Catholic Commentary
Simon Rises as Leader of Israel (Part 2)
9Fight our battles, and we will do all that you tell us to do.”
1 Maccabees 13:9 records the assembly of Israel's formal pledge to Simon Maccabeus, granting him complete military and political authority to lead their struggle against foreign oppression. The people's promise to obey all his commands deliberately echoes Israel's covenant oath at Sinai, positioning Simon as a divinely-commissioned leader in the line of Moses and Joshua.
A people's total pledge to their leader—"Fight our battles, and we will do all that you tell us"—becomes a mirror of how the Church surrenders to Christ.
The Assembly as Type of the Church
The collective voice of "we" in verse 9 is also significant. Israel does not send individual representatives to pledge allegiance — the whole assembly speaks as one body. This corporate dimension prefigures the Church's self-understanding as the People of God (LG 9), who together acknowledge Christ as Head and together pledge fidelity. The unity of the pledge ("we will do all") is an icon of the ecclesial unity the Church is called to embody.
Catholic tradition illuminates this verse at several intersecting levels.
The Nature of Legitimate Authority
The Catechism teaches that "every human community needs an authority to govern it" and that this authority "is exercised legitimately only when it seeks the common good" (CCC 1897–1899). Simon's investiture here is a textbook illustration: authority flows upward from the people's consent but is ordered toward their protection and covenantal fidelity — not toward Simon's personal aggrandizement. St. Thomas Aquinas in his De Regno argued that legitimate rule is marked by the ruler's willingness to bear the burdens of his people rather than exploit them. Simon's readiness to "fight our battles" is precisely that selfless bearing of communal burden.
Total Obedience as a Spiritual Posture
The pledge "we will do all that you tell us" finds its deepest theological home in the concept of obedience as a theological virtue. St. Ignatius of Loyola, drawing on the Maccabean and monastic traditions, described perfect obedience as "the mortification of one's own judgment in submission to one's superior." The Church Fathers, particularly St. John Chrysostom (Homilies on Romans, Homily 23), saw in Israel's covenantal pledges to human leaders a preparation for and type of the soul's total surrender to God.
Christ as the True Battle-Fighter
The First Vatican Council and the liturgical tradition both affirm Christ as Rex et Dominus, King and Lord, who has conquered sin and death. Simon fighting Israel's earthly battles is a shadow; Christ's Paschal Mystery is the substance. Pope Pius XI in Quas Primas (1925), establishing the Feast of Christ the King, drew on precisely this OT warrior-king tradition: Israel's anointed leaders point forward to Christ's universal and eternal kingship.
Contemporary Catholics often struggle with the tension between personal autonomy and obedience — to the Church, to pastors, to legitimate civil authority, or to God's will as discerned in prayer. The people's pledge in verse 9 is a counter-cultural model. They do not negotiate the terms; they do not insist on veto power. They recognize Simon's leadership as providential and surrender their agenda to his.
For Catholics today, this invites a concrete examination: In what areas of your spiritual life are you still withholding the "all" from God — fighting your own battles on your own terms, rather than entrusting the outcome to Christ? In the sacrament of Confession, in fidelity to Church teaching on difficult moral questions, in daily prayer ("Your will be done") — the pledge of verse 9 asks whether our discipleship is partial or total.
For those in leadership — parents, pastors, catechists, lay leaders — Simon's example is equally challenging: the people will only pledge "all" when they trust that the leader is genuinely fighting their battles, not his own.
Commentary
Verse 9 in Its Immediate Context
Verse 9 is the climactic close of a public oration addressed to Simon by the assembly of Israel (vv. 3–9). The people have just rehearsed Simon's distinguished pedigree, his loyalty to the Law, and the deaths of his brothers Judas and Jonathan in service of Israel (vv. 3–7). They have declared him their "father and ruler" (v. 8), invoking language that merges familial tenderness with political authority. Verse 9 is the assembly's formal conclusion: it is simultaneously a plea, a commission, and an oath of allegiance.
"Fight our battles"
The imperative here is stark and without qualification. The people are not offering Simon a consultative role or a conditional mandate — they are handing him the sword and the standard. The word "battles" (Gk. polemos) encompasses not just military engagements but the entire struggle for Israel's survival, identity, and fidelity to the covenant. To "fight our battles" in the Maccabean world meant defending the Torah, the Temple, and the people's very right to worship the God of their fathers. This phrase echoes the ancient formula by which Israel understood God Himself as their divine warrior (cf. Ex 14:14; Deut 3:22); the people now invest Simon with a share of that martial mandate, making him a mediochal instrument of God's providential protection.
"and we will do all that you tell us to do"
The second clause is the more theologically weighty of the two. This is a declaration of comprehensive obedience — not merely military cooperation, but total submission of communal will. The verb "do" combined with "all" signals a covenantal resonance: this is the language Israel used when ratifying the Sinai covenant ("All that the LORD has spoken we will do," Ex 19:8; 24:3, 7). By mirroring that formulaic pledge, the assembly places Simon within a long line of divinely-sanctioned leaders — Moses, Joshua, the Judges — to whom Israel gave its trust in moments of existential crisis. The totality of the pledge ("all that you tell us") also anticipates the formal recognition of Simon in chapter 14, where the people ratify his high priesthood, civil authority, and military command in a bronze-inscribed decree (14:27–49).
Typological and Spiritual Senses
Typologically, Simon foreshadows the Church's relationship to Christ as her sovereign Head and warrior-shepherd. Christ "fights our battles" in a definitive and eschatological sense — not against flesh and blood (Eph 6:12) but against sin, death, and the Evil One. The Church's response to Christ echoes Israel's pledge to Simon: "we will do all that you tell us." This is not blind submission but faith-formed obedience, the kind articulated by Mary at Cana ("Do whatever he tells you," Jn 2:5) and at the Annunciation ("let it be done to me according to your word," Lk 1:38). The progression from crisis, to recognition of the leader, to total surrender of will maps the Christian's journey of conversion and discipleship.