These [reasons] seem to prove that he did not rightly marry [her]. First: it was not lawful to take a Canaanite wife (Deut. 7; Exod. 34). Secondly: likewise [not] any foreigner (Num. 36). Thirdly: but to marry a harlot
(col. 811)
to marry seems, from Deut. 23:17 [Vulg. 23:18], a nefarious thing. Fourthly: and certainly [is it right] to take such a one, whose modesty was defiled and prostituted — [is that] to take an honorable [wife]? Fifthly: and [even] if [it be] honorable for others, [is it fitting] for such and so great a youth — for [him], a prince of so great a tribe?
It is to be noted that she whom an Israelite would wish to join to himself in matrimony can be considered [as] twofold: Israelite, namely, and foreign. The Israelite [woman] is either of the same tribe as he, or of another. If of another, either some inheritance and patrimony is owed to her, or not. If she is foreign, she is either also a believer, and initiated in the divine rites, or unbelieving and not yet initiated; and these, again, are either of the Canaanite nation, or of another. Of the Israelite [woman] nothing is now to be said here: ch. 36 of Numbers can be consulted. But of the foreign [woman] it is thus to be determined. When she is a believer, and initiated in the divine ceremonies — of whatever nation she may in the end be — she can be married by any Israelite. For then the cause is absent on account of which a marriage of that kind [is] forbidden: which [cause] is a just fear either of apostasy to be urged upon the men, or of a corrupt superstition to be brought into the tender ears of the children. This is plain, first, from the cited Exod. ch. 34, since, after marriages of foreign women of that kind — and indeed of Canaanite women — are forbidden, it is subjoined: Lest, after they have played the harlot, they make thy sons also to play the harlot. Secondly, from Deut. 21, where [a woman] who had been captured in war from other nations is permitted to be married by a Jew — provided she forswear all the things of her fatherland, among which error and superstition, which concern the true worship of God, hold the first place. Thirdly, from many examples, in two ways. First, from those which are narrated in Scripture and are not disapproved. Secondly, from those which are disapproved. For [such marriage] is disapproved only for this cause: that foreign women were married [while] obstinate in superstition, from whom there was cause and danger of the husbands themselves, or the children, lapsing (1 Kings 11:1; Ezra 10:11). Fourthly: there are also good authors of this opinion — Abulensis in this place, qq. 57, 58; certain other Rabbis, as R. Moses of Coucy [Makotsius], cited before, in the negative precept 112, and R. Abraham Zacuto (fol. 10), hold that of the seven nations forbidden by God none could marry any Israelite, but that Rahab was of some other nation, and was made a proselyte. See on ch. 2 of Esther, part 1, p. 6, q. 2, fol. 474.
I say, therefore, that Salmon did excellently when he joined Rahab to himself in wedlock. First: because this was the highest recompense of the benefit received. Secondly: an invitation to others to deserve well of the same people. Thirdly: an exhortation of other peoples toward the Jewish sacred things and religion. Fourthly: a certain singular motion and instinct of God, that out of diverse nations and rites they should coalesce into one and the same marriage — that is, into a fellowship of things divine and human — from whom the Saviour of all nations, the Consummator of all sacred things, might be born. Fifthly: because all the objections are most easily overthrown. For to [objections] 1, 2, and 3 the answer is already [given]. To [obj.] 4 I say that it is honorable to take such a one who has already repented — nay, so much the more honorable, since there are more, weightier, and more honorable causes for doing this same thing. What [shows] God’s goodness so much as the reception into grace of those who repent of their past crimes? To [obj.] 5: by how much he who acts well in things which are commonly deemed vile and abject is the greater, by so much is his deed the more honorable, the more admirable, the more commendable. And to this sense could be accommodated those verses of Horace (from book 2, ode 4) — which are otherwise deservedly hissed off [i.e. usually quoted to the contrary purpose]: Let not the love of a serving-maid be a shame to thee, etc. And the honor conferred on Rahab by Joshua, and by so great a people, could also — not amiss — have spurred Salmon himself to this marriage; [as could] the ample possession given [her], her own good beauty, suitable character, the approval of all [her] kinsfolk, and the applause of all the fellow-tribesmen Israelites.