Diverse weights, and diverse measures, both of them are alike abomination to the LORD.
Read Chapter 20
Ambrose of Milan
AD 397
He who commands must always keep to the exact scope of the commandments, and he who distributes tasks must observe equity in looking into them, for “a false balance is an abomination to the Lord.” There is, then, an excess and a defect in weight, but the church acccepts neither, for “excessive and defective weights and diverse measures, both of them are alike abominable in the sight of the Lord.”
Every kind of unfair action is shameful. Even in common things, false weights and unjust measures are accursed. And if fraud in the market or in business is punished, can it seem free from reproach if found in the midst of the performance of the duties of virtue? Duties of the Clergy.
If there were two persons to be judged, one being given more consideration and the other less consideration, with a judge standing between both and making them equal by depriving only the one who has more than enough, the judge can be said to have failed to the extent that the adjudged party is injured. He who does not first have true justice instilled in his soul, but is corrupted by money or favors his friends or seeks vengeance against his enemies or reveres power, is unable to effect justice.… For rectitude in judgment is evidence that someone’s soul is well disposed toward equity and law. Hence, it prohibits this in what follows, saying, “Large weights and small weights are abominable before God,” with inequality in judgment being indicated in Proverbs under the title of weights.
We must be careful not to have either unjust weights in our hearts or double measures in the storerooms of our conscience, not only in the way that we have spoken but also in the following way. That is, we must not burden those to whom we preach the word of the Lord with stricter and heavier precepts than we ourselves are able to bear, while taking it upon ourselves to lighten with a greater and more indulgent relaxation the things that pertain to our rule of strictness. If we do this, what are we doing but weighing and measuring the revenue and fruit of the Lord’s precepts with a double weight and measure? For if we weigh them out in one way for ourselves and in another for our brothers, we are rightly rebuked by the Lord for having deceptive balances and double measures, according to the words of Solomon, where it is said, “A double weight is an abomination to the Lord, and a deceptive balance is not good in his sight.” .
