Table of Contents:
[Synopsis criticorum aliorumque Sacrae Scripturae interpretum]
CHAPTER XIII:
Herein treateth it of the precepts Ethical, or those which order life: there follow the Political, which here be twain, the obedience of subjects toward Princes, and mutual justice among inferiors. After the absolute use of the Ritual Law and that pertaining to Manners, it cometh to that part which pertaineth to public Governance and Civil Society: and it sheweth in this part that the Laws of Moses be not abolished by Christians, as though, if they dwelt in Judea, they ought to obey those Laws; but they be made equal with the laws of other nations not repugnant to God. Nor doth it hinder that the Law of Moses was given by God, since also those governments without Judea, and their authority, have their origin from God. At once it cutteth off the difficulty of many in Judea, who, because it was said in Deuteronomy 17:15, that a king should be chosen from among brethren, that is, from their own people, inferred that no obedience was owed to foreigners; subtly intimating that that law held when the Hebrew people were under their own jurisdiction; but after, by God’s judgment, they came under the dominion of the Romans, they ought no less to obey them than a Jewish king or the Sanhedrin of the Jews, even as Jeremiah commanded to obey Nebuchadnezzar, and as the Prophets obeyed the Chaldeans and Persians. And this admonition was the more necessary because he had said above that Christians were free from the Law of Moses, whence some unwary person might have inferred that neither the Political Law of Moses for the Hebrews, nor other Civil Laws for Christians, imposed any necessity of obedience: which he sheweth to be contrary by the origin and use of governments. This doth Paul inculcate, here and elsewhere oft, both by occasion of the slander which was then cast upon Christians and the Apostles themselves, who were mostly Galileans, as if they were followers of Judas the Galilean, and subverters of kingdoms, and withdrew themselves from obedience to Princes; which was a cause of persecutions, etc.; and also lest the faithful should think themselves exempt from obedience to Princes by the privilege of religion; concerning which, see 1 Peter 2:13; and chiefly because of the believing Jews: for the Jews, ever prone to rebellion, were so under the pretext that they were the free people of God, etc. Wherefore the same precept is repeated in the Epistles of Peter and James, who wrote to the Jews; and of Paul to Titus, where he noted the disobedience of the Jews.