Timna was concubine to Eliphaz, Esau’s son; and she bare to Eliphaz Amalek. Consequently the Israelites and the Amalekites were near of kin; they were sprung from the loins of one father, Isaac. This nation, consequently, which was bound by kindred to assist the Israelites, forgot its ties of blood, and fell upon them.
There is also a third reason for the annihilation of Amalek. It was the FIRST of all the nations to assault the chosen people, the first to fall upon them with the sword, the first to stop the way to the Promised Land. This was the final reason why Amalek was singled out for such overwhelming destruction that Balaam in prophecy could exclaim: Amalek was the first of the nations that warred against Israel (marg.), but his latter end shall be that he perish for ever. The children of Israel were in a critical position when encamped at Rephidim: they had just escaped from Egypt, and in a few days they might return thither if their hearts failed at the prospect of war. They had begun to sigh for the leeks, and the onions, and the flesh-pots of Egypt, and but little more was wanting to bring their discontent to a climax, and to send them back to their captivity. Amalek, being the first to attack them, set an example to other nations of the land, provoking Midianite, Moabite, and Amorite to regard the chosen people of God as enemies instead of treating them as wayfarers, to impede their progress instead of opening to them a passage.
Applicatio. From this learn, Christian soul, that if God chose to annihilate this people because it hindered the chosen race in its progress to the Land of Promise, because it opposed this people which it was bound by relationship to assist, because it was the first to do so, thereby encouraging others to stand against it—then great indeed will be God’s wrath with you, if you prevent others from reaching the Heavenly Canaan, they being members of the same spiritual family, and you being the one to encourage others to destroy the souls for which Christ died.
Let infidel, heathen, and heretic persecute, their guilt is tolerable compared to yours; if you lead from the paths of righteousness, and you be the first so to lead astray, one who is of the same household of Faith, a brother, a relation, one redeemed by Christ’s blood, a member of the same mystical body, of the same Church—think what you are thereby doing! Christ, the true Moses, is leading His people from the Egypt of sin, through the wilderness of this world, into the country of everlasting felicity. And what are you doing? Barring the passage to God’s people, undoing the work of Christ, setting at nought the blood of the covenant. Terrible will be the condemnation of those who act thus!
De Barzia, after having appealed earnestly to the consciences of his hearers, and urged them to examine themselves whether they have ever put an occasion of falling in their brother’s way, bursts into a magnificent piece of irony. He says that he hears the excuse made,—“Come, now! persecution is a strong term, unjustifiably strong; I never persecuted any one for leading a holy life: I may have teased So-and-so, but that is all; just teased him in joke, you understand.” In joke! a joke more ruinous than the worst cruelty of a persecutor. A joke! Ah, ha! a right merry joke, a capital joke, indeed! Go, cut the pipes which bring water into this city—only in joke, of course—cut the pipes, then, and watch the result. Such a joke! the fountains fail, the mills cease working, the gardens are parched up, men and beasts perish through thirst. Oh, magnificent joke!
This the Bishop applies with all his vehemence and fire. He then continues by reference to the old law: Life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, burning for burning, wound for wound, stripe for stripe. If a man smote another with a stone and injured him, by the law of Moses he was bound to pay for the cure of the injured man, and also for the loss of time. By which is signified, that if any one by evil example, or bad advice, cause spiritual sickness in another, he must atone for that, suffering for the sins which he has led his brother to commit.
Epilogus. Woe to such an one on the last great day, when the Judge says, “See, impious man, this child was waxing strong in spirit, filled with wisdom, and the grace of God was upon him, but you by your sneers and ridicule, by your jests and scoffs, turned him aside from the path of My commandments into the way of death. You have made My labours for that poor soul in vain; come now, make recompense for all that you have done,” and He shall deliver him to the tormentors till he have paid the debt.
At the risk of wearying the reader, I shall give in outline a specimen of one of De Barzia’s Saints’-day sermons, and I select the third for the festival of St. John the Divine.
Text, John xxi.—What is that to thee?
Introduction. Although our Lord promised to His disciples that they should have whatsoever they asked, yet He made the condition—If ye abide in Me. Wherefore? Judas had at this time gone out, so that those to whom the promise was made were certain to abide in Christ; and He in His foreknowledge knew that of the eleven all would remain constant till death. But Jesus spake not out of His omniscience as God, but out of care for the eleven, lest they should be elated and puffed up with spiritual pride, knowing that they were ordained to eternal life. Christ spoke conditionally, so as to teach them fear and anxiety for themselves, and in order to keep them humble.