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Harvard Divinity School

Exodus 32 and the Theory of Holy War: The History of a CitationAuthor(s): Michael WalzerSource: The Harvard Theological Review, Vol. 61, No. 1 (Jan., 1968), pp. 1-14Published by: Cambridge University Press on behalf of the Harvard Divinity SchoolStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1508946

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HARVARD

THEOLOGICAL

REVIEW

VOLUME 1

JANUARY

968

NUMBER

EXODUS 32

AND

THE

THEORY

OF

HOLY WAR:

THiE

HISTORY

OF A

CITATION

MICHAEL WALZER

HARVARD

UNIVERSITY

THROUGHOUT

much

of

the

history

of

political

thought

in the

West,

the

Bible was

at

once

a constitutional document and a

kind of case

book,

putatively

setting

limits to

speculation

as well

as

to conduct.

Theologians

and

political

theorists were forced

to

be

judges

interpreting

a

text

or,

more

often, lawyers defending

a

particular

interpretation

before

the

constituted

powers

in

church

and

state

or before

the less authoritative court

of

opinion.

The

Bible

became,

like

other such

texts,

a dissociated collection

of

precedents,examplesand citations, each of which meant what the

lawyers

and

judges

said it meant.

But

the

lawyers

and

judges

did not

agree. Indeed,

the

history

of

any

particular

citation

will

suggest

that

arguments

from

au-

thoritative

texts

are

not

necessarily

less controversial

or erratic

than

the

speculations

of men who admit

no

authorities what-

soever.

The

appeal

to

such texts is

not

a

way

of

ending

discourse

and

settling

disagreements

though

of

course

the

appeal

to

an

authoritative interpreter of texts, possessing political or ecclesi-

astical

power,

is

just

that

-

it is

rather

a

way

of

carrying

on

dis-

course.

But

it

is

a

special

and

highly

formal

way,

restrictive

in

the

arguments

it

permits

even

if not

in the conclusions

it

allows.

The

recognition

of

an

authoritative

text

by

a

group

of writers

imposes

a common

style;

it makes

necessary

certain

intellectual

motions.

It

compels

a writer to

extract his

meaning

from

am-

biguous,

obscure

or

irrelevant

passages

and,

what is most

impor-

tant,

from

passages

with which other men have already wrestled.

Because

of all

this,

it makes

possible

detailed

comparisons

among

writers

committed

to the same

authority.

Their

different inten-

tions

are

often

most

sharply

revealed

in

the

way they

approach

a

disputed passage:

one

man

after another

confronts

the

same

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HARVARDTHEOLOGICAL

EVIEW

words

of

Holy

Writ,

twists

and turns

them, qualifying,

rejecting

or

ignoring

the

views of his

predecessors,

and

inevitably

reveal-

ing (as he may not do when he sums up his doctrine) the goals

at

which he aims and the

anxieties

which attend

him on his

way.

The

purpose

of this brief

essay

is

to

examine

the

history

of a

particular

citation

which

figures significantly

in

the

work

of

three

very

different thinkers--St.

Augustine,

St.

Thomas

Aquinas,

and

John

Calvin

-and which

provides

a useful

key

to

their

different

views

of

a crucial

form of

political

activity:

holy

war

or,

in

Augustine's words,

the

struggle

of

good

men

against

wicked

men.

Then Moses stood

in

the

gate

of

the

camp

and

said,

Who

is on the

Lord's ide?

let

him

comeunto me.

And

all

the

sons

of

Levi

gathered

themselves

ogether

unto him.

And

he said

unto

them,

Thus

saith

the Lord

God

of

Israel,

Put

every

man

his sword

by

his

side,

and

go in andout fromgateto gatethroughouthe camp,andslayevery

man

his

brother,

and

every

man

his

companion,

nd

every

man

his

neighbor.

And

the

childrenof

Levi

did

according

o the word

of

Moses;

and there

fell of the

people

that

day

about three

thousand

men.

In

the

context

of

the

Five Books

of

Moses,

Exodus

32:26-28

is an

uncharacteristic

passage.

It

forms one

conclusion

to

a

kind

of doublenarrativeof the story

of

the

golden

calf

(in

the

alterna-

tive

conclusion,

Moses

intercedes

for the

idol-worshippingpeople

and God

forgives

them:

And

the

Lord

repented

of the

evil

which

he

thought

to

do unto his

people ).

The

text

is

disjointed

and

confusing,

evidence

-

so

we

have

been

taught by

modern

critics

-that

it

is

a

compilation

from

different

sources

or a

late

re-

construction

of

an

early,

now

partially

obscured

tale. The

narra-

tive

as

a

whole

is different

from earlier

and later

descriptions

of

popularrebelliousnessagainst Moses and his new God. Through-

out

the

books

of

Exodus and

Numbers

(and

also

in

the

Deuter-

onomic

recapitulation)

rebels

and

idolators

are

punished

by

Jehovah

directly.

He sends

fire,

plague,

and

serpents.1

But

here

1

Compare,

for

example,

Numbers

II:i,

1:4-34, I6:4I-49,

2I:5-6.

2

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EXODUS 32

AND

HOLY WAR

and

only

here

the

punishment

is

carried

out

by

human

agents

and

at the

direct

command of

an

infuriated Moses

- Moses'

anger waxed hot. There is no command reported in the text

from

Jehovah

himself. More

than

this,

the

executors of the

punishment,

the

children of

Levi,

have

at this

point

in

the Exodus

story

no

defined

political

or

religious

position.

The

only

consti-

tuted authorities

in

the

Mosaic

polity,

such

as

it was at that

early

time,

were Moses

himself,

Aaron

the

high

priest,

and the

judges

chosen

by Moses,

presumably

from

among

the tribal

elders.2

The

establishment

of the

Levites as

priests

(or

as one

set of

priests along with the descendants of Aaron) comes later in the

biblical

narrative.

The

entire

passage relating

the

golden

calf

incident has

been

described

by

some

biblical

critics

as

a late

interpolation

whose

possible

basis

in

fact

or in

memory

cannot

be

known,

and

which

may

indeed

have no

basis

at

all. It

is

excluded

by

Professor

Winnett

from

what

he

calls the

Mosaic

tradition,

a

specula-

tive

reconstruction of

the earliest narrative

which

includes

all

the other stories of rebellion

against

Moses

(the

ten

murmur-

ings ).

The

purpose

of the

interpolation,

Winnett

and

others

believe,

was to

justify

the

role of

the

Levites in

the later

Judaean

state. It was

designed

also,

perhaps,

as a

propaganda

thrust

against

the northern

kingdom

of

Israel,

where

golden

bulls were

set

up

and

worshipped

during

the

reign

of

King

Jeroboam.3

These

are,

of

course,

recent

notions;

so

long

as

the

Bible

was

considered the revealed word of

God,

such

speculation was im-

possible.

Theorists

did

not then

question

the

historical

value

of

particular passages,

but

rather

sought

out

the divine

inten-

tions

and

injunctions

which

they contained,

even

if

obscurely.

But faith in

revelation

was not

an

adequate guide

in

that

diffi-

cult search.

Inevitably, particular

discoveries

of

God's will

were

determined

chiefly by personal

and

social

needs

(in

contrast,

presumably,

to

the

discoveries of modern

critics

which

are

other-

wise determined). Thus the notion conveyed by Exodus

32:26-

2

Exodus

I8:2I.

F.

V.

WINNETT,

The

Mosaic

Tradition

(Toronto,

I949),

48-50,

I46f., I6I;

S.

A.

COOK,

Critical Notes

on

Old Testament

History

(London,

I907),

75;

T.

J.

MEEK,

Hebrew

Origins

(New

York, I96o),

I34ff.

But

see

the

different

view

of

W.

F.

ALBRIGHT,

From

the Stone

Age

to

Christianity

(New

York,

I957),

299ff.

3

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HARVARD THEOLOGICAL

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28

-that

there

existed around

Moses

a

special

group

of

men

whose function it

was to

enforce divine

law

upon

the recalcitrant

multitude- had enormousappeal to certain groups of theorists

and

theologians

in

the

medieval and

early

modern

periods.

It

appealed

to

men

who sensed

the

immediate relevance

of

the tale

of

the

golden

calf

because

they

lived,

or

so

they

thought,

among

idol-worshippers

and

lusty

sinners.

The Levitical

onslaught

re-

quired

of them also

a

vigorous

struggle

against

the enemies

of

Jehovah

and Christ.

But

among

other

men,

who

did not feel

with

the

same

immediacy

the

dangers

of

idolatry,

who were

uneasy

with

religious

militancy,

the tale evoked

only

concern-

and then

called

forth a

considerable

talent

for

exegesis.

If

it

was

not

yet possible

to declare

the text

a

late

interpolation,

it

could

always

be

argued

that God

did

not

intend it as

a

direct

command,

or,

that it

was a command

to be

obeyed

only

in

special

circum-

stances

unlikely

ever to

recur. Whatever

God's

intentions,

Ex-

odus

32

was

frequently

cited

in

the

long

debates

which

raged

over

the

questions

of

religious persecution

and

holy

war

(and

later

over

the

related

questions

of

political

purge

and

revolution).

From

the

time

when

Augustine

first

grappled

with the

problems

of a Christian

empire

until the

collapse

of

Calvinist

radicalism

in

England

in

I660,

the dramatic

onslaught

of

the

Levites

upon

the

idolatrous

people

was an

example which,

if it was not

to

be

imitated,

needed

to be

elaborately explained.

II

It

cost St.

Augustine

many

years

of anxious

study

and

reflec-

tion

before

he

brought

himself to defend

the

persecution

of

heretical

Christians

by

the

Roman

state.4

When

he

finally

did

so,

he offered

in

justification

of

his

new

position

an

interpreta-

tion

of

Exodus

32.

Earlier

in his

career, Augustine

had

main-

tained

that

spiritual

men

would

struggle

against heresy

armed

only with the Word of God. They would not, that is,

make

war

with

heretics,

but

would

rather

seek

to

persuade

them

of

their

folly

or

wickedness

through

the

example

of

holy

lives

and the

The

development

of

Augustine's

thought

on

persecution

is

carefully

traced

by

HERBERT

.

DEANE,

The

Political

and Social

Ideas

of

St.

Augustine

(New

York, I963),

Chapter

VI.

4

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32 AND HOLY WAR

preaching

of

true doctrine. Wars

with the

sword, Augustine

had

insisted,

could

bring only

secular victories.

They

might

lead to

a

worldly peace-or rather to a few moments of worldly peace,

since

war was

chronic

in

the

City

of Man

-

but

they

could never

bring

that

eternal

peace

which God offered

to the

souls

of

his

elect.

Christians

might fight

in

the wars

of the

earthly

city,

seeking

the

only

peace

that was

possible

on

earth; indeed,

they

should

fight

(and

their

wars would be

just),

for

peace

on

earth

was a

worthy

goal

even

for

God's

pilgrims

who

sought

a

higher

end.

But as

a

community

the

City

of

God

had

nothing

to

gain

from such

wars;

they

were civil wars of the earthly city, and

the

heavenly

city

was,

so

to

speak,

a

foreign power

which

was

not

involved

and

had

no

possible

interest

in

intervention.5

Augustine's

defense

of

religious persecution

resulted

from

(or

at

any

rate

required)

the

discovery

of another

kind

of

war.

This

was a

war

very

different

from

the endless

encounters

of

ambi-

tious

and lustful

men,

and one

which

necessarily

culminated

in

a

peace very

different

from

those

brief

moments when

ambition

was

satiated

or

lust

controlled.

It

was

not

a civil

war,

but

stemmed

instead

from

the

deep-rooted

and

perpetual

enmity

between

the

City

of

God

and the

City

of Man.

Thus, Augustine

wrote,

we have

two

wars,

that

of

the

wicked

at

war

with

the

wicked

and

that

of the

wicked

at

war

with

the

good.

6

So

long

as the

two

cities

existed,

there would be

war between

them,

and

reli-

gious persecution,

Augustine

concluded,

was

nothing

more

than

one form of this perpetual struggle. The truth is, that always

both

the

bad have

persecuted

the

good,

and the

good

have

per-

secuted

the

bad:

the

former

doing

harm

by

their

unrighteousness,

the

latter

seeking

to

do

good

by

the administration

of disci-

pline.

..

.

7

In his Letter

to

Vincentius,

one

of

the

first

pieces

in which he

5AUGUSTINE,

City

of God,

Book

XVIII,

2

and

XIX, 7,

12

(trans.

Walsh,

Zema,

et

al.).

' City of God, Book XV, 5.

7

Letter

XCIII,

paragraph

8

(trans. J.

G.

Cunningham).

It

is

necessary

to dis-

tinguish

this

struggle

of

wicked men

and

good

men from

Ithat

defense of the

peace

of the

earthly city

(described

above)

which

Augustine

calls

just

(City

of

God,

Book

XIX,

7).

Good

men

may

fight against

wicked

men in

a

just

war,

but

they

do

so

as

members of

the

earthly

city

and so

represent

only

the

limited

goodness

that

pertains

to

that

city.

Hence

they

fight

a

limited

war.

A

just

war has

a

begin-

5

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HARVARD

THEOLOGICAL REVIEW

defended

the

persecution

of

the

Donatists,

Augustine

used the

book of

Exodus to illustrate

this double

persecution:

Pharaoh

was the oppressor of the good; Moses of the bad. The two used

the

same

weapons.

Faced with the

threat

of

a militant

and

suc-

cessful

heresy,

Augustine

was

unwilling

to

rely

on

holiness and

the

Word. Now

worldly

men and

spiritual

men

employed

alike

the

weapons

of

the world.

Yet

the

Bishop

of

Hippo

had

no

diffi-

culty

distinguishing

them.8

When

good

and

bad do the

same

actions and suffer

the

same afflic-

tions, they

are to

be

distinguished

not

by

what

they

do or

suffer,

but

by

the

causes of

each:

for

example,

Pharaoh

oppressed

the

people

of

God

by

hard

bondage;

Moses

afflicted

the

same

people

by

severe

correction when

they

were

guilty

of

impiety

[reference

to

Exodus

32:27]:

their

actions were

alike;

but

they

were not alike

in the

motive

of

regard

to

the

people's

welfare

-the one inflated

by

the

lust of

power,

the

other inflamed

by

love.

A

close

examination of

this

citation will

suggest

some

of

the

difficulties of Augustine's position. Pharaoh, he argues, oppressed

the

Israelites out of

lust,

that

is,

in his own interest. Moses

acted

out

of

love

for

the

people,

in their

own

interest. These different

motives

point

to another difference of

greater significance

which

Augustine's political purposes

required

him

to

establish.

A

re-

gard

for

the

people's

welfare

was

thought

by

the

classical writers

whom he knew

so

well

to

be

one

of

the

crucial

signs

of a

legiti-

mate

ruler. The mere lust

for

power

marked

the

tyrant.9

Moses

afflicted the

people

for their own

good,

then,

but also as their

true

sovereign,

their

prince,

chief or

judge

chosen

by

God

to

lead them out of

Egypt.

In

another

passage, citing

the same

ning:

it

begins

with a

specific

violation of

worldly

peace.

And it has an end:

it

ends when that

peace

has been

restored

(not

improved

upon)

by

defensive action.

But the war

of

the wicked and the

good

has

no

beginning

or

end,

or

rather,

it

is

coterminous

with the

earthly city

itself,

which had

its

beginning

at

the Fall.

It

is

not

started anew

by

each

particular

aggression,

nor

is

the

activity

of the

good

necessarily

defensive

(or

limited).

The theories of the

just

war

and the

holy

war (or crusade) represent two radically different Christian defenses of the use

of

violence.

Both

have

their

origins

in

Augustine

and a

long

history

thereafter.

For

a

discussion

of

the two traditions

in

later

history,

see

ROLAND

AINTON,

on-

gregationalism:

From

the

Just

War to

the Crusade

in

the

Puritan

Revolution,

Andover Newton

Theological

School

Bulletin

35:3

(April,

I943),

I-2o.

8

Letter

XCIII, paragraph

6.

9

See ARISTOTLE'S

olitics,

Book

III,

C.

VII.

6

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EXODUS

32 AND

HOLY WAR

text, Augustine similarly

stressed the

justice

of

Moses's

action.10

He

was,

after

all,

defending

the

activity

of

Roman

magistrates

and opposing the violence of self-appointed Donatist saints.

Hence,

he had

to

argue

not

merely

that

persecution

was

a war

of

the

good against

the

wicked,

but

also

that the

good

as a

group

had

representatives

on

earth who

might

even

by

earthly

stand-

ards

legitimately

wield

the

sword.

He

was not

ready

to hand

that sword

to

private

Christians.

And

it was

for

this reason that

he omitted

any

mention

of

the Levites and attributed

the afflic-

tion

of

the

people

simply

to

Moses:

for the

Levites

had

appar-

ently

volunteered for their

bloody

mission and never been

ordained

or

appointed.

To have

emphasized

their

activity

would

have been

to

suggest

the

prerogatives

of

saints-out-of-office.

Augustine

seems to be

maintaining

that Christians

may

hold

office in

worldly

states

and

empires

and then act

officially,

and

only

officially,

in

pursuit

of

religious

purposes.

It is an

argu-

ment

which,

as his

most

recent

interpreter

has

pointed out,

fundamentally

contradicts

the

dualism

of

his

general theory.ll

Magistrates

who

persecute

heretics

in

the

name of Christ turn

the

City

of

Man into

a

theocracy or,

since

Augustine

does not

pretend

that

Moses

acted

at the

direct

command of

God,

into

a

kingdom

of the

godly.

But

suppose

the

godly

did

not hold

power

in

state

or

empire.

Might they

still

wage

that second

war

which

Augustine

describes

as

perpetual? Augustine's response

was

firmly

negative.12

But

his own world-historical conception of permanent persecution

vitiated the effectiveness

of

that

response.

He would

have been

more

successful

in

limiting

the use

of

the

sword

to secular

magis-

trates

if

he had

also

limited

the

purposes

for

which

the sword

might

be

used

to secular affairs.

He

would

have

been more suc-

cessful,

or at

least

less useful

to

later

Christian

crusaders,

if

he had

maintained his dualism

consistently.

It

was

simply

not

possible

to defend

worldly

religious

activity

without

calling

forth

all sorts of religious activists, enthusiastic imitators of the chil-

dren of

Levi.

10

Oeuvres

Completes

de

Saint

Augustin

(Paris,

1873),

Vol.

23,

279.

11

DEANE,

Political

and

Social

Ideas,

2i5ff.

12

See the discussion in

DEANE,

p.

199

and

references

there. One

of

the criteria

for

a

just

war is

that

it be

waged

at

the command of a

legitimate

sovereign.

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The

theory

of

eternal warfare

developed by

Augustine

was elab-

orated

in

the

Middle

Ages

into the full-scale

legal

and

theologi-

cal doctrine of holy war.l3 Until the age of Hildebrand, holy

wars were

fought only

between Christians

and

infidels,

and since

in

such wars

the

Christians

were

usually

led

by

their

secular

lords,

the

problem

which had

worried

Augustine

did

not arise.

But

Gregorian

writers of the

eleventh

and

twelfth

centuries,

citing

Augustine's

defense of

religious

persecution,

insisted

that

the doctrine

encompassed

also the

struggle

of true

Christians

against

heretics,

schismatics

and

excommunicants.

Even

this

struggle

might,

of

course,

be carried on in accordancewith Au-

gustinian

restrictions.

Given the

political position

of the

Gre-

gorians,

however,

they

could

hardly

leave it to secular officials.

They urged

instead that

holy

wars

might

be

fought

at

the com-

mand of the church

alone

and that soldiers

who

struggled

against

the

enemies

of

God

required

no secular

sanction what-

soever.

The radical

papalist

Manegold

of

Lautenbach

forth-

rightly

took the

very position

that

Augustine

had

hoped

to

preclude:

those

who

kill

excommunicants,

he

declared,

are

not

considered

murderers.

That

the accusation was

even im-

aginable

indicates that the

men involved were

not

public

officials

enforcing

the laws

of

the

state.

They

were

presumably

private

Christians

who

had

taken the

holy

war,

so to

speak,

into

their

own

hands.l5

To vindicate

Manegold's

extreme

position

it

was

only necessary

to

cite

the

example

of

the

Levites,

so

carefully

ignored by Augustine. And judging from the rebuke which

Aquinas

later administered

to

the

more

enthusiastic defenders

of

the

holy

war

doctrine,

this

appeal

to Exodus

32

was

frequently

made

by

medieval radicals.

III

St. Thomas

Aquinas

did

not believe

that war

was either

chronic

or perpetual, or that human history since the Fall had involved

a

continuous

persecution

of

the

good by

the

wicked and

the wicked

13MICHEL

VILLEY,

La

Croisade: essai

sur la

formation

d'une theiorie

juridique

(Paris,

I942),

3off.

14

VILLEY,

36ff.

15

VILLEY,

39.

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AND HOLY WAR

by

the

good.

His

Aristotelian

conception

of

political

life

dis-

posed

him

towards

a view of

peace

as

the

natural condition of

mankind. Even between Christiansand infidels,he thought,there

was

no

necessary

state

of war

(and

in

his discussion of war in

the Summa

Theologica, Aquinas

made no mention

of the

most

important

wars

fought

in

the

century

and a half

before he wrote:

the

Crusades).16

All

men were ruled

by

the

same natural

law,

imprinted

on

their minds

at

birth

and

not

entirely

effaced

by

Adam's

sin.

Aquinas

did,

of

course,

accept

the notion that

here-

tics

might legitimately

be

persecuted,

but

since

he

did

not

view

this persecutionin world-historical erms, he was able to go much

farther than

Augustine

in

limiting

it.

The

difference between

his

own

position

and

Augustine's

is

evident

in

the new

interpreta-

tion

he

offeredof

Exodus

32.

Christian radicals

(unnamed

in

the

Summa)

had

apparently

drawn

two

arguments

from

the

biblical

description

of

the

Leviti-

cal

onslaught,

both

of

which

Aquinas

was

eager

to

refute.'

They

had

argued

first

that

it was

lawful for

any

private

individual

to

punish

a

sinner--for

had

not

Moses issued

a command that

was

virtually

an invitation:

Put

every

man his

sword

by

his

side

. . . ?

To this

Aquinas replied

that

the

Levites had in

fact

acted at

God's command: Thus saith

the Lord

God of

Israel. . .

The

slaughter

was

properly

His

act and

not

their

own. The second radical

argument

was that clerics

might

legitimately slay

evil-doers.

This

assumed

that

the Levites were

already priests, an assumption that Aquinas chose not to ques-

tion.

He

argued

instead

that the Levites were

ministers

of the

Old

Law

which

appointed

corporal

penalties.

They

were not

to

be

compared

with

Christian

priests.

Aquinas

thus offered an

interpretation

of

Exodus

32

in

its

way

as

curious as

Augustine's:

if

the

Bishop

of

Hippo ignored

the

Levites,

the medieval

doctor

ignored

Moses. He not

only

failed

to

reproduce

Augustine's

discussion of

Moses'

motives;

he

did

not even mention Moses as a participant in the slaughter. In

his version

God and

the

Levites

were

the

only

actors.

Aquinas

AQUINAS,

Summa

Theologica, 2a, 2ae, Q.

40.

17

The

following

paragraph

is

based on

an

interpretation

of Summa

Theologica,

2a,

2ae,

Q. 64,

Articles

3

and

4.

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HARVARD

THEOLOGICAL REVIEW

was

not

willing

to

confront

the attack

upon

the

idol-worshippers

as

the

act of a

secular

magistrate

not

because

he would neces-

sarily have disapprovedof such an act; more likely because he

sensed the

danger

of

defending persecution

with

such a cita-

tion. It was

far better to ascribe

Moses's

indiscriminate invi-

tation

to

Jehovah himself,

since

Jehovah, Aquinas

felt,

was un-

likely

to

issue another such.

And this

in

effect

denied the value

of

the citation

altogether.

This

particular

incident

in

Israel's

history

was

a

special

case from which

Christians

had

nothing

to

learn.

God

no

longer

gave

commands

like

the

one

he

presumably

gave

(no

direct command is mentioned in the

text)

to the Le-

vites.

The

penalties

of

the

Old Law

had

been

superseded.

Aquinas

had no

desire,

of

course,

to

question

the

general

value

of

Israelite

history

as a

guide

for his

contemporaries.

Indeed,

he defended his

preference

for

mixed

government

with a careful

analysis

of the Mosaic

polity.l8

Like

Augustine, however,

his

argument

set

in motion

intellectual

processes

which

he

could not

arrest.

Men who

shared

St. Thomas's obvious

dislike

for

the

crusading spirit,

for

example, might

well

deny

the

legitimacy

of

religious

persecution

as well

-

crusade

and

persecution

had

often

enough

been

described as

aspects

of

the same

war.

The

defense

of either

by

reference to Old

Testament

passages

might

then be

met

by

a

simple

extension of

Aquinas's

own

argument

as to

rele-

vance.

An

interesting example

of

this extension

can be found

in

Hugo

Grotius'

De

Jure

Belli

ac

Pacis,

a

seventeenth-century

treatise restating and enormously elaborating the Thomist doc-

trine

of

the

just

war. Grotius

repeats

in

rather different

but

recognizable

form

Aquinas'

two

arguments

against

the relevance

of

Exodus

32.

First,

he

attributes

the

severity

of

Mosaic

punish-

ment to divine counsel.

And he

then

dismisses

such counsel with

a

fine

show

of

agnostic

trepidation:

no conclusive inference can

be

drawn

.

.

.

its

depths

we

cannot

sound

. . .

we

are

liable

to

run

into

error.

19

Acts committed at

the

command of

God

are no precedentsfor latter-dayChristians. The conclusion is not

different

from

Aquinas'

and the

method is

only

a more

radical ver-

sion

of

his

own.

Secondly,

Grotius writes

what

sounds

like a

28

Summa

Theologica,

ia,

2ae,

Q. 105,

Article

i.

19

De

Jure

Belli

ac

Pacis,

Book

II, XX,

xxxix.

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EXODUS 32 AND

HOLY WAR

modernist

parody

of

the medieval

argument

about

the

Old Law:

the

zeal

of

private

men to

punish

sinners and

idolators,

he

sug-

gests, was justified in the period before civil jurisdiction was

established. Primitive

law

permitted

such

punishment,

but it

is

very

unsafe

today.20

IV

For

both

Aquinas

and

Grotius, society

and

peace

were the

natural

conditions

of

mankind

and the natural

aims of all

men.

God,

perhaps,

could act

against

nature

(though

Grotius

did not

believe

he

ever did

so)

but

men

surely

could

not,

or

at

any

rate

only

perverse

men could

-

the

terms of the

argument

are am-

biguous

enough,

but

the intentions of the

theorists are

fairly

clear.

They

meant to

require peaceful

behavior

from

all men

and

to restrict war

to a

defensive

struggle against

aggression

and

perversity

waged by recognized

champions

of

society

and never

by private men or self-designated saints.

For

John

Calvin,

on

the

other

hand, peace

was the

natural

condition

only

of

regenerate

men. So

long

as mankind

was divided

into saints and

worldlings,

war

was

inevitable and

continuous.21

Describing

this

struggle,

urging

the saints

onward,

Calvin

and

his

followers

brought

the

theory

of

the

holy

war

to

its

logical

conclusion. Their

rejection

of

the

moderation of

Aquinas

and his

school

carried

them

further

than

Augustine

had

ever

ventured.

The radicalism of their doctrine is apparent in the startlingly

new

view

they

took of

Exodus

32.

Flatly

contradicting

Aquinas,

Calvin

described the

Levitical

onslaught

precisely

as

a

precedent:

the Levites

foreshadowed

the

Protestant elect.

They

were

a

special

group

of

men

to

whom

God

had

given

special

privileges

and

commands;

but

they

were

also

symbols

of

the

coming gen-

erations

of

holy

warriors.

The

key

to

the character of

the Levites

for

Calvin

was not

that

20 De

Jure

Belli

ac

Pacis,

Book

II, XX,

ix

and xiv.

The

imagery

of

warfare

was

frequently

employed

in

CALVIN'Sermons

to

describe the

activity

of

the

saints and

the

response

of Satan

and

his

worldlings;

for some

examples,

see

Commentaries

upon

the

Prophet

Daniel

(London,

I570),

Sig. B2;

Sermons on the

Epistles

of

St. Paul to

Timothy

and

Titus

(London,

I579),

Sermon

9

on

Timothy,

p.

ioo.

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HARVARD THEOLOGICAL

REVIEW

they

killed idolators

but

that

they

killed brethren.

He thus

stressed

a feature

of

the biblical

text

carefully

avoided

by

both

Augustine and Aquinas. You shall show yourselves rightly

zealous

of

God's

service,

he told his

Genevan

audience,

in

that

you

kill

your

own brethren without

sparing,

so

as

in this case the

order

of nature be

put

underfoot,

to

show that

God

is above

all

. . .

22

The

point

was made even

more

clearly

by John

Knox,

in a brief comment

upon

the same text:

God's

word

draweth

his elect

after

it,

against

worldly appearance, against

natural

affections and

against

civil statutes and constitutions.

23

Neither Calvin nor Knox made any mention of the time-honored

distinction

between

private

men and

magistrates.

That

distinc-

tion

had been

largely superseded

by

the

confrontation of

saints

and

worldlings-a supersession always implicit

in

the

theory

of

the

holy

war.

Indeed,

Knox's

reference to

civil statutes

and

constitutions

suggests

that he was

perfectly

willing

to set

saints-

out-of-office

against ungodly

magistrates.

He

saw

the

Levites

as

saints

serving only God,

and that

without benefit

of

ordination.

Moses

presumably

served

God

also,

in a

higher

but not

in

a

different

capacity.

Both

the

Levites

and

Moses

were assimilated

to

the

new

Protestant

conception

of the

elect,

and so neither

Calvin

nor

Knox shared

the concern of

Aquinas

and

Augustine

over which

to

emphasize.

The radicalism

of

Calvin's

sermons

is

not

at

all

evident

in his

Institutes. It

was

only

with

Knox and then some

of

the

English

Puritans that that radicalism was developed in anything like a

consistent

fashion.

Writing against

the

Anabaptists

in

the

famous

chapter

on civil

government,

Calvin

merely

reaffirmed

Augus-

tine's

view of the

right

of

magistrates

to

wage

war

upon

God's

enemies-

and reaffirmed

also the

required

version

of

Exodus

32

Sermons

on the

Fifth

Book

of

Moses

(London,

1583),

p.

I203.

In

his

Com-

mentaries

on

the Four Last Books

of

Moses

(Edinburgh,

1854),

Vol.

III,

35Iff.,

Calvin

denies

that

there

is

anything

cruel

in the

slaughter

of

brethren:

Moses

only

wished to

condemn

that absurd

regard

to

humanity whereby judges

are often

blinded . . .

It should be

said

that

the

long

discussion

of

Exodus

32

in

the

Commentaries

is not

directly

relevant

here,

since Calvin is

not

citing

the

passage

in

the course

of an

argument,

but

expounding

it

in detail. Citation

depends,

to

a

degree,

on

previous

exposition,

but

often the

exigencies

of

argument

will lead a

writer

to use a

particular

passage

in a

way

not

yet

canvassed

by

the

expositors.

23JOHN

KNOX, Works,

ed.

D.

Laing

(Edinburgh,

1846-48),

Vol.

III, 3IIf.

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EXODUS 32 AND HOLY

WAR

with its

exclusive

emphasis upon

the role of

Moses.

How

did

the meek

and

placid

Moses,

Calvin

asked,

burn with such

cruelty,

that,

after

having

his hands imbrued in the blood of

his

brethren,

he

continued

to

go through

the

camp

till

three

thousand

were slain?

24

There

is,

of

course,

no mention in the

text

of Moses

having

killed

anyone

at

the

foot

of

Sinai,

let alone

all three thousand

of

the

idol-worshippers.

Once

again,

the omis-

sion of

the

Levites

is

determined

by

the answer which

Calvin

intends

to his own

question:

Moses was

engaged,

by

virtue

of

his office, in the infliction of public vengeance. Still, Calvin's

stress was not

quite

the same as

Augustine's;

he did

not mention

the

people's

welfare and he was

quite

unconcerned with

any

suggestion

of Moses' secular

authority. Instead,

Moses

avenges

the affliction of

the

righteous

at the command of

God.

God

alone

is

sovereign,

and

if

in the Institutes he

is

imagined

to

work

only

through

men

whom

he

has first raised

to

public

office,

it

is

not hard

to

imagine

him

choosing

other

instruments--or

to

imagine

other men

claiming

to be so chosen.

That claim was most

dramatically put

forward

during

the sev-

enteenth-century English

Revolution.

Indeed,

the

English

saints

expanded considerably

on

the

ancient

dispute

over

the

meaning

of

Exodus

32

and

developed

a full-scale

interpretation

of

the

escape

from

Egypt

as a revolution

parallel

to their

own,

an

in-

exhaustible

source

of

godly precedents

and

examples.25

In

their

sermons and pamphlets, the Levitical onslaught was described

as

a

revolutionarypurge.

But

it

was still a

question

whether

that

purge

should

be

conducted

by

magistrates

or

by private

men.

The divine

policy

and

heavenly

remedy

to recover a common-

wealth and

church

. .

.

endangered,

wrote one Puritan

minis-

ter, citing

Exodus

32,

is

that those that

have

authority

under

God do

totally

abolish and

extirpate

all the cursed

things

whereby

it was

disturbed.

26

But

saints

in and

out of office

might

still

2

The

Institutes

of

the Christian

Religion,

Book

IV, XX,

x

(trans. John

Allen).

2

See

for

example

the remarkable

sermon

which

JOHN

OWEN

preached

just

after

the execution

of

Charles

I, Works,

ed.

W.

H.

Goold

(Edinburgh,

1862),

Vol.

VIII, I27ff.

6

SAMUEL

AIRCLOTH,

he

Troublers

Troubled

(London,

1641),

24f.

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HARVARD

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EVIEW

claim that

extraordinary authority.

Alas,

the

tale of the

golden

calf offered

no

clear

evidence

as to its

precise recipients.

V

Three basic

interpretations

of

Exodus

32

were offered

by politi-

cal

theorists

and

theologians

n the course of more than a thousand

years

of

debate.

St.

Augustine

imagined

the

slaughter

of

the

idol-worshippers

as

a

public

and

benevolent

act

of

persecution

directed

by Moses,

a

secular

magistrate

seen

in

the

guise

of

a

Roman

consul.

St.

Thomas

Aquinas

saw the same event as an

act

of

God

(the

Levites

merely

his

agents),

without

significance

for

the future. Calvin saw it as an

example

of

zealous

activity

by

a band

of

saints

free from

earthly

and

natural

law,

instru-

ments

of

the

divine

will,

but

voluntary

instruments.

In

these

in-

terpretations

the three men reveal

themselves

and

the

special

anxieties

of

their times:

Augustine,

struggling

to

justify perse-

cution, but also to establish limits upon it consistent with the

existence

of a

Christian

empire;

Aquinas, uneasy

with

crusading

fervor, refusing altogether

to

recognize

the

war

of

good

men

against

wicked

men;

Calvin,

eager

for battle and

willing

to

set

the saints

loose from

secular control.

All

three

of them

were

forced to

be

biblical

lawyers,

but

God's

law in their

hands was

as

different

as

men and

ages

could

make

it.

Differently

as

they might interpret

that

law,

however,

dismiss

it they could not. Only when the Bible had ceased to be an au-

thoritative

text

could

men free themselves from

the need to de-

bate its

precise meaning

and to describe their

own

positions

as

consistent with

that

meaning.

Then

the

way

was

open

for the

historical

critics,

and

open

also

for a

kind

of

judgment

which

could never have been uttered

by

Augustine,

Aquinas,

or

Calvin.

Thus

John Aubrey reports

the

opinion

of

Thomas

Hobbes: I

have heard him

inveigh

much

against

the

Crueltie of

Moyses

for putting so many thousands to the Sword for Bowing to the

Golden

Calf.

27

27Aubrey's Brief

Lives,

ed.

O.

L. Dick

(Ann

Arbor, I962),

I57.

See also the

entry

Moise

in

VOLTAIRE'S

Dictionnaire

philosophique.

14