LIBER JOB

( Vide inter Opera B. Hieronymi. )

• 747D

Job is reported to have dwelt indeed in the land of Husitis, on the borders of Idumaea and Arabia; and his name before was Jobab. And he took an Arabian wife, and begot a son, whom he called Ennon. Now he himself was indeed the son of Zara, a son from among the sons of Esau; but on his mother's side of Bosra, so that he is the fifth from Abraham. And these are the kings who reigned in Edom, in which he too reigned. But the first who reigned in it was Bela, the son of Beor; and the name of that same city was Denaba. And after Bela, Jobab, who is called Job. And after Job, Husan, who was a leader from the region of the Themanites. And after him reigned Adad, the son of Badad, who cut down Madian in the plain of Moab; and the name of his city was Avith.

• 748D

Some things here are said historically, and allegorically, and morally. Some cannot be taken according to the letter, because they would be erroneous or impossible, or at variance one with another: as that, namely: « Under whom they are bowed down who bear up the world (Job IX), » as though giants carried the world; and that, namely: « My soul hath chosen hanging (Ibid. VII), » as though one so patient would wish to end his life by hanging; and that, namely: « Let the day perish on which I was born (Ibid, III), » etc. Sometimes he who neglects the sense of the letter hides from himself the light of truth, while by seeking something else within he loses what lies without; as when, speaking of the works of mercy, he seeks an allegory in: « If I have denied what they wished, to the poor 749A(Job. XXXI). » For the divine word, just as it prudently affords exercise in its mysteries, so by its surface it refreshes the simple: for it is like a river shallow and deep, in which a lamb may walk and an elephant swim.

To erring man the law was given. He who is disobedient to the law is put to shame by the example, chiefly of a man without the law who lived lawfully. Whence (Isa. XXIII): « Blush, Sidon, » that is, the stability of those set under the law, « saith the sea: » the Gentile world, which, while it keeps the law, refutes the hearers of the law.

Moses is said to have written these things about Job as about one who went before, because in Genesis it is read that Jobab descended from Esau and succeeded Balach the son of Beor in the kingdom. But it is the custom of sacred speech to touch briefly, in the earlier parts, upon things that will follow long after, while it hastens on to 749Bother matters. Job therefore was not before the law, but in the time of the Judges, because he himself is more truly believed to have written the deeds of his own victory. Nor does it tell against this that it says: Job said, or did, these things; for it is the custom of the saints to speak of themselves as of others. For it is the Spirit who speaks in them as concerning others. Whence the angel of Moses is now called an angel, who serves outwardly, now the Lord, who presides inwardly; whence David also: « Attend, O my people, to my law (Psal. LXXVII). » For neither the people nor the law was David's, but his who speaks in him.

And he willed to be prophesied of by a Gentile as by a Jew, he who had come for both peoples.

Unfruitful talkativeness, like leaves of words, is pruned away from divine things, since a grove is forbidden to be planted 749Cin the temple of God. It is unworthy that the words of the heavenly oracle should be confined under the rules of Donatus.

The virtue of Job was great even in quiet, known to himself and to God; but stirred by scourges, it breathes out its fragrance to us like spices. Whence the faithful too are compared to a grain of mustard, which unbruised is mild, but if it is bruised grows hot, and what lay hidden in it comes forth; whence in the Psalm: « In the day the Lord hath commanded his mercy, and in the night he hath declared it (Psal. XLI). » [Vulg. et nocte canticum ejus, "and in the night his song"] The gift of mercy, which is received in the quiet of the day, is said to be made manifest in the night of adversity. He is scourged also, that he might know how to give thanks amid evils, the one thing that was indeed lacking to him. What therefore the enemy sought for evil, God permitted for good. Nor let anyone think that any words of Job are to be reproved, one whom God so far commends, in whom, 749Das in a middle ground, the devil contends against God. But that he recounts his own good things is not arrogance; rather by them he strengthens himself, lest he despair, since through so many evils and the reproaches of his friends he was being driven to despair of his life. Job is struck with every kind of temptation: with losses of goods, by which one powerful in the world was thought to be moved, but these he despises; with bereavement of offspring, but this he mourns with an even mind; with the smiting of the flesh, which he patiently endures; and these were as it were the outward assault of war, and as it were enemies fighting from the front. But within, through his wife as through a fellow citizen, his mind endures the poisons of counsel; yet her too he wisely instructs.

His friends come for consolation, but leap forth to rebuke; and among them the last and younger, 750Abecause he is unworthy, rebukes the more sharply, since sometimes words trouble more than wounds. Behold, as it were enemies on the flank. By wounds patience is proved, by words wisdom is exercised: the one he overcame by strength, the other by reason.

Job's friends offended more by ignorance than by malice. For so great a man did not have wicked friends; but while they cannot discern the cause of the smitings, they slip into fault. For of smitings, one is that by which the wicked man is struck that he may be punished; another that he may be corrected; another that he may not commit things to come; another that, when salvation follows, the Saviour may be the more loved. If a good man is struck, his merits are heaped up: and not knowing how to distinguish this, they believe him struck for fault. Whence also they return the sooner to pardon, whom God here humbles, that not 750Botherwise than through him whom they had despised should he receive them into grace.

As all the just, so Job prefigured Christ, not only by words but by deeds, that by his passion he might show Christ who was to suffer: that is, the head together with the body, which is the Church. His wife signifies carnal men, who, the nearer they are within the Church by faith, the more harshly they press upon it by their life. Job's friends [signify] heretics, who under the appearance of giving counsel wish to deceive, and while they speak as it were on the Lord's behalf, set themselves against the truth. Job is called grieving, by which the passion of Christ or the labour of the Church is expressed. Eliphaz, the contempt of the Lord, that is, heretics, who, while they think false things of God, contemn him by their pride. Baldath, oldness alone, because they speak not with good intention but with appetite for glory, that is, 750Cnot with the zeal of the new man, but with the depravity of the old life. Sophar, the scattering of the watchtower, or scattering the watchman, because heretics desire to strike with words the minds that contemplate things above. By contemning God, therefore, they hold themselves in oldness, and remaining in it they harm by evil discourses those who keep watch. But that they too sometimes return to the Church, the reconciliation of the friends shows, for whom Job prays, because the sacrifices of heretics are not accepted by God unless offered by the hands of the Church. Seven sacrifices are offered for them, because while they receive the sevenfold Spirit they are expiated as by seven oblations. Bulls and rams were offered for them: in the bull is signified the neck of pride, in the ram the leadership of the flock; because, springing back from the Church through pride, they drew weak flocks after them; 750Dand this is slain in them when they return to Job, that is, to the Church. By Elihu, who speaks with right understanding but is drawn aside into words of elation, is expressed the arrogant man who is nevertheless faithful, and who is also reproved; nor yet is he brought back by a sacrifice, because by the truth of faith he is overcome, but by the swelling of pride he displeases. Whence Elihu is interpreted This is my God, or Our God: for although proud, yet by believing truly he openly confesses, and declares him both God through his divinity and Lord through his incarnation.

After all his evils, he received on account of double things, because the Church here also receives double for her labours, when, the Gentiles having been received, at the end she converts the Jews also; and in the world to come she will be endowed with a double robe, that is, with the beatitude 751Aof soul and of body. Whence the Prophet: « In their own land they shall possess double (Isa. LXI). » To Job afflicted it is said [Afflicto; read Afflictus, "Job is said to be afflicted"]; but for how long a time it was, is passed over in silence, because the Church is known to be destined for affliction, but for how long is unknown; whence: « It is not for you to know the times or the moments which the Father hath put in his own power (Act. I). »

VERS. 1.-- « There was a man in the land of Hus. » (GREG. in Job, tom. I.) By Job, Christ is designated, that is, the head and the body: therefore, after the history, having seen in the head what we are to believe, let us see from the body what by seeing we are to hold.

GREG. (Ibid.) Job in the land of Hus, etc., as far as afterwards also cunning things were gathered.

751B(ID., ibid.) The person is first described as fitting, before his combat is told, so that such a one may be seen able to conquer. « Simple. » It is needful that the cunning of the serpent instruct the simplicity of the dove, and that simplicity temper the cunning; whence the Spirit appeared in a dove and in fire, because they who are full of him so serve the meekness of simplicity that against evils they are kindled with zeal for uprightness.

« Fearing God. » Solomon: « He who fears God neglects nothing (Eccle. VII). »

(Ibid.) Likewise Solomon: « He who offends in one thing shall lose many good things (Eccle. IX). » Those animals are called lawful, that is, clean according to the law, which both chew the cud and divide the hoof: of which the camels have the one, but the other is lacking to them, and so they both agree with the law and 751Cdiffer from it.

VERS. 3.-- (Ibid.) « And a great household. » An innumerable crowd of thoughts, which, like maidservants, when the mistress, that is reason, is absent, desert the work and make an uproar; but when she returns they work in silence. If we rule these well, neither is the mind overcome by their multitude.

(Ibid.) « Among all, » that is, among the angels that cleave to the rising light, we are great, their fellows. Orientals are all who by faith are in Christ, of whom the Prophet: « The Orient is his name (Zach. VI): » and the Man who is God surpasses them all.

VERS. 4.-- « And they made a feast, » etc. (Ibid.) The sons make feasts, etc., as far as because he who trembles at everything grows sluggish in good works.

751D« Through the houses, each one, » etc. Through the houses, as Peter through Rome, Philip in Samaria; on his own day, that is, according to the measure of understanding, because Paul made one instruction among the Greeks, Peter another among the Romans, although they did not disagree in the faith.

« Three sisters, » that is, faith, hope, charity: into everything that they do they call the virtues, that they may rejoice in it. They take strength as from food, when by good works they become more confident; they are made drunk as from drink after food, when they long to be steeped in the dew of contemplation. But out of these very good things evils also arise, such as elation; or when gladness comes to the mind on account of them, a certain security is also present, and thence sluggishness. Therefore he adds: « And when the days had passed round in their circuit. » When the feast is over, to sanctify the sons 752Ais, after the perception of the virtues, to direct the intention of the heart, and to cleanse everything that is done by strict re-examination, lest one be deceived by the quality of an evil, so that things which are evil be thought good; or by the quantity of a good, so that it be believed sufficient when it is not made perfect. But this he finds better by praying than by scrutinizing. For the mind, lifted up by compunction, judges more surely of all things beneath it.

VERS. 5.-- « And when in their circuit, » etc. The days of the feast pass round in their circuit when by preaching the mysteries are accomplished; and when all is accomplished Job offers for his sons, because for the apostles returning from preaching Christ prayed the Father, and by sending the Holy Spirit sanctified them, cleansing away whatever of fault could be in them.

752B(Ibid.) He rises at daybreak who of compunction, etc., as far as which, when accomplished, stand in need of expiation.

(Ibid.) A holocaust is called wholly burnt, etc., as far as may cover before the eyes of God even to the end of life.

VERS. 6.-- « Now on a certain day. » (GREG., lib. II, Moral., cap. 2.) In the opening, the quality and the end of a matter is expressed; as here, the temptation of Job is said to have begun from a day, because it is spoken of unto victory, as also in other places. Now the matter is marked by the quality of the time, as that the angels appear to Abraham at midday, and Judas goes out by night. Now by place: as that Israel, being weak, hears the law not on the mountain but below. Now by the quality of the air, as when it is said: It was winter, when preaching is made to those who will not believe; and it was cold, when Peter's denial was at hand. Now 752Cby the posture of the body, as that Stephen saw Jesus standing.

(Ibid.) Nothing is said to be done before the Lord, etc., as far as whereby king Achab, his deserts requiring it, may be deceived.

« He was present among them. » (Ibid.) On the day the Lord saw Satan, etc., as far as just as a blind man does not see the light by which he is lit.

« Among them Satan also. » Because he thrusts himself in among the good thoughts of God which are from God, that he may disturb them; but God uncovers him to us when he lies hidden. Whence it is said: « Whence comest thou? » which to say is to lay open his snares to us. « I have gone round about the earth. » He searches carnal hearts, that he may sow evils in them; nor does he fly over, but walks through, because he does not quickly forsake the one he tempts, but tarries, that he may 752Dimprint the traces of depravity. Against him Job is praised: « Hast thou considered my servant, » whom God makes good and strengthens, and praises as it were in the ears of Satan. Whence he rages the more grievously against him, saying: « Is it for nothing? » as if to say: why dost thou praise him whom thou protectest? Were I set at nought, he would be worthy of praise if he stood against me by his own strength. Whence he maliciously demands: but stretch forth a little. While good things abound, the mind is somewhat lifted up, as though the good things were from itself; and these good things the devil desires for evil, but God permits the testing for good, so that while man is shaken in those good things, his weakness being known, he may be made firm in God. Whence he adds: « Behold, the whole substance which he hath is in thy hand. » [Vulg. Job 1:12 sets the clause in the plural, with no noun answering to substantia]

VERS. 7.-- « To whom the Lord said, » etc. (Ibid.) 753ANot the Lord, etc., as far as which is to pant with the heats of his own malice for the affliction of the good.

« Whence comest thou? » (GREC.) He does not ask of the good, because we do not ask save what we do not know; and for God not to know is to reprobate, just as a good man too is said not to know how to lie, not because he does not know, but because he contemns it. To say therefore « whence comest thou? is to reprobate his ways as though they were unknown. « I have gone round about the earth. » By the circuit of the round, the anxiety of labour is signified. He went round about the earth in labour who did not stand at rest in heaven; and he does not fly over but walks through, because he fell from the flight of spiritual power, weighed down too heavily by the burden of his own malice. Of his members also it is said: « The wicked walk round about (Psal. XI), that is, they are wearied in the labour of outward things. The devil contends not against Job, 753Bbut against God with Job in the middle. Whence he did not first ask for Job from God, but God praised him in his sight.

VERS. 9.-- « Doth Job fear God for nothing? etc. » (Ibid.) The devil had perceived that the Redeemer had come; but on account of the lowly things which he suffered, whatever he had suspected concerning his deity came into doubt for him by reason of his own pride, and he believed him not to be God born, but one kept by the grace of God. « Hast thou not hedged him about? » He calls the house hedged about, because by tempting he could not penetrate his conscience; the substance, because he did not presume to invade his elect.

« His possession hath increased. » (Ibid.) As if to say: because he has received so many good things on earth, he bears himself innocently in return for them; but he would not be innocent if he stood amid adversities. Because 753Che cannot in the day, he wishes to reprove him in the night of adversities. Therefore, knowing that by adversities he would prove not the strength of Job, but each man more truly, he demands that he be tempted. « But stretch forth, » nor does he attribute to himself the power of striking. His will, which is from himself, is always wicked; the power, which is from God, is just. Whence: an evil spirit of the Lord upon Saul; and it is the Lord's by permission, and evil by its own will.

« The hand. » (Ibid.) He complains that the number of the faithful is increased when the apostles preach: for Satan to say this is to think such things enviously, and to grieve over them with pining.

VERS. 11.-- « Touch. » (Ibid.) Because the things he asks to be crushed are outward, and he thinks it not much unless he wound the soul.

« To the face. » The face of the Lord is the regard of his grace. 753DHe says therefore: if thou withdrawest the given things which he loves, he will not seek the regard, that is, of thy grace, thy favour, but will contemn it by cursing.

VERS. 12.-- « The Lord said therefore. » (Ibid.) God is not overcome, provoked by the devil's petition, but grants to the enemy, unto the enemy's own grief and deception, what may profit his servant. « Behold, all that he hath, » etc. By a merciful dispensation he loosens and reins in: he gives up the substance, he protects the body; and though afterwards he is to hand over the body, yet not all at once, lest heaped together they destroy what divided can be borne. Or: the Lord knew Job's lot, and yet divided the wars, that he might be the more wonderfully victor, when the conquered enemy should refit himself again for new wars.

« Behold, all . . . only upon him, etc., » that is, 754AI grant his goods outwardly to be tempted, but within I keep him for myself.

« But stretch forth. » (Ibid.) He thought that through sufferings Christ could sin. « Behold, all that he hath is in thy hand. » The hand of Satan is not power but temptation: first Judaea, which had been his possession, was taken away by unbelief and set against him; afterwards his flesh also was crucified.

« Having gone forth. » That is, he came to the desires of his own longing. Or he goes forth when what is permitted him with a good intention is carried out by him with a depraved intention. « Satan having gone forth. » Whither did he go out, away from him who is everywhere? But so long as, pressed down by the power of God, Satan could not carry out what he desired, he stood as it were before his face; he goes out when he is let loose to the accomplishment of his desire. 754B« And having gone forth from the face. » Because, while he cannot prevail as far as the heart, being shut out from the inmost parts he wanders outside; and if he troubles the mind, he is outside: because he does not destroy, but instructs.

(Ibid.) Times agree with temptations. He chose a fit time for tempting, when he found his sons at a feast: the gladness of satiety is the herald of tribulation.

VERS. 13.-- « Now when on a certain day the sons and « daughters, etc. » The apostles and all the faithful. The elder son is the Jewish people begotten by the law; the younger, the Gentile called at the end. In the house therefore of the firstborn the apostles feast, because as yet they fed on the delights of sacred Scripture within the gathering of the Jewish people alone, to whom it was then said: « Go not into the way of the Gentiles 754C(Matth. X). »

« They should eat and drink, etc. » To eat is to rejoice in good works; to drink wine is to burn with heavenly desire.

« Of his firstborn brother, etc. » Wisdom is born first in the heart, etc., as far as that what the mind lost when forestalled, it may receive back when afflicted.

VERS. 14.-- « The oxen were ploughing, etc. » (Ibid.) The ploughing oxen, that is, the good who work well; the she-asses, those who live in simplicity; and these are beside the oxen, because they are fed by their understanding. The Sabaeans taking captive, that is, demons; the boys, that is, beginners, not yet of manly steadfastness; with the sword, that is, with despair of eternity. The messenger who escapes is the prophetic word, which says: « My people hath been led captive, because it had not 754Dknowledge (Isa. V); » because, while the evils come to pass which it foretold, it returns as it were unhurt to the Lord: for when the weak are led captive, it is known to have foretold true things.

VERS. 15.-- « And the boys. » He calls boys that watchfulness of diligence by which he provides for these things, and which is struck in him also.

VERS. 16.-- « The fire of God fell from heaven. » Heaven, the doctors of the law, the priests, from whom the fire of envy falls upon the sheep and the boys, that is, upon the innocent and the weak. The boy returns unhurt, because it became clear that the prophecy had spoken true things, zeal laid hold of the untaught people.

(Ibid.) The sheep are the innocence of thoughts. The fire from heaven, that is, from the powers of the air, the flame of spite rushes in, and often kindles clean thoughts with the burning of lust 755A: and this is a fire of God, not as doing it, but as permitting it; and because by a sudden onset the acts of circumspection are overwhelmed, the guardian boys are slain. But discretion alone, that is, reason, announces the losses to the mind, and as it were calls the Lord to lamentation.

VERS. 17.-- « The Chaldeans made, » etc. The Chaldeans are interpreted fierce, etc., as far as these struck the boys with the sword, that is, with sinister persuasion, etc.

« The camels, etc. » The camel is in part a clean animal, etc., as far as and discretion alone reports to the mind what it should bewail.

« That I might tell thee, etc. » Evils are announced, both many and sudden, so that, wound being inflicted upon wound, he may bear it impatiently; and the crafty enemy makes trial not so much by the loss of goods as by the order of the messages. First he announces 755Bperverse things, then greater, at last the death of the sons: lest to one already bereaved the loss of goods should grow cheap, since there would be no heirs for whom he might keep it. Step by step, therefore, he hears worse things, that every wound may find a place in his heart.

VERS. 18.-- « To thy sons, etc. » (GREG.), The sons and daughters (as has been said) are the apostles and the peoples subject to them, who in Judaea fed upon Scripture. « A wind, » that is, a strong temptation, bursts forth from the desert, that is, from the hearts of the Jews, or from unclean spirits; and it shook the four corners on which the house stands: the priests, the scribes, the elders of the people, the Pharisees. The house, that is, Judaea, falling in the persecution of the Lord, overwhelmed the apostles in despair. And the word concerning the persecuting people is true: « My beloved hath wrought 755Cmany crimes in my house (Jer. XI), » And concerning the apostles: « My neighbours stood afar off (Psal. XXXVII). » And: « I will strike the shepherd, and the sheep shall be scattered (Matth. XXVI), » etc.

« In the house of the brother, » that is, in the feast of the elder brother Satan overwhelmed the sons, because through the negligence of the elders he seeks an entrance to the death of the younger; and he gains greater strength against others when he sees those who by their guardianship are set over others serving mirth. Not indeed that they were given over to the belly; but when amid feasts the good intention of the mind glows less, it foresees less.

VERS. 19.-- « Suddenly a wind. » (Ibid.) He is said secretly to have moved the elements against him, at whose nod they were moved; it being permitted to the devil, power having once been received from God, to shake the elements to the use of his own wickedness, as for those condemned in the mine both fire and water serve for use.

755D« From the region of the desert. » The region of the desert, etc., as far as it shows the named wrath in the air, a wind rushed in.

VERS. 20.-- « Then Job rose up, and rent his garments. » (Ibid.) The house falling, etc., as far as that the whole heart, burning in the love of God, may consume them by the perfection of devotion. « And with his head shorn. » It is thought a great steadfastness, etc., as far as and might show that he consented to the divine power. « Falling to the earth. » (GREG.) Falling, he adored, because he offers true prayer who humbly sees that he is dust. Whence he also says: « Naked came I forth from my mother's womb. » Naked in faith the first grace begot him; naked the same grace receives him. When, beaten by vices, he flees as one naked to mercy, and being at some time stripped of some virtue, 756Ahe is better clothed by that very humility, ascribing not to himself but to God what he has: the Lord gave good things, the Lord also takes them away; and this is done for a time, that being humble he may have better.

VERS. 21.-- « Naked came I forth. » The earth brought me forth naked entering hither; the earth will receive me naked going hence. A consolation from the condition of things: that he did not lose what was his own, but calls to mind things received and to be left behind; the time in which he did not yet have these things he foresees, in what state he is to depart. He consoles himself also from the justice of God.

« From my mother's womb. » The mother of Christ is the Synagogue, which held him within herself covered by the letter, and did not see him naked in his deity; but from her he came naked to the Gentiles. Behold Joseph, whom the Synagogue, believing him mere man, wished to bind fast 756Bin an adulterous embrace; to whom he left the covering of the letter, and showed himself openly to the Gentiles. But he will return naked, when at the end of the world God shall be made known to the remnants of Israel. « The Lord gave. » Judaea, while it believed that he was to come, took [him] away when she herself despised him at his coming. « As it hath pleased the Lord. » When we are troubled, we ought to have recourse to the judgment of God, and to render greater praises, because we know more truly that we are being beaten.

VERS. 22.-- « In all these things Job sinned not. » (Ibid.) A grieving mind ought to guard itself, etc., as far as he swelled not in heart, he murmured not with his mouth, his tongue was not insolent.

VERS. 1, 2.-- « And it came to pass, etc. » « Whence 756Ccomest thou? » (GREG. in Job l. III.) This not as before, etc., as far as thou who didst wish to diminish hast served his advancement.

VERS. 3.-- « Innocence. » He retains innocence who, even after a fall, roused by a spark of reason, faithfully repents.

(Ibid.) How was the Father moved against Christ, with whom he is the same, through Satan? Because Christ as man would not have suffered unless Adam had sinned, when Satan moved Adam he stirred [him] up against Christ God. In vain, because he bore the penalty without fault of his own; but not in vain, because he paid what another had seized.

VERS. 4.-- « Skin for skin. » The devil, on account of the miracles, thought him the Son of God, but on account of the lowly things, mere man. Judging him therefore from others, who in the place of shepherds contemn the losses of others, as one not 756Dmoved when many things had been withdrawn, as being things which are outside himself, he tempts him with the pain of his own flesh, as one who would grieve for himself who does not grieve for others. When he asks that this be done, he speaks with desires; and these things he brought in through his members by words and desires, through which he said: « Let us put wood into his bread (Jer. XI), » , that is, let us apply the stock of the cross by fixing it to his body.

(Ibid.) Skin is given for skin, because often, when a blow comes against the eye, we put the hand in the way, that we may be wounded rather in it than in the more tender part. Knowing that this is customarily done, he says: « Skin for skin, and all that a man hath » As if to say: Job therefore bears with an even mind so many scourges outside himself, because he is afraid lest he himself be struck; and out of care for himself he feels less about his own. Whence he demands to strike 757Athe man himself: « Put forth thy hand, » which God rightly permits, that being often conquered he may be struck dumb.

VERS. 5.-- « Otherwise put forth thy hand. » Often the devil, after he has assaulted the mind, ceases for a time, that he may suddenly break in upon it while it is secure. Therefore he demands Job again, which God grants him by keeping silence. « And touch his bone. » By the bone and the flesh he understands bodily life; by the soul he understands reason, as above.

VERS. 6.-- « Behold, he is in thy hand. » Satan had power through his own over the flesh of Christ, but he preserves the soul, not because he does not tempt it, but because he does not overcome it; or the soul, that is, he loses from his own right those dear to him and chosen by him, when he slays him from the sole of the foot even to the crown: because from the beginning of the world he brought hard things upon his members, 757Band by his raging reached even to their head, that is, Christ. « Behold, in thy hand. » He suffers us to be tempted, that we may seem weak to ourselves; and yet he guards us.

VERS. 7.-- « Satan therefore having gone forth. » (GREG.) Leave having been received, etc., as far as by repenting he looks back, lest any elation arise.

VERS. 8.-- « Who scraped the corrupt matter with a potsherd. » (Ibid.) A potsherd is made of clay, etc., as far as but worse are they who by elation, as Job's wife, who being proud gives counsel to her husband.

VERS. 9.-- « But his wife said to him. » (Ibid.) It shows the first temptation of the devil, etc., as far as but they slide away into harshness.

« Dost thou still continue in thy simplicity. » She reproves his simplicity, that he despises earthly things and desires eternal ones 757C; as if to say: Why dost thou in simplicity seek eternal things and groan grievously over these, falling away (despise eternal things) and escape present evils, or by dying. But those men suffered these things, a form of uprightness. Whence he says: « As one of the foolish women, etc., » they endure those who strike without, they teach the perverse within: there strong, here merciful; there they drive back adversaries, here they protect their own; and it is a great thing to do both of these in the battle line. « Dost thou still continue. » Eve repeats her own words, as if saying: Forsake simplicity, that is, obedience; contemn the forbidden thing by eating it. « Bless the Lord and die. » That is, by overstepping the precept, live beyond what thou wast created. See the order: after the wounds the enemy brought in words, because when the force of pain grows heavy a small persuasion more easily takes a man; for which reason he who took away the rest 757Dkept the wife in reserve.

VERS. 10.-- « As one of the foolish women, etc. » (GREG.) Because the understanding, not the sex, is in fault: he does not say, one of the women, but « of the foolish women: » what savours of depravity belongs to accidental folly, not by the condition of nature. « If we have received good things, etc. » (Ibid.) It is a great consolation in evils to remember good things, lest there be despair on every side, just as in glad times the foresight of evil tempers one from elation. Whence it is said: In the day of good things be not unmindful of evils, and in the day of evils be not unmindful of good things. « If good things, » that is, if we strive toward eternal good things, why do we not endure present evils? « In all these things, » etc. (Ibid.) In two ways we sin with our lips: when we say things that are not just, or when we keep silent about just things. 758ABut Job neither said proud things against him who struck, nor kept back right things against her who counselled. He had patience, giving thanks to God, teaching by reproof the folly of his wife . And so the enemy, being conquered, is the more hotly goaded; and because the wife fell silent, he stirred up others to insults. « In all. » Wherein the saints, in all things which they suffer without and within, neither go beyond bounds at injuries done to God, nor amid the insults of the wicked.

VERS. 11.-- « Therefore. » (Ibid.) The friends signify heretics, etc., as far as hypocrites, not wishing to be, but to seem, learned. « Hearing. » He does not say hearing because these vices hear, but the devil, who tempts by these things, understands them. « Three friends. » This number, moral or mystical, signifies the three troops of the Chaldeans, that is, the assault which is made in deed, 758Bin tongue, and in thought; for he assaults all these.

« They had agreed together, etc. » (Ibid.) Because they agree in falsehood, and while they teach their own doctrines they seem to console. But they truly console in present affliction who instruct concerning eternal things. Heretics are called friends, because they are to be named not from their own wickedness but from our kindness: as, « Friend, whereto art thou come (Matth. XXVI)? » « They had agreed together. » Because certain vices join together among themselves against us, as pride and anger, slackness and fear; which, although they are diverse, yet tend to the same end, that is, to the overthrow of the spiritual Job.

VERS. 12.-- « And when they had lifted up their eyes afar off. » They who are below lift up their eyes, etc., as far as we change enemies as it were into friends by the sacrifice of our intention. 758C« Crying out they wept. » Because the blow had changed the appearance of the stricken man, a voluntary grief changes the appearance of the consolers; because he cannot console a grieving man who does not agree with the grief, but cleaving to him drags him along. Therefore, seeing his body torn, they rend their garments; seeing him changed, they defile their heads with dust, that Job may the more easily hear them, while he sees something of his own affliction in them. Yet the consoler must take care lest, grieving too much, he weigh down the afflicted and make the mourner despair. Perhaps Job's friends grieved too much, not knowing the mind of the stricken man, as though he had fallen from his heart. « They scattered dust. » Dust is earthly understanding; the head, the mind; heaven, the precept of the speech from above. To cast dust upon the head toward heaven is to corrupt the mind with worldly understanding, and to think earthly things 758Dconcerning heavenly words. Day is understanding, night ignorance, seven the totality. They sit, therefore, that is, they feign that they condescend to the weakness of the Church; both in those things in which they understand the true light, and in those in which they have ignorance; and thus they prepare the guiles of deception.

VERS. 13.-- « On the ground. » Because they show an appearance of humility, that they may urge proud things. Or the earth is the incarnation of Christ, which certain heretics do not deny, but they disagree with us either about the deity or about the manner of the incarnation; because therefore they do not deny it, they sit as it were with Job on the ground. « Seven days. » It is not known whether they persisted continuously, or over so many days with frequent visitation. « Days and nights. » Because either in that which they rightly, or in that which they foolishly, understand, 759Athey do not contradict the incarnation. « No one spoke a word to him. » Because then the enemies are silent, if we neglect to beget sons of God by preaching; but if we speak right things, then they heap up grievous insults, and break out against us into the voice of grief. They do indeed speak the seeds of errors, when they see the hearts of the faithful grow sluggish; but when they see them relish high things, grieve over the misery of the world, and seek a return to heaven, they warily bridle their tongue.

« No one spoke. » For there are many, etc., as far as and unless they be cleansed by sacrifice, they must be punished.

« For they saw the grief. » Because then they fear to speak perverse things, when the grief of the love of God shapes hearts; because then they would not profit, but would lose even those whom they held, the good being exercised.

• 759B

VERS. 1.-- « After these things, etc. » He makes them attentive, as it were to hidden things which were covered in closed vessels, but which are uncovered when their mouth is opened, that we may be refreshed by their inmost fragrance. Thus far a threefold exposition; from here on, according as the several passages require.

(GREG.) « He cursed his day. » Behold, this is not according to the surface of the history, because this is both evil and impossible. For the day on which he was born no longer was, and it is idle to curse a thing that does not exist, but pernicious if it did exist; nor can a past day now be turned into darkness, nor can the other things that follow suit it, nor would the untimely birth (which he says afterwards) enjoy rest: therefore here nothing is according to the letter.

759C« After these things. » That is, after all the aforesaid things which he suffered, his friends also being silent. Since therefore he patiently gave thanks in all things and taught well, he is not now, with none instigating him, to be believed to break out into cursing from impatience; but he says this calmly, because amid evils he praised God. « He cursed. » (Ibid.) A curse is spoken of in two ways, etc., as far as and applies the remedy.

VERS. 3.-- « Let the day perish on which I was born. » Not created, etc., as far as but brought in the darkness of sin.

« Let the day perish. » The day is the prosperity of the world, which ends in night, because it leads on to tribulation; or the day is the delight of sin, the night the blindness of the mind. Man is spoken of in three ways: by nature, by fault, and 759Dby weakness. Man therefore is born in the day, conceived in the night: because he is not carried off to the delight of sin unless he is first weakened through the darkness of the mind. But let the day perish, that is, let the delight of sin be destroyed by the vigour of justice.

« And the night. » (Greg. in Job l. IV.) That is, let penitence extinguish what the blinded mind perpetrates through consent, while it does not warily see through the blandishments of delight, lest the fault which begins to flatter should drag it to destruction.

VERS. 4.-- « That day, » etc. (Ibid.) That is, let it be seen, at the outset of delight, to what end of perdition it hurries a man, and let it be tormented by penitence. But if it has been so punished. « Let it not require. » In judgment, that he may punish; 760Aand he will not illumine. He illumines with light who reproves; but he is as it were covered who is not recalled into the memory of the judge. Whence: « Whose sins are covered (Psal. XXXI), » nor then let them be shown in the sight of all.

VERS. 5.-- « Let it not be illumined, etc., let them darken it. » That is, the day of delight, lest it be seen by him who sees all things. « Darkness. » (GREG.) That is, the laments of penitence, or the hidden judgments of God, from which we are absolved by prevenient grace, which we know not how to merit. « And the shadow of death. » That is, the death of Christ according to the flesh, etc., as far as in what mercy has succoured him, let man punish it. Whence follows: « Let gloom seize upon it. » That is, the confusion of the mind, of which it is said: « For there is a confusion that brings glory. (Eccli. IV.) » « And let it be wrapped about. » On every side. « With bitterness. » 760BOf penitence. But if the day, that is, the delight of sin, is so punished, what of the night, that is, the consent to fault?

VERS. 6.-- « Let a dark whirlwind possess that night. » It is as it were a whirlwind of a storm stirred up, etc., as far as for the blindness of the damnation in which we were born. « Let it not be counted in the day of the year. » The year is the grace from above, etc., as far as but is forever without share in that fatherland. Whence he adds:

VERS. 7.-- « Let that night be solitary. » Because it is separated from that throng, or loses the man whom it had made its companion; and when the elect have been redeemed by grace, he alone with his own body is handed over to Gehenna. « Nor worthy of praise. » Man, when laid low, worshipped idols, in which he praised demons as the darkness of night; 760Cbut now that the idols have been rejected, the night is worthy of praise.

VERS. 8.-- « Let them curse it. » (Ibid.) In the old translation, etc., as far as and at the end, being loosed, may openly wage wars. « Leviathan. » That is, their addition, that is, of men, in whom after his suggestion he does not cease to add evils. Or a reproach, because when he promised to add divinity to Adam, he took away even what he had. He is called by the prophet a twisting serpent, who softly, as by the coaxing endings of words, pours in his snares. And a bar, because being hard through malice he strikes unto death. Once roused he will act openly, but meanwhile in secret.

VERS. 9.-- « With gloom » Of that night. « Let the stars be darkened. » That is, hypocrites, who shine by their 760Dworks before the eyes of men. These are they which are drawn by the tail of the dragon, that is, by the last persecution of Antichrist; these are darkened, because the malice of the enemy so prevails over them that they are wrapped in open evils, such outwardly as they are within. « Let it look for light. » This according to his members, etc., as far as which by prophesying waited for Christ, but did not know him when he came. « Nor the rising of the dawn as it springs up. » (Ibid.) The rising of the dawn is the new birth of the resurrection, in which the saints shall rise with their flesh to see the eternal light. But however much the elect shine here, they cannot penetrate what that glory of that new birth will be. This night did not close but opened the doors of the womb, because, when man was conceived, it unbarred the desires of concupiscence unto sin. 761AAnd when these doors, that is, the desires of carnal concupiscence, have been unbarred, we are dragged on to innumerable evils of corruption. Whence, weighed down, we groan; because justice requires this, that what we did willingly we should endure unwillingly.

VERS. 10.-- « Because he did not close the doors of the womb, etc. » This of the head himself, etc., as far as as we say that robbers give life to their captives, if they do not take it away.

VERS. 11.-- « Why did I not die in the womb. » It is not to be believed, etc., as far as lest suggestion should draw him to delight. « And having come forth from the womb. » (GREG.) Because sin conceived outwardly, etc., as far as while they bear the strife of their own flesh against the spirit.

VERS. 13, 14.-- « For now. » (Ibid.) By "now," 761Bwhich belongs to present time, he designates the rest that stands always in the present, that is, eternal rest. « I should rest with kings. » That is, with the angels, in that they rule the things subject to them. Who are also consuls, because by announcing to us the will of God they take counsel for us. Or by kings he means holy preachers, who rule themselves; and consuls of the earth, because they counsel earthly men well. He says therefore that if he had not sinned, he would have ascended thither even unredeemed, whither the apostles and holy preachers after the redemption arrive with great labour, who are not deferred as the ancients were, but soon after death enter heaven. « Who build, » Every earthly man is pressed in his heart by dense tumults of thoughts, and is trampled by the throng of desires as by crowds. But to build solitudes is to drive out from the secret place of the heart the tumults of earthly desires, 761Cand to pant after the love of inmost rest, so that it may be said: One thing I have asked of the Lord, and this will I seek after, etc.

VERS. 15.-- « With princes who possess gold. » The princes are the rulers of the Church, etc., as far as but he who has foreseen things to come already calls to mind things past.

VERS. 16.-- « Or as an untimely birth. » (Ibid.) Because that which is an untimely birth comes forth before its time, and being extinguished is straightway hidden away. These are the saints, with whom he considers that he could have rested, who from the beginning of the world were before the time of the redemption, and yet mortified themselves to the world. The first time, before the law, which brought forth fathers dead a second time, was as it were the womb of an untimely birth; and they were as it were dead from the womb, 761Dwho without the tables of the law feared God by nature, and believing in the Redeemer to come slew their pleasures. « Hidden. » Because, few being recorded by Moses, etc., as far as whom the spirit of prophecy irradiated, as Job himself. (Ibid.) Now he opens the rest of this light, and shows in plainer words what is daily done in it concerning the manner of life of the wicked.

VERS. 17.-- « There the wicked. » That is, in the light of Christ, which the ancients awaited, the Gentiles cease from the throng of the desires of the world, and with tranquil mind already foretaste eternal rest. And this is: « And there they rested. » In the world the strong are said to be strong in vigour, not wearied. But he who is strengthened in the love of God healthfully 762Afails from his own strength; and the more strongly he seeks eternal things, the more wearied he is, and dies to earthly things. Whence: « My soul longeth and fainteth for the courts of the Lord (Psal. XXXVIII). » When by "there" he means the light, he shows the place of the elect in which they are contained.

VERS. 18.-- « And they who once were bound. » The just, though at rest from desires, yet while in the body are bound by the trouble of their own corruption. For the body weighs down the soul, and the flesh strives against the spirit. There are also bodily chains, hunger, thirst, and the like, which here cannot be loosed; but from them all they shall be loosed in the liberty of the glory of the sons of God. See the degrees: the wicked, being converted, cease; the well-exercised rest in the inmost bosom; those absolved from the chains of corruption come to liberty. But what they did here meanwhile, he adds: « Who have not heard, 762Betc. « The exactor is the devil, who once bestowed on man the coin of deception and daily demands the debt of death; his voice is temptation. He hears who is tempted and resists; he hearkens who consents. The same concerning inward peace, because what the mind greatly loves it repeats the oftener.

VERS. 19.--Small and great are there. » (Ibid.) Because here there is a distinction of works, there it will be of dignities. Whence: « In my Father's house there are many mansions. (Joan. XIV.) » « And the servant. » He who sins is the servant of sin, because here he never becomes free while he fears the judge; but there he will be free, where there will be no doubt about pardon. There will indeed be there a memory of fault, not such as defiles the mind, but such as, without injury to blessedness, binds one more closely to blessedness and gladness, as when healed 762Cwe remember our pains without pain; whence we give the more thanks to the physician.

VERS. 20.-- « Why is light given to the wretched? » (GREG. in lib. Job lib. V.) Having contemplated that rest, where, made free by the Lord, he looks down upon the prosperities of the world, which draw men back from it. « Why is light given to the wretched, » that is, prosperity in the wretchedness of our pilgrimage: because, although it does not utterly crush the just man, yet it divides the mind between the love of God and the management of itself. Whence he adds: « And life to those who, etc. » There is bitterness to every just man, etc., as far as or to be set over others in rule.

VERS. 21.-- « Who look for death. » (Ibid.) That is, they desire to mortify themselves utterly to the world, but by the hidden judgment of God it does not come, because they are compelled to be taken up with the honors laid upon them, which they bear in the fear of God; 762Dand within is the desire of godliness, and without they fulfil the ministry of their order, lest through pride they gainsay the disposing of God: and thus they both profit many, and, in that they see themselves imperfect, they rise the higher through humility: and in that they are put off from their desires, by that very delay they are enlarged toward the same: whence he adds, as though digging out, etc. « As those digging out a treasure. » Because he who seeks a treasure by digging, etc., as far as he finds examples of contemplation, whereby he may be rich.

VERS. 22.-- « To the man whose. » Behold, whereas it was asked why light is given to the wretched, he shows here: the way is hidden from the man; because, if he now does well, he knows not what he shall do at the last; or sometimes the things that are thought to please God displease him.

763AVERS. 23.-- « God hath compassed him about. » (GREG.) Because, although he desires heavenly things, yet he knows not what has been ordained within concerning himself. And about him also are the darknesses of ignorance: he is unmindful of the past, he does not find out things to come, things present he scarcely knows, the inmost things of God's dispensation he cannot pierce. But he who bends his mind upon these darknesses weeps, and with his whole sight seeks the light above: whence it sometimes comes to pass that in a godly weeping the brightness of inward joy breaks forth; whence there follows:

VERS. 24.-- « Before I eat. » To eat is to be fed with the light of contemplation, which none has save he who first, in this exile, as in a place where good things are not, groans, and sighs with desire, and follows out the force of tears.

« And as overflowing waters, etc. » Overflowing waters are borne with a rush in many rollings; so in 763Bthem that mourn there are many rollings, while they know not who is adjudged before God: while they call to mind their own past things, they greatly fear the things to come, and in their own good things they are afraid lest they err: and while the scourges of God take them to task, they suspect that they have given offense: whence he adds:

VERS. 25.-- « For the fear. » For they weep, because they fear to be forsaken: and lest the godly stroke be not of discipline, but of vengeance, whence: « Who knoweth the power of thy wrath? (Psal. LXXXIX.) » For sometimes there is a grace which we call wrath, and sometimes a wrath which we call grace; whence it is needful that he be feared in all things: in prosperity, lest the things be given him for a greater blinding, not for consolation, as is wont to befall the good; lest in adversity there be the beginning of punishment.

VERS. 26.-- « I have dissembled. » (Ibid.) And if always 763Cby thinking, etc., as far as whether he sets forth Job, such as he was in power, for an example.

« Have I not dissembled? » Power possessed is both to be thought upon for profit, and to be dissembled because of swelling; and he that is powerful, that he may be bound to profit others, should know that he is able.

« Have I not kept silence? » Behold what he is in his mouth.

« Have I not been quiet? » Behold what he is toward things unlawful, etc., as far as because our perfection is not without fault, whence he adds:

« And indignation is come upon me. » Whence, being about to speak of stripes with great art, he set his rightly-done deeds first, that in them every man might consider what punishment awaits the wicked, if thus he here chastises the just; so that, if the just man shall scarcely be saved, where shall the ungodly appear?

763DVERS. 2.-- « If we begin to speak to thee. » (Ibid.) They begin softly, but they break out into harsh things. So heretics set forth smooth words, that they be not guarded against, but bring in harsh ones after.

« But that which is conceived. » (Ibid.) The perfect do not even in their heart conceive perverse things, which they check by silence. Others conceive depraved things, but bind them fast by the great strength of silence: others both conceive them and straightway bring them forth. Light in understanding, headlong in tongue. Of these is Eliphaz, who out of his own experience judges the same of all men.

« Who shall be able to hold it. » As though he would fain hold it back: wherein he hints that he will give offense in speaking.

VERS. 3.-- « Behold, thou hast taught very many. » (Ibid.) There are certain good things which even he confesses who wishes to lay a charge 764Aagainst a man. How great was he before, who, though busied with the ordering of so many things of his own, yet freely taught others also, showing right things by deed and by word? But because the accuser speaks good things of the same man, he bent them to a charge, saying:

VERS. 5.-- « But now it is come, etc., as though thou hast not kept the right things which thou didst say. » But note that there are wicked men who speak the good things of the just which, being known, they cannot deny, lest they seem depraved: and that they may thereby be the more believed in the evils which they bring in, they turn these very good things also to the heaping up of guilt. Here therefore, as though by his own testimony, he is reproved as an evil man for having spoken right things, but not kept them: below he is noted for speaking ill, that he may hold his peace. And these are the two ways in which evil men assail the good, saying that they either speak depraved things, or do not hold the good things which they speak.

764B« Thou hast fainted, etc. Where is thy fear? » As though he marveled at virtues that were lost, which he sets down in a fitting order. As in the way of the world boldness begets strength and fear begets weakness, so also in the way of God boldness begets weakness, and the fear of God strength: because he who is joined to God is raised by a certain power above all things; strength is not shown save in adversities, whence patience is added, because he as it were makes progress in strength who bears others' evils unmoved. Of patience is perfection born, whence a man is said to possess his soul in patience, that is, to live rightly in all things, to have dominion out of virtue over all the motions of the mind: for he who conquers himself is strong against all things.

(Ibid.) But since he took him to task by inveighing against him, now he adds as it were by exhorting:

764CVERS. 7.-- « Remember, I beseech thee. » But this too he does blameworthily. For the innocent and the upright are often here utterly blotted out, even though they are kept for things eternal: but they who serve God not for an eternal but for an earthly wage feign for themselves the thing they seek, and, presuming to teach, when they preach earthly security, show by all their labors what they love.

VERS. 8.-- « Nay rather I have seen them. » (Ibid.) He sows sorrows who speaks. He reaps deceitful things who prevails by speaking. Or, he sows sorrows who does perverse things. He reaps, who prospers in them. These do not (as he says) perish, but live here more happily than the just. For God suffers certain men to prevail here, that the life of the just may be purged the more cleanly. He punishes others straightway, lest he be thought to neglect human things, and to pass over many evils, that he may strengthen the hearts of the innocent 764Dwho are faint-hearted: but he would speak more truly of all men at the end; it could be said generally that the innocent and the upright man does not perish, because though he be worn down here, with God he is restored in true salvation. And the evil perish, because though they grow higher here, at the end they shall be smitten more hardly. But since he says, remember, it is plain that past things are brought back to mind, not that things to come are declared.

VERS. 9.-- « That they perished at the blowing of God. » (Ibid.) We blow air, while from without we draw it within, and from within we render it without. God therefore is said to blow in retribution, because from outward causes he conceives within the counsel of judgment, and from that inward counsel he sends forth the sentence outwardly, that is, from our evils which he sees without, 765Ahe disposes judgment within, and from the inward conception he makes damnation without. Or God is said to blow, that is, to be angry, by a likeness, because we, when we are angry, are inflamed with the blast of fury. God therefore blows in being angry, purposing vengeance, when, after long patience, he who in himself is tranquil seems turbulent to the guilty, since they before him are troubled by their own guilt.

(GREG.) After he had admonished him kindly, he openly rebukes him. « The roaring of the lion, » that is, the severity and terror of Job himself: « the voice of the lioness, » the talkativeness of his wife, « the teeth of the whelps, » the greediness of his sons, has been destroyed. The stiff man exults, as though they had been condemned by right. He compares Job also to a tiger, because of the spots of dissembling. For the hypocrite, who seems upright, has hidden vices, 765Bwhich sometimes, breaking out, change his color. The glory of the just is a prey which he snatches to himself: this man therefore, thinking that holy Job had held by hypocrisy the good things which he knew in him, says:

VERS. 11.-- « The tiger hath perished. » That is, the variety of thy dissembling is put out, etc., as far as such men as these think that they surpass all men in wisdom.

VERS. 12.-- « Moreover a hidden word was spoken to me. » (Ibid.) Heretics feign that they hear hidden things, whence they also preach secretly, that their preaching may be held holier, and not equal to that of others.

« By stealth, etc. » (Ibid.) Because they do not enter with the rest by the door, but seek the chinks of a depraved understanding; and because a thief fears the light, he adds:

VERS. 13.-- « In the horror of a nightly vision. » 765CIn the dread of a nightly vision they say that they have perceived the veins of the divine whisper, because, that they may boast of lofty things, they say that they can scarcely take them in. But while they thus mark lofty things, they are witnesses against themselves of their wickedness. For in a nightly vision a thing is seen doubtfully.

« When deep sleep is wont to seize. » That is, while all below sleep in torpor, we watch for the perceiving of high and heavenly things. And when at times they see this despised, they feign to fear themselves the things they say, whence he adds:

VERS. 14.-- « Dread held me. » That they may seem wonderful in high things, they are as it were greatly afraid of what they feign: and yet they are bold to bring forth the things which they assert they could scarcely hear.

« A word was spoken to me. » (Ibid.) The Son of God 765Dis said, etc., as far as so much the more, being checked, does it dread his uprightness: whence he adds:

« In the horror of a nightly vision, etc. » That is, in the dread of hidden contemplation, in which nothing is seen manifestly, but as it were in an image. But to this no man attains, unless the desires of the flesh be checked, whence:

« When deep sleep is wont to seize men. » He watches who is intent upon the cares of the world: he sleeps in quiet who flees them. This is Jacob, who sleeps on the way and sees angels, that is, in the course of this life he closes his eyes to worldly things, which fault opened to our first parents for coveting. And no man is brought to the seeing of inward things unless he be withdrawn from those things which entangle him without; 766Awhence: « Be still and see: for I am God (Psal. XLV). » But the more the mind, lifted up in contemplation, beholds things higher than itself, the more terribly does it tremble in itself, whence:

« Dread held me and trembling and all the bones. » (Ibid.) That is, the stronger deeds, etc., as far as he feels the sting of the flesh, he adds:

VERS. 16.-- « There stood one. (Ibid.) That they may judge that they have known incomprehensible things, etc., as far as because he arrogated to himself specially a good that is common.

« The hairs of my flesh stood up. » (Ibid.) The hairs are all the superfluous thoughts of human corruption, of the old life: which if we shut out from the mind, we cut the hairs from the flesh, that we be not wearied with pain. Whence Moses: « Let the Levites shave all the hairs of their flesh 766B(Levit. XIV). » But these things we behold more subtly in ourselves when we pierce into high things, whence rightly it is now said:

« When a spirit passed by. » For when the mind sees true things, it torments itself the more hardly concerning superfluous things. When therefore the spirit passes, the hairs are greatly afraid, because before the force of compunction superfluous thoughts flee away, because the inward vision inflames the soul against itself; and while it cuts away unlawful things strictly, the mind cleaves more widely to contemplation, and it well fixes the spirit which was passing; nor yet does this very staying of contemplation fully open the force of loving-kindness, whence he adds:

« There stood one whose countenance I knew not. » (Ibid.) He is not said to be a certain one, etc., as far as he beholds through his co-eternal likeness, he adds:

766C« An image before the eyes me. » [Vulg. Job 4:16 meis, "an image before mine eyes"] The Image of the Father is the Son, who says: No man comes to the Father but by me.

« And I heard a voice as of a gentle breeze. » (Ibid.) The voice of the breeze is knowledge, etc., as far as who from this hearing learned.

VERS. 17.-- « Shall a man be justified in comparison of God? » This he knew in contemplation, that human justice compared with the divine is injustice, as the lamp which shines in the darkness grows dim in the sun: which he could do, because he who sees the light knows what to reckon of the darkness.

« Or purer than his maker? » (Ibid.) This he reckons who murmurs against him that scourges him. But he ought to know that he does not scourge impiously who made wonders out of nothing, and that the 766Dfounder of nature is not an unjust judge of fault. And though this man unjustly reproves Job, yet he rightly describes the measure of the creature in comparison with the Creator. A man therefore reckons himself purer than his maker if he prepares a complaint against the scourge, and without doubt sets him after himself, when he reproves his judgment concerning his own affliction

« Behold, they that serve him. » (IDEM.) An angel, although he remains unchangeable in his estate, yet in this, that he is a creature, has the vicissitude of changeableness, and so is not stable. For if this nature were not changeable, since it was well founded, it would have fallen in nothing. But of free choice it had it to fall or to stand, and in those that stood the merit was that they fixed the motion of their own changeableness by the earnestness of the will. This is the proof of changeableness which he adds concerning the apostate:

767A« And in his angels he found wickedness. » From the comparison of these the infirmity of man is gathered.

« How much more they that dwell in houses of clay. » (GREG.) That is, earthly bodies, etc., as far as they behold, being taken up with the cares of the world; whence he adds:

VERS. 20.--From morning until evening. » That is, from the beginning of their life until its end they are wounded by the committing of iniquity, and being cut down by it they fall into the deep.

(Ibid.) Or morning is prosperity; evening, adversity; but by both they perish, because through prosperity they are wanton, through adversity impatient, and rise up to madness. And because none of them, namely, « who from morning until evening shall be cut down » understands what is kept here for the afflicted good, what is to come for himself who 767Bhere thinks them good things. But because not all are so forsaken, he adds:

« But they that shall be left. » That is, the despised of the world, whom the age has left as unworthy: as the Egyptian boy, that is, the lover of the age, black with sins, is often left despised by the age, that he may not run with it, but, broken by adversities, may lie torpid. But him David, that is, Christ, finds, and turns to his own love, and feeds with the food of the word, and makes the guide of his journey, that is, his preacher: by which guide he destroys them that feast together, that is, the gladness of the world, which scorned to have him for a companion.

« They shall be taken away from them. » Because God has chosen them for himself.

« They shall die, and not in wisdom. » Having set the lot of the just between, he returns to the destruction of them that understand not. 767CThe reprobate despise the just, because through their own death they seek things invisible, or through death they seek the invisible life. But they themselves, who flee alike from death and from wisdom, do indeed utterly forsake wisdom, being unwilling to die for the truth, and yet they do not escape death.

VERS. 1.-- « Call therefore. » (Ibid.) Since he had truly brought this forth against the wicked, though he had secretly set Job in their number, being puffed up with the pride of wisdom he adds an open mockery against Job: « Call therefore, » that is, if in affliction thou criest out, God does not answer, that is, he does not give effect, because in tranquillity thou didst despise him; and « to some one of the saints, » that is, 767Dthou hast not the saints for helpers in affliction, because thou hadst them not for companions in mirth.

(Ibid.) After the mockery he adds a sentence, etc., as far as these things trouble the wise, but anger through vice butchers the foolish.

« And it slayeth the little one. » That is, while he envies him whom he thinks the greater, etc., as far as or by having a part it straitens the quantity for us.

(GREG. lib. VI Moral., cap. V.) Because he is made solid with all his desires in earthly love, whence Cain first built a city on the earth, a stranger to heaven he lives here more happily.

VERS. 3.-- « And I cursed his beauty. » (IDEM.) Because, whereas from the seen prosperity of the evil the feet of the weak totter, the strong, seeing what punishment 768Afollows upon their glory, straightway reprove their prosperity. The weak man is changed with the quality of things: while he sees prosperous things, he praises; while they are changed, he judges them to be nothing: but the firm man, together with that very glory, considers the punishment that follows, and straightway condemns it. But because they that thrive in the world draw many with them, he adds:

VERS. 4.-- « His sons shall be made far off. » That is, his followers.

« In the gate. » (Ibid.) The gate of the kingdom is the day of judgment, in which the elect enter into glory, before which the sons of this world are lifted up, but then they shall be crushed.

VERS. 5.-- « And there shall be none to deliver. » (Ibid.) Because the truth snatches away there those whom here it presses down through discipline.

768B« Whose harvest. » Every man has a gift of understanding, whereby he understands right things and speaks them: but because he neither loves nor does the same, he fasts from the harvest which he has; but he who hungers for justice, hearing right things from him, refreshes himself, whence: « What they say, do ye (Matth. XXIII). »

« And the armed man shall seize him. » (Ibid.) The devil is overcome as unarmed when, suggesting open evils, he tries to take away all good things alike: but he conquers armed, when he passes by some good things untouched and secretly corrupts others.

« And they shall drink. » (IDEM.) The fool often has riches, etc., as far as and the diligent man is hindered by slowness? He answers:

VERS. 6.-- « Nothing on earth is done without cause. » Because thereby the one is more justly punished for negligence, the other crowned for diligence. But because we are schooled to the understanding of right things 768Cnot only by diligence, but also by persecutions, it is added: « And out of the ground it shall not come forth. »

« And out of the ground it shall not come forth. » (Ibid.) The ground, that is, the elements of the world, are turned into the punishment of them that offend; whence it is said: « It shall fight for him, » that is, for the Lord, the world of the earth against the senseless; but yet sorrow shall not come forth out of them, because punishment is not born of those things which strike, but of those men who by sinning have wrung out the strokes: but the more the outward punishment chastens, the more is the mind lifted to things above; whence he adds:

VERS. 7.-- « Man is born to labor. » Because it is impossible in this pilgrimage to be without labor: but in that the flesh is afflicted, the mind is lifted to the seeking of high things. « Or man, » that is, the carnal man, feels the evils 768Dof the world, because he greedily desires its good things. But he whose mind passes beyond these, lifted like a bird to the heights on the wing of hope, feels no evil, and rejoices even in scourges; but because no man avails for these things by his own strength, he adds:

VERS. 8.-- « Wherefore I thee. » That is, I ask him through whom I know that these things are given.

VERS. 9.-- « Wonderful things without number. » Because the greatness of the divine works can neither be examined by quality nor numbered by quantity.

VERS. 10.-- « Who giveth rain. » (Ibid.) These words are mystical, because Job's friends had been schooled by his fellowship. « He giveth rain to the earth: » when he pours the grace of preaching into the dry hearts of the Gentiles.

« But he watereth all things with waters. » When he fills a man 769Awith the Spirit unto fruitfulness. Man is called all things, because he has something in common with all things. Or all things, that is, rich and poor, and all the differences of men, because a recompense follows a good work.

VERS. 11.-- « Who setteth the humble on high. » (GREG.) That they who are now despised may judge with the Lord.

« Them that mourn. » Because the more they are now troubled by adversities, and chasten themselves by lamentations, so much the loftier soundness shall they have even in this life. These things may be understood of the elect, where the humble transcend with lofty mind all temporal things, and the afflicted are raised up in soundness, not in madness, as they who rejoice when they have done evil. But these are glad out of the certainty of eternal salvation.

769BVERS. 12.-- « Who scattereth the thoughts. » (IDEM.) When the reprobate think evil things, God sometimes, lest they prevail against the good, takes away their strength, that they may lack the effect of the work, and be guilty in conscience before God.

VERS. 13.-- « Who catcheth the wise. » (Ibid.) Because human deeds serve the counsels of God fittingly even then when they resist: as in the selling of Joseph, that he might not be adored; in the demanding of the foreskins by Saul, that David might be destroyed; in the death of the Lord, that all might not believe in him. God grants some things being favorable, permits others being angry: which things he then turns to the use of his own counsel, so that the things which fight against his counsel serve his counsel; and what is done without his will is not contrary to his will, whence: « All things whatsoever he would, etc. »

769CVERS. 14.-- « By day they shall run into. » Because in the very presence of the truth they were blinded by the error of unbelief, seeing the miracles of Christ and doubting of his godhead.

« As in the night. » By groping we seek the things we do not see with the eyes: the Jews had seen the miracles, and still as it were groping they were seeking: « If thou art the Christ, tell us plainly (Joan. X). » But Christ could not long be held back by their hands.

« By day they shall run into darkness. » (Ibid.) The mind of the envious, when it is afflicted at another's good, is darkened by the ray of the sun.

« And as in the night so shall they grope at noonday. » The day of a good work shines outwardly in one's neighbor: they grope as in the night, because, blind with spite, they busy themselves to find 769Dsomething to reprove. Behold Lot, that is, the just man, is shut in and fortified within the house while evil men set themselves against him, that is, he returns to his mind and remains within; the blind men of Sodom go about, that is, the envious search out his deeds and words, and find no door, that is, no approach for reproof, but grope the wall, because everywhere the praiseworthy action of the just man meets them.

« They shall grope. » But the poor in spirit, that is, he who is not lifted up in his own eyes, is saved from the sword of the mouth, that is, from wicked persuasion.

VERS. 15.-- « But he shall save the needy from the sword of the mouth. » The sword of the mouth is the accusation of the Jews. The hand of the violent is the heathen world which crucified him: but these Christ overcame by rising again. In which needy one, that is, in the humble people of the faithful, the hope of the life to come is made solid. 770ABut iniquity, which now opens wide its mouth in reproach of Christ, shall close it through punishment, or being converted ceases from injuries. The same things generally of the depraved.

« The poor from the hand of the violent. » That is, from the adverse power, so that he be neither drawn by the blandishments of persuasions nor broken by the pain of torments. But the poor man is not drawn away, because his hope, fixed in things eternal, is made solid against these things. And when the poor man has come to the fruit of that hope, the proud man is struck dumb and draws in his mouth: because torments bind the tongue which was speaking against the just by detraction. But that the elect may escape torments and attain to rewards, he must here be purged by scourges, whence he adds:

VERS. 17.-- « Reject not therefore the rebuke of the Lord. » (Ibid.) He rejects it who complains that he suffers unjustly. 770BEliphaz therefore, thinking that Job was smitten for purgation, not for the proving of his strength, because Job speaks freely, seeking the causes of his smiting, thinks that he rejects the rebuke of the Lord. So heretics turn to evil what is rightly done by the Church.

VERS. 18.-- « For he woundeth. » (IDEM.) In two ways God wounds those whom he brings back to salvation. Sometimes he strikes in the body that he may heal the mind; sometimes without outward scourges he strikes the hardness of the mind with desire of himself, and so heals it, which lay secure and dead in the world. But while the mind pants after God and despises all worldly things, all things are straightway turned for it into temptation, and afflict it; but while it is worn down by a passing labor, it is delivered from the everlasting one; 770Cand therefore he adds:

VERS. 19.-- « In six tribulations. » (Ibid.) By the number six, which a seventh follows, the working and the course of the present life is signified: because on the sixth day God, finishing all things, made man, and on the seventh he rested, which has no evening, that is, no end; in the seventh tribulation therefore he delivers, lest in the seventh evil touch him: because here, chastening as a father, he wears down, but in the day of judgment he hides from the stroke.

VERS. 20.-- « In famine. » (Ibid.) He reckons up the evils of the present life and the helps of God. The famine of the mind is the silence of the word of God: which being withdrawn, the temptation of the flesh grows strong, which is war. But God even in famine snatches the soul from death, because he refreshes it with his word. « And in war. » Against the temptations of the flesh he makes men strong. But 770Dsuch a one sometimes fears detractions, whence he adds:

VERS. 21.-- « From the scourge of the tongue. » That is, from the upbraiding of reproach, for which, being mocked, he ceases from good; whence David: « And from the sharp word. » From this the holy man is hidden, because, while he seeks not praise here, neither does he feel reproaches; but because after these things a man fears some torment of bodies, there follows: « And thou shalt not fear calamity. » That is, of persecution: but because such a one prepares security for himself in the terror of the judgment to come, he adds:

VERS. 22.-- « In wasting and in famine. » The wasting is e s the gehenna which is without, etc., as far as that in the moment of death he may not shudder at its onset, there is added: « And 771Athe beasts of the earth. » Which at the time of death are let loose to snatch away souls, but he does not fear them raging who has not followed them fawning: and the beginning of the recompense is, at death, security of mind. But when a man lives well, heed must be taken lest any one, despising the rest, glory in his singularity, but let him consider the good of fellowship, whence he adds:

VERS. 23.-- « But with the stones of the regions a covenant. » As it were: the regions of the nations are divided, churches differing in customs and tongues; the stones are the elect, who are set in the building. He therefore who lives rightly joins himself by covenant to the stones: because in that he forsakes the world, he binds himself to the saints by imitation; whence assault grows, by which nevertheless, being worn down, he is more humbly made subject to God, whence he adds: « And the beasts of the earth. » Not 771Bpacified but peacemaking, because they do not have peace, but make peace; because when a man is more sharply assaulted by the devil, he is the more driven to love, and with him a sturdier peace is wrought. Or the beasts are the motions of the flesh, which, pressed by continence as by a cage, though they roar in tempting, yet do not go so far as the effect, as it were to the madness of biting, wherein they are peacemaking. Or because they disturb, that is the more loved wherein men live with no gainsaying: and thus they drive us to the love of inmost quiet.

VERS. 24.-- « And thou shalt know that peace. » (GREG.) Peace either begun, which is here conceived out of the desire of God; or full, which is in the world to come out of the vision of God. When therefore the mind is made subject to God, or the flesh to the mind, the tabernacle of the just man, that is, the body which the mind inhabits, has peace, 771Cthe motions of the desires being bridled under justice. But this chastity of the flesh is nothing, if there be not present the sweetness of the mind in the love of one's neighbor.

« And visiting thy beauty thou shalt not sin. » (Ibid.) Our beauty is our neighbor, etc., as far as because out of the seed of a good work he gathers the rich fruits of preaching; whence there is added:

VERS. 25.-- « Thou shalt know also that thy seed shall be manifold. » For he receives the eloquence of speaking well who lives well, and whose conscience does not hinder him as he speaks. Hence it is that the Egyptians, being made servants, receive grain for seed, who before, being free, had received it for eating: because when we are fully made subject to God, we are filled with the word of preaching. Before, being free, they were fed with the sacred eloquence; and yet they were at leisure for certain things which we 771Dseek in the world. Out of preaching a great offspring of the faithful follows. And this is: « And thy offspring, as the grass of the earth. » That is, innumerable. Or it is compared to grass, because, forsaking the withering glory of the world, it grows green with inward hope. But it is not enough for the just man to do these great things outwardly, unless he also pierce through contemplation into things eternal; whence there is added:

VERS. 26.-- « Thou shalt enter into the grave in abundance. (Ibid.) The grave is contemplation, etc., as far as what they may pour back for the profit of their neighbors. « As a heap of wheat is brought in. » Because the time of action is first, that of contemplation last. And it is needful that the perfect man first exercise his mind in virtues, and afterward lay it up in the barn of quiet. Or the grave 772Ais eternal rest, in which the more truly is rest had, the more perfectly the life of corruption is slain. Into this he enters in abundance who, after the works of this life are gathered in, being fully dead to this changeableness, is hidden in the secret of the true light, like wheat: because the just feel the strokes in another's time, but in their own, like grains, they enter into the barn.

VERS. 27.-- « We have searched it out. » In this he notes of himself that he had not spoken according to the surface concerning the grave, the beasts, the stones, the tabernacle, and the like, but that he had sought inward things in them. « What thou hast heard, ponder in thy mind. » Words of boasting; and though he taught well, it is unskillfulness to wish to teach a better man: whence the sayings of the friends, though right, are proved to have been not rightly said.

772BVERS. 2.-- « Would that they were weighed. » Touched by the scourges, he is provoked by words, not that, not raised up into his own defence, he might fall defiant: but that, struck, he kept silence and gave thanks, and provoked, answered rightly: « would that sins were weighed. »

« A balance. » (Ibid.) Christ, holding in the Father's hand the scale of mercy and of justice, loosing sin through mercy, showed it to be light; and by dying showed calamity to be of heavy weight. To him he grants this also of grace, that the calamity itself should be knowable. For man, being blind, rejoiced in exile as though in his homeland: but God, appearing without, calls man back within, so that, having seen what he lost, he may grieve heavily for what he endures; he says therefore:

« Would that they were weighed. » That is, the evil of our, etc., as far as weighing the judgments of God by which he is afflicted, 772Cand this is:

VERS. 3.-- « Whence also my words are full of sorrow, because the arrows of the Lord. » That is, the stroke of God's chastisement, which does not dismiss me uncleansed, as it does many.

VERS. 4.-- « It hath drunk up the spirit. » (GREG.) That is, it curbs pride, so that he may say: « My spirit hath failed (Psal. LXXVI). » And I not only groan at what I suffer, but I fear what thou threatenest, and this is:

« The terrors of the Lord war: » lest after this eternal death should follow. But because he longs for the coming of the stature, with what ardour the Gentile world and Judaea thirst for the same he sets down, when he says:

VERS. 5.-- « Will the onager bray, » that is, the wild ass, etc., as far as but he was held carnally, 772Dhe adds:

VERS. 6.-- « Or can that which is unsavoury be eaten. » Salt is the power of hidden understanding, etc., as far as hungering, he received it by being converted.

(Ibid.) He longs for the balance; we now live by his faith; but yet for our cleansing we suffer his arrows, and with dread of what is to come we fear.

But because we are sons, we ought not to fear him as a Master, but to love him as a Father, and to pant after him, where we may be fed with food, that is, with his eternity, for which we now bray, whence:

« Will the onager bray. » (Ibid.) The onager is the people who, etc., as far as they separate themselves even from words of this kind, and this is:

773A« Or can that which is unsavoury be eaten. » But those already set on high, removed from the foolish, often, while they see to their own concerns alone, hard for the bearing, are not girded for the love of truth.

« Or can anyone taste. » (GREG.) It is hard to ask for what torments, what puts life to flight; but often, when he is set on high, he bends himself to bearing the evils of the foolish, that he may draw them. For with the desire of heavenly things increased he is straitened, and before their sweetness he does not fear the bitter things of the world. Whence, after the impossible taste of death, he adds:

VERS. 7.-- « Which before it would not touch, » that is, the evils of the world are now sweet food before the love of heaven. And since these are sweet, « Who will grant that my petition may come? »

773BVERS. 9.-- « May he who has begun, himself crush me. » (GREG. in Job lib. VII.) The adversary crushes, and man falls away from thee. God crushes, and one broken off from his vices is made solid in virtue. He therefore who through scourges desires to draw near to God says: « May he who has begun, himself crush, » because sometimes God begins the crushing of vices, and in that very beginning of advance the man is lifted up, and thus the enemy, shut out, creeps in the heavier with other spirits taken to himself, and crushes the virtues.

« Let him loose his hand, » that is, let him put forth the effect; for while, puffed up with long prosperity, he does not exercise his love through scourges, he holds his hand as it were bound for striking the vices; whence he says to a sinning people: I will no longer be angry with thee, and my zeal is departed from thee.

« Let him cut me off. » For when sorrow or temptation does not 773Cstrike, the elation of the mind falls cut down, so that it now seeks the hand of him who lifts up.

VERS. 10.--And let this be my consolation, that afflicting. » (Ibid.) As it were: here he spares certain men, that he may strike them eternally; but let him strike me here, not sparing, which is a consolation to me. For the saints fear to be spared here. That he said this not with a swelling but with a humble mind, he shows in these words.

« Nor will I contradict his words. » God's words to us are not only things said, but also things done, as here the striking of Job; which he does not contradict by murmuring, because him also whom he bears with by striking, he calls holy.

VERS. 11.--For what is my strength? » (Ibid.) The strength of the good is one thing, etc., as far as and for that which he does not love he refuses to suffer; he says therefore:

773D« For what is my strength, or what my end? » That is, evils, etc., as far as whence the weak man has strength; whence he subjoins:

VERS. 13.-- « Behold there is no help. » To the merit also of a greater fortitude he adds how he is forsaken by those nearest him:

« My kinsfolk also. » Though despised without, within he presides on the throne of judgment; for he breaks out into sentences: « He that taketh away, etc. »

VERS. 14.-- « He that taketh away from his friend. » (Ibid.) A friend is any neighbour, etc., as far as who within have long since perished by neglecting eternal things: of whom it is rightly said:

VERS. 17.-- « And when they shall have grown warm, » that is, when through 774Athe knowledge of punishment they shall have begun to burn, they will be separated from the delight of the flesh which they held by desire. The wicked do not understand eternal things, save when they are already punished for earthly ones: then the mind boils, and inflames itself with the fire of late repentance; then its hardness is melted by torment, whence the prophet: « Vexation alone shall give understanding to the hearing » (Isai. XXVIII); and being about to suffer this then, meanwhile they are entangled in these things.

VERS. 18.-- « They are wound about. » Everything that is wound about is folded back upon itself: so the wicked, sometimes willing good things as though stretched outside themselves, are folded back, when tempted, to their accustomed evils. Or they are wound about who, even if sometimes, one wickedness being conquered, they lift their foot, another wickedness reigning entangles them even toward that which they had conquered: as he who, avarice being now spurned, is still lustful, and for the price of his lust returns to 774Bavarice. Thus by mutual help the vices retain their fugitive, and bind his goings out as with snares; whence, often fallen, they return to their pleasures, and care not for the things that abide; whence he adds:

« They shall walk in vain and shall perish. » Because they carry nothing with them of the fruit of their labour. But the just man does not appear empty in the sight of the Lord: for he carries the sheaves of justice. And from imitating them he terrifies by their end: « Consider the paths, etc. »

VERS. 19.-- « Consider the paths. » (Ibid.) Thema is interpreted the south wind, Saba a net: the south wind, which loosens the limbs by its warmth, is here the loose slackening of living; the net is the binding of action, and by loose deeds a man is entangled, while he does not perfectly forsake the world, while he goes not with strict zeal but with dissolute steps, 774Cas one who for carnal love of parents is hindered from the things that are God's. « Consider, » he says, because in doing perverse things we love them, but seeing these in others we judge them; whence, returned to ourselves, we blush for such things.

« Wait a little while. » Because whatever is ended is little; but he who thinks this long has no care for eternal things. The brevity of life being told, he rises up against the wicked with the voice of the just

VERS. 20.-- « They are confounded. » Because, namely, the wicked try through hardships to draw the good back from hope: and if they accomplish it, they exult; if not, they blush to have been cruel in vain; whence he adds also what comes to pass in the retribution:

« They came also. » In the judgment the wicked come through to the just, because they shall see their glory, that they may grieve the more heavily 774Dseeing what they have lost. Then shame covers them, when conscience as witness burns them. The same spiritually. Job's friends are confounded, because while they cannot bend him to despair, they are confounded; they came, while they now inwardly acknowledge the constancy of his mind and blush. These he shows to be of the number of those who do not fear God, unless terrified by their own adversities or those of others.

VERS. 21.-- « Now you are come, and now seeing my wound. » (Ibid.) As if to say: I feared God even before adversities; you who do not fear God out of love, dread him from the lash alone.

VERS. 22.-- « Have I said. » The Church has no need 775Aof the substance of heretics (whose figure Job's friends are), that is, of carnal wisdom; and it refuses to hear from them even the right things which they sometimes speak against the devil concerning conversion, because through these they draw men to perfidy. « The hand of the enemy » is the strength of Satan. « The mighty » are the malignant spirits.

« Have I said: Bring. » Against the rich of the world, etc., as far as and what they despise in themselves, also in others.

VERS. 24.-- « Teach me. » This is either subjoined to what precedes, or is said by itself by way of rebuke.

VERS. 25.-- « Why have you detracted. » (GREG.) He ought to be clean, etc., as far as do you bring forward reprehensible things for rebuking?

(Ibid.) Two kinds of speech are harmful: that which praises perverse things, and that which blames even right ones; there 775Bis favour, here anger: for this he reproves Job's friends; and one arrives at that vice from idle words, whence he adds:

VERS. 26.-- « And into the wind. » To utter words into the wind, etc., as far as let there be therefore a door of the tongue, which is now shut, now opened.

VERS. 27.-- « Upon the orphan. » (GREG. in Job lib. VIII.) See of how great weakness he should weigh himself to be, etc., as far as whether he bears with those whom he does not love, or does not bear with those whom he loves.

VERS. 28.-- « See whether I lie. » (Ibid.) Because, being humble, the things he says he does not enjoin from authority, but persuades from reason; but because on occasion of reason his opponents are unbridled into contention, he adds.

VERS. 29.-- « Answer, I beseech you, without contention. » Because heretics in their inquiries do not aim 775Cto attain the truth, but to seem victors.

« And speaking, etc. » Because he who speaks is subjected to the judgment of the hearer. Between his heart and his tongue let there be a fair arbiter, that nothing may come forth headlong from the heart through the tongue, but that he examine before he speaks. And because those who first judge of their own, judge rightly of the sayings of others, he adds:

VERS. 30.-- « And you shall not find in my tongue. » Because folly does not sound to you in me, if it does not proceed from your own conscience; so the Church first destroys the false things of her enemies, afterwards opens the true, for which there is no place while false things are held for true; by « the tongue » is open speech, by « the throat » hidden handling, because what the Church preaches without, she keeps by living.

775DVERS. 1.-- « And like the days of a hireling. » (GREG.) He who wishes the day to pass quickly, that he may come to the reward of his labour, so is every just man; and as that man sweats in another's labours but prepares his own reward for himself, so let the just man sweat amid worldly evils, that he may lay hold of heavenly goods. He takes care lest the day go empty of work, and the reward be lessened. He suffers hard things, that he may be the more crowned, although the wage is already in his heart; but yet the heat is felt more heavily in the body, that afterwards there may be refreshment in rest, and this is:

VERS. 2.-- « As a servant. » Every elect man is rightly called a servant, so long as he is under the yoke of this corruption, before he comes into the liberty of glory.

« And like a hireling. » Who chafes at the heaviness of the work, 776Aunless he were relieved by hope of the end; but when that is seen, he counts as nothing what he feels.

VERS. 3.-- « Empty months. » Empty of the things of the world, because the good do not seek them through their acts; and they endure toilsome nights of adversities, when they are already in the torment of the body. Or the months are empty, because now there is labour, but not yet the reward.

« Toilsome nights. » He numbers, etc., as far as the more he groans that he was long ignorant of what he seeks, and that he laboured in vain.

VERS. 4.-- « If I sleep. » (Ibid.) According to the history, the mind of one grieving is expressed, who, sadness compelling him, wanders through diverse desires; in the night he desires the day, in the day the evening, because grief does not let what is present please him; and having now found this heavy, 776Bwith desire consoling him he awaits another thing; but not even so is the grief ended, whence:

« And I shall be filled with sorrows. » And the cause of the sorrow is this:

VERS. 5.-- « It is clothed. » (Ibid.) The same things more subtly in the Church, etc., as far as they have not here entire health, whence he adds:

« And I shall be filled with sorrows until the darkness. » Because he does not find security until he wholly leaves the time of temptation. And he adds the cause of the sorrow:

« The flesh is clothed, » that is, the carnal life which I lead is either defiled by evil working, or, held back from that, is darkened out of memory by the images of sins, which rise like dust before the eyes. But the Church 776Cfeels in some the rottenness of the flesh's lust, and in those who are given to earthly acts is sprinkled with dust: of both he adds:

« My skin. » The skin in the Church are they who are free only for outward cares: whose hearts despair dries up, and therefore they are drawn together, not stretched out through long-suffering toward eternal life: they cling to things present: which comes about because they do not attend how fleeting this life is. But the Church on the contrary:

VERS. 6.-- « My days more swiftly. » As a web grows by threads, so life advances by single days: but the more it grows, the more it tends toward the cutting. But the swiftness of life outstrips even the haste of the web, and always fails. And therefore the elect do not fix their heart in it, whence he says:

« And they are consumed, » that is, I place no 776Dconfidence for myself in these things: what the reprobate do, I do not.

VERS. 7.-- « Remember. » (Ibid.) That is, look kindly upon him who passes swiftly, because the consideration of human brevity is an offering pleasing to God.

« Because it is wind. » Eternal life is also solid: here life is judged neither solid nor abiding.

(Ibid.) And because after life passes there is no place for meriting pardon, he adds:

« And it returneth not. » That is, after death the mind, seeing its own retribution, is not called back to the performing of good works: whence the rich man, despairing of himself, which is an aggravation of the punishment, prays for his brethren. Behold, life passes; what follows abides. Afterwards also,

777AVERS. 8.-- « Nor shall the sight of man behold me. » That is, the mercy of the Redeemer, which softens the hardness of sinners, as when he looked upon Peter (Luc. XXII); but after death it does not free him whom grace does not reform before. Not the sight of man, but,

« Thine eyes upon. » (GERG.) That is, thou shalt see a strict judge to strike, and he who here, awaited unto repentance, stood firm substiti, let him now not stand firm. This befits the just man, who fears everything that he does, and knows beforehand that, mercy removed, he will perish, and does not stand before those eyes, because his life is not sufficient for the punishment, if justice presses him. For neither are the stars, that is, they who shine with holiness, clean before him. And the fault and the punishment of the human race is briefly added.

VERS. 9.-- « As a cloud is consumed. » (Ibid.) A cloud 777Bis lifted on high, etc., as far as go into thy house.

VERS. 10.-- « Neither shall his place know him any more. » (Ibid.) Man's place is God, etc., as far as he still feels contradiction from the corruption of the flesh.

VERS. 12.-- « Am I a sea. » (Ibid.) The prison is the flesh which hinders, etc., as far as now he adds counsel against them.

VERS. 15.-- « Wherefore it hath chosen. » (Ibid.) The soul is the intention of the mind, etc., as far as « if thou art about to do this to me, kill me. »

VERS. 16.-- « Spare me, O Lord, » that thou mayest give eternal things, because by contempt of those these are the better hoped for. While he asks to be spared, he proves that he did not despair of God; 777Cwhich is, he chose hanging, that is, he despaired; of the same he brought in, spare: which is, death the bones: that is, let them not live further, this the third time.

« For my days are nothing. » He who considers eternal things, returning to himself, rightly calls these days nothing, and dreads to be strictly judged.

VERS. 17.-- « What is man. » (Ibid.) God magnifies man with much spiritual gift, and sets his heart toward him, because for what is given he judges the more strictly. But what is man? as if to say: even though magnified beyond himself by thy gifts, yet because he is flesh, if he be judged without mercy he cannot bear it; whence he further adds:

VERS. 18.-- « Thou visitest him at daybreak. » Daybreak is when man comes out of the night of vices and of ignorance into the light, in which he is also straightway tested: for lest he boast that he has good things 777Dfrom himself, he is allowed to be shaken by temptation, that the height of God and his own weakness may be seen, as Solomon after his wisdom is tempted by harlots; all this man suffers in this mortality, whence: « How long dost thou not spare me. »

VERS. 19.-- « Spittle. » (Ibid.) Spittle slips into the mouth from the head, etc., as far as he who wishes to merit this confesses the evil which he has done: « I have sinned, etc. »

VERS. 20.-- « I have sinned, what shall I do to thee. » (Ibid.) As if to say: I find not what I may offer thee in recompense, because every strength of man is too weak to wash away guilt. Or, « what shall I do to thee, » as if to say: all good things profit not thee, but us.

« O keeper of men. » Because he so forsook us that we 778Acannot keep ourselves, and if we attempt anything, we are weighed down by sins, whence:

« Why hast thou set me contrary. » When man believed the serpent, etc., as far as but he seeks mercy, whence he adds:

VERS. 21.-- « Why dost thou not take away. » Behold the desire of the Mediator, who taketh away the sins of the world. Or, then will sin be fully taken away, when man shall be changed into corruption [in corruptionem; read incorruptionem, "incorruption"]. He desires therefore the Redeemer, or the resurrection; whence he adds both the punishment which he merited from his origin, and the judgment which he fears from his own action. Behold, it was now said to sinning man: Ashes thou art, and into ashes thou shalt return. » [Vulg. pulvis es et in pulverem reverteris, "dust thou art, and unto dust thou shalt return"]

« Why hast thou set me contrary. » (Ibid.) Because the lower, having been made in a manner contrary to the higher, that is 778Bto God: therefore our lower part, that is sensuality, has been made contrary to the higher, that is to the spirit, so that they always fight.

« In the morning, » that is, at the coming of the judge, to whom all things are open. God's seeking is to judge strictly, before whom not even the just man stands; but this is the solace of deliverance, that the humble man says he cannot suffice for himself; he laments therefore the death which now is, he fears the judgment which is at hand.

VERS. 1.-- « And answering. » (GREG.) It must be known first of all that, as Eliphaz noted the most holy Job chiefly for pride, though he touched briefly upon hypocrisy also, so this man too intends to note him chiefly for hypocrisy; but before he does this, 778Che sets something first, from which it is weighed how burdensome the words of Job himself had been to him, words namely of edification: as though therefore he could no longer endure a man speaking well, he broke out indignantly into these words, saying:

VERS. 2.-- « How long wilt thou speak such things. » As if to say: why dost thou speak useless things? and a manifold spirit . . . . .

« Still thou speakest such things. » (Ibid.) Because to a wicked man the words of edification are heavy, so that he cannot bear them, as it were; and because he does not wish to be corrected, he accuses things well said.

« And a manifold spirit. » (Ibid.) While he attributes manifoldness to his speech, he reproves the poverty of his understanding. And note that there are four kinds of speaking. 778DFor some are ample in mouth and in sense, who are to be praised; others straitened in both, who are to be pitied; others ample in sense, but unable to speak out, who are to be helped; others poor in sense, but torrential in tongue, who are to be despised: and this last kind this man twists into a charge against Job.

VERS. 3.-- « Doth God. » (GREG.) These things Job had neither denied nor been ignorant of, etc., as far as as though they had perished justly, they strike others, whence he adds:

VERS. 4, 5.-- « Even if thy sons have sinned, etc. If at daybreak: » as though they themselves were in the light, and the Church were in the night: which they summon, that it may rise through the knowledge of God, and through the prayer of penitence wash away things past, « if clean » in thought, « upright » in work.

779AVERS. 6.-- « He will awake. » He who now sleeps from giving help to thee who art erring.

« And he will render peaceable. » (GREG.) That is, he will restore the tranquillity of the present life, which alone they reckon to be God's reward.

« The dwelling of the just man. » (Ibid.) They say it is the counsel of the mind that is made peaceable, because if they draw men to their own side, they fall silent from contention. They promise also the riches of understanding by saying.

VERS. 7.-- « So much. » But because their words are not easily believed, they bend the sentences of the fathers into an argument for their own error, whence it is added:

« That thy former things. » Because they promise both that what was lost be recovered, and rewards of the present life greater still.

VERS. 8.-- « For ask the generations. » They advise that it be not seen, 779Bbut investigated, because they do not wish that to be looked upon which lies plainly open to all.

VERS. 9.-- « Of yesterday: » sometimes they teach morally that present things are to be inferred from things past, namely from their passing, that these are nothing; whence he adds, « of yesterday. » Because, if the former generation is called to mind, this life is known to pass swiftly as a shadow.

VERS. 10.-- « They shall teach. » They praise the fathers along with us, that thereby he may assail us the more.

« From the heart. » (Ibid.) As if to say: thou hast simplicity of spirit in the mouth, not in the heart: they the contrary. Often the wicked, not attending to themselves, tear the good; and either they bring forth good things which they have learned not by seeing but by hearing, or they thrust upon others the evils which they themselves do; and thus by their deeds they excuse themselves, by their words they judge. So Baldath, 779Ca feigner of justice, says wonderful things against hypocrites, and presumes to teach the just man about the things which would suit the depraved. Senseless is he who, while the gardens thirst, pours water into the river.

VERS. 11.-- « Can it live. » (Ibid.) He compares the hypocrite to a bulrush or a sedge, etc., as far as but let him show it by others' crimes.

« Before all herbs. » (Ibid.) The just also are herbs according to the flesh, because all flesh is grass (Isa. XLVIII); and they wither, because their works fail together with the life of the flesh. But those of the hypocrites wither before: because they forsake good things as soon as they have obtained the things for the sake of which they feigned. These are « the grass of the housetops, which withered before it was plucked up. »

VERS. 13.-- « So are the ways of all. » Behold to what he compares 779Dthe bulrush or the sedge: the hypocrite's hope is glory, and worldly things of this kind, which perish; eternal things abide.

VERS. 14.-- « His folly shall not please him. » (Ibid.) Folly is to sell a great thing at a cheap price, that is, to do laborious good works for favour: in this he is now delighted, but in punishment it will displease him, and then he will know that all the things which have passed were nothing, whence:

« And his confidence is like the spider's web. » The spider's web is woven with care, and is scattered by a breath of wind: so whatever the hypocrite sweats out, the breeze of favour carries off.

VERS. 15.-- « He shall lean upon his house. » The house of the mind is whatever thing the soul inhabits by love: the house of the hypocrite therefore is 780Afavour. Or, the house is confidence in one's own holiness, which will stand before men, but not before God.

VERS. 16.-- « He seemeth moist. » The bulrush, the hypocrite, seems moist in the night, that is, he appears to men as one filled with the grace of holiness, but before the sun, in the day of judgment, he will wither.

« And in his rising his shoot. » Every herb is first brought forth from the earth, etc., as far as the hypocrite, even when he acts rightly, wishes to be seen by many.

VERS. 17.-- « Upon a heap of stones. » (Ibid.) The roots are thoughts; the stones, because "living" is not added, are men both good and bad; the hypocrite therefore, who lingers among the stones, multiplies his thoughts in seeking the admiration of men: for through all that he does he seeks praises with hidden thought, having openly 780Bthat which his enemies may plunder. As Hezekiah, who after many benefits done to him showed all his goods to the messengers of the king of Babylon: whence he presently hears: « All shall be carried off into Babylon (II Reg. XX); » [Vulg. (IV Reg. XX, 17) auferentur omnia, "all things shall be carried away"] so too, while praise is sought, virtue and beauty are handed over into the hand of the enemy; whence Baldad says:

« And he shall abide among the stones. » Because he stands there, where he makes firm the intention of his mind: and though he be full of good things, if God shall have swallowed him up, that is, taken him away by death, from his place, that is, from the favours of this life; he will say: I know thee not, as it is said to the foolish virgins (Matth. XXV): and rightly, because it is not enough for him unless he has made others also like himself, and this is what he says: for this is the joy of his way.

« For this is the joy, etc. (Ibid.) That he may be punished also for their 780Cguilt, but:

VERS. 20.-- « God will not cast away the simple man. » Whose simplicity may now be called folly by the craftiness of the double-minded.

« Nor will he reach out his hand. » (Ibid.) So as to raise them from the depth in which they seek glory. The malignant are hypocrites, who do not even do good things well. Or, because outwardly they show themselves to their neighbour pure and simple, while inwardly they hide duplicity; against whom Moses says: « Thou shalt not put on a garment woven of wool and linen together. » (Deut. XXII.)

VERS. 21.-- « Until it be filled. » Not that afterward, which is certain: but not before, which may seem doubtful to men: as if to say, he neither forsakes the simple before the judgment, nor ceases to strike the wicked.

« Let thy mouth be filled with laughter, » that is, the mind with the joy 780D« of eternal security, whence:

« And thy lips with rejoicing. » Jubilation is conceived in the heart with such great gladness as speech may not unfold, and yet the mouth sounds it.

VERS. 22.-- « They that hate. » (Ibid.) Confusion shall clothe the enemies of the just in the judgment, because then, the judge being seen, all their evils are turned before the eyes of the mind, and the guilt that presses them down clothes them on every side. And they come to this for the reason that here they loved transitory things alone, whence he adds:

« And the tabernacle, » that is, the building of eternal felicity, which they multiply though it will fall upon them, that here they may defend themselves from necessities necessatibus as from heat and rain: in which the mind dwells, and which the good wayfarer despises.

• 781A

VERS. 1-- « And Job answering said. » (GREG. in Job. ) The perverse, to whom the person speaking is displeasing, attack all that he says, whether crooked or right; but Job, to whom not the person but the fault is displeasing, seeing that Baldath had said right things: « Doth God supplant judgment » : and had brought forward true things against hypocrites, approves what he has heard. Truly I know that a man who is humble and set beneath God receives justice, and one set alongside him loses it, because he who compares himself with him, arrogating to himself what is God's, deprives himself of the good which he received. But also every merit of our virtue (if it be strictly judged) is a vice.

VERS. 3.-- « If he will contend with him, » (Ibid.) by presuming upon his own merits, and by arrogating the glory 781Bof his own virtue not to God but to himself.

« He shall not be able to answer him one for a thousand. » (Ibid.) That is, he shall not be able to, etc., as far as but lest he contend, let his power, once seen, terrify the weak man.

VERS. 4.-- « Who hath resisted him and had peace. Who creates, that the things created may accord with him, ordains wherein there may be peace for them; and he who strives to fight against his disposing loses peace: as the angel, who, lifted up by his own unquiet, and man, who is vexed by the trouble of the flesh, each of the two lost peace, because he would not be subject to his Creator.

VERS. 5.-- « Who hath removed mountains, » etc. (Ibid.) The confusion of pride having been spoken of in general, he shows in the destruction of Israel what punishment awaits the lifted up. He removed the mountains, that is, the holy preachers, from the Jews to the Gentiles, which the Jews did not know, who were overthrown in this, reckoning 781Cit a joy to themselves that they had lost the light. The mountains being removed, he moves the lands.

VERS. 6.-- « He moveth the earth out of its place. » Because he drew the Jews out of their own borders by the Romans.

« The pillars. » The priests, the princes, the doctors of the law. They were shaken, because not even they were allowed to live to themselves, whence they drove out the apostles; and besides they were left forsaken in the darkness of their own error.

VERS. 7.-- « Who commandeth the sun. » (Ibid.) The sun shines through the day, etc., as far as it is spread abroad into all nations. Whence:

VERS. 8.-- « Who spreadeth out the heavens. » (Ibid.) That is, he causes the apostles, put to flight by the Jews, to be honoured everywhere.

« Alone. » Who wonderfully dispensed this, and that while the bitterness of the world raged in the slaying of the good.

781D« He walketh upon the waves, » that is, he treads them down while he calms them by the wonder of signs. Jeremias: « I have set the sand a bound for the sea (Jer. 5), » that is, to break the glory of the world he chose the abject and the poor; and while the sea rages, the Church advances.

VERS. 9.-- « Who maketh Arcturus. » (Ibid.) He uses the names of the philosophers, etc., as far as nay rather, as Arcturus is turned about, he is raised up.

« Orion. » (Ibid.) Which rise in the wintry season, etc., as far as but he raised up the peaceable unto their slaying.

« The Hyades. » They are born in the forehead of Taurus in the spring, etc., as far as he may come through to the inward things of the country above, whence he adds:

« And the inner parts of the south. » The south wind is the fervour of the Holy 782ASpirit, etc., as far as he comprehends better by failing, saying:

VERS. 10.-- « Who doeth for me. » [Vulg. qui facit magna, "who doeth great things"] He fulfils it better who confesses that he cannot fulfil it, and he speaks more eloquently who is silent in astonishment.

« Great » in power.

« And incomprehensible » in reason.

« And wonderful things whereof there is not » in manifoldness. But why should we wonder at the things which are outside us, when we are ignorant even of what is done concerning us? If he come to me.

VERS. 11.-- « If he come to me. » (Ibid.) He comes when he gives gifts, etc., as far as and yet man, thus blind, shall render an account of his acts to God.

VERS. 12.-- « If suddenly he ask. » (Ibid.) He asks suddenly, when the unexpecting, etc., as far as, which is shown more plainly 782Bwhen it is added:

« Who can say, Why dost thou so? » We ought to venerate the deeds of God, etc., as far as which the proud man kindles inextinguishably, whence he says:

VERS. 13.-- « God, whose wrath no man can resist. » Moses and Phinees and other saints, etc., as far as returning from these to himself, he humbly grows vile in his own eyes before the power of God.

VERS. 14.-- « How great therefore himself. » (Ibid.) That is, if an angel does not suffice to consider him, with what mind do I, who am pressed by the flesh, dispute of his judgments? Our words to God are works, but with these; because man cannot speak with God, because in them there is no confidence before the subtle judgment of God; whence he adds:

VERS. 15.-- « Who, even if I shall have anything, etc., I will beseech. » 782CAfter God's justice he stands in need of prayer, that what avails less of itself may avail from the mercy of the judge. Though justice be full in the more perfect, « anything » is said to be had of it, because the mind of man scarcely accomplishes what it comprehends, and little is that which it comprehends. But prayer, because it is shaken by many thoughts, even if it is heard, fears to be repelled.

VERS. 16.-- « When he shall have heard me calling, not. » (Ibid.) For when (as David says) « now they mount up to the heavens (Psal. CVI), » when they penetrate the heights, and now they go down into the depths through shameful temptations, they have no certainty of being heard. See how subtly he judges himself, and lays open his own weakness.

« How great therefore. » He does not trust in justice, but flees to 782Dprayer: who, even if I shall have had anything just, being fearful about that very prayer, says: « When calling. » He looks about him thus for this reason, that he sees he cannot bear the force of the judgment, of which he says:

VERS. 17.-- « In a whirlwind also he will crush me. » He who, being awaited in tranquillity, despised, shall be crushed in a whirlwind.

« A whirlwind: » because in the commotion of the elements he fears that works are there strictly required: since he sees that some also are damned without works by original guilt, in whose voice he says:

« He will multiply my wounds. » Because they themselves did nothing, whence it is said: « There is none clean in his sight, nor an infant of one day. »

« Without cause. » According to the estimation of human sense; 783Abut with God it is just, that a tree should keep in its branches the bitterness which it drew from the root. These things also spiritually of Job, who both, fearing, foresaw the scourges of God in the whirlwind, and, foreseeing, bore them; whence he says: « And he will multiply my wounds without cause, » because he was not struck for a fault; whence above, « that I should afflict him in vain. »

VERS. 18.-- « He granteth not. » (GREG.) A full proving: without, torments tear; within, temptations chastise; whence he says that he is filled with bitternesses; but the equity and the power of him who strikes tempers the force of the sorrow. And this is:

VERS. 19.-- « If strength be sought. » As if to say: no one dares, because he examines merits who does not search them out by another's testimony, but as a silent 783Bobserver waits long. Another cannot be a witness for me, because not even I myself for myself.

VERS. 20.-- « If I would justify. » ( Ibid. ) I do not suffice to be a witness of innocence, nor do I know that I have it.

VERS. 21.-- « If I be simple. » He who knows the good things which he does, etc., as far as he bears ill this exile of blindness, whence he adds:

« And I shall be weary of my life. » But there is a consolation for this darkness: the just power of God brought back to the mind, which both punishes the wicked and surpasses the just.

VERS. 22.-- « One thing there is which I have spoken. » ( Ibid. ) Or « the innocent » is consumed, etc., as far as he may destroy our double of flesh and of soul.

VERS. 23.-- « If he scourge, let him kill himself. » [Vulg. occidat semel, "let him kill at once"] ( Ibid. ) For God to laugh 783Cis at affliction, etc., as far as he opens that he alone bore the death of the flesh.

VERS. 24.-- « The earth is given. » Or « delivered up. » The earth is the flesh, the wicked one the devil.

« The hands » of him, the slayers of Christ, etc., as far as than Christ came.

VERS. 25.-- « My days have been swifter than a courier. » ( Ibid. ) It belongs to a courier to announce what is to follow: so all the elect who before his coming announced Christ were couriers; but because they die beforehand, they grieve that they pass more swiftly than a courier, so that they do not see him present who is singularly called good; concerning whom also he adds

VERS. 26.-- « Like ships. » He who carries apples 783Denjoys their fragrance, etc., as far as through compassion the discourse is turned also to their hardness, thus.

VERS. 27.-- « When I shall say: By no means. » ( Ibid. ) Israel, as before, would not speak, when he denied him whom he had foretold: in which his inner face is changed with the filth of perfidy, so that he is not acknowledged by God; whence it remains for him to be tormented with eternal sorrows.

« My days have passed more swiftly. » ( Ibid. ) The first man was so made that his life could be stretched out through times, not run out; but because he sinned he underwent a running-down, which man always endures, and yet desires, so long as he seeks to live. The losses of this running-down he laments with the voice of the human race.

« They have fled, » because man would not stand in the light, 784Aby fleeing he lost his sight, so that he could not see the good which is, for which he was made.

« Like ships carrying apples. » ( Ibid. ) The fruits of the earth through the waves, etc., as far as lest that thought break out into pride, he humbly restrains himself, saying:

« I will by no means speak thus. » But, being weak, let me be restrained from such an inquiry. In which the face of the mind is changed, because that which sought high things, seeing itself weak, venerates what it does not know. In which there is sorrow, because he is greatly afflicted who is blinded for the understanding of the things which are of himself. To these common evils he fears to join his own: « I feared all, » etc.

VERS. 28.-- « I feared all my works. » ( Ibid. ) They were indeed good, etc., as far as as though not even through labours he might come to life, whence:

784BVERS. 29.-- « But if I am wicked even thus. » He does not repent of having laboured, but grieves that amid his labours he is uncertain about the rewards. So is the just man uncertain, that he may trust; so he trusts, lest being secure he grow torpid.

« In vain: » I say because.

VERS. 30.-- « If I be washed as it were with waters of snow. » He who crushes himself as with laments, etc., as far as he who is pricked in prayer for earthly things, the water of the earth.

« The hands, » ( Ibid. ) are works.

« As most clean, » as though not truly clean under this corruption.

VERS. 31.-- « Thou shalt dip » that is, thou shalt show me dipped, because the more we draw near to him, the more we recognize our own filth from his cleanness.

« The garments. » The garment of the soul is the body, 784Cwhich Solomon commanded to be white at all times; and if it be mingled with blood, that is, with carnal desires, Isaias says it must be burned (Isa. 9).

« They shall abhor, » that is, they shall render him abominable, as it is said of Judas: « He possessed a field of the reward of iniquity, » that is, he caused it to be possessed. In the abhorrence of the garment it has this the heavier, that it does not know the mind of him who reproves it.

VERS. 32.-- « For neither, he being seen. » [Vulg. viro, "to a man"] Among men we both hear the charges brought against us, and answer them, and are heard; but in the judgment of God, he himself hears us, because he sees all that we do, but we do not hear him, because we do not fully understand what displeases him. He cannot be heard on equal terms.

VERS. 33.-- « Who may avail for both: » that is, may be able for God 784Dand for me:

« To reprove. » He reproves who from the authority of reason, etc., as far as that he corrected the hearts of offenders by gentleness rather than by terror, whence he adds:

VERS. 34.-- « Let him take away the rod from me » of the law, by which he punishes; but Christ took it away, and through gentleness showed the ways of life. He willed to be feared as God, but to be loved as a father.

VERS. 35.-- « I will speak and I will not fear him. » ( Ibid. ) He has fear no longer, but rather affection as toward a father. Behold, the staff, that is, the fear of the law, when sent does not raise up the boy; but Eliseus himself, brought down to the boy's measure, and breathing seven times, that is, through the love of the spirit.

785A(GREG.) « To answer » is to render in recompense deeds that are worthy; but does no one who fears in servile fashion answer to the benefits of God? Only he who through the confidence of love does not fear that worthy service be rendered to him. He is not pure who would do evil things if it were allowed. But to one who loves there is a weariness of this life, which before was sweet, even mourning he endures it.

VERS. 1.-- « My soul is weary of my life. » ( Ibid. ) But when this life grows cheap through love of the heavenly, he who was defending his faults now accuses them. And this is:

« I will let go my speech » which I was using in my own defense.

785B« Against me, » because by confessing I accuse myself, not as one who still blushes to confess, because he does not forsake his evils with so great a desire; but because sometimes a man confessing openly does not groan, but says with gladness what ought to be lamented, he adds:

« I will speak in bitterness, » that bitterness may punish what the tongue accuses. Out of penitence security is born, and more confidently he asks how it is dealt with toward him. And this is:

VERS. 2.-- « I will say to God: Do not condemn me, » because my punishment quenches thy torments.

« Show me why thou judgest me thus, » that is, thou scourgest me, whether unto security or for what fault in particular; because even if he is just, he yet has some evils: and therefore he asks that God show himself to him, so that what God punishes in him, 785Che too may punish by weeping. Therefore I seek the cause; for I know that it is not unjustly.

« Why thou judgest me thus. » In two ways he judges here. Either he sends a punishment, etc., as far as whom also by striking he keeps in innocence. He says therefore:

VERS. 3.-- « Is it good. » This question demands a denial, etc., as far as because he considers the weak man.

« The work of the hands. » As if to say: thou dost not impiously destroy him whom thou hast made freely.

« Of the impious, » that is, of the malignant spirits, who, since they cannot return to life, seek companions unto death; whose counsel it was that they should break by adversities Job who was upright in prosperity; but God 785Ddoes not suffer a man to be tempted above his strength.

VERS. 4.-- « Are the eyes of flesh. » The eyes of the flesh know nothing but certain deeds done in time, because they too are closed together with time, and human sight follows after whatever work there is, it does not run before it.

VERS. 5.-- « Days. » The days too and the years of man differ from the eternal: to whom nothing is past, nothing is to come, but he beholds all things present.

VERS. 6.-- « That thou mayest seek my iniquity. » And so that thou mayest know that I have done nothing impiously, as though he were asking humbly: why dost thou prove by scourges in time him whom thou hast known with thee perfectly and before all time?

VERS. 7.-- « Whereas there is no one » ( Ibid. ) As if: what remains to thee but to spare him whom no one can withstand? For by how much none can hold back thy vengeance, by so much the more 786Aeasily ought mercy to spare; and that he may be appeased, since we cannot offer our own work, let us offer him his own work.

VERS. 8.-- « Thy hands. » As if: weigh it mercifully, lest what thou hast made perish.

« They have made. » According to the soul.

« Wholly round about. » According to the body, etc., as far as when of the rest he said only: fiat.

« And so suddenly. » As if: him whom thou settest before others with such dignity, why dost thou despise with such vileness? But together with this dignity, which is through the spirit? there is infirmity through the flesh, which may move a merciful judge, whence he says:

VERS. 9.-- « Remember, I beseech thee, » etc. Whence the fault is venial, whereas it is unforgivable in an angel, who was strong. It is clay, when water floods the earth: 786Bso is man, when the soul waters the flesh, whose death he plainly adds:

« And into dust, » etc. As if: see the matter and the punishment, and spare the fault; and because he had set forth the quality of man as created, he adds the order of propagation, whence he says:

VERS. 10.-- « Was it not as milk, » etc. Man was made as clay, but propagated as milk is milked out by seed, that he may be curdled as cheese into flesh. He is clothed with flesh and skin, made solid with bones and sinews. After the creation of the body, which is the lesser thing, there is added the wondrous breathing-in of quickening.

« Was it not as milk, » while the mind is drawn by the Spirit of God and by its oldness as milk is milked out, because it is formed in a kind of beginning; as cheese it is curdled, 786Cwhen, growing rich, it is pressed together by thoughts, so that it no longer flows away in desires, but is made solid in one love. But against these first rudiments the flesh murmurs out of its old habit.

VERS. 11.-- « With skin and carnal things. » That is, the mind is walled about by the siege of carnal motions; but he who outwardly loosens it for wars, inwardly strengthens it through the bones of the virtues, that it may be humble and strong. And God rightly bestows the uprightness of living rightly, because he spares past offenses.

VERS. 12.-- « Life and mercy. » ( Ibid. ) But these good things he has given in vain, unless he himself keep them, whence he adds:

« And thy visitation. » The same things of the inward man, 786Detc., as far as he considers the gifts of God more subtly.

« Life and mercy. » ( Ibid. ) Life is given together with evil minds, etc., as far as after he had said of himself the gifts of mercy generally, he adds:

VERS. 13.-- « Yet I know that thou art mindful of all » which is said: why do I tremble concerning myself, who know that all the nations are to be gathered.

« Though thou hide these things in the heart. » ( Ibid. ) Because as yet thou dost not show it in open speech. Those who are certain of pardon are wont to be touched by the memory of their former wickedness, and to be beaten upon, unwilling, by unlawful thought, whence he adds:

VERS. 14.-- « If I have sinned. » God spares for a time, etc., as far as but let them who are beaten fix their hope more strongly upon the help of God alone.

787AVERS. 16.--Because of pride. » (GREG.) While the lioness greedily seeks food for her whelps, etc., as far as but if we grow numb from holy desire, he sets forth the examples of those who watch well.

VERS. 17.-- « Thou multipliest thy wrath against me, » that is, thou showest it manifold, because even if he scourges the good, what shall it be for the impious? Thus, the manifold anger being foreseen, man returns to himself, and punishes his depraved deeds.

VERS. 19.-- « I should have been as though I were not, from the womb. » ( Ibid. ) The same as what was said there: « as a hidden untimely birth, » etc., or, they who, being conceived, did not see the light.

VERS. 20.-- « Shall not the fewness of my days. » ( Ibid. ) Let not the delight of the present life take hold of me, because it passes quickly.

787B« Let me go therefore . . . my sorrow. » ( Ibid. ) That is, temper the scourges, etc., as far as which the foresight of hell chiefly does, whence he says:

VERS. 21.-- « Before I go. » Hell is called earth, because the captives are held there.

« Before I go. » Not that he who laments goes, but that he goes who does not lament: as if I should say to a debtor, pay before I constrain thee.

« I shall not return. » ( Ibid. ) Because mercy does not deliver the damned any further.

VERS. 22.-- « Of misery and of darkness. » Because grief torments without those whom the blindness of the mind darkens within; or, there no one returns any more to the light, as in this life: where, though there be misery, it is permitted to return to the light by conversion.

787C« The shadow of death. » Death is separation from God; the shadow is its darkness; because the penal fire has burning and not light, so that they may be punished in both who sinned in both.

« No order. » ( Ibid. ) Not that God does not ordain, as far as the quality of things is not kept. Whence he also adds:

« Everlasting horror. » Here is the fear of evil to come, etc., as far as lest they should come to the torments whom he who saw Lazarus saw in punishment.

VERS. 2.-- « Doth he who many things. » (Greg. in Job. lib. X.) He begins from insults, etc., as far as who think nothing right except what they themselves perceive.

« Or a man full of words. » A true saying, because it is read, 787Dsilence is the cultivation of justice, but not said fittingly to the occasion. He who cannot bear right things, careless of being corrected, girds himself for an answer.

VERS. 3.-- « Shall men be silent for thee alone, » etc. ( Ibid. ) He whom conscience gnaws thinks all right things a mockery of himself, and reckons what is said generally to be said of him. Whence he is kindled also to speak against them, that so at least he may govern his shame as though he were not guilty, if he accuses others; whence, lying, he adds:

VERS. 4.-- « For thou hast said: My speech is pure. » Job had not said it; but it is a solace to wrongdoing if the life of him who rebukes is defiled, even falsely.

VERS. 5.-- « And would that God might speak with thee, » etc. ( Ibid. ) The perverse wish good things in word only, 788Athat they may seem kindly, and that the things which are in the present may be shown to be evil, whence this man too says:

« Would that God might speak. » As if he should say, thou now speakest to thyself, while thou art carnally wise: thou art empty of the spirit of truth; as though I had compassion rather on thy ignorance than on thy punishment:

( Ibid. ) « The lips, » that is, judgments, through which, being laid open, etc., as far as he acknowledges to God: and if he acknowledges his sins, he patiently bears the scourges. And this is:

VERS. 6.-- « And that thou mightest understand that many lesser things. » Unjustly he charges the just man with iniquity, but this insult proceeds from zeal for God, and is venial. Not knowing also the merits of the just man, out of ignorance he adds a mockery:

VERS. 7.-- « Perhaps thou wilt comprehend the footsteps of God. » ( Ibid. ) The kindness of his visitation, etc., as far 788Bas because his essence shall be fully seen by none.

VERS. 8.-- « Higher. » Because in the circumscription of his own spirit he transcends all things.

« Deeper than hell. » Because by transcending he bears upward.

VERS. 9.-- « Longer than the earth. » Because he exceeds the measure of the creature by the perpetuity of eternity

« Broader than the sea. » Because he so possesses the times, etc., as far as or knowest thou not how to reprove thine own self in temptations?

VERS. 10.-- « If he shall overturn. » ( Ibid. ) He overturns heaven, etc., as far as that either, resisting, she may be exercised, or, being seduced, she may be broken, whence rightly he says:

« Who shall contradict him? or, who can say to him why thou doest thus? » Because none can withstand the judgment of God, 788Cor pierce into it by inquiry. Why does he overturn or straiten?

VERS. 11.-- « For he himself knoweth. » ( Ibid. ) While the mind is lifted up by elation, etc., as far as whither vanity together with iniquity drags it, namely to swelling, he adds:

VERS. 12.-- « A vain man unto pride. » ( Ibid. ) The vain man is made bold out of his fault, etc., as far as through unbridled liberty he runs boldly astray through his desires.

VERS. 13.-- « But thou hast established. » ( Ibid. ) That the heart is established is not in this place, etc., as far as he subjoins to him, as though teaching: « and thou shalt be steadfast, » etc.

VERS. 14.-- « If iniquities. » ( Ibid. ) Iniquity in the hand, etc., as far as if the conscience of his own guilt accuses him.

788DVERS. 15.-- « And thou shalt be steadfast. » Because by so much the less does he tremble at the judgment, as he stands the more solidly in good acts.

VERS. 16.-- « Of misery also. » ( Ibid. ) The soul feels the evils of the present life the more harshly, the more it neglects to weigh the good that follows. But if it fix the eye of the heart upon the things that abide, it beholds that whatever tends to an end is nothing.

« And as of waters. » Because the miseries that pass do not shake by force, but pour in a touch of sorrow, while without he grieves for the stroke, within he grows cold from temptation, against which the divine light is kindled the more, whence it is added.

789AVERS. 17.-- « And as the noonday. » The noonday brightness at evening is the renewal of virtue in temptation.

« And when thee consumed. » (GREG.) When the just man has begun to sink through outward evils also, then his brightness begins: on the contrary, the light of the wicked is in the day of this life, their darkness at evening. « And when thee consumed. » Because, falling without, he is renewed within, and the harder the things he bears, the more surely he hopes for the rewards, and this is:

VERS. 18.-- « And thou shalt have confidence. » Those who are buried sleep securely, etc., as far as he sleeps secure within himself, hidden from the acts of the world.

VERS. 19.-- « Thou shalt rest and there shall be none. » For he who is fixed in the desire of eternity, since there is nothing in 789Bthe world that he seeks after, there is nothing about the world that he dreads.

« And they shall entreat. » The depraved, when they preach right things, promise to others as a great thing that which they themselves seek after; but lest by long promising what they are should lie open, they return the more quickly to words of uprightness, whence it is added:

VERS. 20.-- « But the eyes of the impious. » By the name of eyes, etc., as far as he does not find where he may be able to hide himself.

« And their hope an abomination, » etc. (Ibid.) Because the spirit perishes forever from that very source from which the flesh lives sweetly for a time.

VERS. 1.-- « And Job answering. » (GREG.) 789CThis Sophar said truly, etc., as far as whence Job adds:

VERS. 2.-- « Therefore you alone are men. » He who thinks that he goes before all men in reason exults that he alone is a man. « Therefore you alone are men. » For he who reckons that he alone is wise, what else does he think but that this same wisdom will die with him?

VERS. 3.-- « And I too have a heart as. » That he may correct their pride, he denies that he is their inferior; and lest he pass the bound of his own humility, he keeps silence that he is their superior. See with what discretion, in which he shows what they ought to feel concerning themselves.

« For who is ignorant of these things which you know? » As if he should say: since the things you say are known to all, why do you swell singularly over 789Dthe knowledge of what has been said?

VERS. 4.-- « He that is derided. » (Ibid.) Because human derision makes him near to God whom innocence of life keeps a stranger to human depravities.

VERS. 5.-- « A lamp despised. » (Ibid.) By the name of the rich he designates the elation of the proud; but the simplicity of the just man is called both a lamp and despised: a lamp, because it shines within; despised, because among the minds of carnal men it is reckoned abject.

« Prepared for the appointed time. » The appointed time of the despised lamp is the predestined day of the last judgment, in which every just man who is now looked down upon is shown with how great power he shines.

VERS. 6.-- « The tabernacles of robbers abound. » (Ibid.) He shows that the riches of the present life are nothing, etc., 790Aas far as and yet the good things they have they received from God.

« Surely ask the beasts, » etc. (Ibid.) Beasts of burden are those who are duller in perception. The fowls of heaven are those who are wise in lofty things.

VERS. 8.-- « The fishes. » (Ibid.) The curious are understood. And the sense is: if thou shouldst inquire of these, they confess God the creator of all things. It can also be understood according to the letter.

VERS. 10.-- « In whose hand is the soul. » In this place, by the soul of every living thing, the very life of the body is signified.

« The spirit of all flesh. » (Ibid.) That is, man's effect of spiritual understanding, which things are in the power of God. It can also be that by the soul of every living thing the life of beasts of burden is signified.

VERS. 11.-- « Doth not the ear discern words. » From 790Bthese bodily things, etc., as far as and what you know savors to me to the marrow through inmost love.

VERS. 13.-- « With him is wisdom, » etc. (GREG. in Job, l. XXI.) For with God in the beginning the Word was God, who is both the power of God and the wisdom of God; he has counsel, because he disposes his own things; understanding, because he knows ours.

VERS. 14.-- « If he destroy, there is none that can build. » The Almighty destroys the human race when he abandons it, he builds it when he fills it: and unless this be done, a man is admonished outwardly by a preacher in vain.

« If he shut up a man. » Every man through that, etc., as far as and not to soften the reprobate heart through grace.

VERS. 15.-- « If he withhold the waters, all things shall be dried up. » 790CBecause, if the knowledge of preachers is withdrawn, etc., as far as he referred the sevenfold grace

« If he send them out, they shall overturn. » For if the grace of the Holy Spirit is poured in, etc., as far as straightway the earth is overturned: because the hardness of the sinful mind is changed out of the obstinacy of its own immobility.

VERS. 16.-- « With him is strength. » In the former words in which he says, etc., as far as he shall judge for the elect in the kingdom in what manner the wisdom of the Father is.

« He knoweth both the deceiver and him that is deceived. » (Ibid.) He knows the deceiver, etc., as far as is sometimes wont to be made the beginning of vengeance.

VERS. 17.-- « He bringeth counsellors to a foolish end. » By counsellors he means preachers, who furnish their hearers with the counsel of life. And these, when they preach for the sake of temporal things, 790Dare led away into a foolish end: because they tend thither by labor whence they ought to flee by rectitude of mind.

« And judges. » They who are set over the examining of the morals of others are rightly called judges; but when they by no means carefully discuss them, nor know how to correct them, they are led into stupor.

VERS. 18.-- « He looseth the belt of kings. » For in those who seemed to rule their own members well, he destroys the girdle of chastity because of the fault of elation. And because in the loins is the delight of the flesh, he girds their loins with the rope of sin and of delight.

VERS. 19.-- « He leadeth away priests without glory. » (Ibid.) Nay, they shall not find glory before the judge, which 791Athey do not now seek out in the morals of their subjects by zeal for preaching.

« And he supplanteth the nobles. » (GREG.) Because, when by just judgment he abandons the mind of those who rule, they neglect heavenly things, and fall here into their own pleasures.

VERS. 20.-- « Changing the lip of the truthful. » Because often those who were truthful in preaching heavenly things, while they love temporal things, rush headlong into the loving of earthly things, and the lip of the truthful is changed. Or it can be understood of the Jews, who, being truthful before, announced that Christ would come, and they themselves denied this same one when present.

« And the doctrine. » (Ibid.) The doctrine of the elders has been taken away, because the Jews by no means followed in believing the things which they remembered that their fathers had foretold.

VERS. 21.-- « He poureth contempt upon princes. » 791BThe Jews, abiding in the commandments of the law, seemed to have rule through faith: the Gentiles, pressed down in the deep, lay hidden through unbelief; but when Judaea denied the mystery of the Lord's incarnation, the Gentile world believed. Thus:

VERS. 22.-- « He revealeth deep things out of darkness; » when the mystical senses of the allegories are recognized in the hidden words of the prophets.

« And bringeth to light the shadow of death. » (Ibid.) He says the shadow of death, etc., as far as the death of the flesh is least of all feared.

VERS. 23.-- « Who multiplieth the nations. » (Ibid.) Because he both extends the nations by the fruitfulness of offspring, and yet leaves them in their own unbelief, and those whom he had left in the fall of unbelief he at some time led back 791Cto the faith, and when they are thus restored there comes to pass what follows, « who changeth the heart, » etc.

VERS. 24.-- « Who changeth the heart of princes. » (Ibid.) The heart of the princes of the earth has been changed, etc., as far as the way could not lie open against the author of all things.

VERS. 25.-- « They shall grope as in darkness. » (Ibid.) For as it were in darkness he gropes, etc., as far as « Is not this the son of the carpenter? »

VERS. 1.-- « Behold all things. » (GREG.) For all these things to the blessed man, etc., as far as he saw some things to be in works, others in words; there follows:

« These things my eye hath seen, and my ear hath heard. » But because words have no profit if they 791Dlack understanding, there follows:

« And I have understood every one. » For when something is shown, or heard, if understanding is not granted, it is not prophecy at all; and because he is not lifted up over that understanding, he shows it when he says:

VERS. 2.-- « According to true knowledge. » [Vulg. Job 13:2 vestram, "according to your knowledge"] By these words he made known of how great humility he was, who denies that he is inferior to them whose life he had far transcended by living holily: and he affirms that he knows according to their knowledge, he who by knowing heavenly things passed beyond their earthly thoughts through the spirit of prophecy.

VERS. 3.-- « But yet I will speak to the Almighty. » (Ibid.) We speak with the Almighty while we beseech his mercy 792A. We dispute with him while, joining ourselves to his justice, we discuss our own deeds with subtle searching. Or he disputes with God who, obeying him here, will afterward judge the peoples with him, who even in the meantime does not cease to judge concerning the wicked.

VERS. 4.-- « First I will show you, » etc. (Ibid.) So the Church says of heretics, « first I will show you to be framers; » for as a building is framed out of stones, so also a lie is framed out of words.

VERS. 5.-- « And would that you kept silence. » (Ibid.) Seeing that they wish to appear, etc., as far as by which they may seduce weak minds.

VERS. 6.-- « Hear therefore my correction. » (Ibid.) Rightly therefore he brought in correction first and judgment after, because unless the swelling of the fool be first pressed down by correction, 792Bthe judgment of the just man is by no means known through understanding.

VERS. 9.-- « Shall he be deceived as a man by your deceits. » Heretics practise fraud upon God, who build up things that do not please him for whom they speak, and offend him while they strive to defend him.

VERS. 10.-- « He himself shall reprove you, because. » There are those who feel the truth of God in the heart, etc., as far as by how much in the secret of thought they know the right judgments of God.

VERS. 11.-- « Straightway. » (Ibid.) By a human word the very strictness of his rectitude is called the motion of God: which shall trouble by vengeance the reprobate, who here refuse to be troubled by penitence.

« And his terror shall rush in. » Because for the reprobate fear does not beget 792Crest, but punishment begets fear, whence the prophet: « Vexation alone shall give understanding to the hearing (Isa. XXVIII): » because when they are punished for the commandments of God despised, then they understand what they have heard.

VERS. 12.-- « Your memory. » However much a man for the sake of memory, etc., as far as and the elated flesh wastes away in rottenness.

VERS. 13.-- « Be silent a little while, that I may speak. » He shows that they have spoken with the sense of the flesh: whom he therefore restrains to silence, that he may say the things which his mind shall have suggested to him. As if he should say: I speak not carnally, but spiritually, because through the sense of the spirit I hear what I utter through the ministry of the body.

VERS. 14.-- « Why do I tear my flesh with my teeth. » Teeth in this place signify the inward 792Dsenses, etc., as far as if I cannot profit those who look upon me, that is, you.

« With my teeth. » The teeth are the inward senses, which search out particulars, etc., as far as lest it be able to chew spiritual things.

« And I carry my soul in my hands. » (Ibid.) To carry the soul in the hands is to show the intention of the heart in operation, which is done for the building up of one's neighbor. And the sense is: Why do I either judge myself strictly before men, or show what I seek in my work, if I profit my neighbors neither by judging evil things nor by showing good ones?

VERS. 15.-- « Although he should kill me, I will hope in him, » etc. (Ibid.) He is truly patient who both 793Ais worn down by adversities, and yet is not bent from the uprightness of hope.

« Yet my ways. » For thus is the Lord the Saviour then found, if now, for the fear of the Lord, your sin is reproved by your own selves.

VERS. 16.-- « For no hypocrite shall come into his sight. » Now indeed he shall come before the tribunal of the judge, etc., as far as he refuses to come into the sight of the Lord.

VERS. 17.-- « Hear my speech. » By this, that he names riddles, he shows that he has figured speech, whence in the voice of the faithful people he adds:

VERS. 18.-- « If I shall be judged, I know that I am just, » which does not disagree from his person, etc., as far as he is not ignorant that he has been made just out of a gift.

793BVERS. 19.-- « Who is he that would be judged with me. » Because in outward acts he has nothing for which he may be reproved, he freely seeks an accuser. But because the hearts even of the just reprove themselves for foolish thought, it is added:

« Why am I consumed keeping silence? » As if he should say: As I have lived so as to fear no accuser without, would that I had so lived as not to fear an accusing conscience within me. For he is consumed keeping silence who finds within himself that whereby he is burned.

VERS. 20.-- « Only do thou not two things. » And the face of God he here calls his animadversion: in which, while he beholds sins, he punishes them; from which no one is hidden, unless the two things he asks be removed, concerning which there follows:

VERS. 21.-- « Put thy hand far from me. » By 793Cthe hand, which he asks to be put far off, etc., as far as but he serves through dread.

VERS. 22.-- « Call. » (GREG.) He seeks the presence of Christ, that through it he may both hear what he does not know, and be heard in the things which he knows. Or, God calls by choosing, man answers by obeying; man speaks by desiring, God answers by appearing. But panting thus, he examines himself more subtly.

« Call me and I will answer thee. » To call is God's part, to look upon us by loving and choosing. To answer is ours, to obey his love with good works.

Or else I will speak. » We speak when we ask for his face by desire: he answers those who speak when he appears to us who love him.

VERS. 23. « How many are my iniquities, » etc. It is the labor 793Dof the just, that they may find their own selves, and, finding them, may lead them on to better things by weeping and correcting. Iniquity seems graver than sin, wickedness than offense.

VERS. 24.-- « Why hidest thou thy face? » (Ibid.) Man had the contemplation of God in paradise, but through fault he ran into darkness. And, roused out of punishment, he returns to love, and says:

« And thou thinkest. » Because if thou didst look upon me as a friend, thou wouldst not deprive me of the light of thy vision.

VERS. 25.-- « Against a leaf, » etc. Man is called a leaf, etc., as far as whom thou knowest to be thus infirm?

VERS. 26.-- « Thou writest. » Because what we speak passes away, 794Awhat we write remains. God is said not to speak but to write bitternesses, when his scourges long endure upon us. For once he fixed the sentence concerning the mortality of the flesh, which shall not be able to be changed until the last.

« And to consume. » It is plain that the sins of the young and of the old are grave, if the just so fear that which they committed in a weak age.

VERS. 27.-- « Thou hast put my foot in the fetter. » God has set the foot of man in the fetter, because he has bound his depravity by the strong sentence of his strictness.

« And thou hast observed all my paths. » A path is narrower than a way; but since we take ways to be actions, we rightly take paths to be the thoughts of actions.

« And thou hast considered the steps of my feet. » He called the intentions 794Bof works footprints; or, depraved works, which, while we do them, we set forth as a bad example to the brethren who behold this, and, as with a foot bent outside the way, we leave crooked footprints to those who follow.

VERS. 28. « Who as rottenness. » As a garment is eaten by the moth sprung from itself, so man has in himself the rottenness whereby he is consumed. Or he is tempted out of the corruption of his own flesh, as a garment is consumed by the moth sprung from it.

« How many are my iniquities. » (Ibid.) As it were, man through the blindness of his exile does not know himself, which befalls him because he hides himself from the face of God, for which, already admonished by the punishment itself, he grieves. « Against a leaf. » Man was a tree in his creation, but dried up in temptation a leaf, in his casting down stubble.

794C« Thou wishest to consume me, » because he finds that he sinned in his youth, etc., as far as as though they had then been without discretion.

VERS. 1.-- « Man born of woman. » (GREG.) Here by the name of woman infirmity is designated, and the sense is: What has he of strength in himself, who is born of infirmity, who is both straitened unto life, and enlarged unto misery.

VERS. 2.-- « Who cometh forth like a flower. » Because he shines in the flesh:

« He is crushed, » because he is brought back into dust and rottenness.

« And he fleeth as a shadow. » He compared man not to one merely fleeing, but to a shadow. For he who has not the warmth of the heart in the love of God, 794Dand yet does not hold the life which he loves, flees like a shadow.

« And never in the same state, » etc. (Ibid.) For he always fails from that very point whence he believes himself to advance into a span of life.

VERS. 3.-- « And dost thou think it worthy over such a one, » etc. For God to open his eyes is to exercise judgments, and to see whom he strikes

VERS. 4.-- « Who can make, » etc. For he who alone is clean of himself, etc., as far as he says that Christ alone was not born of unclean seed.

VERS. 5.-- « Short are the days of man, » etc. (Ibid.), because with God even the things that slip away stand fast: he declares that the number of the months is with him. Or, in days the brevity of time, in months 795Athe multiplied spaces of days are designated: to man therefore the days are brief; but because our life is stretched out afterward, the number of our months is recorded to be with God.

« Thou hast appointed his bounds. » (GREG. in Job. l. XII.) For none of the things that come to pass for men in this world come to pass without the hidden judgment of God.

VERS. 6.-- « Depart a little from him. » Withdraw, that is, now take away the scourges of the present life, and show the good things of eternal rest

« Until the desired come, » when he receives eternal rest as the recompense of his labor

VERS. 7.-- « A tree hath hope. » etc. He hints that the human race is as it were despised, and how far insensible things themselves seem to go before it. Or according to 795Bthe mystical sense: the tree is preferred to man, for here every carnal man is the man; the tree is taken as the just man, who, when in death he is afflicted with suffering, is recovered in the greenness of eternal life.

« And its branches sprout, » because out of the suffering of the just man the faithful receive the greenness of spiritual life.

VERS. 8.-- « If its root grow old in the earth. » (Ibid.) The root of the just man is holy preaching, because from it he arises and in it he subsists: which among the hearts of earthly men is believed to be spent of all its strength: « And in the dust the trunk dieth, » because among the hands of persecutors his body is deprived of life.

VERS. 9.-- « At the scent of water it shall spring up, » etc. Because through the breathing of the Spirit, in the hearts of the elect, by the example of his own work, he makes the seed of virtue.

795C« And shall put forth foliage, » etc. For a cut trunk to make foliage, etc., as far as he made foliage, because the apostles who had withered grew green unto the faith as before.

VERS. 10.-- « But when man shall be dead. » (Ibid.) But by that very loss of justice man dies, he is stripped of the garment of innocence granted in paradise, he is consumed, the destruction of the flesh following: « where then is he, » he who is not in his love, where « true being » is?

VERS. 11.-- « As if the waters should depart from the sea. » The sea is the mind of man, etc., as far as we are now filled with the sweetness of prosperity.

VERS. 12.-- « Until the heaven be worn away he shall not awake. » Because, unless the end of this world shall have come, the human race shall not awake from sleep.

VERS. 13.-- « Who will grant me this. » Before the coming 795Dof the Mediator, knowing that he was to descend to hell, he asks there for the protection of his Creator.

« That thou appoint me a time wherein thou wilt remember me. » He asks for the coming of the Redeemer to the lower regions.

VERS. 14.-- « Thinkest thou that a dead man again. » Just men are wont, etc., as far as that afterward he may strengthen the more.

« All the days. » He therefore who awaits his own change with so great desire, shows how certain he is concerning the resurrection.

VERS. 15.-- « Thou shalt call me and I will answer. » Then do we truly answer God who calls, when at the command of the highest incorruption we shall rise incorruptible.

796A« To the work of thy hands thou wilt reach out thy right hand, » as if he should say: For this reason shall the corruptible creature be able to persist unto incorruption, because it shall be raised by the hand of thy power; or by the right hand the Son is meant, who was sent incarnate to raise up man.

VERS. 16.-- « Thou indeed my steps, » etc. He numbers the steps, and spares the sins: he who subtly considers our deeds, and yet here mercifully relaxes them to the penitent.

« Thou hast numbered them, but spare. » He numbers, while he turns us to weep for the single things we have done; he spares, because he does not punish the things we have punished, whence he still adds:

VERS. 17.-- « Thou hast sealed as in a bag, » etc. (Ibid.) In secret, etc., as far as he heals because here through scourges he utterly relaxes.

796BVERS. 18.-- « A falling mountain floweth away. » (Ibid.) There are two kinds of temptations, etc., as far as or long and slow, as thou permittest Solomon to be consumed.

« The rock, » that is, the mind of the just man is carried,

« Out of its place, » that is, from justice to fault by too great an impulse.

VERS. 19.-- « The stones, » that is, strength, « the waters » constant blandishments.

« The earth, » which sanctifies.

VERS. 20.-- « Thou hast strengthened him a little, » etc. (Ibid.) Man has been strengthened a little, because here he has received the powers of living for a short time; but in this brevity, wherein he has been strengthened, he gathers whence he may find in perpetuity; either that he may always rejoice, or that he may not escape torments.

796C« Thou shalt change his face, and send him away. » The face of man, etc., as far as unwilling, he is compelled to pass over to things eternal.

VERS. 21.-- « Whether his sons be noble. » For just as those who are still living are ignorant in what place the souls of the dead are held: so the dead, carnally, do not know how the life of those set in the flesh is ordered after them.

VERS. 22.-- « But yet his flesh, while he liveth, shall grieve. » For even those who live spiritually here suffer the tribulation of the flesh.

« And his soul over. » For it is fitting that a man should always find sorrows in himself, who, having left the Creator, sought joy in himself.

796DVERS. 2.-- « Shall a wise man answer? » (GREG.) All things that are perceived in the saints displease the wicked as though uttered into the wind, and they reckon the words of the good to be not sayings of reason but goads of fury.

« And he will fill with burning. » (Ibid.) They who also strive to cloak, under a defence of the Lord, the things which they perceive themselves to be saying contumeliously; whence he adds:

VERS. 3.-- « Thou reprovest him with words. » (Ibid.) And they think that no one has the fear of the Lord save him whom they have drawn to the folly of their own profession; whence he adds:

VERS. 4.-- « As much as is in thee, » etc., it is said, that is, thou hast taken away. As if he were saying: Presuming upon thy own justice, thou disdainest to entreat the grace of thy Creator. When 797Aheretics find no true evils against the good, they invent things to reprove, that they may seem just.

VERS. 5.-- « For iniquity hath taught. » (GREG.) Iniquity teaches the mouth when out of an evil life there is conceived something worse to be said.

« Thou imitatest the tongue of blasphemers » (Ibid.) Heretics, as though venerating God, deny the lowly things, that is the flesh and the death, and say that the Church, confessing these, blasphemes: and if any adversity befall her, they say it comes to pass for this injury; whence he says:

VERS. 6.-- « It shall condemn thee, » etc. But sometimes they wish to crush as though by reasoning; whence:

VERS. 7.-- « Art thou the first man. » But this defence of God is taken up by them for this reason, etc., as far as weigh that thou art ignorant of the counsel.

797BVERS. 9.-- « What knowest thou. » (Ibid.) These words openly show out of what elation of mind proceeds whatever sounds as though for the Lord's defence.

VERS. 10.-- « Both the aged and the ancient. » Heretics, because they cannot establish their own doctrines by reason, strive to defend them among the foolish by the authority of the ancients: and they say that the doctors of the Church were their masters.

VERS. 11, 12.-- « Is it a great thing? » There follows: « What doth thy heart lift thee up. » Often the mind of the just is suspended to the contemplating of higher things, so that outwardly their face seems to have been struck with amazement. But the reprobate think that this force of contemplation comes about through hypocrisy; for what is in themselves they suppose to be in others.

VERS. 13.-- « Why doth thy spirit swell against God? » 797CFor the most part the just, afflicted by certain necessities, are compelled to confess their own works, which blessed Job had done, and which is thought to be elation; but in the ears of God those things are not proud which are brought forth with a humble heart; and as it is a grave fault to arrogate to oneself what one is not, so for the most part there is no fault if one humbly says the good that is.

« Sermons of this kind. » (Ibid.) Of thy good things; yet Job did not in these swell against God, but humbly said the things he had truly done; often the just and the unjust have the same words, and whence those please, these give offence, as the Pharisee who justifies himself in work (Luc. XVIII), and Ezechias who justifies himself in thought (IV Reg. XX).

VERS. 14.-- « What is man? » By this very thing, that he is called homo, one earthly and weak is expressed. For he has his name from humus, the ground.

797D« And that one born should appear just, » etc. For how should he appear just who is born of her who stood forth as the pourer-out of injustice? For the woman first poured out injustice to the man in paradise.

VERS. 15.-- « And the heavens are not clean. » By this name of the heavens he repeated what he had signified by the appellation of the saints, who before the strict judgment of God cannot themselves be clean unto perfection.

VERS. 16.-- « How much more abominable. » (Ibid.) Any perverse man is abominable because of the uncleanness of his stain.

« Unprofitable, » because of the justice of a perfect life; who is said « to drink iniquity, » because what is drunk has no delay in the swallowing. Fault therefore, because it is 798Aperpetrated by an unjust man without any drawing back, iniquity is drunk as it were water.

VERS. 17.-- « I will show thee. » Because he teaches with a lesser authority who speaks the things he has heard than he who speaks the things he had seen, in order that Eliphaz might arrogate to himself a stronger authority, he says:

« What I have seen I will tell thee. » It is proper to the arrogant, etc., as far as which he fortifies by the authority of the Fathers.

VERS. 18.-- « The wise confess. » Behold the audacity of heretics, etc., as far as that a stranger, that is the devil, has passed through their hearts. Behold the sentences.

VERS. 20.-- « All the days. » Even the elect are wont on certain days to be proud, but before they end their life they change their hearts from elation; the impious man, however, is proud on all days, and so ends his life 798Bthat he in no wise withdraws from elation.

« And the number of the years of his tyranny. » Properly a tyrant, etc., as far as whose life is held under uncertainty?

VERS. 21.-- « The sound of terror always. (Ibid.) A depraved mind is always in labours, as a good mind is always tranquil: because it either contrives evils which it may bring in, or fears lest these be brought in upon it by others.

VERS. 22.-- « He believeth not that he can return from darkness unto: » because while he believes himself struck on every side by snares, with health despaired of he always grows toward wickedness.

VERS. 23.-- « When he shall move himself, » etc. Bread here is the wage of the present life, etc., as far as avarice despises those victuals.

798CVERS. 24.-- « He shall terrify, » etc. In everything that the wicked man does, etc., as far as if perchance that should fail him which he may set against it out of deceit.

VERS. 25.-- « He hath stretched out, » etc. (Ibid.) To stretch out hands against God, etc., as far as is now done by many one by one.

VERS. 26.-- « He hath run, » that is, in an evil work he had no obstacle from adversity.

« And he is armed with a fat neck. » A fat neck is opulent pride propped up by abounding things as though by much flesh.

VERS. 27.-- « It hath covered his face. » Fatness covers the face, because the desired abundance of earthly things presses down the eyes of the mind.

« And from his sides. » (Ibid.) The sides of the rich 798Dare those who cling to them; the fat hangs down from his sides, because whosoever clings to a powerful and wicked man, he too swells from that man's power as though from fatness.

VERS. 28.--He hath dwelt in cities. » Because a city is so named from the converse of those who live together, etc., as far as they show beyond doubt that they have fallen from the building of life.

VERS. 29.-- « He shall not be enriched, » because the thought of the proud man shall not be inhabited by the grace of its own Author.

« Nor shall he continue. » (Ibid.) As if he should say: This which he seems to have passes away outwardly, and that which could not pass away he has not inwardly.

« Nor shall he send into the earth, » because, as at a light 799Abreath, so at the motion of the hidden sentence his life is plucked up; or, « into the earth he shall not send, » etc., because he never plants the thought of his heart unto the desire of eternal life.

VERS. 30.-- « He shall not depart from darkness. » For because he does not seek the light of justice, he does not depart from darkness.

« His branches, » etc. Because they too who are joined to him burn with earthly desires, so that they bear not the fruit of good work, since they pant through wickedness after the seeking of the lowest things.

« And he shall be taken away by a breath, » because he shall receive the sentence of striking in that wherein he restrains not the breath of his mouth by the fear of God.

VERS. 31.-- « He shall not believe. » Because alms 799Bto redeem him, etc., as far as because he redeems not the soul which he restrains not from vices.

VERS. 32.-- « Before his days. » (GREG.) Because those long in mind, etc., as far as death meets the undisciplined.

VERS. 33.-- « His hands » are dried up from every good working.

« He shall be hurt as, » etc. If a flourishing vine, etc., as far as makes them strangers from fruit in holy zeal; whence he adds:

« And as an olive casting off. » The olive, when it is in flower, etc., as far as so that they cannot discern with what intention they do anything.

Or « in the first flower. » A weak man ought not to rule or to do lower things, because in earthly acts he grows cold. 799COr, when he sees that the things he does give pleasure, he works those same good things more ardently, and as it were glows in holy zeal, whence he perishes by the heat.

VERS. 34.-- « For the congregation of the hypocrite, » etc. Hypocrites gather good works, but that gathering of theirs is barren, because through what they do they do not seek to receive fruit in the eternal retribution.

« And fire shall devour their tabernacles, » etc. He calls tabernacles the bodies in which their souls dwell: which here the desire of praise, but afterwards the fire of gehenna, shall burn up.

« Tabernacles. » Thought is a tabernacle in which the mind dwells, which the heat of avarice lays waste. Or, 799Dhe calls the heart a tabernacle, which the burning of praise consumes. Or, the body is the tabernacle of the soul, and they who here burn in mind shall burn in flesh with the fires of gehenna.

VERS. 35.-- « He hath conceived sorrow. » When he thinks perverse things, he is in travail with iniquity; when he has begun to accomplish it, he has conceived. The mind also of the hypocrite is never free from evil, because it envies others the things which it desires, from whose despising it may be the more renowned; whence also it prepares deceits, that it alone may take the esteem.

« His womb prepareth deceits, » that is, the mind in which thoughts are generated conceives the greater malice against neighbours the more it seeks alone before all to be seen more innocent: this he says, because he thought Job stricken for hypocrisy.

• 800A

VERS. 2.-- « I have often heard such things. » The elect often hear the evils of others as though their own, and a charge is thrust upon them by those very men by whom the charges thus thrust are themselves committed.

« Burdensome comforters all of you. » When the depraved see the good labour, etc., as far as lest he who ought to soothe the sorrow increase it.

VERS. 3.-- « Shall windy words have an end? » The evil bring forth windy words. For their sayings, even if at times they are sound in their judgment, are yet puffed up through elation.

« Or is anything troublesome to thee if thou speak? » As if he were saying: for this reason thou speakest the more, that thou hearest from me nothing troublesome concerning thy deed.

800BVERS. 4.-- « I also could speak like to you. » He tells what he was able to do, but lest he forsake justice, he declines what he was able to do.

VERS. 5.-- « And would that your soul were for my soul. » In these words he is shown to intend this, etc., as far as because he would rebuke their evils with a moderate invective.

VERS. 6.-- « As it were sparing. » Note the quasi, because, etc., as far as he seems to approve, and they grow into an example.

VERS. 8.-- « But now sorrow hath oppressed me, » etc. (Ibid.) The Church is pressed with sorrow, etc., as far as those whom she has within; whence by the voice of the blessed man there is presently and fitly added.

VERS. 9.-- « My wrinkles, » etc. The wrinkles of the Church 800Care all those who live within her doubly, who cry the faith with their voices and deny it by their works. These in the time of peace, because they see that same faith to be in honour with the powers of this world, feign themselves to be faithful: but when adversity has suddenly troubled the Church, they straightway show what they were contriving in a perfidious mind. And the sense is: they rebuke me by persecuting me, who, being set within my body, amend not the malice of their own duplicity.

« And a false-speaker is raised up against the face, » etc. (Ibid.) While they do not presume to contradict her preaching openly, the Church suffers false speech as it were behind her back; but when the time of malice has broken out, he who now, being afraid, disparages, comes to contradict before her face: because he withstands the words of the true faith with open 800Dvoices. And because this is done through the malignant spirit, he turns his words to the describing of him.

VERS. 10.-- « He hath gathered together his fury. » The devil, the prince of false speech, has now his fury against the Church, but it is scattered, because he stirs up hidden temptations through individual men. But when, licence being received, he has openly raged against her, he gathers his fury together upon her, because with his whole intention he binds himself to her affliction. He who gnashes with his teeth against her, and beholds her with terrible eyes, because through some he works cruel things against her, and through others provides the things he may work.

VERS. 11.-- « They have opened their mouths upon me, » etc. (Ibid.) Because the reprobate open their mouths in reproaching, 801Awhen they both fear not to preach error and mock the teachings of the right faith.

« They have struck my jaw. » The jaw of the Church is the holy preachers, who convert the life of carnal men by the word of correction: these the reprobate chiefly persecute, and when they even slay them, that penalty satisfies them which chiefly tortures, or chastises, the mind of the Church.

« My jaw. » Peter is the jaw, who slays and eats. Samson holds the jaw of an ass, and kills the enemies, that is, Christ holds the simple heralds in the hand of his power, and kills carnal men from their vices. The jaw cast upon the ground pours forth waters: because the bodies of the heralds given over to death show forth great miracles.

801BVERS. 12.-- « God hath shut me up, » etc. The people of the elect is shut up with the wicked one: when its flesh is given over for a time to the persecutions of the ancient enemy. Which is delivered not to the spirit but to the hands of the enemies, because in that they cannot take him in mind, therein they burn the more cruelly against his flesh.

VERS. 13.-- « I, that once wealthy man. » (GREG.) He designates the mind of the weak, because while they know not how to foresee adversities, things are the heavier to them the more they are borne unlooked-for. Or, in certain men, when these same slip back, the Church suffers these things, who after the wealth of doctrine are sometimes turned to sudden vices. « He hath held my neck. » The neck here signifies the uprightness of liberty, which the enemy holds in the time of persecution; « he binds it fast, » while the weak 801Cpresume not freely to preach the true things which they perceive. Or, he calls his neck those who in the Church, under pretext of defending rectitude, are enslaved to the vice of elation: which the enemy bends down by the straitness of his persecution.

« And he hath set me as it were for a mark. » (Ibid.) A mark is set for this, that it may be struck by the shooting of arrows. And so the faithful people is set as a mark for its enemy, because he ever assails it with his blows, when he afflicts it with his persecutions; whence the Apostle: « For yourselves know that we are appointed thereunto (I Thess. III). » As if he should openly say: Why do you marvel at our wounds in this time? we who, if we seek eternal joys, have come to this that we should be struck.

VERS. 14.-- « He hath compassed me about. » The Church is compassed about with lances 801Dby her enemy, when in her members she is assailed on every side by the crafty assailant with the darts of temptations.

« He hath wounded through my loins. » When the enemy draws the faithful people to luxury, he strikes it in the loins. And « to wound through » is said, because what he suggests to us amiss, we, following, fulfil of our own will, and as it were together with him we wound ourselves alike.

« He hath not spared, and hath poured out my bowels upon the ground. » He calls the bowels of the Church the minds of those who contain her mysteries within themselves: whom, while the ancient enemy draws them to secular business, he pours out her bowels upon the ground.

802A« He hath not spared, » that is, he has not ceased.

VERS. 15.-- « He hath cut me down. » In her weak ones the Church, etc., as far as when it has heaped fault upon fault.

« He hath rushed upon me as a giant. » Because assuredly the malignant spirit fights after the manner of a giant against her, that is against the soul, overcome by depraved habit, since the more often the soul subjects itself to him, the more intolerable it makes him to itself. But because for the most part it returns to penance, there follows.

VERS. 16.-- « I have sewed sackcloth over my skin. » By sackcloth and ashes penance is understood, by the skin and the flesh the sin of the flesh. Therefore as it were sackcloth is sewed over the skin, and the flesh is covered with ashes, because the fault of the flesh is covered by penance, lest in the strict judge's 802Bexamination it be seen unto vengeance.

VERS. 16.-- « My face is swollen. » The faces of the Church are those who, set in governance, appear first, so that from their comeliness there may be honour for the faithful people. These bewail the faults of the weak; but while they see some return to pardon, and some persist in iniquity, they are amazed at the hidden judgments of God, which they do not understand.

VERS. 17.-- « And my eyelids. » They are called eyelids, because they keep watch for the foreseeing of the ways of the peoples; but when not even the vigilant overseers understand the hidden judgments of God, the eyelids of holy Church grow dim.

VERS. 18.-- « These things I have suffered. » From the words of the body, etc., as far as by whom is the sorrow borne?

VERS. 19.-- « Earth, cover not thou my blood. » 802CTo sinning man it was said: « Thou art earth and into earth shalt thou go; » [Vulg. Gen. 3:19 pulvis es et in pulverem reverteris, "thou art dust and into dust shalt thou return"] which earth hid not the blood of our Redeemer, because every sinner, taking the price of his own redemption, confesses and praises it, and makes it known to what neighbours he can. The earth also did not cover his blood: because holy Church has now preached the mystery of her redemption in all parts of the world. « Nor let my cry find in thee a place of hiding. » (Ibid.) The cry of our Redeemer is « the blood of redemption, » which is taken by the faithful, which, as the Apostle says, speaks better than the blood of Abel: because the blood of Abel sought the death of the fratricide, the blood of the Lord obtained life for its persecutors. Which cry finds a place of hiding in us, if what the mind has believed, the tongue 802Dkeeps silent.

VERS. 20.-- « For behold, in, » etc. The Father is the witness of the Son, as in the Gospel: « And the Father who sent me, he hath given testimony of me. »

« And my conscious one. » Because by one will, etc., as far as but such a man ought not to fear the reprehensions of men, whence it is subjoined.

VERS. 21.-- « My friends are full of words. » When friends are full of words, that is, when even those disparage who are joined in the faith, it is needful that the eye should drop unto God, so that our whole intention may flow down into the compunction of inward love, and may raise itself to the inward things the more, the more it is compelled by outward reproaches to return within.

VERS. 22.-- « And would that, » etc. Sinners 803Aindeed we are, etc., as far as but nevertheless he consoles himself concerning its shortness.

VERS. 23.-- « For behold, short years pass away. » Everything that passes is short, and we walk in the path of death by which we do not return, not that we are not brought back to life by rising again; but because we come not again to the labours of this mortal life, nor to the winning of rewards by labours.

VERS. 1.-- « My spirit shall be made thin. » (GREG.) The spirit of the elect is made thin by fear of the judge, and if they find in themselves any carnal thoughts, they consume them by the burning of penance. But the spirit of the wicked grows thick through the swelling of elation. « And only the grave 803Bremaineth for me. » He considers himself almost dead, because he in no wise is ignorant that he is to die whence there follows:

VERS. 2.-- « I have not sinned. » He did not sin so far as to deserve these scourges, because he was struck not for the correcting of a fault but for the increasing of grace. Or, the Head says this, who without fault took upon himself the penalty of fault, that is, the bitterness of the passion.

VERS. 3.-- « Set me beside thee. » Through the ascension; afterwards, because Judaea was stirred against the disciples, he adds: « The hand of whomsoever. » Because now they act in vain against him who sits in heaven.

VERS. 4.-- « Their heart far off. » For if they knew the keeping of discipline, they would in no wise despise the precepts of the Redeemer. « Therefore not, » etc. For they who study not 803Cto keep their life by discipline lie always in the depths through their desires, nor do they raise their mind to the hope of the heavenly country.

VERS. 5.-- « He promiseth a prey, » etc. He turns the sentence to the head of the wicked, namely the devil, whose « companions » are the apostate angels, who fell with him. « Sons » are perverse men, who out of his depraved persuasion are begotten in the working of malice. « He promiseth therefore a prey to his companions, » because he promises to the malignant spirits the souls of the depraved, to be seized at the end.

« The eyes of his sons shall fail. » (Ibid.) Because the intentions of men, etc., as far as what they may grieve over, they suffer without end.

VERS. 6.-- « He hath set me. » Everyone who is struck by a scourge, etc., as far as and he wishes for his 803Dadversary that same penalty which he beholds to have befallen a just man.

VERS. 7.-- « It hath grown dim from indignation. » The eye grows dim from indignation, when those very men who in the Church have the light of truth behold the perverse prevail against the innocent: because they are troubled by wonder at the hidden judgment. But when the just grow dim unto indignation, the weak for the most part fall away even to unbelief, whence there follows: « And my members as it were into nothing. » By the name of members the tenderness of the weak is expressed, who, while they see the perverse flourish and the just tormented, repent of having begun good things, and so withdraw the sooner to the doing of evils, as though the good which they had begun had harmed their life.

VERS. 8.-- « The just shall be astonished at this. » This is 804Awhat he had said, « my eye hath grown dim toward indignation. » [Vulg. Job 17:7 ab indignatione, "from indignation"] « And the innocent shall be raised up against the hypocrite. » The perfect innocent man is raised up against the hypocrite, when he despises him together with his flower, and by preaching the things that are right declares that he is to be despised by the rest.

VERS. 9.-- « And the just shall hold his way. » Because, the hypocrite having been considered, while he beholds him obtain out of a depraved will the things that are of the world, he himself is bound the more strongly to the love of heavenly things. Knowing that eternal rewards shall not be wanting to good desires: since temporal goods are not denied even to depraved and double hearts. « And he that hath clean hands shall add strength. » Because seeing the earthly glory of the perverse, etc., as far as which cannot be 804Bcommon to him with the reprobate.

VERS. 10.-- « Therefore all you. » After he has brought in the outward advancements of the evil, but the inward ones of the good, he exhorts the elect that they be converted, by forsaking evils, and come, by doing good things.

VERS. 11.-- « And not in you. » Desiring their conversion he longs that he may find no wise man among them, as if he should say: Learn to be fools among yourselves, that you may be able to be truly wise in God.

« My days have passed. » « Days, » prosperities: « Thoughts tormenting the heart, » he calls the care of earthly happiness: which, the more heavily they press the elect, the more subtly does the judge think that accounts of them are to be exacted these thoughts are scattered together with that same earthly happiness.

804CVERS. 12.-- « They have turned night into day. » Scattered thoughts turn « night into day, » because to the just it is sometimes more pleasing to suffer evils out of adversity than to be wearied out of prosperity by the care of an earthly stewardship.

« And again after darkness. » (Ibid.) Light is hoped for after darkness, etc., as far as and would place the souls of the just in a perpetual seat already.

VERS. 13.-- « If I wait. » The former saints were able to endure adversities, etc., as far as to have prepared for themselves a rest in hell.

VERS. 14.-- « To rottenness I have said. » He calls rottenness his father, etc., as far as that we may be wearied in mind by restless thoughts as it were by certain worms.

804DVERS. 15.-- « Where is then now my expectation. » The expectation of the just is Christ; whom they knew would come at some time, but they sought that he should come sooner: whence here is added, now: « And who considereth my patience? » God considers the patience of the just; but he is said as it were not to consider, because he appears less quickly than the prayer of desire would have, and defers the grace of his dispensation unto longer times.

VERS. 16.-- « Into the deepest hell shall all my things descend. » Before the coming of the mediator Job was to descend into hell, etc., as far as the retribution was still awaited to be received in the rest of hell alone. « Thinkest thou that at least for himself there will be rest for me? » [Vulg. Job 17:16 ibi, "there"] It is to be weighed which of us is secure 805Aconcerning rest: if even he trembles about it, whose praises of virtue the very judge who strikes him proclaims.

VERS. 2.-- « Unto what end will you cast about words. » (GREG., in Job, l. XIV.) He asserts that blessed Job had broken out into pride, whom he acknowledges to cast about words. « Understand thou first. » [Vulg. Job 18:2 intelligite, plural, "understand ye"] He marks with how great elation that man had swollen, who thought that Job spoke what he did not understand.

VERS. 3.-- « Why are we reputed. » It is proper to the human mind to suspect that this is done to itself which itself does. For he thinks himself despised who has been accustomed to despise the good: and out of the suspicion of contempt he leaps forth into indignation, and heaps up contumelies.

VERS. 4.-- « Why dost thou destroy thy soul. » [Vulg. Job 18:4 Qui perdis animam tuam in furore tuo, "thou who destroyest thy soul in thy fury"] The reprobate 805Breckon the zeal of rectitude, or the spiritual grace of holy preaching, to be the madness of fury: whereby they judge that the souls of the faithful perish. « Shall the earth be forsaken for thee. » The Church says, etc., as far as whence this man insults over the scourges of Job, whence he adds:

VERS. 5.-- « Shall not the light of the impious be quenched. » This could rightly be said of an impious man, but ought not to have been said against a holy one: Light he calls the prosperity of the present life. But the light of the impious is quenched, because the prosperity of a fleeting life is ended together with that life itself. « Nor shall the flame of his fire shine. » He calls fire the fervour of temporal desires, whose flame is the outward comeliness or power which proceeds from his inward burning: but it shall not shine, because in the day of departure every outward comeliness is withdrawn.

805CVERS. 6.-- « The light shall be darkened in the tabernacle. » Sometimes we take darkness for sadness and light for joy. The light therefore is darkened in the tabernacle of the impious, because in his conscience the joy which had come from temporal things fails. « And the lamp that is over him shall be quenched. » The lamp is a light in an earthen vessel, etc., as far as because earthly joys possess the mind of the wicked.

VERS. 7.-- « The steps of his strength shall be straitened, etc. » Because the powers of his malice, which he now exercises, punishment shall afterwards bind fast. « And it shall cast him down headlong. » The wicked man has now a counsel to seek after present things, etc., as far as which he expresses when he subjoins.

VERS. 8.-- « For he hath put into a net. » (Ibid.) He who puts his feet into a net does not draw them out when he wills. So 805Dhe who casts himself down in sins does not rise at once when he wills.

« And he walketh in the meshes thereof. » (Ibid.) He who walks in the meshes of a net entangles his own steps by walking: and when he strives to free himself for walking, he is bound so that he may not walk.

VERS. 9.-- « His foot shall be held, » etc. Because, namely, the end shall be bound fast in sin. « And it shall burn against him. » Because in that he weighs himself bound to evils, therein he despairs of his own return; and by that very despair he burns more sharply toward the concupiscences of this world. In his mind a thirst burns against him, because he who has acted perversely is kindled to act more perversely.

VERS. 10.-- « It is hidden in the earth. » (Ibid.) 806AA snare is hidden in the earth, when a fault is concealed under earthly advantages, so that a man may see what he can covet, and yet may in no wise see in what noose of fault he sets his foot. « And his trap. » For the enemy observes the ways of each man, to what vice they are near, and sets before his face those things to which he knows the mind is more easily inclined, as luxury to soft and merry ways, anger and pride to harsh minds. There, then, he sets his trap, where he beholds the path of the mind to be: because he plants there the peril of deception, where he has found the way of a near thought to be.

VERS. 11.-- « On every side they shall terrify. » Because often for this reason each man fears to be good, lest he suffer from the depraved what he remembers himself to have done to the good: and while 806Bhe fears to suffer what he does, terrified on every side, suspected on every side, he loses his step in good work.

VERS. 12.-- « Let it be made thin by hunger. » Our flesh is weakness. But strength is the rational soul, which by reason can resist in the overcoming of vices. Which is made thin by hunger, when it is fed by no refreshment of inward food. « And let starvation invade his ribs. » The ribs are the senses of the soul, which, lying hidden, fortify the thoughts as bowels do. Starvation invades the ribs of the wicked man, because inward hunger wastes the senses of the mind, so that they in no way rule their own thoughts within, but wander to the outward things which they seek.

« Let it devour the beauty of his skin and consume his arms. (Idem.) » The beauty of the skin is outward temporal glory: through the arms works are designated. 806CDeath he calls sin, which slays the soul.

VERS. 13.-- « The firstborn death. » Pride, which is the beginning of every sin. The firstborn death therefore devours the beauty of his skin and his arms: whereby pride supplants the glory or the working of the wicked man. For he could have existed glorious even in this life, if he had in no wise been proud

VERS. 14.-- « Let his confidence be plucked away from his tabernacle. » (Idem.) His confidence is plucked out of the tabernacle, when the perverse man who had prepared many things in this life is scattered by a sudden death. « And let destruction tread upon him as a king. » Because either here he is pressed by the vices which draw him to destruction, or at the time of death he is subjected to the demoniac power.

VERS. 15.-- « Let them dwell in the tabernacle. » That is, let the apostate angels be conversant in 806Dhis mind through most wicked thoughts, his companions namely, who therefore now is not, because he has withdrawn from the highest essence.

« Let it be sprinkled in the tabernacle. » (Ibid.) In the tabernacle of the wicked man brimstone is sprinkled, as often as the delight of the flesh has dominion in his mind. For by brimstone the stench of the flesh is understood. And because such a man remains in evil whence he cannot even bring forth the fruit of good, he adds:

VERS. 16.-- « Below let his roots be dried up. » By « roots » we understand thoughts, etc., as far as because his whole working is accounted as nothing by the judgment above.

VERS. 17.-- « Let the memory perish. » (Ibid.) The wicked man strives to establish his memory in the earth, when he endeavours to spread abroad the glory 807Aof his own praise. And he rejoices that his name is celebrated in the streets, when far and wide he spreads out the working of his own iniquity.

(GREG.) The head of the wicked is the devil: for he himself in the last times, having entered into that vessel of perdition which shall be called Antichrist, shall endeavour to spread his name far and wide.

VERS. 18.-- « He shall drive him out of the light. » He is led from light to darkness, when from the honour of the present life he is damned to eternal punishments. Thus he speaks of each wicked man, so that it may be turned to the head, that is to the devil, who in Antichrist shall spread out the name which the evil now imitate. « And shall remove him out of the world, » etc. When, the judge appearing from above, he is removed from this world to punishments, all which things can also be taken of Antichrist, the head 807Bof the evil.

VERS. 19.-- « There shall be no seed, etc. » Because all the wicked, who out of his persuasion have been born in depraved actions, shall be struck together with that same head of theirs. That these things are to be taken of Antichrist, he opens in this while he says:

VERS. 20.-- « In his day they shall be astonished. » Because being then about to show forth so great signs, etc., as far as they fear the torments which they overcome. « And horror shall invade the first, » that is, the hearts of the elect shall be struck with dread: whence it is written.: « So that even the elect, if it can be done, may be led into error (Matth. XXIV), » not indeed about to fall, but about to tremble out of the flesh.

VERS. 21.-- « These then are the tabernacles. » Of this he related that which he had said, etc., as far as that they believed holy Job to have been struck for iniquity.

VERS. 2.-- « How long do you afflict, etc. » (GREG.) The good are worn down by the words of the wicked, when those men swell in words against them who lie either in a perverse faith or in depraved ways.

VERS. 3.-- « Behold ten times you confound me. » (Ibid.) Because he had heard rebukes from them five times, and five times answered, he declares himself to have been ten times confounded. Because in that he was heavily rebuked, and in that he speaks the words of doctrine to men who do not hear, he bore confusion, in his own rebukes, because he does not profit in them; in their rebukes, because he grieves over the depravity which he hears.

807D« Behold ten times » (Ibid.) The Church keeps the decalogue, to which the wicked bring confusion as often as in their own acts they withstand the divine voices.

« And you are not ashamed, oppressing me. » There are some whom a malice suddenly arisen invites to the perpetrating of wickedness, but whom nevertheless human shamefastness calls back.

VERS. 4.-- « Truly even if I have been ignorant. » The knowledge of heretics is not with them but against them, since it puffs up. But the ignorance of the Church, in that she cannot penetrate hidden things, is with her, because it is for her, since she humbles herself; and because what heretics seek to know is elation, that they may seem learned against the good, he adds: you on the contrary ought from me who am stricken to be raised up 808Aagainst yourselves, fearing worse things for yourselves. For a good man is first raised up in himself, afterwards in others.

VERS. 5.-- « But you raise yourselves against me. » That is, you leave your own selves to be reproved, and rebuke me with strict sentences. « And you reprove me. » Because those who had known him just before the scourges judged him to be unjust from that very striking of his.

VERS. 6.-- « At least now understand. » This the Lord had said of him ( thou hast stirred me up against him in vain ) which he himself asserts of himself: that he was afflicted by the Lord not with an equal judgment. For if his life and his scourges are weighed, he seems afflicted not with an equal judgment: but because he heaped up his merits out of the scourges, God afflicted Job with no unjust judgment. « That God hath not with an equal judgment. » It must therefore be asserted that God both 808Bdealt rightly with Job, and yet that he does not lie who says that it is not done equally: otherwise the devil overcame (in that which he had promised concerning the fault of the blessed man) him whom God praised. This not elation but sorrow wrung out. A good man, if in a humble mind, the cause or the sorrow requiring it, says good things of himself, does not sin. « And hath girded me with his scourges. » When so great an affliction weighs us down that the mind can breathe again by the consolation of no thing, we are now not only borne with scourges but even girded, because we are surrounded on every side by the lash of tribulations.

VERS. 7.-- « Behold I shall cry out, suffering violence. » (Ibid.) God, knowing what shall profit us, etc., as far as who cannot even discern the things that are to be done.

VERS. 8.-- « He hath hedged in my path, etc. » He saw his path hedged about with stripes, when, 808Cdesiring to pass over to security, he could not escape the scourges: and as it were in the track of his heart he found the darkness of ignorance, who could not penetrate why he was thus scourged.

VERS. 9.-- « He hath despoiled me of my glory. » Plainly these things suit Job, etc., as far as by whose falling the army falls more widely.

VERS. 10.-- « He hath destroyed me on every side, and I perish, and as to a tree plucked up, » etc. A tree is driven by the wind that it may fall: so the weak man is drawn by threats to injustice, and leaves the eternal things which he hoped for; and because sometimes he who, terrified by punishments, forsakes justice, nevertheless does not escape the punishments.

VERS. 11.-- « He is angry against me. » For he who is so struck that his strength is overcome, him God strikes not 808Das a son through discipline, but as an enemy through anger: whence also the prophet: « With the stroke of an enemy have I struck thee, with a cruel chastisement (Jerem. XXX). » And because often malignant spirits persuade many things to the hearts of the afflicted, and steal whatever of good there is, he adds:

VERS. 12.-- « His robbers have come together. » That is, the malignant spirits, who are busied in searching out the ways of men: who make themselves a way in the hearts of the afflicted, when amid the adversities which are borne outwardly they cease not to send in depraved thoughts also. « And they have besieged my tabernacle round about, » etc. They besiege the tabernacle round about, etc., as far as they wore down his whole body with ulcers

VERS. 13.-- « My brethren far off. » (Ibid.) Now 809Ahe uses the voice of the Redeemer: from him his brethren were made far off, and his acquaintance withdrew; whom, while they held the law, they had known how to prophesy, and yet when he was present they in no wise recognized him. For the Jews, near by the flesh and acquainted through the instruction of the law, as though forgetful of him whom by the words of the law they had prophesied through faith, denied him incarnate by the words of perfidy.

VERS. 15.-- « The tenants of my house. » That is, the priests, whose origin, assigned to the service of God, was already through their office held in the condition of « handmaids. » The souls of the Levites are as it were serving more familiarly at the secret places of the tabernacle, as at the inner parts of the chamber. « And I was as a stranger, etc. » Because he was not known by the synagogue; whence also the prophet: « Thou shalt be as a husbandman in the land, and as a wayfarer turning aside to lodge 809B(Jer. XIV). » For he who was not heard as Lord was believed to be not the possessor of the field but « a husbandman: » « Who as a wayfarer turned aside to lodge, » because he took away few out of Judaea, and, going on to the calling of the Gentiles, accomplished the journey he had begun.

VERS. 16.-- « I called my servant. » The Jewish people was the servant, obeying out of fear; whom, by gifts bestowed, as by voices sent forth, he determined to lead to himself, but he answered not, because he scorned to render works worthy of his gifts. « With his own mouth he was adorning. » [Vulg. Job 19:16 deprecabar, "I besought"] But I who had committed so many precepts to him by the mouth of the prophets, besought him with my own mouth: because, shown forth in the flesh, while he humbly spoke the commandments of life, he asked, as it were, a proud servant to come.

VERS. 17.-- « My wife hath abhorred my breath, etc. » 809CThe wife of the Lord, etc., as far as which, given over to carnal senses, did not recognize the mystery of his incarnation.

« And I entreated the sons of the womb. » By the womb of God we ought to understand his counsel; in which before the ages we were conceived through predestination, that being created we might be brought forth through the ages. He entreated therefore the sons of his own womb: because those whom he had founded he, being incarnate, humbly asked.

VERS. 18.-- « Fools also despised, etc. » Because while the men learned in the law despised God, the crowd of the people followed their unbelief. Leaving the wise, he had come to seek the poor and the foolish: whence with an increase of sorrow he says « Fools also; » they therefore for whom I took up folly, the Word made flesh, despised me. « And when I had departed from them. » 809DThe Lord as it were drew near to the heart of the peoples, when he showed them miracles: and as it were withdrew, when he displayed no signs, and they would not give faith to him who rested from miracles.

VERS. 19.-- « They have abhorred me, etc. » The scribes and the doctors of the law, etc., as far as concerning the same order of the doctors of the law there follows: « And he whom I loved most. » The order of the doctors, which, first serving in preaching, was loved most: whom the crowd followed not only unto not believing, but even unto persecuting God. And then was done that which follows:

VERS. 20.-- « To my skin, being consumed. » In the bones is strength, etc., as far as at the time of the passion he found women beside him.

810A« The flesh » (GREG.) Which had clung to the bone, while the disciples, though weak, preached the faith of the truth to the peoples. And when the holy women prepared those outward supports of the body which were necessary, they remained as it were the skin outside upon the body.

« And left behind. » The teeth are the apostles; the lips only were left about the teeth, when two, walking after his death, knew indeed how to talk together concerning him, but were afraid now to preach him, or to bite the vices of unbelievers. But now he returns to the proper words of Job.

« Only. » Nor is there in happy men anything else about the teeth than lips: and so it is plain that this is said mystically.

VERS. 21.-- « Have mercy on me. » It belongs to the godly, when they suffer from adversaries, to be moved not so much to anger as to 810Bprayers. And he calls himself touched by the hand of the Lord, as Satan himself had said: « Put forth thy hand, and touch his bone. »

VERS. 22.-- « Why do you persecute me. » By so much the more justly does God strike the vices of others, as he has in himself nothing of vices. And the sense is: You so afflict me out of my weaknesses, as if you yourselves, after the manner of God, had nothing of weakness. « As God. » They do the same with God, because they do what almighty God permits to be done; but they do not will the same: because when almighty God by loving shows forth a cleansing, the depravity of the unjust by raging exercises malice. Or, as though they were not weak, who ought not to rebuke when God strikes, lest they add sorrow to sorrow, but to console. But when the hand of the Lord ceases, then rebuke 810Ccan be made to those who deserve it. « And are you filled from my flesh. » Those whose mind hungers for the punishments of neighbours seek to be filled with the flesh of others. Or, they who feed by the disparaging of another's life are filled with the flesh of others.

« Who will grant me, etc. » The hard things which he endures he wills not to be covered by silence, but to be drawn into knowledge by his example, so that others may be able to be built up unto patience.

« Who will grant me. » (Ibid.) These things too suit the Church, etc., as far as but afterwards he divides that same book into a plate of lead and into flint.

« Who will give me, etc. » By the iron pen, the strong judgment of the Fathers. By the lead, the people of Judaea heavy 810Dwith sin. By the flint, the gentile world is figured. All things therefore which he bore, both the people of Judaea, taught by the strong judgment of the Fathers, and the gentile world acknowledged. What is written in lead is the sooner blotted out. In flint it is carved with difficulty, but it remains: so Judaea quickly received the words of God, and quickly forsook them. The gentile world scarcely received them, but what it had received it kept firmly.

VERS. 25.-- « For I know that my Redeemer, etc. » He said not maker, but openly declaring him Redeemer, who, after he had created all things, redeemed us from captivity by his own passion. And he lives who lay dead among the hands of the impious.

« And in the last day I shall rise out of the earth, and again, etc. » (Ibid.) Because the resurrection, etc., 811Aas far as in which flower he is shown to be a priest, who intercedes for us.

VERS. 27.-- « Whom I myself shall see, etc. » (GREG.) Our flesh after the resurrection shall be the same and diverse. The same by nature, diverse by glory. And it shall be spiritual, because incorruptible and palpable: because it shall not lose the essence of a true nature. « I myself, and mine eyes shall behold, and not to others. » [Vulg. Job 19:27 et non alius, "and not another"] He expressly indicates the truth of the resurrection: for it is not that one dies and another rises again (as those say who hold that the body shall be invisible and impalpable, as Eutychius said) but the very same.

« This my hope is laid up in my bosom. » We believe that we have nothing more certain, etc., as far as whence he straightway adds:

811BVERS. 28.-- « Why then now. » The perverse, because they long to find matter of accusation in the tongue of the just man, seek the root of a word, from which they may take the origin of their speaking and spread out the branches of their loquacity: but nevertheless the holy man, in pity, shows the evils that they should flee.

VERS. 29.-- « Flee therefore. » (Ibid.) To flee the face of the sword is to appease the sentence of strict animadversion before it appears. « And know ye that there is judgment. » Everyone who acts perversely, by the very fact that he despises this, does not know that there is a judgment of God.

« Therefore my thoughts. » (GREG. in Job., l. XV.) As if he should say: because I consider the terror of the last judgment, therefore I am confounded in fear by the tumults of my thoughts. 811C« And my mind is hurried into diverse things. » When now he weighs with anxious dread the evils which he neglected to do, now the blameworthy things in which he stands, now the right things which he sees to be still wanting to him. These men, out of Job's company, knew indeed how to live rightly, but not knowing how to weigh God's judgments subtly, they believe that the just cannot be stricken here. And therefore they suspected him to be wicked, and slip down into rebuke: to which nevertheless they descend under a certain reverence. Whence this man adds.

VERS. 3.-- « The doctrine wherewith, etc. » (Ibid.) These things having been moderately set down first, etc., as far as and this I find, that « the praise of the wicked, etc. »

VERS. 4.-- « This I know from the beginning. » For if we lead the eyes of the mind from the very rising of the human race as far as this present time, 811Dwe see how brief was everything that could be brought to an end.

VERS. 5.-- « And the joy of the hypocrite. » The joy of the hypocrite is after the likeness of a point. For as the stylus, in making a point, is lifted while it is set down, so the hypocrite, while he touches the praise of the present life, loses it.

« After the likeness of a point, » because the gladness passes away, the punishment abides: it appears for a moment, it disappears for ever.

VERS. 6.-- « If he shall have gone up, » that is, even though he feigns that he leads a heavenly life, even though he makes a show of his understanding as like to the true preachers, yet like a dunghill he shall be destroyed in the end, because his mind shall be damned for the stench of its own vices.

812AVERS. 7.-- « And they that had seen him shall say. » (Ibid.) They who saw this man lifted up will say, when he is extinguished, Where is he? because he appears neither in this world where he had been lifted up, nor in the rest of eternity, of which he was thought to be.

VERS. 8.-- « As a dream that flieth away. » The life of the hypocrite, etc., as far as because sleeping he was seeing the favours of men.

VERS. 9.-- « The eye that had seen him. » The place of the hypocrite is the heart of flatterers: for there he rests, where he finds favours. The eye therefore that had seen him shall not see him, because in death he is hidden from his lovers, who had been wont to look upon him with admiration.

« Neither shall he behold him any more. » Because the tongues of flatterers 812Bdo not follow him unto judgment with their favours.

VERS. 10.-- « His children shall be worn away, » etc. Because those who are born in hypocrisy from the imitation of him, while they do not hold the solidity of truth, fail in the neediness of the heart.

VERS. 11.-- « His bones shall be filled. » The youth of the hypocrite is the beginning of depravity, etc., as far as to be emptied of all solidity and to perish.

VERS. 12.-- « For when it shall have been sweet. » (Ibid.) In the mouth of the heart iniquity is sweet, which he covers under the covering of bland speech. For the evil would be on the tongue, and not under the tongue, if the hypocrite in speaking laid open his malice.

« He shall spare it and not. » He spares the evil which he loves, who does not pursue it by repenting; and he does not forsake it, 812Cbut conceals it in his throat, because he so keeps it in thought that he never brings it forth in the voice.

(BEDA.) That is, he strokes, cherishes and nourishes his own evil, and delighting himself in it, never repents so as to depart from it.

VERS. 14.-- « His bread in his belly. » For the most part the hypocrite is eager to be instructed by the bread of sacred eloquence, not that he may live by it, but that he may appear learned; but while he understands crookedly the word of doctrine which he seeks ill, he slips also into heresies: it befalls him that, as of the gall of asps, so he dies of the bread. But because he in no wise keeps God's words in work, even if he understands them rightly, he loses them in the present life, so that he does not know what he wished to do.

VERS. 15.-- « Riches. » Those of the sacred law, which he devoured by reading, 812Dhe shall vomit up by forgetting: which God by a just judgment plucks out of his memory.

« The head of asps. » (Ibid.) The asp is a small serpent, etc., as far as as the viper kills by its tongue.

VERS. 17.-- « Let him not see the streams. » (Ibid.) The streams of the river are the gifts of the Holy Spirit, etc., as far as it signifies the mystery of Christ's incarnation.

VERS. 18.-- « He shall pay for all the things that he did. » For he shall pay out in torment those unlawful desires which he kept here, nor shall he be consumed in death; but that he may be tormented without end, he is compelled to live without end, so that he whose life was here dead in fault, there his death may live in punishment. Let him say therefore, « he shall pay for all the things that he did, » and yet he shall not be consumed, because he is tormented and not extinguished: he dies 813Aand lives, he fails and subsists always, and is without end.

VERS. 19.-- « Because breaking in pieces. » He breaks and strips bare the house of the poor man, because him whom he crushes by power he does not blush to despoil by avarice

VERS. 20.-- « Neither was his belly satisfied. » For the belly of the wicked man is avarice, and in it is gathered whatever is swallowed down by perverse desire. But it is clear that avarice is not extinguished by the things desired, but increased; for after the manner of fire, when it has received logs to consume, it grows, and whence the flame seems for a moment to be pressed down, thence a little after it is seen to spread abroad.

« And when he shall have had what he had coveted. » It is of greater 813Bwrath when that is granted which is ill desired, because from thence a sudden vengeance follows, because he obtained this also which he coveted while God was angry.

VERS. 21.-- « There remained nothing of his city. » [Vulg. cibo, "food," where Migne prints civitate; the gloss below reads "food"] When the hypocrite is stricken, nothing remains of his food, because when he is led to punishments he is estranged from all the things he had possessed.

« Therefore nothing, etc. » Because, withdrawn from this life, he goes naked to the judge.

VERS. 22.-- « When he shall be filled, he shall be straitened. » (GREG.) When he has heaped up much he is straitened; for he is made anxious how he may guard what he has acquired.

« He shall burn, and every sorrow. » On this side and that he fears those who lie in wait, etc., as far as by so much the more easily is he hurried away to 813Ctorment. There follows:

VERS. 23.-- « Would that his belly may be filled, etc., let him rain down war upon him. » For God to rain down war, etc., as far as he scorned to foresee.

VERS. 24.-- « He shall flee from weapons of iron. » (Ibid.) The covetous man sometimes filches what belongs to another, etc., as far as he sets himself before the strokes of the eternal judgment. But meanwhile,

VERS. 25.-- « The sword drawn out, » etc. The wicked man, while he contrives crooked things in thought, is as a sword in the sheath. It goes out of the sheath when it is laid open by the iniquity of an evil work; drawn out, however, by the seducer, but going out by his own will,

« They shall go and come, » etc. Malignant spirits are to good minds, etc., as far as elation over continence 813Dis put in its place, etc.

VERS. 26.-- « All darkness is hidden. » For he who does not fulfil all things at once in effect holds silently in his mind all the things that may hurt.

« It shall devour him, » etc. The fire of Gehenna, which is not kindled by human effort, but was created by God from the origin of the world.

« He shall be afflicted, being left. » The tabernacle of the wicked man is the flesh, because he dwells in it gladly, and with it his spirit shall be tormented. The good do not place their joy in the flesh, but in heaven. Left by the flesh from which he is drawn away, which he loved here and would not leave: then, because of the torments, he will wish to leave it, but shall not be able.

814AVERS. 27.-- « They shall reveal; » (Ibid.) because here he spared neither the good nor the bad, in the fearful examination the life of the just and of sinners alike shall accuse him.

VERS. 28.-- « It shall be laid open. » When every evil that was being born in his conscience is shown forth, at the coming of the judge.

« He shall be dragged away in: » because in the time of vengeance, hurried away to punishments, he is separated from the face of the eternal judge.

VERS. 29.-- « This is the portion of a wicked man. » For when the justice of God exacts punishment of the reprobate for their perverse acts, it renders them evils even to the retribution of their words.

• 814B

VERS. 4.-- « Is it against. » Blessed Job, if while pleasing God he displeased men, would have no causes of sadness; but because he believed that he had displeased God through the present scourges, being made doubtful about the life he had passed before, he now called his mind to sadness: for if, the scourges being absent, he were disputing against a man about the merits of his own life, he ought in no wise to have been made sad.

« Is my disputation against man. » As if: not yet a hypocrite, if I were dealing with men concerning my life, I should not fear: and if I displeased them, I should not care; but because it is with God, I am rightly saddened. « But do you attend to me, » as I do God, yet I do not fear you.

VERS. 5.-- « Attend ye, » that is, consider what I have done, and wonder at the things which I suffer.

814C« And lay your finger upon your mouth, » that is, add to your speech the virtue of discretion.

VERS. 6.-- « And I, when I shall have remembered. » (Ibid.) Because he had not forgotten his own acts, etc., as far as he subjoins against his words:

VERS. 7.-- « Why then do the wicked live. » They are raised up with honours, they are strengthened with possessions, because the divine patience bears with them.

« And comforted with riches, » etc., so that they are allowed to subsist long in them; but because there are those to whom to have these things is a punishment, since they have no heirs to whom they may leave them. He adds:

VERS. 8.-- « Their seed continueth. » For the increase of their felicity, heirs are given along with the patrimony.

814D« Before them. » Lest any necessity should withdraw, at least from their eyes, the things in which their mind exults; but lest, these being barren, the stock should be extinguished in them, he adds:

« A crowd of kinsmen and of grandchildren in their sight. » Behold, they are said to have life, honours, riches, sons, grandsons: but if domestic care burned within, this felicity would not be glad, whence he adds:

VERS. 9.-- « Their houses are secure, and peaceable, and there is not. » For what would the aforesaid felicity be, if it were not glad? If things are prosperous within, in the fields also.

« Their ox hath conceived. » For the masters of flocks the first felicity is, etc., as far as whence the fruitfulness of the household is subjoined:

815AVERS. 11-- « They go forth like flocks. » That, as greater things have been granted them to have, so many may spring up to be guarded.

« And their little ones exult in play. » But lest we should think that play a mean thing, he says:

VERS. 12.-- « They hold the timbrel and the harp. » As it were: while the masters swell with honours and possessions, those subject to them rejoice in sportive doings.

VERS. 13.-- « They spend their days in good things. » Because all the length of the present life is known to be a point, since it is ended by an end. For whatever could pass away was sudden.

« And in a moment they go down to hell. » But the end is worst; behold whither he was tending, because the prosperity of the present life is no witness of innocence, since both they who have used 815Bit perish, and they who are scourged are set free: which is against Job's friends.

VERS. 14.-- « Who have said to God: Depart from us. » (GREG.) They say to God, Depart from us, who refuse to afford him an approach to themselves, and assail him with crooked deeds.

« The knowledge of thy ways. » The way of God is peace, humility, patience: and they who despise these say, We will not have the knowledge of thy ways.

VERS. 15.-- « Who is the Almighty? » etc. « For the fool hath said in his heart: There is no God. »

« And what doth it profit us if we pray? » The wicked, who seek not God but outward gifts, when they see that these same are lacking to those who serve, themselves 815Cscorn to serve.

VERS. 16.-- « But yet, because they are not. » He has his goods in his hand who, by despising things temporal, presses them under the dominion of the mind. But whosoever loves them too much subjects himself to them rather than them to himself.

« Their counsel is far. » The counsel of the wicked is to seek earthly glory, to neglect the eternal. But because in this life they do not prosper continually, there follows:

VERS. 17.-- « How often shall the lamp of the wicked be put out. » Often the wicked man reckons the life of his sons to be his lamp; but when the son who is too much loved is taken away, the lamp of the wicked man, which was seen, is put out; and so it is also with wealth and honours.

And a flood shall come upon them. » A flood comes upon the wicked 815Dwhen they suffer the waves of sorrows from some exaliqua adversity.

« And he shall divide sorrows, » etc. He who keeps eternal sorrows for the wicked man also pierces his mind here sometimes with a temporal sorrow; for because he strikes both here and there, he divides the sorrows of his fury upon the wicked man, that he may be crushed with a double crushing.

VERS. 18.-- « They shall be as chaff. » Because by the blast of God's anger they are suddenly lifted up and carried away to the fire:

« And as the ashes which, » because the whirlwind, snatching them, carries them off to eternal punishments.

VERS. 19.-- « God shall keep for his children. » Because he who imitates the iniquity of a parent is bound also by his offence.

816A« And when he shall have repaid. » For the wicked man does not know the evils he has done, save when he has begun to be punished.

VERS. 20.-- « His eyes shall see. » Because he had so hardened in iniquity that he did not fear to be struck even in the very things he loved, provided that he might fulfil what he had crookedly thought: concerning which hardening it is subjoined:

VERS. 21.-- « For what is it to. » Not that in hell he does not think about his kindred, etc., as far as lest anyone presume to discuss it, there follows:

VERS. 22.-- « Shall any man teach God knowledge? » [Vulg. Job 21:22 sets Deus in the nominative, "Shall God teach any man knowledge"] that is, he does nothing unjustly with us, who has justly judged the angelic nature also, which is subtler than we; whence nothing remains to complain of.

VERS. 23.-- « This man dieth. » Behold, he sets down those things in which one may discuss the secret of the Almighty, by asking 816Bwhy he permits these things so to be. The surface of the letter is plain enough of itself. But as to what he says:

VERS. 24.-- « His bowels are full of fat. » For fat comes of abundant food, etc., as far as behold, the rich man rejoices emptily, the poor man is afflicted more emptily.

VERS. 26.-- « And yet they shall sleep together in the dust. » (Ibid.) What care is there about an unlike life, prosperous or adverse, when the end in the dust is alike? That life is to be thought upon, where by the resurrection an unlike end is reached, where the happy man passes to punishments, and the afflicted to rest.

« And yet together in the dust. » That is, in earthly desires they shall close the eyes of the mind:

« And worms, » which are of the flesh, that is, fleshly cares 816Cpress them: which was not so in Job, who neither swelled over the things he had, nor was anxious over the things he lost. But they think this, wherefore he subjoins:

VERS. 27.-- « Surely I know your thoughts. » For him whom they saw stricken, etc., as far as nor do they pass over perfectly to things eternal, whence he adds:

VERS. 29.-- « Ask any one of the way. » [Vulg. viatoribus, "wayfarers," for via; the gloss expounds the wayfarer] He is called a wayfarer who considers the present life to be for him a way and not a country, who scorns to fix his heart in love of the passing world, but seeks things eternal.

VERS. 31.-- « Who shall reprove his ways before him. » While he was speaking of the body of all the wicked, etc., as far as neither Elias nor Enoch by their own powers, but by God's.

VERS. 32.-- « He himself unto the graves. » This in life, etc., as far as because he shall be received only in the hearts of the depraved.

816D« And in the heap. » Because in the congregation of sinners he puts forth the snares of his cunning; and since the wicked are many, they are rightly named a heap.

VERS. 33.-- « He was sweet. » Cocytus is called the mourning of the sick, etc., as far as signifying that there is there an unjust mourning.

« And after him every. » (Ibid.) Here is understood the man who savours of human things; he draws every man after him, because all whom he finds carnal he snatches under the yoke of his dominion: who even now, before he appears, draws innumerable men, though not all, because many are drawn back from carnality.

VERS. 34.-- « How then do ye comfort me, etc. » 817ASince, if the wicked man is permitted to prosper in this life, which has been shown concerning Antichrist, it is necessary that the elect should be held under the bridle of the scourge.

« Since your answer, » etc. For they could not comfort him, in that by their own words they went against the truth. For when they called him a hypocrite, since by lying they were committing a fault, they were increasing the punishment of the afflicted just man; because the fault of another's deceit tortures him who loves the truth.

VERS. 1, 2.-- « Answering, etc. Is it to God. » (GREG., in Job., l. XVI.) They who fail against the words of truth repeat even what is known, lest by keeping silence they should seem overcome; whence Eliphaz, pressed by blessed Job's words, 817Bsays the things of which no one is ignorant; for he says:

« Is it to be compared to God? » For in comparison with God, knowledge, etc., as far as he subjoins as though coming down.

VERS. 3.-- « What doth it profit? » For in everything that we do well, etc., as far as Eliphaz still adds what no one is ignorant of.

VERS. 4.-- « Shall he, fearing, reprove thee? » Who, even doting, would think this, that God reproves us out of fear, and out of dread sets forth his judgment against us? « Shall he reprove to thee? » They who know not how to measure their words slip down into idle sayings.

VERS. 5.-- « And not for thy very great malice. » From idle words, etc., as far as but let him always come down to worse things. For there follows.

817CVERS. 6.-- « For thou hast taken away the pledge. » These things are plain to the letter, etc., as far as or they lose spiritual gifts, who come to thee.

VERS. 9.-- « Widows. » Heretics call the peoples, etc., as far as they say that it is repaid to him for sins? And this is, « Therefore art thou surrounded with snares. »

VERS. 11.-- « And thou didst think that thou. » As if he should say, etc., as far as as wave upon wave.

VERS. 12.-- « Dost thou not think that God. » As if: is it therefore, etc., as far as because by a foolish judgment they think themselves alone wise.

VERS. 15.-- « Is it the path? » As the path of the Redeemer is humility, so the path of the ages is pride. And so wicked men tread the path of the ages, who walk about in elation through the desires of this life.

817DVERS. 16.-- « Who were taken away before their time; unless that all. » [Vulg. Job 22:16 has no clause answering to nisi quod omnes] They who love the present life, etc., as far as and the sentence is changed, but not the eternal counsel.

« And a river hath overthrown their foundation. » While the wicked do not look upon present things as fleeting, etc., as far as because the course of mutability undermines in them the standing of a perverse structure.

VERS. 18.-- « When he had filled. » The Lord fills the houses of the wicked, because he does not deny his own gifts even to the ungrateful.

« Whose counsel is far. » This also Job, etc., as far as he desires to be unlike the wicked.

818AVERS. 19.-- « The just shall see, » the destruction of the wicked.

« And shall rejoice. » When they shall have cleaved to the strict judge in a security now made perfect. For now they look upon the reprobate and groan.

VERS. 20.-- « Is it not cut down. » Here the wicked are set upright, etc., as far as or they are dragged from the sight of the judge to Gehenna.

« And devoured their remains. » Because even if here they leave the flesh behind, at the resurrection they shall receive it back, that they may burn in the flesh in which they sinned.

VERS. 21.-- « Be at peace therefore. » It is a fault of pride to teach one who is better, which heretics often do to Catholics.

VERS. 23.-- « If he shall have returned. » [Vulg. reversus fueris, in the second person, "if thou shalt have returned"] Because thou hast been pulled down from the 818Bbuilding of justice.

« And thou shalt put far away. » The body is taken as the tabernacle of the soul, and the mind as the tabernacle of thoughts. And the sense is: If after thy errors thou return to God, thou shalt be cleansed in thought and in work.

VERS. 24.-- « He shall give for earth. » By earth is signified the weakness of action, by the flint strength, by the golden torrents the doctrine of inward brightness. To those therefore who are turned to him he gives for earth the « flint » of sturdy work, and « for the flint golden torrents. »

« For. » Because for sturdy work he multiplies the doctrine of clear preaching.

(BEDA.) He says this, that if, the Lord being made favourable to him, etc., as far as they are silver tried by fire.

VERS. 25.-- « And the Almighty shall be against. » 818C(Ibid.) Often, when we give heed to the sacred words, we grievously endure the snares of malignant spirits. And the sense is: when he shall have driven the malignant spirits from thee, the talent of the divine word shall grow bright in thee.

VERS. 26.-- « Then upon. » To abound in delights upon the Almighty is to be filled, in his love, with the banquets of Holy Scripture.

« And thou shalt lift up to God. » To lift up the face to God is to raise the heart to the searching out of things sublime.

VERS. 27.-- « And thou shalt pay thy vows. » He who has vowed vows, but through weakness is not strong enough to pay them, this is wrought in him out of the punishment of sin, that the power should be withdrawn from him who wills the good: but when the fault which stands in the way is wiped off, it comes to pass at once that possibility follows the vow.

818DVERS. 28.-- « Thou shalt decree. » A thing is decreed and comes to pass, when the virtue which is sought after out of desire, the Lord bestowing it, prospers also in effect.

« And it shall come. » Heretics promise the same things to the afflicted, if they will follow them.

« And in the ways. » For light to shine in the ways of the just is to sprinkle abroad the signs of its own brightness through the wondrous works of the virtues.

VERS. 29.-- « For he that hath been humbled. » Because he who humbles himself shall be exalted.

« And he who. » So far as it can be discerned through the ministry of the members, the first showing of pride is wont to be in the eyes.

VERS. 30.-- « The innocent shall be saved. » Because when 819Agrace has here come to him so that he becomes innocent, when he is led to judgment he is rewarded out of merit.

VERS. 1.-- « And Job answering said: Now also in bitterness. » (GREG.) The mind of the just man is always in bitterness, etc., as far as who seek to seduce by sweet speeches.

VERS. 2.-- « And the hand of my stroke. » Now the hand of the stroke is the strength of the smiting; but because out of adversities the just thirst the more for the face of their author, there follows:

VERS. 3.-- « Who will grant me. » The elect, when they see anything whatever done against their wish, run back to the hidden judgments of God, that in them they may see that what seems to run without in disorder 819Bis not disposed within in disorder. And this is what he adds:

« That I might find him. » As it is: that God now defers, so that he may be the more desired.

« And come even to his throne. » The throne is the angels, etc., as far as while they see that God disposes better things, whence:

« I will set judgment before God. » To set judgment before God, etc., as far as to consider how terrible the judge, now hidden and silent, will afterwards appear.

VERS. 4.-- « I will fill my mouth. » Because, while he contemplates the judge's examination against himself, he pursues himself bitterly with the invective of penance.

VERS. 5.--That I may know the words which, » etc. For when 819Cwe pursue our faults by repenting, we find what the judge could say to us about them in his examination: which he does not know, because he neglects his own evils.

VERS. 6.-- « I would not that he contend with much strength. » For who could be found just in the examination, if God should sift the life of men according to the majesty of his strength: for however just a man be, if he is strictly judged, he is pressed by the mass of that greatness, whence he adds:

« Nor of greatness. » As if he should say: If he contended with me according to his strength, he would press me with his own mass. And note that, while he shuns the strength, he desires the weakness of the incarnation, whence he adds:

VERS. 7.-- « Let him set forth equity. » The mediator of God and of men, etc., as far as as victor I may bring forth the judgment of 819Dmy absolution.

VERS. 8.-- « If to the east. » (Ibid.) As if he should say: the incarnate Son, etc., as far as But not even in all these does the soul fully know itself, whence:

VERS. 10.-- « But he indeed knoweth the way. » That is, I am not able to see him who sees me.

« And he hath tried. » Not being lifted up does he compare himself to gold, but he humbly considers his own things, which is allowed to every just man. And this is: « And try thou me as gold. » [Vulg. probavit me quasi aurum, "he hath tried me as gold," in the indicative] For by the burning of tribulation both vices are taken away and merits increased.

VERS. 11.-- « His steps he hath followed. » Blessed Job in his future working, etc., as far as he runs back as to an example set before him.

820AVERS. 12.-- « And in my bosom I have hidden. » We hide the words of his mouth in the bosom of the heart, since we hear his commandments not in passing, but as to be fulfilled in work; and if the words come forth in work, they nevertheless lie hidden in the heart. If the mind is not lifted up within, but if praise is sought without, then the word of God is not hidden in the bosom.

VERS. 13.-- « For he alone is. » Principally and unchangeably. For he alone is through himself, who does all things, in which he himself is to be feared, not the things which we suffer. Concerning whose unchangeableness he adds:

« And no man can turn away. » Because judgments once fixed can in no wise be changed.

« And his soul. » That very power by which he disposes all things is called his soul.

820BVERS. 14.-- « When he shall have fulfilled. » He fulfils his will in me, because he afflicts me with many strokes. But « many like things are at hand with him, » because if he purposes to strike, there is still found where the wound may grow.

VERS. 15.-- « And therefore at his face. » He is shaken with the dread of rectitude, when he beholds himself not to be fit for the accounts of one rendering them, if he be judged strictly.

VERS. 16.-- « God hath softened. » He ascribes therefore the power of his own strength not to himself, but to its author.

« He hath troubled me. » Never are the hearts of the just secure, but troubled with the fear of the judge; which hearts nevertheless are comforted by the gifts they have received, whence: « For I have not perished. » The scourges of the just either purge past sins or turn away future ones; which is not so in Job, but his virtue is increased.

820CVERS. 17.-- « For not. » He, set in the scourge, perishes from the health of the body because of the impending darkness, who is struck for the things done in the past, that he may be hidden from future punishments.

VERS. 1.-- « But they who. » Because although we already know God through faith, yet how his eternity is without past or future, we do not see. Blessed Job, that he may not be wise more than it behoves to be wise, testifying that the days of the Lord cannot be comprehended, presently turns the regard of his mind to the pride of heretics, who desire to be wise in high things, concerning whom there follows:

VERS. 2.-- « Others the bounds. » Whom, under the name of others, etc., as far as and with pestilent teachings they nourish them 820Dfor the slaying.

VERS. 3.-- « The ass of the fatherless. » By the fatherless he means the elect, etc., as far as they drive them back from the ministry of the good.

« And they have taken away. » The Church is called a widow, etc., as far as that they may draw away their followers also, whence he adds:

VERS. 4.-- « They have overthrown of the poor. » Not seldom those who seem meek and humble, if they know not how to keep discretion, fall by the examples of others.

VERS. 5.-- « Others like onagers. » For there are heretics who shun to be mingled with the peoples, but seek the retirement of a more secret life, and infect 821Athe more with the plague of their persuasion in proportion as they seem, from the merits of their life as it were, the more worthy of reverence. And they are compared to onagers, who, let loose in their own pleasures, are strangers to the bond of the faith of reason.

« They go forth. » For they accomplish not God's work but their own, while they follow not right teachings but their own desires.

« And watching for the prey. » They watch for the prey who always endeavour to wrest the words of the just to their own meaning, that through this they may prepare the bread of error for perverse sons.

VERS. 6.-- « A field not his own. » By the name of field or of vineyard the Church is signified, whom perverse preachers reap, and whose Author they vintage by oppressing him in his members: who, persecuting the grace of the Creator, 821Bwhile they snatch away certain out of her who seemed upright, what else do they carry off than the ears or the clusters of souls?

VERS. 7.-- « They send men away naked. » As garments protect the body, so good works protect the soul. And so heretics, when they destroy the good works of certain men, take away their garments.

« To whom not. » The covering pertains to justice, etc., as far as they may die without the garment of good work.

« Whom the showers of the mountains water. » That is, the streams of the preachers satisfy them.

« And having not. » By stones he means strong men, etc., as far as they embrace stones?

VERS. 10.-- « To the naked and to those going about without clothing. » 821CHe who works neither good things nor evil, etc., as far as we withdraw as it were the chaff of the ears, that we may be refreshed by the marrow of the spirit.

VERS. 11.-- « Who having trodden the winepresses. » (GREG.) They who persecute the Church, etc., as far as they rest in their own deeds as though at noonday. »

VERS. 12.-- « Out of the cities they have made [them] groan by force. » [Vulg. Job 24:12 viros, "they made men groan"] Because cities, from the peoples living together, etc., as far as those who run by the way of God not loosely but manfully.

VERS. 13.-- « And the soul of the wounded hath cried out. » The soul of the just is wounded when the faith of the weak is troubled; and it cries out while it wastes away at another's fall.

« They themselves were rebels against the light. » They are rebels against the light 821Dwho, by following their own desires, despise the good which they have known.

« They knew not his ways. » For they who are rebels first by knowing are afterward blinded, so that they know not.

« Nor have they returned. » A path is narrower than a way. But they who despise to do the more manifest things do not attain to the understanding of the more subtle; and God waited that they should go forward by his paths; but would that they had at least been willing to return by them, that the roads of life which they knew through innocence they might at least hold through penitence.

VERS. 14.-- « Very early in the morning the murderer riseth up. » Because every perverse man, in the prosperity of the present life (which is designated by the morning), slays the life of the humble by pressing it down, 822Aand, set in adversity and dejection (which is designated by the night), secretly wounds by wicked counsels, like a thief.

VERS. 15.-- « The eye of the adulterer. » This is said of heretics: for as he who commits adultery unlawfully joins to himself the flesh of another man's wife, so the heretics haeritici, when they snatch away a faithful soul into their own error, take another man's wife as it were.

« And he will cover his face. » The face of the human heart is the likeness of God, which the perverse man covers, that he may not be able to be known by the strict judge, when he confounds his own life with evil deeds; whence he shall say: « I never knew you. »

VERS. 16.-- « He diggeth through. » By the name of houses, etc., as far as they by no means dared to speak perverse things

822B« As in. » Because when they beheld the just in prosperity, since they could not speak, they will give themselves to malignant counsels against them.

VERS. 17.-- « If suddenly. » For when they see the just break forth to the summit of governing power, they are troubled. These rejoice at the casting down of the good, but « if suddenly the dawn appear, » that is, if good men come to rule, « they think it the shadow of death, » because they fear that the things they have done perversely be punished; they will not be corrected, but choose to go loosely and to rejoice in fault, whence he says

« And thus in. » Because they so rejoice in the night of sin as though the light of justice poured itself around them; or, in the present blindness they are as glad as though they already enjoyed to the full the light of the eternal country.

VERS. 18.-- « He is light upon the face of the water. » 822CThe surface of the water hither and thither, etc., as far as whence the sentence often returns to him who is the author of evil.

« Cursed be the portion. » (Ibid.) Whosoever in the present life does right things, etc., as far as yet he is held in the guilt of eternal malediction.

« Nor let him walk by the way of the vineyards. » He walks by the way of the vineyards who, weighing the preacher of the universal Church, turns aside neither from the rectitude of faith nor from that of good deeds.

VERS. 19.-- « He shall pass over to excessive heat. » Iniquity is compared to cold, etc., as far as that he may believe those who preach right things, he adds:

VERS. 20.-- « And even unto hell his sin. » That sin is brought down even unto hell which 822Dis not amended before the end of life.

VERS. 21.-- « His sweetness. » Because it belongs to the nature of worms, etc., as far as the corruption and stench of rottenness is loved.

« Let him not be in remembrance. » God beholds the life of the depraved and forgets it, because what he judges by the strictness of his sentence, so far as pertains to the memory of mercy he knows not.

VERS. 22.-- « For he hath fed the barren. » In this place the flesh is named barren: which, while it desires present things alone, knows not how to beget good thoughts:

« And to the widow. » The soul is called a widow, etc., as far as it scorns to serve.

VERS. 23.-- « He hath drawn down the strong. » In the strength 823Aof his own depravity he draws down the strong, when through the cunning of his error he snatches away the powerful of this world.

« And when he shall have stood. » The perverse preacher stands in this world so long as he lives in an earthly body, but he refuses to believe in his own life, because he scorns to know true things concerning God.

« But his eyes. » (GREG. in Job., l. XVII.) The sinner beholds his own ways, because he strives to think on those things only, to discern those things only, which may help him to temporal advantage.

VERS. 24.-- « They are lifted up for a little while. » For they cannot subsist who are divided from eternal solidity.

« And they shall be humbled like all things. » All earthly things, assuredly. And the sense is: They can in no wise stand, 823Bbecause the very things on which they lean flee away also: and while they love temporal things, they run their course together with these and with the rolling of time.

« And like the tops of the ears of corn, » etc. The tops of the ears are the awns, etc., as far as it is broken by the force of the last threshing, and the grains appear.

VERS. 25.-- « But if it be not so, » etc. (Ibid.) The sense is: All things are as I have set forth, etc., as far as yet it is not fitting that he be judged by the depraved.

« Who can convict me of having lied. » As though he should say: The things which I speak, you are not able to set before the judge, because by sinning you hide his face from yourselves. He sets deceitful words before God who examines them within himself in the sight of truth, who, the inward judge being considered, weighs outward things.

• 823C

VERS. 1.-- « And answering, » etc. (Ibid.) Because Job said many things, etc., as far as he knows not: when does he lack those things which are his by right of that same power?

VERS. 2.-- « Who maketh concord. » The highest things are composed into concord, etc., as far as they never will what they are not able to obtain.

VERS. 3.-- « Is there. » In human knowledge there is no number of the higher spirits, because how great the throng of the invisible army is there, it knows not: who are called soldiers, because they contend against the powers of the air, not by toil but by command.

« And upon. » Because the strength of those same soldiers, or of the elect, is made firm not by their own powers, but by the infusion 823Dof heavenly grace: and if this did not arise in our heart, our mind would assuredly remain in darkness, whence he adds:

VERS. 4.-- « Can [a man] be justified. » Because man is born by a woman made subject to fault, the weakness of the first guilt is propagated in the offspring.

VERS. 5.-- « For behold. » By the moon the Church, by the stars the souls of the several men living well are designated: who desire perfectly to subdue their faults. But so long as they are constrained by the corruption of the flesh, they are bound by its chains, « how much more man, rottenness! »

VERS. 6.-- « And the son, » as though he should say, etc., as far as as from man the son of man, so from rottenness the worm is born.

• 824A

VERS. 1.-- « And Job answering. » The words of his friends being finished, Job, now at the last, rises up more sharply against them, as it is the custom of the skilled to keep the stronger things for the conclusion.

(Ibid.) « Whose helper? Is he weak. » To help the weak is of charity; to wish to help the powerful is of elation. And the sense is: while thou purposest to help him beneath whose greatness thou sinkest, the solace which thou bestowest is of ostentation, not of piety.

VERS. 3.-- « To whom hast thou given. » (Ibid.) To give counsel to a fool is of charity; to give counsel to the wise man himself is of perversity, whence there follows:

824B« And prudence, » etc. Everyone who is right in prudence is not exceeding great in it: because he does not desire to be wise more than it behoves to be wise.

« Exceeding great. » Beyond measure, as those who desire to seem more learned than others, whence it comes about that, being immoderate, they even speak foolish things, whence the excess of prudence is added:

VERS. 4.-- « Whom to teach. » By the breath we live, without which we are not wise, but through which we are. He therefore who gives life gives wisdom also.

« The breath. (AUG.) » As we cannot not out of our own nature, etc., as far as because not created, the created.

« Is it not him who. » (Ibid.) Baldath, because Job scourged, etc., as far as he unfolds through sentences, saying:

824C« Behold the giants groan under the waters. » After he had repressed the swelling of wisdom, etc., as far as whereby it raises itself on high.

VERS. 5.-- « And they that dwell with. » Together do those groan who are joined to such men, because they too are pressed down by the sharing of their labour; and because the heights that are desired cannot be administered without sins, and the evil which is done is not hidden from the divine wrath.

VERS. 6.-- « Hell is naked. » By the name of hell and of perdition he designates the devil and the companions of all his damnation.

VERS. 7.-- « Who stretcheth out. » (Ibid.) By the name of the north the devil is called, who, that he might constrain the hearts of the nations with the cold of the body, said: I will sit in the mount 824Dof the testament, on the side of the north. Who is stretched out over the void, because he possesses those hearts which are not possessed by the grace of divine love.

« And he hangeth the earth. » (Ibid.) By the name of earth the Church is designated, etc., as far as « All nations are reputed as nothing and empty. »

VERS. 8.-- « Who bindeth. » (Ibid.) He narrates the beginnings of the Church at its birth, saying, etc., as far as they should overwhelm the hearers by its immensity.

VERS. 9.-- « Who holdeth back the face. » In the face knowledge is shown. The face therefore of his throne is held back, because in this life the glory of his kingdom is not known by us. Over which a cloud is said to be spread, because that heavenly glory is not seen as it is.

825A« The face of the throne. » The throne is his majesty, or the angels, who now cannot fully be known congnosci; or we ourselves, whose face, that is, knowledge, is forbidden to go forward to higher things: over whom is the cloud, in whom he puts forth hidden judgments, whence he adds:

VERS. 10.-- « He hath set a bound about the waters. » Because he moderates the knowledge of the human race, so that, so long as the vicissitudes of the alternating times pass by, they may not perfectly attain to the knowledge of the inmost brightness.

VERS. 11.-- « The pillars. » (GREG. MAG.) He calls the pillars of heaven the holy angels, or the highest preachers of the Church.

VERS. 12.-- « In strength. » (Ibid.) Because, the Lord being made incarnate, hearts discordant in the Church believe 825Bconcordantly.

« And by his prudence. » By prudence, not by power, was the ancient enemy struck, because while of old he boldly attacked Christ, in whom nothing belonged to him, he lost by right the man whom he was also justly holding. But, the Lord being slain, what glory of the preacher was to follow, there follows:

VERS. 13.-- « His spirit hath adorned the heavens. » Because unless the preachers had received the promised gifts of the Paraclete, they would have shone with no comeliness of strength.

« And by his hand acting as midwife. » The ancient enemy, who spoke to man by the mouth of the serpent, who is called tortuous, because he stood not in the rectitude of truth; he, by the Lord's hand acting as midwife, was cast out of the Church. And in a few sentences he has related the order of the Lord's first 825Ccoming, but he adds that the second is greatly to be feared.

VERS. 14.-- « And behold, these things have been said in part, of the ways. » (Ibid.) By the name of ways, etc., as far as as a slender drop of the heavenly liquor flows down to us.

« And when scarce a little. » As though he should say: If we scarcely bear the things to be wondered at in his humility, with what strength shall we endure the terrible coming of his majesty?

VERS. 1.-- « He added also, » etc. (GREG. in Job., l. XVIII.) The Church suffers bitter things from her enemies in two ways: either by words, where her wisdom is exercised; or by swords, where her patience is proved. Now he speaks of that persecution wherein she is assailed by false assertions.

VERS. 2.-- « God liveth. » There are those who, suffering adversities, 825Ddo not believe that God is: some judge that God is, but that he by no means cares for human affairs. This man, set in the figure of the Church in affliction, that he might confess that God is, says: « God liveth. » And that he might declare that he cares for human affairs, he adds: « Who hath taken away my judgment, » etc.

VERS. 4.-- « My lips shall not speak. » (Ibid.) That formerly iniquity, etc., as far as to meditate is of studious depravity.

VERS. 5.-- « Far be it from me. » Because Solomon says: « He that justifieth the wicked, and he that condemneth the just, both are abominable before God. » And this is: « Far be it from me. » For he would depart from innocence if he judged good things of those evil men.

826AVERS. 6.-- « My justification. » (Ibid.) He would forsake the justification he had begun, if he turned aside into the praise of sinners. He well stands off from others' faults who first keeps himself from his own: as it were, for this cause I fear to sin concerning them, because my heart does not reprove me.

« For neither doth my heart reprove me. » As though he should say, etc., as far as yet he strongly resisted the thought.

VERS. 7.-- « As the wicked, my enemy. (Ibid.) The wicked man is called unfaithful, etc., as far as he who agrees not with me in work.

VERS. 8.-- « For what is the hope of hypocrisy. » The hypocrite, who in Latin is called a dissembler, is a greedy plunderer, who, while acting wickedly he desires to be venerated for sanctity, snatches the praise of another's life.

VERS. 9.-- « Will God hear? » Because he finds no 826Bremedy in his crying at the judgment who now loses the fitting time of crying. Concerning whose depravity it is subjoined:

VERS. 10.-- « Or will he be able to delight in the Almighty. » He who is overcome by the love of earthly things is in no wise delighted in God:

« And to call upon God in every. » The hypocrite calls upon God only then, when the tribulation of earthly things straitens him.

VERS. 11.-- « I will teach you by the hands. » The Son is called the hand of God, etc., as far as it is a sin to him.

VERS. 14.-- « If they shall have been multiplied. » (Ibid.) They who are begotten by the preaching of heretics are struck by the sentence of the judgment to come.

« And the grandsons. » The grandsons of heretics are, etc., 826Cas far as he leaves some obstinate in malice. There follows:

VERS. 15.-- « They that shall be left. » Left, that is to say, out of that people of heretics, they shall be buried in destruction, because while they do not return to the light of truth, they are pressed down by earthly understanding.

« And his widows shall not weep. » By widows he means the subject peoples left destitute by the death of the heretic: who, while the preacher of error is snatched away to eternal torments, often return to the grace of true knowledge.

VERS. 16.-- « If he shall have heaped together. » (Ibid.) Silver, that is, the eloquence of heretics, etc., as far as they weave together the testimonies of Holy Scripture.

VERS. 17-- « He shall indeed prepare. » Because a man full of right faith gathers the testimonies of Scripture which the heretic brings forward, 826Dand thence convicts the obstinacy of error, as David slew Goliath with his own sword.

« And the innocent shall divide the silver. » For the innocent to divide the silver, etc., as far as because they mingle false things with true.

VERS. 18.-- « He hath built his house as a moth. » (Ibid.) The moth builds itself a house by corrupting: so too the heretic makes the place of his perfidy nowhere but in the minds which he corrupts.

« And as a keeper. » The shelter of the keeper, etc., as far as the discourse is raised up, when it is subjoined.

VERS. 19.-- « When the rich man shall have slept. » The rich man sleeps and opens his eyes, because when he dies in the flesh his soul is compelled to see what it scorned to look to beforehand.

827AVERS. 20.-- « It shall lay hold on him. » For, want driving him, the burning rich man among those below was compelled even to the begging of the least things, who here, tenacity driving him, came even to the denying of the least things.

« By night shall it oppress him. » By night he calls the hidden time of a sudden departure; by the name of tempest he designates the whirlwind of judgment.

VERS. 21.-- « The wind shall take him away. » The burning wind is called the malignant spirit, who drives him whom he has now kindled with the fire of perverse concupiscence afterwards to the flames of hell.

« And as a whirlwind shall snatch away. » The place of the perverse is the delight of temporal life.

VERS. 22.-- « And he shall send upon him. » As often as God corrects the sinner by striking, he sends forth the scourge 827Bto this end, that he may spare. But when by striking he shuts up his life as it remains in sin, he sends forth the scourge, but by no means spares.

« Out of his hand. » Because by the hand operation is understood, he flees out of the hand of the stricken man who, while he beholds the destruction of the depraved, forsakes the ways of depravity, whence there follows:

VERS. 23.-- « He shall press over him. » To clasp the hands is to confirm the works of life in rectitude, by beholding in another's punishment what he should fear.

VERS. 1.-- « Silver hath the beginnings of its own veins. » (GREG.) After the punishments of the proud and powerful, etc., as far as that they be made solid by no authority of the sacred books.

827C« And there is a place for gold. » In this place the heretics haeritici, etc., as far as he shall first have burned here in the workshop of charity.

VERS. 2.-- « Iron is taken out of the earth. » Heretics are wont to glory of justice, and they accuse the Catholics of having been wicked. Against whom it is said, by way of humble confession: « Iron is taken out of the earth. » Because the stronger men are separated from the earthly action which they formerly held, and become the champions of the Church.

« And the stone loosed. » Because a hard heart, etc., as far as and he may become sonorous through preaching.

VERS. 3.-- « He hath set a time for the darkness. » The measure of the wicked man, that is to say, whereby they may cease to be wicked.

« And of all things. » Because he beholds the end of the elect, etc., as far as that it should blind itself with the darkness of hardened perfidy.

827D« The stone also of darkness. » The people of the Jews, hard through perfidy, etc., as far as he expressed his image in himself.

VERS. 4.-- « The torrent shall divide from the people. » (Ibid.) But by the name of torrent, etc., as far as by the name of torrent the watering of holy preaching may be understood.

« Those whom he hath forgotten, » that is, the Jews, etc., as far as because they would not afford a way to the heart for the words of life.

VERS. 5.-- « The land out of which arose. » Because Judaea both had before the law which should refresh, and afterwards, the miracles of the Redeemer having been seen, the envy which should burn up.

VERS. 6.-- « The place of the sapphire, its stones. » (Ibid.) 828ASapphires are of an airy colour. And he says this, because never were there wanting out of Judaea holy souls that should lead a heavenly life:

« And its clods. » By clods he means the gatherings of the several orders, etc., as far as But why she lost her good things, there follows:

VERS. 7.-- « It knew not the path. » In this place by the name of bird he is signified, etc., as far as he would not consider.

« Nor hath the eye beheld. » Our Redeemer, of the vulture, etc., as far as concerning whom it is subjoined:

VERS. 8.-- « The sons of the merchants have not trodden it. » Merchants are they who carry on spiritual business, etc., as far as the sons of merchants, pastors and doctors.

828B« Nor hath the lioness passed through it. » The Church is called a lioness, because she slays those living ill in vices by the mouth of holy preaching, whence it is said to Peter: Slay and eat. And so the Church passed into Judaea, but did not pass through: because out of her she snatched a few to the faith, but yet she did not utterly extinguish the unfaithful people from perfidy. But, repulsed by the Jews, what did she do?

VERS. 9.-- « He hath stretched forth his hand to the flint. » Because he sent the arm of his preaching to the hardness of the nations.

« He hath overthrown the mountains from the roots. » The roots are the inmost thoughts of the proud: the mountains were overturned from the roots, because the powers of the world fell from their inmost thought to the worship of God.

VERS. 10.-- « In the rocks he hath cut out streams, » etc. (Ibid.) 828Cthat is, in the hard hearts of the nations he opened rivers of preaching.

« And his eye hath seen every precious thing. » God saw the precious thing, when he looked upon the human soul, abject in itself, with the illumination of the grace of his wisdom.

VERS. 11.-- « The depths also. » The Lord searches out the depths of the rivers, etc., as far as and by no merit of ours does the wisdom of God come to us.

VERS. 13.-- « Neither is it found in the land. » By the land he means the human soul. This wisdom cannot be found in the land of those who live pleasantly, because whosoever is still fed with the pleasures of this life is separated from the understanding of eternal wisdom.

VERS. 14. « The deep saith. » By the deep he means the hearts of men, etc., as far as which he calls foolish 828Dbefore God, by their wicked works.

« The sea speaketh: Not, » the minds of the restless, etc., as far as but she should come through her own self. There follows:

VERS. 15.-- « Fine gold shall not be given for it. » By fine gold the holy angels are named, etc., as far as but not without the contagion of fault.

« Neither shall silver be weighed out in exchange for it. » Because the life of the just who preach, or of those who write the words of God, with however great a light of sanctity it may be strong, does not by its own presence impart to us the coming of the heavenly wisdom.

VERS. 16.-- « It shall not be compared with the dyed colours of India. » By India this world is understood, etc., as far as and a garment without dye.

829A« Nor to the sardonyx stone. » The sardonyx holds the likeness of red earth, the sapphire an airy appearance: by the sardonyx therefore are understood men, or the fathers of the Old Testament, who follow after certain earthly things; by the sapphire, the preachers of the New Testament, who seek heavenly things alone, or the angels.

VERS. 17.-- « Gold shall not be made equal to it, or. » (GREG.) After it was said, etc., as far as because they are a creature.

« Nor shall vessels be exchanged for it. » A lofty vessel of gold, etc., as far as but he believes him the Lord of the prophets.

VERS. 18.-- « Neither shall they be remembered in comparison. » For what are men compared with God? Nothing.

« But wisdom is drawn. » Because, since it is invisible, etc., as far as « And thou knowest not whence it cometh, or whither 829Bit goeth. »

VERS. 19.-- « The topaz shall not be made equal to it. » For that it shines again with every colour, etc., as far as which he shows when he adds:

« Nor with the cleanest dyes. » The cleanest dyes are those who humbly keep the grace of the virtues that comes upon them. For they would not be dyed, if they had held holiness naturally.

VERS. 20.-- « Whence then cometh wisdom? » Because it is born of the invisible Father, etc., as far as « and where is the place of understanding? »

VERS. 21.-- « It is hidden. » Because so long as men live here, God cannot be seen through the appearance of his own nature; but through images he was seen by Moses, Jacob, and others.

« It lieth hid also from the birds of heaven. » (GREG. in Job, 829Cl. XIX.) Because, being set in this corruptible flesh, etc., as far as in their sayings and consolations they breathe again from the weariness of this life.

VERS. 22.-- « Destruction and death have said, » etc. (Ibid.) Because to see God is the same as to have him: therefore the wicked do not see this wisdom, because, repulsed through pride, they were by no means able to have it. But to have heard its fame is to have known its power from its might.

VERS. 23.-- « God understandeth the way. » As though he should say, etc., as far as she was to fill the hearts of the elect in all the parts of the world. There follows:

VERS. 24.-- « For he beholdeth the ends of the world. » For God to look upon is to reform lost things unto grace.

VERS. 25.-- « Who made a weight for the winds. » By the swiftness 829Dand loftiness of the winds, etc., as far as to temper glory with infirmity mingled in.

« And he weighed the waters, » etc. (Ibid.) By waters he means minds by the Holy Spirit, etc., as far as but he fled the woman, stricken with fear.

VERS. 26.-- « When he was setting a law for the rains. » The rain is the sayings of those who preach, etc., as far as which keeps in work that which it has sounded forth.

VERS. 27.-- « Then he saw it, and declared it. » He saw this incarnate wisdom, that is, he made it to be seen, and to be declared, and made it to be prepared by preachers and to be searched out by hearers. For he prepares it for himself, whosoever has taken care, by living well, to have it propitious in the day of judgment.

830A« He saw it, » etc. He saw, because it is a form, etc., as far as what man should know of it in himself, whence it is subjoined:

VERS. 28.-- « And he said to man, » etc. Because we cannot penetrate the nature of wisdom, what it is in itself: from God's condescension we have heard what it is in us. For it is certain that he has it, of whom it is not uncertain that he fears God.

« Behold the fear of the Lord, that itself, » etc., as though he should say If thou fearest God, it is agreed that thou art full of the wisdom which among men is called the fear of the Lord. But because he truly understands the force of divine fear who keeps himself from all depraved works, he adds: « And to depart from evil is understanding. »

• 830B

VERS. 1.-- « Job added also, » etc. (Ibid.) In this last discourse, etc., as far as that she should desire these our wretched times with a sigh, whence she says:

VERS. 2.-- « Who will grant me, that I may be, » etc. The appointed number of days is called months, etc., as far as when the error which is now hidden shall be open.

« The former months. » Days, when they are gathered, are withdrawn into months; because the Church, while she gathers shining souls, hides them in her inmost parts. Or, the month is put for the perfection which shall be in rest for those in whom it is now in working, of which the Church is now mindful.

« According to the days, » etc. Because she will then reckon herself to fall in those who fail 830Cthrough persecution, who now beholds herself to be kept in these.

VERS. 3.-- « When the lamp shone, » etc. The lamp is called the light of Holy Scripture. Now therefore the lamp shines above the head of the Church, because the sacred words irradiate the darkness of our mind.

« And at his light, » etc. (Ibid.) The Church, although she does not penetrate the hidden things of another's thought, because she does not know as it were the face of God in the night, yet sets the steps of good work by the direct light of the heavenly speech.

VERS. 4.-- « As I was in the days of youth. » The Church was grown up, etc., as far as when she is not able to bring forth sons by preaching.

830D« When God was secretly in the tabernacle. » The tabernacle, a dwelling, etc., as far as « When the Almighty was with me. » There follows:

« And round about, » etc. They are called boys who serve the heavenly commands, who are now round about him, because they are found in almost all the nations.

VERS. 6.-- « When I washed my feet. » The feet of the Church are the ministers of the lower works, etc., as far as the feet are those who minister outward things.

« And the rock poured out for me, » etc. (Ibid.) Because in her the preachings of Christ, of the inward unction, flow forth. Out of this rock streams of oil went forth, the books of the evangelists; or by streams of oil he means the gifts of the Spirit.

VERS. 7.-- « When I went forth, » etc. Through the gate of the city, etc., as far as which Job also did.

831A« And in the street they prepared, » etc. Because in the breadth of great authority she shows the liberty of her teaching. For he who preaches with public voice the right things which he perceives sits as it were in the street upon a chair, when he fears nothing concerning his own preaching; no one, pressed by terrors, hides himself in silence.

VERS. 8.-- « The young men saw me, » etc. He calls them young men, because they are supported by no gravity of counsel; the old men, mature by the long age of their manners. And the sense is: the immature dread the vigour and rectitude of the Church, and the aged glorify it.

VERS. 9.-- « The princes shall cease to speak. » By princes or leaders he means the authors of heretical depravity. And the sense is: When it was permitted me to preach with public voice, everyone who was not subject to the truth 831Bwas afraid of me. They lay the finger upon the mouth, while by false complaints they signify that they are held down not by the reason of a voice, but by the hand of power.

VERS. 10.-- « The leaders held back their voice. » Doubtless these, who endeavour to draw erring peoples after them, etc., as far as while they insinuate perverse things, they confirm them unto impiety by nourishing them.

VERS. 11.-- « The ear that heard. » There he said what he showed forth through doctrine, etc., as far as who answers to the examples of her life by living well.

VERS. 12.-- « Because I had delivered the poor man that cried out. » The Church delivers the poor man crying out, when to the sinner who prays for pardon she remits the faults which he has committed.

« And the fatherless that had no helper. » She delivers the fatherless, 831Cwhile each one, etc., as far as These things also the Church shows forth both bodily and spiritually.

VERS. 13.-- « The blessing of him that was about to perish. » (GREG.) The blessing of him that was about to perish comes upon her, when she forestalls the destruction of the sinner, and by holy exhortations leads him back from the pit of fault.

« And I comforted the heart of the widow. » The heart of the widow receives great consolation, when the faithful soul knows something in the words of the Church concerning the coming of him to whom she is spiritually joined.

VERS. 14.-- « I was clothed with justice. » He is clothed with justice as with a garment, etc., as far as who is lifted up concerning the fault which he overcomes.

« And with my judgment as with a diadem. » The judgment of the just is called a diadem, because through this they desire to be rewarded not in earthly and in 831Dweak things, but above.

« I was clothed with judgment: » which is compared to the crown that is set above, because he seeks to be crowned in heaven, not on earth. He discloses his own good things, that his friends, not rebuking, may be lifted up, but keeping silence, may imitate. The memory of former things also avails against despair, in place of rebukes.

VERS. 15.-- « I was an eye to the blind and a foot to the lame, » etc. For blessed Job had both reached out his hand to him by himself, etc., as far as he who is worthless to himself, to whom is he good?

VERS. 16.-- « I was the father of the poor. » For the poor in spirit are begotten out of her preaching.

« And the cause which I knew not. » The Church, when through 832Athe elect evils, etc., as far as yet the lesser things are to be left for the greater.

VERS. 17.-- « I broke the grinders, » etc. The wicked one means the devil; by the grinders, his hidden snares; by the teeth is shown the perpetration of open fault. It is necessary therefore first to betray the hidden contrivances of his counsels, that we may be able to call back the soul of our hearer in an open lapse.

VERS. 18.-- « And I said: In my little nest I shall die. » By the name of nest is expressed, etc., as far as nor, as some do, does he do more in the beginning and less in the consummation.

VERS. 19.-- « The root, » etc. (Ibid.) The root of the Church is Christ incarnate, as far as the thought of the mind is opened

832B« And the dew shall abide, » etc. Understand, I said, etc., as far as that we may be worthy to be gathered out of the lower things.

VERS. 20. « My glory shall always be renewed. » The same one bewails as it were his lost glory, because those whom he believed to serve as soldiers of the new life he knows to be serving old desires.

« And my bow. » The Scripture is the bow, etc., as far as which even now is.

VERS. 21.-- « They that heard me. » She is mindful of past times, in which everything that is said by her is heard with fear by the faithful, and she bewails the insolence of her adversaries.

« And they kept silence, intent. » They keep silence at her counsel who dare not attack her words, but believe them.

832CVERS. 22.-- « To add to my words. » Heretics presume to add something to her sayings, when they endeavour as it were to amend the rectitude of her preachings.

« And upon them it distilled. » In this distilling of speech the measure of preaching is taken according to the capacity of the hearers.

VERS. 23.-- « They waited for me as for the rain. » We await the words of holy preaching as the rain, when with true humility we acknowledge the dryness of our heart, that we may be watered with the draught of holy preaching.

« And they opened their mouth as it were for the shower. » Because while in the last part of the world we receive the words of holy preaching, we open the mouth of the heart as it were for the late shower.

VERS. 24.-- « If at any time I laughed on them, they believed not. » 832D(GREG. in Job., lib. XX.) This the Church says in the voice of the head, etc., as far as immoderate severity may render him hateful.

« And the light of my countenance fell not. » (Ibid.) The light of blessed Job's countenance, etc., as far as the Church too does not preach clear mysteries to earthly men.

VERS. 25.-- « If I had wished to go, » etc. The Lord both comes when he wills, and when he comes, sits first: because both his coming into our heart is gratuitous, and the appetite of desire for him in our thought is not equal to other desires.

« And when I sat, as it were, » etc. The letter also builds up, etc., as far as to console is a ministry of piety.

« The comforter of them that mourn. » (Ibid.) He who has heard 833Aof the justice of God, that he may fear, let him hear also of his mercy, that he may trust, that there may be fear and hope together. In the ark, together with the tables, there is the rod, and the manna; that is, together with the knowledge of Holy Scripture in the breast of the ruler, there is the rod of strictness, and the manna of sweetness.

VERS. 1.-- « But now me the younger. » (GREG.) Those younger in time deride the Church, when they who have gone out from her despise the words of her doctrine.

« Whose fathers I did not deign, » etc. The flock of the Church, therefore, etc., as far as and she scorns to number them among true fathers.

VERS. 2.-- « With whom was the strength of hands. » The strength of hands is greatness, etc., as far as but concerning one's neighbour 833Bto think better things than concerning oneself.

VERS. 3.-- « By want. » For by immoderate sports, the more they crave the knowledge of the supernal science, the more they lose it.

« And barren with hunger. » Because they desire to know, whence they may be learned and talkative, not composed in their ways; whence they scarcely take hold of outward things, who suppose that they have penetrated hidden ones.

« Who gnawed in the wilderness, etc. Heretics who from the universal, etc., as far as But they lick, who take away by the blandishment of the tongue.

« Squalid with calamity. » They are declared squalid with calamity and misery, because they are despised both by the ruin of their ways and by the depravity of their senses. Calamity is as it were a sickness: misery is the neglect of it, whence it becomes 833Cgraver. No one would be squalid, if in his own necessities he did not add the misery of pleasure.

VERS. 4.-- « And they chewed herbs, » etc. To chew herbs, etc., as far as but not to hold a right intention in the same works.

(Ibid.) For what by herbs, etc., as far as since they serve avarice alone, they are filled with the root of the juniper, and this is.

« And the root of the junipers. » Junipers have, in place of leaves, thorns as it were, etc., as far as who for the most part follow after in their words the outward gains alone.

VERS. 5.-- « Who snatching these things from the valleys. » They snatch those things from the valleys, etc., as far as to the carnal things which press within.

VERS. 6.-- « They dwell in the deserts of the torrents. » 833D(Ibid.) The finders-out of perverse things, etc., as far as are the earthly things which the evil love.

« And in the caverns of the earth. » (Ibid.) For heretics, by clandestine, etc., as far as he descends even unto evils.

« Or upon the gravel. » We call gravel the most compacted stones, which the river water drags along: heretics dwell upon the gravel, because they drag those minds of men which are made solid by no weight of stability.

VERS. 7.-- « Who among such things glad. » By the name of brambles, etc., as far as whence it is also openly subjoined:

« And to be under brambles, » etc. They rejoice indeed over temporal things, etc., as far as that it should not please them to cease from the yoke of 834Aworldly servitude, even if it were permitted.

VERS. 8.-- « The sons of the foolish and of the ignoble. » Their sons who were, etc., as far as who have been made exiles from the land of the living.

VERS. 9.-- « Now into their song, » etc. The time of the Church is expressed, in which she is publicly derided by the reprobate.

« And I am made a proverb to them. » He will be made a proverb to the depraved, because when they behold the good dying by torments, they take from them a likeness of cursing, saying: So may it come to thee as to that man who was butchered.

VERS. 10.-- « They abhor me, and flee far from me. » The wicked flee far from the Church, etc., as far as he knows how to ascribe his own evils to the justice of the judge. There follows:

VERS. 11.-- « For he hath opened his quiver. » 834BBy the quiver the hidden judgment of God is signified. When therefore the Lord sees sins, etc., as far as but in the rebuke the strength of counsel is opened.

« And he hath put a bridle into my mouth. » For holy doctors, while they see the hearts of those who resist forsaken by God, afflicted and groaning fall silent, lest they speak to the unworthy, who would also become worse. He spares the wicked by keeping silence, to whom nevertheless he commends his own life through patience.

VERS. 12.-- « At the right hand of the Orient calamities. » (Ibid.) Our Redeemer is called the Orient, etc., as far as because, when persecution breaks out, the just suffer the assaults of the depraved.

« They have overthrown my feet. » By the feet of the Church her outermost members are signified, which, while they are subservient to 834Cearthly works, can be deceived the more swiftly, the less they understand lofty things.

« And they have oppressed with paths as with floods. » The path of the adversaries is compared to floods, because the life of the depraved, troublesome with insolent unquietness, glides in like a tempest to overwhelm (so to speak) the ship of the heart.

VERS. 13.-- « They have scattered my ways. » Let blessed Job say this of malignant spirits; let the Church say it of her persecutors, who scatter her ways, while in the minds of certain weak ones they disturb the way of truth by a squalid persuasion.

« They have lain in wait for me and have prevailed. » Those lying in wait prevail, when those whom they cannot openly 834Ddraw to evil, they pervert by feigning good things.

« And there was none who brought help. » For the most part the just, caught in tribulation, reckon that the hand of the helper is delayed, when the savagery of their persecutors straitens them a little longer; and the remedies of the deliverer are indeed swift, but they seem slow to grief.

VERS. 14.-- « As with a broken wall. » The Redeemer is a wall to us, etc., as far as which indeed comes to pass, because power is given by God to enemies.

« And the door being opened they rushed in upon me. » When with the perverse in this life, etc., as far as they strive to destroy the defences of the faith.

« And they are rolled down unto my miseries. » The reprobate are rolled down through their own miseries even to ours, when 835Athey draw also certain who are joined to us into those evils in which they themselves are entangled.

VERS. 15.-- « I am brought to nothing. » In the estimation of the evil, etc., as far as and they are to be taken according to the history, which is plain.

« Thou hast taken away my desire as a wind. » The faithful people declares that it suffers, because it grieves that those whom it loves suffer. The wind therefore takes away desire, when any transitory thing destroys the appetite for eternity.

« It passed away as a cloud. » A cloud stands out on high, but the blast drives it to its course: salvation therefore passed away as a cloud, because the glory of the perverse, the higher it is, is not fixed. When the desires and the acts of the weak are ended, it returns at the voice of the elect.

VERS. 16.-- « But now in my very self. » In 835Bour own selves now the soul, etc., as far as whence it soon returns to those who are falling.

VERS. 17.-- « By night my bone is pierced with sorrows. » He so speaks his own things, that they suit also those who fall, etc., as far as as though they already had a certain opening of fear.

« And they that devour me. » (GREG.) Because malignant spirits, who consume the carnal out of the Church, know not how to rest from temptation so much the more, as they are weighed down by no burden of flesh.

VERS. 18.-- « In the multitude. » What else is the garment of Job, etc., as far as who clung to him by the bond of love.

« And as with the collar of a tunic. » The collar of the tunic surrounds the neck, etc., as far as they strive to extinguish the voice 835Cof preaching.

VERS. 19.-- « I am compared to mud. » In the judgment of the reprobate, the Church of the elect is compared to mud, because, trodden down for a time, she is despised; she is likened to embers and to ashes, because they reckon that she has come to those evils only which they see exhibited in her bodily.

VERS. 20.-- « I cry to thee. » The Church in the time of her persecution, etc., as far as and those who are deferred that they may profit, fear lest they fail.

VERS. 21.-- « Thou art changed to me into one that is cruel. » In God neither cruelty nor mutability comes, etc., as far as But nothing worthy can be said of him.

« And in the hardness of thy hand. » The hand of God is then said to be contrary to our will, when it pursues by striking that which displeases him in us.

835DVERS. 22.-- « Thou hast lifted me up, and as it were. » Because the glory of the present life is discerned as it were on high, etc., as far as their elevation forthwith falls.

VERS. 23.-- « I know that thou wilt deliver me to death. » For no one comes hither, etc., as far as therefore it is aptly subjoined:

VERS. 24.-- « Nevertheless not to their consuming. » The Lord his hand, etc., as far as who, standing outwardly, lay prostrate from the state of the mind.

VERS. 25.-- « I wept once. » Compassion is more than a gift, etc., as far as he joins to them his own weeping in continual prayer.

(Ibid.) In the time of the last persecution of the Church, she recalls to memory the good things which she did in the time of peace. 836ADesiring which eternal joys, but pressed with evils while they are deferred, she adds:

VERS. 26.-- « I awaited good things, and evils came to me. » The faithful people awaits good things, but receives evil.

« I looked for light, and darkness broke forth. » It awaits the light, and runs into darkness, because for the grace of remuneration it hopes now to share in the joys of the angels, and yet, deferred here for a longer time, it endures the hands of its persecutors, as Tobias.

VERS. 27.-- « My inward parts have boiled up without any rest. » That the inward parts of holy Church boil up, etc., as far as and this is, « his inward parts have boiled up. »

« The days of affliction have prevented me. » For the Church 836Bof the elect knows that in the last persecution she will suffer many evils. But the days of her affliction go before her, because she bears among her the life of the wicked heavily even in the time of peace, who already show in their depraved ways what is to come.

VERS. 28.-- « I went mourning. » The holy man raised up, etc., as far as he comes by a rough way to his country.

« Rising up without fury. » Often the tumults of seditious men provoke the minds of their own superiors: who, if they are good, have a cry against the clamour of the insolent tumult, and have not fury, since those whom they mercifully bear with, they cease not to teach.

VERS. 29.-- « I was the brother of dragons. » By the name of dragons 836Cthe malicious, etc., as far as but the feather of virtue lifts him not at all from the earth.

VERS. 30.-- « My skin is blackened. » By the name of skin the weak of the Church, etc., as far as who are in her are tormented by the zeal of faith.

VERS. 31.-- « The harp is turned to mourning. » As if he should say In the time of my peace, etc., as far as because vices are to be extinguished, not the flesh.

VERS. 1.-- « I made a covenant with my eyes. » (GREG. in Job., l. XXI.) Now he enumerates his own virtues in order, so weaving the history of his life that he may insert something very rare which can be understood allegorically.

« I made a covenant with my eyes. » For that the thoughts 836Dof the heart, etc., as far as They ought not to behold the things which it is not lawful to covet.

VERS. 2.-- « For what part should God have in me from above. » As if he should say: The founder of the high places refuses to have me for his possession, if my mind wastes away with weak desires before his sight. For no good things please God without cleanness of mind.

VERS. 3.-- « Is there not destruction for the wicked. » Then will there be alienation for the reprobate, when they shall behold themselves to be anathema from the inheritance of the strict judge.

VERS. 4.-- « Doth not he himself consider my ways and all. » By the name of ways, etc., as far as the things which among us have grown cheap by use remain unexamined.

837A(GREG.) Knowing himself to be seen he takes heed, yet not secure and perfect indeed among the ancients, he weighs in the precepts of the Christ to come how much he lacks of perfection. Therefore he says: « If thou goest about. »

VERS. 6.-- « Let him weigh, » as if he should say: So far as concerns the measure of human life I see no evils in me; but unless the mediator appear, who surpasses all men, I do not know how far I am distant from true simplicity.

« In a just balance. » By the name of the balance the mediator of God and of men, etc., as far as if he had truly held a simple life.

VERS. 7.-- « If my step hath turned aside from the way. » So often does the step turn aside from the way, as often as our thought forsakes the path of rectitude through consent to error.

« And if my heart hath followed my eyes. » For as 837Btemptation is drawn in through the eyes, so sometimes that which has been conceived within compels the eyes without to serve it.

VERS. 8.-- « And let my offspring be rooted out. » Whosoever lives not according to that which he speaks, those whom he has begotten by word he plucks up by his work from the stability of rectitude

VERS. 9.-- « If it hath been deceived. » (Ibid.) By this the holy man is shown not even to have thought about the stain of fornication.

« And if at the door. » By this he plainly shows, etc., as far as according to this which he says if the heart has been deceived, etc.

VERS. 11.-- « For this is a wickedness. » Herein does sin differ from crime, etc., as far as but it devours even unto perdition.

837CVERS. 12.-- « And rooting out all offshoots. » The germs of the soul are good works, because if the evil of luxury is not resisted, those things also perish which seemed good; but in so great a cleanness of chastity he opens how humble he was, when he subjoins:

VERS. 13.-- « If I have despised to undergo. » He who refuses not to be judged together with his menservants and maidservants, etc., as far as whence also he forthwith adds: « For what shall I do. »

VERS. 15.-- « Did not he make in the womb. » For men in power the virtue of humility is great. Having considered the equality of their condition, he now turns himself to the works of liberality.

VERS. 16.-- « If I have denied what they wished. » After chastity and humility he adds concerning liberality; by 837Dthis it is shown that he served the poor not only in their want but even in their desire.

« And the eyes of the widow. » That is to be given without delay which is sought with true humility, that is, which is asked not out of desire, but out of necessity, so that the merits of good works may be increased not only by the gift, but also by the swiftness of the gift.

VERS. 17.-- « If I have eaten my morsel alone. » Not only did I give outwardly, etc., as far as Nor does he ascribe this piety to himself, but to the grace of God, saying.

VERS. 19.-- « If I have despised him that passed by. » In that he despised not the poor man, he showed the virtue of humility; but in that he covered him, the virtue of piety. And he shows that he had pity on a neighbour unknown to him, whom he calls one passing by, 838Abecause with a pious mind nature avails more than acquaintance, as in Job.

VERS. 21.-- « If I have lifted up against the little one. » (Ibid.) As if he should plainly say, etc., as far as it signifies that which was done in the gate.

VERS. 22.-- « My shoulder. » If those good things which I have brought forth with my mouth, etc., as far as that he may show them joined together in himself, he enumerates them one by one.

VERS. 23.-- « For always as it were tu mentes. » The floods, when swelling they hang over from above, etc., as far as which the saints daily dread.

« I could not bear its weight, » since he who considers the coming of the last judgment with intent mind, is assuredly seen to be so terrified that so great a dread hangs over him, as he fears not only to see then, but even now to foresee 838B.

VERS. 24.-- « If I have thought gold. » (GREG. in Job., l. XXII.) For it would have been to despair of the Creator, if he had placed hope in the creature: for he who leans upon that which is falling, must needs fall with what falls.

VERS. 25.-- « If I have rejoiced. » For nothing outside God suffices the mind which truly seeks God, etc., as far as The understanding either grows torpid in idleness, or vanishes away in elation, and therefore he says:

« If I have rejoiced. » But when the things which it understands, etc., as far as the heart gaping outwardly is blinded away from the invisible light, and this is the sense.

VERS. 26.-- « If I have seen the sun. » Almost alone do men not see their own good things, etc., as far as while by the contemplation of the mind, the sun from heaven.

838C« And the moon going. » By the moon he means fame, which, shining in the night of this life, receives its strength from good work. « And my heart hath not rejoiced in secret. » [Vulg. Job 31:27 has no negative here, and reads that the heart did rejoice in secret] For there are those who are exalted in their own praises before themselves, and rejoice. And this is:

VERS. 27.-- « And it hath rejoiced, etc. » And because a heedless mind, drawn by favours, sometimes praises what it has done, he adds:

« And I have kissed: » by the mouth speech is signified: he therefore kisses his own hand with his own mouth, who praises what he does.

VERS. 28.-- « Which is an iniquity. » (Ibid.) Because whosoever ascribes to himself what he works is convicted of denying the grace of his own author.

« Most great. » Every sin which is of infirmity 838Ddoes not lose hope, because it seeks pardon from God; but presumption, by how much the farther it is from humility, by so much the more grievously in despair, and while it ascribes strength to itself, it seeks not from God.

VERS. 29.-- « If I have rejoiced at. » Because, namely, loving even his enemy, when he grieved with his falling adversary, he himself also grew to good out of that man's evils

VERS. 30.-- « For I have not given. » For there are some who strike with cursing those whom they reckon adversaries, because by strength they are by no means able.

VERS. 31.-- « If the men have not said. » For he bore with adversaries dwelling beside him, because he did not yield by silence to those who acted unjustly, but withstood them by rectitude.

839A« Who may give of. » This mystically of Christ, of whose flesh they desired to be filled, either the Jews of the household, willing as it were to destroy his body by consuming it, or the believing Gentiles, who are daily refreshed from his body.

VERS. 32.-- « The stranger did not stay without. » About to speak of his own bounty in the grace of hospitality, he first set forth what manner of man he had been within himself, because outward gifts are seasoned out of the inward cleanness of the heart.

VERS. 33.-- « If I have hidden as a man. » He perceives it to be proper to man, etc., as far as the confession of sin being expressed, it is rightly subjoined:

VERS. 34.-- « If I have dreaded at the multitude. » To desire nothing of the world is great security, so that, cleaving to him who is unchangeable, a man is not troubled in 839Bmind though all things below be in tumult, even if outwardly he is sometimes troubled by the infirmity of the flesh.

« And the contempt. » Good men, even when despised, do not open their own things, etc., as far as they go forth as through the door of the mouth, whence:

« And I was not rather silent. » Well does he set « I was silent, » first, because he who impatiently knows not how to be silent goes out from the house of conscience. This mystically of Christ, who feared not his many persecutors, nor those who despised him, who both was silent, and, having gone out, did not avenge himself by his power.

VERS. 35.-- « Who will grant me a hearer, that he may hear my desire? » He requires a mediator, knowing that the prayers of human desire cannot be heard unto the rest of eternal deliverance except through his own advocate: of whom it is added.

« And that he write a book; whence: The Father judgeth not 839Cany man, but hath given all judgment to the Son. » Who, coming for our redemption, etc., as far as but why, blessed Job, dost thou desire that a book be written?

VERS. 36.-- « That I may carry it upon my shoulder. » To carry the book upon the shoulder is to fulfil Holy Scripture by working. But first it is described as carried upon the shoulder, and afterwards as encircling like a crown, because if the commands of the sacred eloquence are now well carried in work, afterwards they present to us the crown of victory in the recompense.

VERS. 37.-- « Through my every step. » He calls the increases of the virtues steps, etc., as far as but shows it also by works.

« And I would offer it as to a prince. » What we offer, we hold in the hand. Therefore to offer the book 839Dto him who comes to judgment is to have held the words of his precepts in action.

VERS. 38.-- « If against me. » For a greater showing, etc., as far as and it is called a land tilled by no works.

« And with it the furrows. » Those are called furrows who, etc., as far as and the untaught cry out against him, and the perfect weep

VERS. 39.-- « If I have eaten its fruits. » He who presides and he who is subject, etc., as far as from whom he received the fruit of bodily service.

« I have afflicted the soul of its husbandmen. » The ruler of the Church afflicts the souls of the husbandmen, 840Aetc., as far as who seeks not his own glory, wills to be helped by all.

VERS. 40.-- « Instead of wheat. » If, I say, I did this or that, etc., as far as of them therefore, « Its glory as the flower of grass. »

« Instead of wheat. » For instead of wheat a thistle, and instead of barley a thorn arises, when in the last recompense, in which the reward of labour is sought, the pricking of grief is found.

VERS. 1.-- « But the three sent. » (GREG.) At length the full things of blessed Job, etc., as far as and by keeping themselves in oldness they harm by their depraved discourses the watch 840Bof the ruler.

VERS. 2.-- « And Eliu was angry and indignant. » Eliu, that is, My God, etc., as far as although he is severed from their life by the depravity of elation.

« But he was angry against Job. » For the followers of vain glory, etc., as far as they press those set within by the quality of their speaking, that is, by the vice of elation.

VERS. 6.-- « And Eliu the son answering. » (GREG. in Job., l. XXIII.) Because these things lack the solidity of gravity, etc., as far as yet he vehemently exercises the practice of it.

(Ibid.) It is no small condemnation out of a good thing, etc., as far as that in his ruin they might learn what they should fear concerning elation.

VERS. 11.-- « For I awaited your words, 840CI heard your prudence. » When he says « I awaited, etc., » he declares himself to the words, etc., as far as in whose words they reprove perverse doctrines.

VERS. 12.-- « But, as I see, there is none who can convict Job. » Often heretics through this that they are, etc., as far as whose voice Eliu meets, saying:

VERS. 13.-- « Lest perhaps you say. » As if to say, in vain you say, etc., as far as and he keeps eternal rewards for him that arrives.

VERS. 14.-- « He hath spoken nothing to me. » (Ibid.) Eliu indeed had heard blessed Job publicly, etc., as far as when they judge themselves wiser than even those who reprove them. But because he says:

« And I will not answer according to your words. » Well to blessed Job not, etc., as far as but concerning 840Dthemselves they suspect things worthy of more than is needful.

VERS. 15.-- « They were afraid and answered no more. » Well are the words of the friends of Job reported by Eliu to have been afraid, because sometimes the defenders of the Church arrogantly, although they keep not the order of speaking, nevertheless disturb their adversaries by the strength of their sayings, etc. Vide Greg. loc. cit. usque ad fin. cap.

( We omit, for brevity's sake, the exposition of chapters 33 and following, expressed word for word out of Gregory. Vide Greg., Moralium in Job, lib. XXIII, cap. 7 et seq., Opp. tom. II. )