1 Samuel 8:15

Account these worthy to be esteemed your rulers and your kings, and bring them tribute as to kings; for by you they and their families ought to be maintained. As Samuel made constitutions for the people concerning a king, in the first book of Kings, and Moses did so concerning priests in Leviticus, so do we also make constitutions for you concerning bishops. For if there the multitude distributed the inferior services in proportion to so great a king, ought not therefore the bishop much more now to receive of you those things which are determined by God for the sustenance of himself and of the rest of the clergy belonging to him? But if we may add somewhat further, let the bishop receive more than the other received of old: for he only managed the affairs of the soldiery, being entrusted with war and peace for the preservation of men's bodies; but the other is entrusted with the exercise of the priestly office in relation to God, in order to preserve both body and soul from dangers. By how much, therefore, the soul is more valuable than the body, so much the priestly office is beyond the kingly. For it binds and looses those that are worthy of punishment or of remission. Wherefore you ought to love the bishop as your father, and fear him as your king, and honour him as your lord, bringing to him your fruits and the works of your hands, for a blessing upon you, giving to him your first-fruits, and your tithes, and your oblations, and your gifts, as to the priest of God; the first-fruits of your wheat, and wine, and oil, and autumnal fruits, and wool, and all things which the Lord God gives thee. And thy offering shall be accepted as a savour of a sweet smell to the Lord thy God; and the Lord will bless the works of thy hands, and will multiply the good things of the land. "For a blessing is upon the head of him that giveth."

And observe the wisdom of the prophet, or rather the lovingkindness of God. For because he wished to turn them from their desire, bringing together a number of difficult things he asserted what would be true of their future king, as, for instance, that he would make their wives grind at the mill, require the men to serve as shepherds and drivers of mules; for he described all the service appertaining to the kingdom in minute detail.

9. When subjection is sought by carnal men, assuredly whatever is commanded them is burdensome, even if it is not difficult: because since they have it from the swelling of pride that they follow the judgment of their own will, whatever opposes their deliberation they consider most grievous. But indeed when harsh and contrary things are commanded, what a weight of burden is that! What swelling of heart! When they could scarcely bear even pleasant and light things unwillingly—things which, if they had been willing, they would have borne most easily. Let us therefore see how the pious dispensation of the Creator worthily answers the foolish audacity of man. The laws of men are set before those who despise the laws of God; and upon those who had spurned the mild and salutary counsels of the Divinity, the harsh and unbearable burdens of human servitude are proclaimed: so that from these things they might reckon with themselves how intolerable the commands of man would be for those who had refused to obey the counsels of God—who was not so much commanding as advising them not to seek this. But the hearts of carnal men possess recklessness from the increase of audacity, and hardness from the nature of pretense. From recklessness indeed they deliberate upon things easy to do; but because they do not understand what they wrongly propose, they cannot be helped by the counsels of those who are wiser. Wherefore here too it is added: (Verse 19.) The people refused to listen to the voice of Samuel. And they said: By no means: for a king shall be over us, and we also shall be like all the nations, and our king shall judge us, and shall go out before us, and shall fight our battles for us.

There follows: "But he will also tithe your crops and the revenues of your vineyards, to give to his eunuchs and his servants." When the wicked are in charge, it is very difficult that one who is subject to them should suffer no losses to his religion. For the minds of some perish entirely: but those whom they cannot completely pervert, while they unceasingly observe their wicked words and deeds, are stained with some sort of defilement. Rightly therefore it is said: "He will tithe your crops and the revenues of your vineyards." As if to say: Under a reprobate pastor, even the goods of the elect are not whole. But what is taken from the good is given to the eunuchs and servants of the king. The eunuchs and servants of carnal prelates are their hypocritical listeners. They are eunuchs indeed because they show themselves to have cast off worldly pleasure: but they are the king's servants because through everything they pretend to have of virtues, they bear upon themselves the yoke of their reprobate superiors. And rightly the tithe of the crops and vineyards is said to belong to the eunuchs: because the poison of hypocrites is not easily recognized. Inasmuch as even holy men can be deceived in this, what they lose is ascribed to those by whose fraud they are captured.

But what does it mean that the crops and the returns of the vineyards are said to be tithed and given to the eunuchs and servants of the king? The crops of the elect are tithed when we gather their most excellent works so that we may bring them forth as an example for the faithful. For there was only one who had in himself the fullness of all virtues, into whom all the fullness of the Godhead poured itself bodily (Col. 1:19). But we, because we have all received from his fullness, possess the gifts of graces in divided portions. Hence Paul says: "To one indeed is given through the Spirit the word of wisdom, to another the word of knowledge, to another kinds of tongues, to another the interpretation of speeches, to another faith in the same Spirit, to another the working of powers, to another prophecy, to another the discernment of spirits" (1 Cor. 12:8). By the number ten, because it is perfect, we tithe the virtues when we gather the gifts of individual elect persons for the lesser ones to imitate. For it is written of Moses: "He was the meekest of all men on earth" (Num. 12:3). Of Abraham also it is said: "Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness" (Gen. 15:6). When therefore we wish to imitate gentleness together with faith, it is necessary that from the example of Moses and Abraham, as from choice crops, food be tithed for the refreshment of our mind. Just so, just so indeed, preachers bring forth the chastity of Joseph (Gen. 39:8), the patience of Job (Job 1:21), the zeal of Phinehas (Num. 25:7) as an example for us: because when they display the virtues of the perfect, they gather, as it were, the tithes of choice harvests, which they may set before those who are making good progress. Hence also it is rightly said that these same tithes of the fruits are given to the eunuchs and servants. Eunuchs, indeed, are those who by strength of soul have crushed in themselves all the fuel of lust. Of whom the Lord certainly says in the Gospel: "There are eunuchs who have made themselves eunuchs for the sake of the kingdom of heaven" (Matt. 19:12). Servants are those who still serve under another's care in the pursuits of the active life and cannot yet go forth free to the heights of charity. These are also found in Moses to owe six years of service to their masters (Exod. 21:2), so that in the seventh they may go forth free: because indeed they must first be perfected in works so that they may be able to go forth in due order into the summit of contemplation. The teacher therefore assigns the tithes of the harvests to the eunuch-servants when those who obey him in the splendor of chastity follow the chosen works of the great ones. He also assigns the tithes of the vineyards when he shows them with what wondrous charity our Fathers loved God and neighbor, so that they too may strive to be filled with the same abundance of charity, and as though inebriated and forgetful of things past, may love only the things to come, and not fail to run fervently toward them.

But he will also tithe your fields and the incomes of your vineyards, etc. But the ancient corrupter will wholly deprive you of your works, almost brought to the perfection of nature, and the hope of all your life with heavenly reward, which is signified by the number ten, so that he may restore the insatiable desires of those wicked spirits serving him, whom, once stripped of angelic virtue, he made to hunger for human destruction, by the damage of these things.