REVENGE, as it includes a Sense of Sorrow and Trouble for the Injuries that are done to us, cannot by any means belong to God. None of his Creatures can disturb his Peace, or cause to him any Trouble or Resentment. Ultio doloris confessio est, says Seneca. Man has recourse to Revenge only because he is gall’d and Senec. de ira. l. 3. c. 5.sensible of Injuries. When therefore it is said in Scripture, that God revenges himself, it speaks after a popular and improper Manner. He vindicates the Injuries done to his Justice and his Majesty, and to the Order he has establish’d in the World, yet without any Emotion of Pleasure or Displeasure. He revenges the Injuries done to his Servants, because he is just, and because Order and Justice must be preserved. Men revenge themselves out of Weakness, because they are offended, because they are too much influenced by Self-love. A great Soul overlooks and despises Injuries; a Soul enlightened by Grace and Faith, leaves the Judgment and Revenge of them to God.
In the Old Testament God tolerated Revenge in certain Cases, to avoid greater Evils. For Example, he would have an Eye for an Eye, a Tooth for a Exod. xxi. 24.Tooth, &c. He permitted, or rather, he bore with it, that the Relations of a Man who had been kill’d might take Revenge of the Murderer. Propinquus occisi, statim ut invenerit eum, jugulabit. And if a wilful Numb. xxxv. 16, 17,18,&c.Murderer should take Sanctuary in a City of Refuge, he was taken away from thence, and given up into the Hands of the Kindred of the dead Man, for them to take their Revenge on him. Mittent seniores civitatis illius, & arripient eum de loco effugii, tradentque in manu proximi cujus sanguis effusus est, & morietur. Deut. xix. 12.The Relations thought it their Duty to pursue to Vengeance such Murderers, and the Hebrews call’d those Goel or Revengers, to whom this sort of Vengeance appertain’d.
But this Toleration was granted only to the Hardness of the Hearts of the Jews: Ad duritiem cordis vestri, as our Saviour tells them on the Occasion of Divorce. God had sufficiently declared himself, to make it understood by good Men, that Vengeance belong’d only to him. Mea est ultio, & ego retribuam.Deuter. xxxiii. 35. He forbids Malice and Revenge in express Terms; he will not allow us to keep any Resentment in our Hearts against our Levit. xix. 17, 18.Brethren. Non oderis fratrem tuum in corde tuo——Non quæras ultionem, nec memor eris injuriæ civium tuorum. And when God seems to have establish’d the Lex Talionis, he does not thereby allow of Revenge, but sets Limits to it. Non fomes, sed limes furoris est, says St. Austin. He does not intend to provoke Aug. cont. Faust. l. 19. c. 25.to Anger, but to stop the Progress and Consequences of it. Non ut id quod sopitum erat, hinc accenderetur; sed ne id quod ardebat, ultra extenderetur.
The Day of Revenge, or of Vengeance, sometimes expresses the last Day of Judgment, in which God will take Vengeance of all his Enemies; and sometimes the Day of Vengeance stands for the Punishment that God exercises upon his Enemies, when their Iniquities are arrived to their full Measure. See Exod. xxxii. 34. Isai. xxxiv. 8. lxi. 2. lxiii. 4. Luke xxi. 22.
Vengeance is often express’d in the Hebrew under the Word Consolation; and tho’ St. Jerom has generally put the Word Revenge, yet he has not omitted sometimes to use the Words Comfort and Consolation, in the Sense of Revenge: For Example, Heu! Isa. i. 24.consolabor super hostibus meis, & vindicabor de inimicis meis. And in the Maccabees, 2 Macc. vii. 6.Deus consolabitur in nobis quemadmodum in protestatione cantici declaravit Moyses & in servis suis consolabitur. And again in Isaiah, Is. lvii. 18.Vias ejus vidi——& reddidi consolationes ipsi. But the Examples are much more frequent in the Hebrew.
In Scripture sometimes Revenge is taken for the meer Action of Assault, or for the Injury committed against another; but yet is not without the Colour and Pretence of just Revenge. Thus Nebuchadnezzar swears by his Throne, that he would be revenged of all those foreign States that would not obey his Summons, and submit themselves to his Judith i. 12. ii. 1.Government; as if he had a Right of demanding this Submission from them. In the same Manner the Idumeans wreak’d their Revenge against Judah, Pro eo quod fecit Idumæa ultionem, ut se vindicaret de filiis Ezek. xxv. 12.Judah. By these Expressions we must understand, to satisfy their Hatred, to shew their Ill-will. When it is said, that God grants his Revenge to any one; Deus qui dat vindictas mihi; this intimates, either that God gives up his Enemies to him into his Hands, to take Vengeance of them; or that he punishes them himself for having afflicted his Servants, by some terrible Effects of his Justice.