The Mosaic Law

II. Positive divine law.

1. Notion. Positive divine law is positive law made by God. It has been promulgated through revelation. Moreover, this law, insofar as it regards the precepts of natural law, is morally necessary in the present condition of fallen nature, namely so that the said precepts may be known more fully, firmly, and without admixture of error.¹ But once the supernatural order has been posited, positive divine law is absolutely necessary with respect to the precepts of that order, because without it the obligations annexed to the said order cannot be known in any way (St. Thomas, I-II, q. 91, a. 4).

2. Division. Positive divine law is distinguished into primeval, Mosaic, and Christian law.

a) Primeval law is little known to us. It embraces the time which flowed from Adam until the Mosaic law was given; it is usually called the time of the law of nature.

b) Mosaic law, also called the old law, is the law made by God for the Israelite people and promulgated through Moses. I have said: made by God, as is clear from Sacred Scripture.² I have said: for the Israelite people, that is, for the people whom God led out of Egypt, and for their descendants. Therefore the gentiles were not bound by the Mosaic law, except insofar as it was natural. I have said: promulgated through Moses, as Sacred Scripture likewise testifies.³

a) The precepts of the Mosaic law were threefold: moral, ceremonial, and judicial. The notion of these can be gathered sufficiently from the terms themselves.

b) The special end of the said precepts was threefold: to preserve from universal corruption the people from whom the Messiah was going to arise; to join families and individuals more closely with God by ceremonial precepts and prepare them for the coming of the Messiah; finally, to give honorable security of temporal life, abundance of goods, and health of body.

c) The Mosaic law ceased from the death of Christ, or at least from the day of Pentecost, on which the Christian law began to be in full force. Namely, ceremonial and judicial laws are dead, as it is said. Moral laws, although they no longer bind as Mosaic laws, nevertheless bind as natural laws, with the indults of the Old Law also removed. Furthermore, the ceremonial laws are not only dead, but have even become deadly, that is, bringing spiritual death (St. Thomas, I-II, q. 103, a. 4), namely insofar as one would sin who observed them either as having force from the Mosaic law, or with the intention of worshiping God through faith in the Messiah who was to come. But one who observed it with the intention indeed of worshiping God, although not in a prefigurative sense, would place a worship alien from that which God prescribed by himself or through his Church.⁴

c) Christian law, which is also called new, is the law made by Christ for the whole world. Christ promulgated his law by his own mouth, while the Apostles and their successors divulged it and continually divulge it. Moreover, to the Christian law also belong the laws which the Apostles received from the Holy Spirit and promulgated.⁵ The former are called dominical laws, the latter divine-apostolic. There are added the evangelical counsels, namely of poverty, chastity, and obedience, which together with the precepts constitute divine law, which now cannot be removed or changed. Besides, observe:

a) The precepts of the New Law are distinguished into: 1. moral precepts, by which natural law is confirmed; 2. ceremonial precepts, which regard the sacraments and the Sacrifice of the Mass; 3. precepts of faith, whose mysteries Christ explained, increased, and imposed as to be believed.

b) The New Law, as it seems, began to be in full force, or at least to oblige all in first act, from the time at which the Mosaic law ceased, that is, from the death of Christ, or at least from the day of Pentecost.

¹ Vatican Council, constitution Dei Filius, c. II.

² Exod. 19:5-8; 31:18; Lev. 1:1 sq.; Matt. 15:3 sq.

³ Acts 7:53.

⁴ Sweens, Theologia moralis fundamentalis, n. 311.

⁵ Laws which the Apostles made by their own authority are human laws, namely ecclesiastical laws.

The Mosaic Law.—This was the special law of God to the Jews, the people chosen by God as the race from which the Saviour of the world was to come. It has two periods: the period of preparation and the period of the Law.

(a)The period of preparation for the Law began with the Promise or Covenant given to Abraham. A law is not given except to a people (see 285), and, as the peoples of the world at that time had returned to the general corruption that reigned before the Deluge, God chose Abraham to be the father of a new nation in which true religion should be preserved until the Redeemer of the world had come. The rite of circumcision was ordered as a mark of the covenant and a sacrament of remission.

(b) The period of the Law began with the promulgation of the Decalogue on Sinai. The descendants of Abraham had grown into a nation and had been freed from slavery, and they were thus ready to receive a special law. Their history thereafter shows how God trained them according to the pattern of the Mosaic Law and prepared them for the providential mission, which, through the Messiah, should be theirs, of giving to the world the perfect and universal Law of the Gospel.

The Excellence of the Mosaic Law.—(a) The Law was good (Rom, vii. 12): it commanded what was according to reason and forbade what was opposed to reason; it had God for its Author and prepared man for the Law of Christ. (b) The Law was imperfect (Heb., vii. 19); it was given for a time when men were spiritually but children and not ready as yet for the teaching and morality of the Gospel; it forbade sin and provided punishments, but the necessary helps for observing it came only from faith in Christ, the Author of the New Law.

The Subjects of the Mosaic Law.—(a) The Jewish people were bound by the Mosaic Law. God had chosen Abraham by gratuitous election to be the forefather of the Messiah, and it was by gratuitous election that He gave the Jews a Law which would lend them a special holiness befitting the promises made their race. The Jews, therefore, were bound to more things than other nations, as being the Chosen People; just as clerics are bound to more things than the laity, as being the ministers of God.

(b) The Gentiles were not bound by the laws peculiar to the Mosaic Code, but only by the common precepts, natural and supernatural, that were in force in the state of the Law of Nature. But it was permitted to Gentiles to become proselytes, that by observing Mosaic rites they might more easily and more perfectly work out their salvation.

The Duration of the Mosaic Law.—(a) The Law began when experience had proved that knowledge is not sufficient to make man virtuous, that is, at a time when, in spite of the Natural Law, the peoples were turning to polytheism and vice: “The Law was given on account of transgression” (Gal, iii. 19).

(b) The Law ended when experience had shown that external observance is not sufficient for holiness, that is, at the time when Judaism was degenerating into formalism, putting the letter before the spirit of the Law: “What the Law could not do, God sending His own Son, hath condemned sin in the flesh, that the justification of the Law might be fulfilled in us” (Rom., viii. 3, 4).

Deuteronomy, vi. 1, describes the Mosaic Law as precepts, ceremonies and judgments; and the commandments of the Old Testament can be classified according to this threefold division. (a) The moral precepts defined the duties to God and man that arise from the dictates of reason and the Natural Law; (b) the ceremonial prescriptions were determinations of the religious duties to God contained in the moral law, and rules concerning the performance of worship based on the positive ordinance of God; (c) the judgments were determinations of social duties contained in the moral law; they were the civil or political code of the theocratic nation which had its force from the positive ordinance of God.

The moral precepts are contained in the Decalogue, which is a sum of the whole Natural Law, inasmuch as the general principles of the Natural Law are implicit therein in their immediate conclusions, while the remote conclusions are virtually found in the Commandments as in their principles (see 301).

The Decalogue expresses man’s duties: (a) towards God, viz., loyalty (First Commandment), reverence (Second), service (Third)—all of which are Laws of the First Table; (b) towards parents (Fourth), and all fellow-men, viz., that no injustice be done them by sins of deed (Fifth, Sixth, Seventh), of mouth (Eighth), or of heart (Ninth, Tenth)—all of which are Laws of the Second Table.

The further moral precepts which were added after the giving of the Decalogue can all be reduced to one or the other of the Ten Commandments. Examples: The prohibition against fortune-telling belongs to the First; the prohibition against perjury and false teaching, to the Second; the commandment to honor the aged, to the Fourth; the prohibition against detraction, to the Eighth.

The ceremonial laws, which prescribed the manner of performing the divine worship or of acting as befitted the Chosen People, and which prefigured the worship and people of the New Testament, were numerous, in order that the Jews might be more easily preserved from pagan rites and customs. The ceremonies they regulated were of four kinds: (a) the sacrifices through which God was worshipped and through which the sacrifice of Christ was prefigured (e.g., the holocausts, peace-offerings, sin-offerings); (b) the sacred times and places, things and persons set apart in order to give more dignity to divine worship and to foreshadow more distinctly the good things to come; (c) the sacraments by which the people or sacred ministers were consecrated to the worship of God and were made to prefigure Christ (e.g., circumcision and the consecration of Levites); (d) the customs which regulated the details of life so that both priests and people might act as became their special calling, and might be types and figures of the Christian people (e.g., the laws about food, dress, etc.).

Unlike the moral laws, which had existed before Moses as the Natural Law and which continue under the Christian dispensation, the ceremonial laws were temporary. Thus: (a) before Moses other ceremonies were observed by the patriarchs (e.g., the sacrifice of Abel, the altars of Abraham and Jacob, the priesthood of Melchisedech, etc.); (b) after the coming of Christ, distinctions of food, new moons, sabbaths, and other Mosaic ceremonies were abrogated, since the figures of future things had been superseded by rites that commemorated benefits that were present.

We may distinguish four periods in the history of the Mosaic ceremonial law: (a) from Moses until Christ, it was the divinely ordained manner of worshipping God, and was obligatory for the Chosen People; (b) at the death of Christ, when the New Testament began, the Mosaic ceremonial ceased to be obligatory; (c) until the Gospel had been sufficiently promulgated (i.e., until the destruction of the City and the Temple of Jerusalem), the ceremonial law was permitted to Jewish converts, not as prefiguring Christ, but as a form of divine worship; (d) after the Gospel had been sufficiently proclaimed, it was no longer lawful to conform to the Mosaic observances.

The judgments or judicial laws of the Old Testament were intended; (a) to regulate the relations of the people of God to one another and to strangers according to justice and equity, and thus to prepare them for the coming of the Messiah; (b) to be, consequently, in some sort a figure of the social constitution of the Christian people.

The judicial laws, like the ceremonial, expired with the New Testament. But since, unlike the ceremonial laws, they were not appointed directly as prefigurative of Christianity, their provisions, if not opposed to Christian law, could be used as part of the civil code of a Christian State.

There were four kinds of judicial precepts:

(a) those concerning rulers. The government was monarchical and aristocratic, as being administered by Moses and his successors with the assistance of a body of elders; but it was also democratic, inasmuch as the princes were chosen from the people and by the people;

(b) those concerning citizens. Excellent laws concerning sales, contracts, property, and the administration of justice, are laid down in the Pentateuch;

(c) those concerning foreigners. The relationship of the Jews to other nations, whether in peace or in war, was regulated by wise and humane laws;

(d) those concerning families. The rights and duties of husband and wife, parent and child, master and servant, were carefully and considerately provided for.

235. It is not our purpose to examine the historical questions concerning the Mosaic law which today are agitated with great heat not only among rationalists, but even among Catholics: for this pertains to the history of revelation.¹ Yet it is fitting to outline a few things: 1. concerning the character and end of this law; 2. concerning its object; 3. concerning its obligation and abrogation, so that the perfection of the new law may be better understood.

¹ Concerning this matter, cf. Vigouroux, Les Livres Saints et la Critique rationaliste, 3rd ed., 1891, t. III, p. 3-226; Hummelauer, Comment. in Exodum, 1891, p. 16-25; in Deut., 1901, p. 23-110; Pelt, Histoire de l'Anc. Testament, 4th ed., Paris, 1904, t. I, ch. XXVII, p. 295-331; Prat, S. J., Le Code du Sinaï, sa genèse et son évolution, Paris, Bloud, 1904; Lagrange, O. P., La Méthode historique, 3rd ed., 1904, p. 147-182.

236. Since the natural law, impressed upon minds, and the primeval law given to the first parents and patriarchs, had gradually been obscured, whether because of sin, or because of the long stay of the Israelites in Egypt, it was opportune that the chief precepts of each should again be solemnly promulgated and completed by others, by which the chosen people would be more efficaciously removed from idolatry and corruption of morals. For this reason, in the third month after Israel's departure from the land of Egypt, on Mount Sinai, the ten precepts of the Decalogue were promulgated,² which contain the sum of the moral precepts of the ancient law; for the rest, not expressed in the Decalogue, are either presupposed, as the precept of faith and love,³ or follow from others, as the prohibition of lying,⁴ which is inferred from the eighth precept, - and the prohibition of unjust hatred,⁵ which is deduced from the fifth. - Yet to these moral precepts were added ceremonial and judicial precepts, which were accommodated to the special condition of the Hebrews, and were ordered to the more perfect observation of the moral precepts.

² Exod., XIX-XX; cf. Hummelauer, in hunc loc.

³ Deut., VI, 5; Levit., XIX, 18.

⁴ Exod., XXIII, 1.

⁵ Levit., XIX, 17-18.

237. (A) That law is truly divine, insofar as it proceeds from God through revelation or inspiration. For this is declared many times not only in the Old Testament (loc. cit.), but also in the New; thus St. Stephen, the interpreter of Jewish tradition, says:¹ "You received the law in the disposition of angels"; and Paul declares that the law was ordained through angels in the hand of a mediator;² for the ministry of angels denotes the intervention of God.

¹ Acts, VII, 53.

² Galat., III, 19.

From this, however, it is in no way permitted to infer that the Hebrew legislator borrowed nothing from the primeval law, from the customs of the patriarchs, or from foreign laws: for God, by inspiring the sacred authors, can move them to use all those things which they already know naturally. Thus, for example, abstinence from things strangled and from blood, and circumcision, had already been prescribed before Moses;³ likewise divorce, polygamy, slavery, and the law of retaliation had been in use, and the Mosaic law limited all these things rather than established them; moreover, certain moral or ritual precepts are almost the same as those which flourished among the Chaldeans and Egyptians.⁴

³ Gen., IX, 4-6; Gen., XVII, 10-14.

⁴ Cf. Prat, op. cit., p. 16-20; Lagrange, op. cit., p. 156-182, where he sets up a comparison between the Mosaic law and the code of Hammourabi recently discovered by V. Scheil, O. P.

But how much the Mosaic law excels foreign laws is clear to one who attends a little: (a) for it clearly and explicitly inculcates monotheism, and strictly prohibits the worship of idols, which flourished among other peoples: "I am the Lord your God... You shall not have strange gods before me. You shall not make for yourself a graven thing..."⁵ (b) Moreover slavery, although tolerated, is much milder than among neighboring nations.⁶ (c) The sum of the law is the love of God and of neighbor: "You shall love the Lord your God with your whole heart, and with your whole soul, and with your whole strength;⁷... You shall love your friend as yourself."⁸ (d) Not only external sins are prohibited, but also internal ones:⁹ "You shall not covet your neighbor's house; nor shall you desire his wife." (e) Nor is only negative holiness commanded, but also positive holiness, which consists in a certain imitation of divine holiness: "Be holy, because I am holy, the Lord your God."¹⁰

⁵ Exod., XX, 2-4.

⁶ Exod., XXI, 1-11.

⁷ Deut., VI, 5.

⁸ Levit., XIX, 18.

⁹ Exod., XX, 17.

¹⁰ Levit., XIX, 2.

238. (B) To urge the observance of the precepts, the Mosaic law chiefly, although not exclusively, uses temporal promises and threats. St. Thomas explains the reason for this:¹ just as in speculative matters means are proposed to the hearer according to his condition, so in moral matters men must be led to the observance of laws by means proportioned to their character, namely by punishments and rewards. Now the Israelites, since they were stiff-necked and especially inclined toward temporal things, were more easily led by the hand to execute the commandments through temporal promises and threats. Wherefore God, accommodating Himself to them, leads them to divine worship by the promise of temporal things, which are symbols of eternal goods: "Whence it was fitting for the old law that through temporal things which were in the affection of imperfect men, it should lead men by the hand to God."

¹ St. Thomas, Ia IIae, q. 99, a. 6.

239. (C) The Mosaic law, although divine, received various additions at various times:² for God did not cease to accommodate His laws to the condition of the Jews; hence He sent Prophets, who not only recalled the people to the observance of the law, but also authentically interpreted and completed the law.³ Likewise He inspired other writers, who in the sapiential books and in the psalms explained the ancient precepts of ethics and handed down new and more perfect ones. The historical books also, besides the examples of virtue which they report, contain not a few precepts or counsels which are especially useful for the spiritual life. Hence, in order to know the old law accurately, it is not enough to read the Mosaic books, but it is necessary to run attentively through the other sacred writers.

² In the Mosaic books a threefold series of laws can already be distinguished: (a) the Code or volume of the covenant (Exod., XX-XXIII); (b) the priestly Code (Exod., XXV-XXX and XXXV-XL; Levit. in its entirety; Num., I-IX, XV, XVII-XIX, XXVIII-XXX, XXXIV-XXXV); (c) Deuteronomy, which either contracts or more fully explains each code.

³ You will find certain examples apud Prat, op. cit., p. 48-67.

240. (D) But the end of the law is Christ;⁴ for, as St. Peter says,⁵ "all the prophets, from Samuel and afterward, who have spoken, announced these days" (messianic days). The law itself was our pedagogue in Christ, that is, leading us to Christ; for its various precepts, not only moral, but also ceremonial, especially those which regard sacrifices and sacraments, were divinely ordered to preparing the way of the Messiah; for by the observation of the law they disposed the Jews to understand and receive more easily the more perfect law of Christ. This indeed is true also of many historical facts, according to that saying of the Apostle:¹ "All these things happened to them in figures"; for many things tended to this, that they might draw minds away from temporal things, and dispose them to awaiting the spiritual kingdom of the Messiah. Therefore the law cannot be rightly understood unless it is kept before the mind that this is a preparation for the evangelical law.

⁴ Rom., X, 4.

⁵ Acts, III, 24-25. We proved this elsewhere, De Vera Relig., n. 229-265.

¹ 1 Cor., X, 11; cf. Fillon, La Ste Bible, t. I, Introduction, p. 2-10.

241. (A) Moral precepts, which are briefly summed up in the Decalogue. For there the chief duties toward God and neighbor are handed down.

St. Thomas declares this as follows:² To God, as the principle of the community, three things are owed: fidelity, reverence, service. Fidelity consists in this, that He alone be adored; hence the first precept: "You shall not have strange gods." Reverence demands that nothing injurious be committed against Him; whence the second precept is as follows: "You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain." Service is owed in recompense for benefits received from the Lord: and to this pertains the third precept concerning the sanctification of the Sabbath, in memory of the benefit of creation. - But toward neighbor, the duties to be fulfilled are special or general: special with regard to parents, to whom children ought to show honor, according to the fourth precept. General duties consist in this, that harm be inflicted on no one by deed, mouth, or heart. By deed let no injury be committed against the person himself: You shall not kill, according to the fifth precept; nor against the person joined in marriage: You shall not commit adultery, as the sixth precept bears; nor in external goods: You shall not steal, as the seventh precept declares. Harm of the mouth is prohibited by the eighth precept: You shall not speak false testimony against your neighbor. But harm of the heart is prohibited by the ninth and tenth precepts: You shall not desire the wife... You shall not covet your neighbor's house.

² St. Thomas, Ia IIae, q. 100, a. 5.

Yet these precepts presuppose another one handed down elsewhere, namely the love of God and of neighbor, as we explained above, n. 236.

242. (B) Ceremonial precepts, which determined the peculiar mode by which God was to be worshiped at that time, and at the same time prefigured the mysteries and sacraments of Christ. From this it can be understood why precepts of this kind were so numerous:³ (a) to promote the worship of God;

³ St. Thomas, Ia IIae, q. 101, a. 3.

for since the Jews were prone to idolatry and the neighboring nations worshiped idols in manifold ways, it was necessary likewise to institute many and solemn ceremonial precepts, by which the chosen people might be more efficaciously deterred from the worship of idols; if the worship offered to the true God had been too simple, the Israelites would easily have been led away to the more solemn worship of the gods; and indeed, when Christian rites, much simpler than Jewish rites, succeeded them, not a few Hebrews converted to the faith grieved greatly over the abrogation of the ancient rites, as is evident from the Epistle to the Hebrews. (b) Moreover, the ceremonial precepts prefigured Christ who was to come, as the Decree for the Jacobites declares:¹ "All the sacred rites, sacrifices, sacraments, and ceremonies of the Old Testament pre-signified Him [Christ] as one day to come." But the mysteries of Christ, on account of their perfection and multiplicity, could be prefigured only by many rites: for the individual Mosaic rites, as imperfect, signified only one or another aspect of the mysteries of Christ; thus, in order to represent the one sacrifice of the New Law, there were many and diverse old sacrifices, each of which in its own way prefigured the immolation of Christ.²

¹ Apud Denzing., n. 602.

² Concerning the reason and sense of the ceremonies of the old law, cf. Bähr, Symbolik des mosaischen cultus, Heidelberg, 1874, t. I; Broglie, Confér. sur l'idée de Dieu dans l'Ancien Testament, Paris, 1892, 6th Conf., p. 197-223; Lesêtre, apud Vigouroux, Dict. de la Bible, t. II, 437-441.

243. (C) Judicial precepts, or civil or political ones, which ordered the Israelites toward one another, under the rule of God, the supreme king. For God was held not only as spiritual Lord, but also as temporal king of the Jewish people. Wherefore He determined their political and social state by judicial laws, and ordered it especially to a twofold end: (a) that the Israelites, by living according to justice and equity, might be prepared step by step for the messianic kingdom, which is a kingdom of justice and equity; (b) that by the social rule of the chosen people the constitution of the Church of Christ might in some way be prefigured.³ - According to St. Thomas,⁴ judicial precepts are divided into four species: (a) those which regard the institution of princes and magistrates, their offices, and the reverence to be shown to them; (b) those which pertain to fellow-citizens in their mutual relations, for example purchases, sales, judgments, punishments, etc.; (c) those which regard foreigners, for example wars against enemies, the manner of acting toward pilgrims and strangers; (d) those which refer to domestic life, namely wives, children, servants.⁵

³ St. Thomas, Ia IIae, q. 104, a. 1-2.

⁴ Ibid., a. 4.

⁵ Pelt hands down a brief synopsis of these civil laws, op. cit., t. II, p. 40-59.

244. (A) Concerning obligation. (a) The old law, insofar as it promulgates moral precepts of natural right, obliges all men who have attained knowledge of these, not because it is the Mosaic law, but because it is the natural law impressed upon hearts; and therefore the precepts of the Decalogue, if you except the sanctification of the Sabbath day, which does not pertain to the natural law, bound the Gentiles per se and also bind them today, and likewise Christians themselves; for, according to the common and true opinion, these precepts, with the third excepted, are nothing other than an exposition of the natural law. Wherefore Trent strikes with anathema those who hold that "the ten precepts pertain in no way to Christians."¹

¹ Trent, sess. VI, can. 19.

(b) But the ceremonial and judicial precepts obliged only the Jews, and the proselytes of justice,² who by circumcision were inserted into the Jewish nation: for these were positive precepts, which had been enacted not for the Gentiles, but for the chosen people alone. Just as today clerics and religious are held by certain laws which in no way bind laymen, so the Israelites were bound to observe certain special commandments to which other peoples were not bound.³ But because legal observances were of no little profit for attaining holiness and salvation more securely, certain Gentiles, who converted themselves to the true God, freely took up the obligation of observing the Mosaic laws.

² Proselytes of justice were Gentiles converted to the faith, who by circumcision were inserted into the Jewish people; proselytes of the gate, although truly converted, were not circumcised, but only had to fulfill the precepts which were called Noachic (Gen., IX, 4).

³ St. Thomas, Ia IIae, q. 98, a. 5.

245. (B) Concerning the abrogation of the old law. From what has already been said, the moral precepts were in no way abrogated by the new law. But the ceremonial and judicial precepts were abrogated through Christ, as is evident from the Council of Jerusalem, which, against the Pharisees, declared that circumcision and the other Mosaic prescriptions were no longer in force,⁴ - and from the Epistle to the Galatians, where the Apostle severely reproves the converts who had wished to bind themselves to this law. - And deservedly; for, since they had been instituted to prefigure and prepare the advent of Christ, once Christ had come, they could no longer persist.

⁴ Acts, XV, 5-29.

Yet, during the life of Christ, the law was in force together with the Gospel, and He Himself willed to fulfill the law, because the mystery of Redemption had to be consummated only through the passion and death of the Savior. Christ having died, the legal observances were dead in law, because our redemption was then completed; yet in fact they were abrogated only at that time when the Gospel had been promulgated.

St. Thomas, I-II, q. 98.

302. The old law is good, both because it has God as author, and because Christ, teaching by words and deeds and observing it, said that it is good (Mt. V, 17), and because it is consonant with reason while it represses concupiscence (Exod. XX, 17) and prohibits sins (ibid.). Whence it is called by the Apostle in Rom. VII, 12: a holy law, a holy commandment (cf. Ps. XVIII, 8-11; Mt. V, 17; I Tim. I, 8). Yet it is not simply perfect, because of itself it was not sufficient for leading to the end which is eternal life, toward which it only aided fallen man, but did not heal him completely nor render him fit: for this happens through grace, which was not given by the old law (Gal. IV, 9; Heb. VII, 19; X, 1). But it was perfect according to the time for which it was given and according to the condition of those to whom it was given.

"But how far the Mosaic law excels foreign laws is clear to one who attends a little: a) for it clearly and explicitly inculcates monotheism, and strictly prohibits the worship of idols which flourished among other peoples: I am the Lord... (Exod. XX, 2-4). b) Moreover slavery, although tolerated, is much milder than among neighboring nations (Exod. XXI, 1-11). c) The sum of the law is love of God and neighbor: You shall love... (Deut. VI, 5; Lev. XIX, 18). d) It prohibits not only external sins, as most laws do, but also internal sins: You shall not covet (Exod. XX, 17; Deut. VI, 5; Lev. XVI, 18). e) Not only negative holiness is commanded, but also positive holiness, which consists in a certain imitation of divine holiness: Be holy because I am holy, the Lord your God (Lev. XIX, 2)."

1. Tanquerey, op. cit., n. 337.

303. The old law was given

1. by God the Father, because it disposed men to the future Christ, His Son, in two ways: both by giving testimony about Him (Luke XXIV, 44; John V, 46), and by withdrawing men from idolatry and placing them under the worship of the one God by whom the human race was to be saved (Gal. III, 23-24; Rom. X, 4);

2. by the ministry of angels, because it was imperfect, while the new and perfect law had to be given through Christ Himself (Gal. III, 19; Acts VII, 53);

3. to the Jewish people alone, whom God chose so that Christ might be born from it; whence it was fitting that it be eminent by a special sanctification (Deut. IV, 8; Ps. CXLVII, 8; Rom. III, 2). Hence although, as to the precepts of natural right which it contained and manifested, it obligated all, nevertheless as to its own precepts superadded to natural law, per se it obligated only the Jews, and per accidens gentiles who were enrolled into the Jewish people by circumcision (Exod. XII, 48).

304. Observations. - 1) Therefore the end of the old law is: a) immediate and proximate, to instruct the people in order to honesty, worship of God, and justice, and thus to procure temporal happiness; b) mediate and ultimate, supernatural beatitude (Luke X, 25); c) extrinsically joined to the aforesaid, Christ as to be honored and glorified (Rom. X, 4).

2. Concerning the time in which the old law was to be given, St. Thomas teaches, q. 98, a. 6: "The old law was most fittingly given in the time of Moses. The reason for this can be taken from two things, according as any law is imposed on two kinds of men: the hard and proud, who are restrained and tamed by law; and the good, who, instructed by law, are aided to fulfilling what they intend. 1) Therefore it was fitting that the old law be given at such a time for convicting the pride of men. For man was proud about two things, namely, about knowledge and about power. a) About knowledge indeed, as though natural reason could suffice him for salvation; and therefore, that his pride about this might be convicted, man was permitted to the rule of his own reason without the help of a written law; and by experience man could learn that he suffered a defect of reason, by the fact that men had fallen even into idolatry and most shameful vices around the times of Abraham. And therefore after these times it was necessary that a written law be given as a remedy of human ignorance, because through law is the knowledge of sin... b) But after man had been instructed by the law, his pride about his infirmity was convicted, while he could not fulfill what he knew. 2) But on the part of the good, the law was given as a help; and this indeed was especially necessary to the people when natural law was beginning to be obscured on account of the overflowing of sins."

St. Thomas, I-II, q. 99 and 100; q. 101 and 104; q. 103, a. 2; II-II, q. 122.

305. The old law, although by reason of the matter about which it is concerned it contains many precepts, nevertheless in itself is one, because all were ordered to one end (q. 99, a. 1).

For since, by distinction from human law, which principally orders men to one another, divine law principally orders men to God and secondarily to one another, hence it contains precepts of a threefold kind:

1. some are moral precepts concerning acts of virtues, by which men were made good and like to God: for the law intended friendship with the best God, which cannot exist without likeness to Him (a. 2);

2. others are ceremonial, by which they were ordered to the worship of God, which must be done not only by interior acts, but also by exterior works by which man professes servitude (a. 3);

3. others are judicial, by which men were ordered to one another, the mode of justice among them being preserved (a. 4).

Now A. to the aforesaid precepts all other things are reduced which pertain to the directive force of law: for either they are dictated by reason itself and are due according to the rule of reason, and then they pertain to morals, which are conclusions of the law of nature (even if they are commands and counsels); or they are due from positive law determining natural law, and are either ceremonial, which are determinations of natural precepts in divine things, or judicial, or determinations in human things (Deut. V, 1; VI, 1, 17). Hence it is called by the Apostle (Rom. VII, 12) a just, holy, good commandment (a. 5).

B. As to coercive force: the law induced to their observance by temporal promises and threats, because it was not directed to the perfect, who, having despised temporal things, cling to spiritual things, but to the imperfect, who desire temporal goods, although in order to God. For means must be proposed to men according to their condition (a. 5 and 6).

Namely, eternal goods did not immediately pertain to the covenant entered between God and the Jewish people, but only through the promise of the Redeemer and the future covenant. Whence the law which regards the people contained only temporal promises; eternal goods could be obtained by individuals through faith and hope in the Redeemer, from His merits and the power of His grace, or by force of the new law, for according to this they pertained to the new law (q. 106, a. 1, ad 3, and q. 107, a. 1, ad 2 and 3).

306. Specifically, A. all moral precepts can in some way be reduced to the ten precepts of the Decalogue proposed to the people.

It is proved: for in the law of nature a) some precepts are primary in knowledge, self-evident, known to all, which it was not necessary to promulgate again; but other, secondary precepts are conclusions deduced from the first, of which b) many are more remote, which were not to be placed in the Decalogue, because their reason is manifest only to the wise alone, to whom it pertains to teach the people, and because a multiplicity of precepts would place confusion, whence they were not to be proposed to the people; c) certain are proximate and immediate, which by slight consideration are at once evidently deduced from the first precepts and whose reason appears to all, and these were placed in the Decalogue, because in fewer cases or among some it happens that human judgment concerning them is perverted.

Now the primary and common precepts (for example, love of God and neighbor) are contained in the precepts of the Decalogue as principles in conclusions (ad 1); but the more remote, conversely, are contained in them as conclusions in their principles.

Therefore all precepts of the Decalogue are moral, except the third, which is partly moral, as to the fact that man deputes some time to divine worship, and partly ceremonial, as to the determination of a special time, namely, the Sabbath (ad 2).

B. Ceremonial precepts determined the peculiar mode by which God was to be worshiped; these had to be many and solemn, for promoting the worship of God and turning away from idolatry. They were of four kinds: a) either concerning worship itself, which specially consists in sacrifices, or b) concerning sacred instruments, or c) concerning those worshiping, who are consecrated by sacraments, and d) are distinguished from others by various observances. All these prefigured the future Christ (q. 101).

C. Likewise judicial (or political) precepts regarded human affairs according to the fourfold order which can be found in a people: a) some were of princes to subjects, b) others of subjects to one another, c) certain of the people to foreigners, d) certain toward domestics (wife, children, servants). These prefigured the Church (q. 104).

Ceremonial and judicial precepts were subject to various changes, for God did not cease to accommodate His laws to the conditions of the Jews, whence He sent prophets who authentically interpreted and completed the law.

307. Moral precepts concern all acts of virtues.

For by difference from human law, which orders the community of men to one another (which is done through exterior operations), and commands only acts of justice and acts of other virtues insofar as they assume the notion of justice, divine law commands concerning all those things by which men are ordered to communication with God. But man is joined to God by reason (and will). Whence divine law commands concerning all those things by which human reason (and will) is duly ordered, which happens by acts of all virtues; yet in such a way that certain things, without which the order of reason cannot be observed, fall under the obligation of precept, but certain things which pertain to the well-being of perfect virtue fall under admonition and counsel.

1. For intellectual virtues order well the acts of reason in themselves; moral virtues order well the acts of reason concerning interior passions and exterior operations.

Nevertheless all precepts of the Decalogue pertain to justice.

For the precepts of the Decalogue are principles of natural law to which reason adheres by slight consideration and which it at once recognizes as due. But the notion of debt appears most in justice, which is toward another (for in those things which concern oneself it seems at first sight that man is master of himself and that he can licitly do whatever he wishes). And therefore the precepts of the Decalogue pertain to justice: the first three concern acts of religion, which is the chief among the virtues annexed to justice; the fourth concerns acts of piety, which is second among these virtues; the other six concern acts of justice commonly and strictly so called, which is between equals.

1. This in a certain way is true, except for those things which cannot be taken away from oneself without injury to God or neighbor.

308. The precepts of the Decalogue are fittingly distinguished according to diverse objects and are enumerated in a fitting number (q. 100, a. 4 and 5). - It is proved:

Just as human laws order men to a certain human community, so divine law orders them to the community of men under God. But in order that someone be well ordered in society, two things are required: that he bear himself well both toward him who presides over the community and toward the other fellow citizens. Whence in divine law first are placed the precepts which order men to God, and then those which order them to other neighbors living together under God, whether by deed, or by mouth, or by heart.

A. But man owes three things to the prince of the community:

I. fidelity in deed, by which He alone is acknowledged, which is handed down in the first precept: You shall not have strange gods; by which we acknowledge the unity of God;

II. reverence especially in speech, by which nothing injurious is said against Him, which is handed down in the second precept: You shall not take the name of God in vain, that is, you shall not commit perjury; by which we revere the truth of God;

III. service even in heart, recompense for benefits received (first of all creation), which pertains to the third precept: Remember that you sanctify the Sabbath day; by which we worship the goodness of God.

B. But someone bears himself well toward neighbors:

a) either specially toward those to whom he is a debtor, if he renders to them what is due, which: