not
claim that dignity by a special concession of God, which he knew to be
undisputable in his decrees, and if this concession had been made to him, he
would have rather regarded it as a temptation, in the belief that it was that
God could not in any way return to what He had established. He would have
thought rather that it was the devil who granted him this right under the
appearance and in the name of God, to believe that God had changed his decrees.
When God forbade Balaam to go to Balac and asked him again if he could go to
the invitation that was made to him (Num. 22:19), God, angry with him, he took
it again by the mouth of an angel, for this animal, seeing the angel who was
opposing his passage, no longer wished to advance. Now, Balaam, asking God
again, who had forbidden him to undertake this journey, if he consented to his
departure, judged of God as of a man who, by the same as he cannot foresee the
future, is changeable and variable in his designs. But Balaam has no testimony
from heaven for him, for he was a diviner. Samuel, on the contrary, was a man
loved by God, and knowing the invariability of his decrees; how could he have
believed that he was permitted to act against such a clearly established law?
It was, they say, after the death of Heli and his sons, who were priests, that
Samuel began to fulfill the priestly functions. That's what history does not
say, that's what reason cannot admit. Those who advance this opinion are
obliged to suppose that there was then no one who could exercise the priestly
functions, and that after the death of Eli and his two sons, the priesthood
would have ceased to exist if Samuel had not sacrificed himself to God. Such a
feeling is offensive to God, because those who support him seem to accuse him
of improvidence by instituting a ministry which could not have duration. Why,
indeed, establish that none other than the children of Aaron could perpetually
fulfill the priestly functions until the time of the advent of Christ, if he knew
that this priesthood should fail? If, on the contrary, he did not know it (and
far from us this thought), he was therefore without foresight, then he could
also be made that in the absence of these legitimate priests Samuel did not
exercise the functions of the priesthood. But if one is forced to admit the
providence and prescience of God, what he has established must have remained,
and if so, Samuel did not exercise the priesthood, because he was not a priest.
In the old law, indeed, and according to the established order of God, the
priesthood was attached to birth; in the news, God has established that the
priests would be instituted. Let them choose one of these two things, whether
they prove that Samuel was born a priest or that he became a priest. Now they
confess that he is not born a priest, because they know that he is not of the
family of Aaron. So if Samuel is not a priest by birth, and if we do not read,
if we cannot prove that God had prescribed to establish priests apart from the
family of Aaron, the rigorous conclusion Samuel was not a priest. Nevertheless,
the contradictors persist in closing their eyes to the evidence; or, they say,
Samuel was not a priest, but he fulfilled the functions, since we read that he
offered a sacrifice to God. (1 Sam. 7:9-10) Who will dare to oppose this
testimony of the holy books? Yes, Samuel offered a sacrifice to God, but it
does not follow that he exercised the priestly ministry. It is said every day
that a man offers a sacrifice when he hands over to the priest the victims whom
he places on the altar; and it is in this sense that Samuel offered it himself,
that is, through the priest, as is done every day. Scripture also says of
David, Solomon, and so many others, that they have sacrificed, are we to say
that all have performed priestly functions? The priest, it is true, performs
his own ministry, yet the very act of sacrifice is attributed to him in whose
name the priest sacrificed, in other words, he is attributed to the one who
presents the sacramental victims. How, indeed, he who was not a priest could
have held the place of a priest? Can a deacon replace a priest? A prefect may
replace a prefect, a lender take the place of a lender, but a private man
cannot replace any authority; how much less can one who is not a priest replace
a priest? For what purpose could he aspire to the exercise of a ministry which
he knows to be forbidden to him? If a priest comes to fail in one place, or ask
another to come and replace him; but no prophet, no saint, will ever do a thing
that he knows to be forbidden to him. A holy life, indeed, does not carry the
power to exercise any ministry. Just as the priest cannot base on his character
alone the esteem he wants us to make of his life; he whose life is holy and the
pure manners cannot hope to find there the right to exercise the priestly
ministry. The priesthood is a good institution, it is true, but it becomes an
evil thing for the one who pretends to exercise it without any right. If we
carefully consider what is written by Samuel, we shall see that testimony
testifies to him the Scripture: "And all the people knew," he said,
"that Samuel was the faithful prophet of the Lord.” (1 Sam. 3:20) And in
the book of Psalms: "May Moses and Aaron be his priests, and Samuel the
number of those who call on his name." (Ps. 98:6) Who does not see this
distinction that these characters are separated by their different dignities;
that is to say, we see Moses and Aaron clothed with priestly dignity, and
Samuel, among the prophets, is deemed worthy to invoke by his prayers the
protection of God over his people, as he did indeed. (1 Sam. 7:9) - The
priests, moreover, were so little lacking, that when the ark was brought back
from the Philistines, carried by the Levites, the inhabitants of Bethsamea offered
sacrifices to God in Samuel's absence; and when Saul became king, Ahimaas,
grandson of the high priest Heli, wore the ephod. Now, they will say, it is
precisely the proof that Samuel was a priest, for he was clothed with the
ephod. But are today deacons not clothed with dalmatics like the bishops? We
also read that David was clothed with the ephod (2 Sam. 6:14), and a double
ephod. Samuel, still a tiny child, was himself wearing the ephod (1 Sam. 6:18),
Could he at this age offer to God the gifts of the people? You see, then, that
this name of ephod has different meanings. The priests wore the ephod, but did
not wear it, while it was the garment. The ephod means sometimes a garment,
sometimes a kind of ornament that the priests wore to consult the Lord. So far
as we seem, we proved that Samuel was not a priest, but a prophet. We now have
to answer those who think that Samuel was a priest, because they do not know
that Samuel was not one of Aaron's children, for it was not permissible for a
descendant of Aaron not to practice the priestly ministry. I want to prove to
them first of all that if Samuel was a priest, his father Helcana undoubtedly
had to be, as well as the sons of Samuel. Now, a proof that they were not
priests, is that he made them judges over the children of Israel, as Samuel
himself was. We read "that he judged the children of Israel."
Helcana, Samuel's father, was not a priest either, because, says the Scripture:
"He went from the city called Ramathaim to the ordained days to worship
the Lord and offer sacrifices to the almighty God of hosts, and there were the
two sons of Heli, Ophni and Phinehas, priests of the Lord. "(1 Sam. 1:3)
Can it be more clearly established that at the appointed time, Elenahana
offered sacrifices to the Lord by the hand of the priests, according to the
prescriptions of Moses, according to which the Hebrews were to offer victims
and tithes of their property three times a year, where was the ark and the
priests of the Lord? Besides, he had two women at the same time, which was
forbidden to priests. Indeed, Helcana was one of the Levites, as indicated by
the following genealogies in the book Chronicles. (1 Chron. 6) The Levites did
not yet have specific functions to fulfill with the priests and the ark of the
Lord. David, during his reign, thus divides the sacred functions between
priests and Levites. From the age of twenty and above, and according to the law
for twenty-five years and above, they had to begin to minister in sacred
ceremonies. He instituted among the children of Aaron, that is to say among the
descendants of Phinees and Thamar, twenty-four classes of priests to perform
alternately their ministry at certain times. He also appointed Levites to be
porters of the tabernacle, to carry the ark of the Lord, to guard the holy
place and sacred vessels, and to receive the mass of offerings. He also
instituted twenty-four classes of cantors, harp players, and other musicians,
who filled their offices in their turn, because they had to be allowed some
rest and time to take care of their household affairs. Now, not only do these
details contribute to establish the truth that we seek to prove, that is,
Samuel was not Aaron's children, but the very promise his mother made to the
Lord is a new proof: "If you give me a son," she told him, "I
will give it to the Lord every day of my life.” (1 Sam. 1:11) Now she would not
have spoken this language if he had been a priest by right of birth; it would
have been necessarily devoted to the service of the altars. But he was only
Levite, and there was still no special law for the Levites; each one did what
he wanted, and often they engaged in the paths of error and iniquity. Thus
Jonathan, the grandson of Moses, who was among the Levites, took it upon
himself to attribute the priesthood to the tribe of Dan. This is why we read in
the book of Judges, "At that time there was no king in Israel; but
everyone did everything that seemed good to him.” (Judg. 17:6) And so Hannah
consecrated Samuel to God, saying, "I put this child into the hands of the
Lord" so that he would not be exposed to going astray like the others.
Finally, to deal with this question in all its aspects, let us still discuss
what is said of Helcana, and that he came to ordinary days to offer sacrifices
and tithe of his goods. How could he offer the tithe of his goods since he
possessed nothing? For the Levites had no part in the division of the lands,
because they were to live on tithes which the people gave them. But it can be
done, and this opinion is based, that he possessed the property of his wife or
others that he would have bought, because not only the Levites, but the others
and the priests themselves were taking wives in other tribes. Thus we see the
High Priest Jehoiada take for wife the daughter of King Joram, of the tribe of
Jude. (2 Chron. 22:11)
(1 Samuel 15:24; 2 Samuel 12:13) 1ST CATEGORY OT QUESTION
18. WHY DID SAUL AFTER HIS SIN, ASK
THAT GOD BE PRAISED, FOR FORGIVENESS WITHOUT BEING ABLE TO OBTAIN IT, WHILE
DAVID, ALSO A SINNER, ASKED FOR IT AND OBTAINED IT? — It is not appropriate to revise the
judgments of God; it is at the school of these judgments that the weakness or
ignorance of men must learn from what they do not understand, and convince
themselves that they are the expression of truth; therefore God must not have
acted otherwise than He has acted, since we know that there is no acceptance of
persons in him. (Acts 10:34) He answered David's prayer, he rejected that of
Saul, he did not commit any injustice in it. He knew in what internal dispositions
each of them prayed to him. He therefore answered the prayer of one who
implored his pardon with a contrite and humbled heart, and rejected the prayer
of him who had closed his soul to all repentance. God, in fact, gives more
attention to the feelings of the heart than to the words that come from the
mouth; he declares it in his own words: "Man," he says, "sees
what appears, but God looks at the heart." (l Sam. 16:7) What misleads us
is that we leave ourselves to deceive by the pretense of language or a lying
exterior, because we cannot see what is going on in the heart. We must
therefore follow the judgment of God who examines men in the most intimate of
the heart, where the real feelings are. This is what the Savior himself did, as
we see in the Gospel. He does not wish to receive among his disciples a scribe
who offers himself to him (Matt. 8:19), and he calls after him Levi who sat in
the house of the tax-collectors (Matt. 9:17; Mark 2:14, Luke 5:27), because the
feelings of this scribe were not in harmony with his words; Levi, on the other
hand, without saying a single word, had in his heart what the scribe had only
on his lips. Now Jesus, according to what is written, knew what is in man (Jn.
2:25), chooses Levi. Moreover, David did not ask as Saul, but he implored his
forgiveness in the feelings of a heart deeply contrite and humiliated. (1 Samuel 26:16) 1ST CATEGORY OT QUESTION 35. HOW CAN DAVID STILL CALL SAUL THE ANOINTED OF THE LORD, AND DO HIM HONOR IN THIS EXCELLENCE AFTER THE LORD HAD DEPARTED FROM HIM? — David was not unaware that the royal dignity was of divine origin, and as long as he sees Saul clothed with this dignity, he honors him in this excellence so as not to appear to be wanting to God who does a duty of these honors to the respect of kings. The king, indeed, is the image of God, as the bishop is the image of Christ. As long as he occupies this high rank, he must be honored, if not for himself, at least for the dignity with which he is clothed. This is the Apostle's recommendation: "Be subject to the higher powers. There is no power that is not of God, and those that are, have been ordained of God.” (Rom. 13:1) This is why we honor a pagan man constituted in dignity, though personally unworthy of him, who, taking God's place, pays his homage to the devil. Power is entitled to the honors we pay him and he deserves them. This is why God revealed in dreams to Pharaoh his future years of famine (Gen. 42:26), and that only of all those who were present with him he saw the Son of God in the fiery furnace (Dan. 3), thanks, no doubt, to his personal merits, he who wished to be adored in an idol, but to the excellence of the royal dignity with which he was clothed. |