Gregorius Moralia EN 229
230
(Jb 1,21)
How wonderfully in control of his innermost thoughts this man was, who lay on the ground, his garments torn! By the judgment of God he had lost all that he had, so he called to mind that time when he had had nothing of what he had lost; by considering that he had once not had them, he could temper his grief at losing them. There is a great consolation at times of loss to bring back to mind those times when it befell us not to have at all the things we have lost. Earth brought forth all of us, so we call the earth rightly our mother. Thus it is written: "A weighty yoke is on the sons of Adam from the day of coming froth from their mother's womb until the day of their burial in the mother of all." Blessed Job, in order to bear patiently what he had lost here, thought carefully how he had come here. He considers this more carefully and thinks how he would leave, all to enhance his patience, and he said: "Naked came I from my mother's womb, naked shall I return there." This is as if to say, 'The earth brought me out naked here when I came, the earth shall take me naked when I leave. If I have lost the things that I had gotten but would have had to leave behind, what of my own have I lost?' Because consolation does not come only from considering one's own creation but also from considering the justice of the creator, it is rightly added:
231
As it has pleased the Lord, so it has been done.' (Jb 1121)
The holy man lost everything in the trial his enemy set, but still he knew that Satan did not have power to tempt him if not from the Lord. So he did not say, "The Lord gave, the devil has taken away," but "The Lord has given, the Lord has taken away." Perhaps he should have grieved, if what the creator had given the enemy had taken away; but when the one who gives takes away afterwards, he takes back his own, he takes away nothing of ours. If we receive from him what we use in this life, why should we grieve at having to give back by order of the one from whom we borrowed in the first place. A creditor is never unjust, if he is not restrained by a fixed date of repayment and he demands what he has loaned whenever he wishes. So it is added rightly: "As it has pleased the Lord, so it has been done." When we suffer in this life things that go against our will, we must study to turn our will to the one who cannot will anything unjust. There is a great consolation in considering that what displeases us is done by the rule of him to whom only the just is pleasing. If we know that only the just is pleasing to the Lord, we can suffer nothing if not what is pleasing to the Lord. All the things we suffer are just and it is altogether unjust to grumble about just sufferings.
232 But because we have heard how the brave speaker has spoken his part against his adversary, now let us here how he praised and blessed his judge at the end of his speech; there follows:
Blessed be the name of the Lord. (Jb 1,21)
All his right thoughts he concludes with the blessing of the Lord, so that the enemy might behold this and blush for his shame in defeat. The devil had been created for blessedness but turned in contumacy against God, the God to whom this man in the midst of tribulation still proclaims a hymn of glory. Note that our enemy smites us with as many blows as he selects temptations for us. We stand on the battle line every day, we shudder under the blows of his temptations every day. But we can send just as many spears back at him if, besieged with tribulations, we speak humble words. Blessed is Job therefore, though battered by the loss of his property, battered by the death of his sons, for he turned his grief into praise of his creator, saying, "The Lord gave, the Lord has taken away. As it has pleased the Lord, so it has been done. Blessed be the name of the Lord." He blasted the haughty enemy with his humility, he flattened the vicious one with his patience. We would not believe that our warrior had taken blows and not given some back. Every word of patience in praise of God the wounded man uttered was a dart thrown against the breastplate of the enemy. Job gave back wounds far worse than he received. In affliction he lost his earthly property, but he saw his heavenly property multiply as he bore his affliction with humility.
233 (Jb 1,22)
Caught in the toils of temptation, it is possible for us to sin in the silence of our thoughts even without speaking; so this text testifies to the words and the thoughts of blessed Job. First it says, "He did not sin," and then it adds immediately, "nor did he utter any folly against God." Who has spoken no folly has kept his tongue from sin; but when it is prefaced, "Job did not sin," it is clear that he kept from the sin of grumbling even in his thoughts. He neither sinned therefore nor did he speak foolishly, for he neither swelled up with pride in the silence of his conscience nor did he loose his tongue in contumacy. Whoever tries to justify himself under the last of divine discipline is speaking foolishly against God. If he dares to assert himself haughtily innocent, what else does he attack but the justice of the one who tests him?
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234
(Jb 1,6)
We must first discuss how it can be said that something was done before the Lord on a certain day, when in his presence the course of time is affected by no alternation of day and night. There is no mutability or defect in the light that shines on the things it chooses without their coming to it and that abandons the things it despises without their leaving its presence. By remaining immutable in itself, that light arranges all the things that are mutable, and so establishes in itself the things that pass away--they cannot pass away in its presence at all, nor does time pass away in that sight within though it runs away from us without. So it happens that in eternity the scrolls of the ages remain firmly fixed that come forth unstable into the world. Why therefore is it said of something that it happened in God's presence, "one day," when eternity is a single day to him? This day is shut in by no end and opened by no beginning, as the psalmist says, "A single day in your court is better than thousands."
235 But since sacred scripture speaks to those brought forth into time,
it is appropriate that it uses words temporally, lifting us up by bending to us. When it says something temporally about eternity, it leads those accustomed to time bit by bit towards eternity. Eternity, full of mystery, pours itself effectively into our minds when it humors us with words and expressions we already know. There is nothing remarkable about God presenting the mystery of his immutability without haste in the sacred scripture.
It is just the way he made known to us by little bits and pieces the incorruptibility of the flesh that he recovered after the resurrection. From Luke we learn that first he sent angels to those who sought him in the tomb. Later he appeared himself to the disciples who spoke of him as they went along their way; but he appeared in a way they would not recognize at first, and in a way they would recognize only after much delay and hortatory talk when he showed himself in the breaking of the bread. Finally, he came in suddenly and offered himself not merely to be recognized but to be touched. Because the disciples' hearts were still weak, they had to be nourished bit by bit for the knowledge of this mystery, seeking and finding little by little, then growing and as they grew holding what they had learned the more firmly.
So because it is not suddenly but by gradual acquisition of arguments and words that we are led to eternity, as though step by step, it is said that something happened with, in God's presence, on a certain day, though he regards all times from outside time.
236 Or is scripture trying to tell us,
because Satan was present when this happened one day, that God saw darkness in the midst of light? We cannot look upon both light and darkness with one and the same glance, for when the eye is fixed on darkness, light is banished; and when it turns itself to the flash of light, the shadow of darkness flees. But that power which immutably observes all that is mutable--Satan was present to it as if by day, because it understood the darkness of the apostate angel without any dimness of vision. As we said, we cannot look upon both what we approve of and opt for and what we despise and condemn with one and the same glance, for when the mind turns one way, it is separated from its other thought, and when it returns to the other, it is removed from that to which it had clung.
237 But because God looks upon all things at once without mutability,
he comprehends all things without extending himself, both the good that pleases him and the evil that he condemns, that which he aids and rewards and that which he judges and condemns; but he does not vary in his relation to these things that he has arranged in various order. Satan is said to have been present to him by day therefore, because the light of eternity is touched by no cloud of mutability. But darkness is also present (in the one who was present 'in their midst') because even the impure spirit is filled with that power of justice by which the hearts of the pure spirits are filled; he is transfixed by the same ray of light by which the others are suffused in order to shine themselves.
238 He was present with the sons of God,
because even if they serve God to aid the elect, he serves to prove them. He was present among the sons of God because even if the sons of God pour out the aid of pity to those who labor in this world, he serves secret justice in his ignorance as he tries to exercise the ministry of reprobation.
So it is well spoken through the prophet in the books of Kings: "I saw the Lord sitting upon his throne, and the host of heaven on his right and left hand, and it was said: 'How shall I deceive Achab, that he might rise and fall in Ramoth of Galaath?' One spoke one way and another spoke another way. And one came forth and said, 'I shall deceive Achab.' And it was said, 'How shall you deceive him?' He answered saying, 'I shall go out and I will be a lying spirit in the mouth of all his prophets.'" How do we take the throne of God if not as the angelic powers over whose minds he presides on high while he orders all things below? And what is the heavenly host if not the multitude of ministering angels? And what does it mean to say that the heavenly host stands at his right hand and at his left? For God is within all things and without all things, hemmed in neither on the right nor on the left. But the right hand of God is the company of the chosen angels, the left hand of God is the band of the reprobate angels. It is not only the good angels who help us that serve God, but even the wicked angels who test us, not only those who lift up the ones who rise again from their faults, but even those who weigh down the ones who do not wish to rise anew.
Nor is it impossible, when it mentions the heavenly host, to understand that as including the reprobate angels. Though they fly only in the air, we speak of the birds of heaven. Paul says of the same spirits, "Against the spirits of wickedness among the heavenly ones," and mentioning their leader, says, "According to the prince of the power of this air." The host of angels stands at the right and left hand of God because the will of the elect spirits serves divine pity, and the minds of the reprobate, serving their own malice, obey God's punishing judgment.
So the lying spirit is said to have leaped out into the middle of the heavenly court, the spirit by whom Achab would soon be deceived for his punishment. It is impious to believe that a good spirit would want to serve deceit and say, "I will go out and I will be the lying spirit in the mouth of all his prophets." But King Achab was worthy, because of his past sins, to be condemned to such deception; so it happened that one who frequently fell willingly into sin should for once be snatched against his will for his punishment, and by a secret justice licence is given to the wicked spirits to drag unwilling souls for punishment, the ones they had trapped as willing sinners in the noose of sin. Where in the one passage it says that the heavenly host stood at the right hand and the left hand of God here as well it says that Satan was present among the sons of God. Behold at the right hand of God stand the angels who are called the sons of God; so at the left hand of God stand the angels as well, for Satan was present among them.
239 But since it is the allegorical sense that we are pursuing here,
it is appropriate to say that God saw Satan in the day because he rebuked his ways with the incarnation of his Wisdom, as if not to have seen him would have been to go on tolerating his depravity for the perdition of the human race.
So it is said to him by the voice of God:
240
(Jb 1,7)
Satan is asked by day about his journeys because the plots of the skulking enemy are brought to light when wisdom is manifest. It is because the devil is rebuked by the incarnate Lord and punished for his pestilential unrestraint that it is rightly added, "To whom the Lord said, 'Whence have you come?'" The Mediator's coming puts a check on the wickedness of his enticements: that is what it means to say that God attacks Satan's ways by asking about them. Nor is it wrong for it to be by day that the sons of God are said to have been present before the Lord, for all the elect are gathered together by invitation at their heavenly home when the light of Wisdom shines upon them. Though incarnate Wisdom came to bring them together by his own act, they aided his divinity from within (as he foreknew). But because the ancient enemy was questioned about his ways when the Redeemer came, let us hear what he answered:
241
(Jb 1,7)
From Adam to the coming of the Lord, he dragged all the nations of the earth behind him. He has gone around and passed to and fro because he has put the mark of his wickedness on the hearts of the nations. Falling from on high, he rightly took hold of the man's mind because we were willing victims when he bound us by the chains of our own sin. He has wandered far and free in the world, for nobody can be found who is free of Satan's crimes. It has been in his power to go all around the world and find no person to resist him completely.
But now Satan comes back--that is, the divine power restrains him from doing his evil deeds, for now there has appeared in the flesh one who had no share in the contagion of sin from any weakness of the flesh. There has come a humble one whom even the haughty enemy respects. The one who had despised the mighty works of God's divinity is made to tremble in the presence of the weakness of his humanity. So then in a wondrous way, that very weakness of humanity is set up for Satan to wonder at, when it says:
242
For there is none like him on the earth, innocent and upright, who fears God and draws back from all evil-doing.' (Jb 1,8)
We said a little before that 'Job' is translated 'suffering.' He is truly said to be suffering, for he foreshadows the man the prophet says would bear our sorrows. There is none like him on the earth, for every other man is only man, but this man is God and man. There is none like him on the earth because even if an adoptive son might advance to share in divinity, in no way couuld he become God by nature. It is well said that he is a servant, because he did not disdain to take on the form of a servant. Nor did assuming the humility of flesh do any harm to his majesty, for he took on a nature that he would preserve and did not change what nature he had, not lessening his divinity by his humanity nor swallowing up the humanity in divinity. So even if it is said through Paul, "Who, though he was in the form of God, did not consider it a prize to be coveted that he should be equal to God but emptied himself, taking on the form of a servant," yet for him to have emptied himself out is for him to have shown himself visible (abandoning the magnitude of his invisibility) so that the form of a servant should cover that which otherwise unchecked would penetrate all things with divine power. It is God's role to say figuratively to Satan, "Have you considered my servant Job," presenting his wonderful and only-begotten son to the devil in the form of a servant. By suggesting the greatness of his virtue in the flesh, he shows the haughty adversary what he himself should grieve over. But because he had spoken of the good which the devil should admire, it remains that he should add an enumeration of his virtues in order to check the devil's pride.
243
(Jb 1,7)
There comes among men "the mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus," offering a model of life in simplicity to man; but upright, to provide an example of unsparing treatment of wicked spirits; fearing God, a model for warring down pride; drawing back from all evil-doing, a model for cleansing impurity of life in the elect themselves. It is mainly of him that it is said through Isaiah, "And the spirit of the fear of the Lord will fill him." And he did indeed uniquely draw back from evil doing, for he did not imitate the deeds he found among men, as Peter attests: "He committed no sin nor was there deceit found on his lips."
Satan answered and said to him, 'Has Job feared God for nothing? Haven't you built walls around him and his house and all around his possessions? Haven't you blessed the work of his hands? His wealth has grown and grown.' (Jb 1,9-10)
The old enemy recognized that the Redeemer of the human race was come into the world to destroy him, as it is said through the possessed man in the gospel, "What can there be between us, son of God? You have come here out of time to torment us." But when he saw that the Redeemer could suffer, could bear human mortality, in his overweening pride he began to doubt all that he had surmised about his divinity. There was nothing but pride in his thoughts when he saw the humility of Christ and doubted his divinity. Thus he had turned the argument of temptation: "If you are the son of God, speak and these stones shall become bread." Because he saw Jesus could suffer, he thought that he was not the son of God but merely one protected by the grace of God. So now he hints likewise:
244 Haven't you blessed the work of his hands? His wealth has grown and grown.' (Jb 1,10)
The devil says that Job and his house are walled in by God because he has tried and failed to reach his conscience. He says that Job's property is walled in because he has not been able to attack his elect ones. He complains that God has blessed the works of his hands and that his property has grown and grown because as he withers away he sees that faith is multiplied in the knowledge of men by the preaching of the apostles. His property is said to have grown and grown because the number of the faithful is daily augmented by the works of the preachers. For Satan to have said these things to God, he had only to have thought them in his envy, to have grieved over them in his decay.
245 (Jb 1,11)
Satan believed Job was protected by the grace of God in time of tranquillity, but able to sin in the face of suffering. This is as if he said openly, 'We will test this person with affliction and discover that he is a sinner, though some think him divine on account of his miracles.'
246 (Jb 1,12)
When we discuss the sacred story in the allegorical sense, the 'hand of Satan' does not stand for his power but for temptation itself. All that Job has is given into the hand of the tempter, and the hand of temptation is forbidden to touch Job himself--though that will be permitted once the property is lost. This is no wonder, for first Judea (which had been his) has been taken away by infidelity and then later his flesh was nailed to the gibbet of the cross. First he had to bear Judea's opposition and then only came to the cross, having first lost what he had owned, and then later felt the wickedness of the adversary against himself personally.
247
(Jb 1,12)
As we said above, Satan goes out of the Lord's presence because he comes to accomplish his desires. He was, so to speak, in God's presence when he could not accomplish (because of God) the things his wickedness thirsted for.
248 and drinking wine at the house of the first-born son . . . (Jb 1,13)
We said that the sons and daughters of blessed Job stood for the band of apostles and the multitude of all the faithful. The incarnate Lord first chose a few from Judea for the faith and later brought the multitude of the pagans to himself. The eldest son of the Lord should be taken as the Jewish people who had been born of his teaching in the Law from long before; the younger sons are the pagans who were gathered from the ends of the earth. While Satan unwittingly served the best interests of men and sought a chance to make the Lord suffer in the cold hearts of the persecutors, the apostles still did not know that the pagans were to be won for God and revealed the secrets of the faith to Judea alone. When Satan is said to have gone out from the Lord, the sons and daughters are said to have feasted in the home of the first born son; for it was said to them, "Do not go astray by the path of the pagans." After the death and resurrection of the Lord, they turned to preaching to the pagans; thus it says in Acts, "It was necessary to speak the word of God first of all to you; but because you spurn it and judge yourselves unworthy of eternal life, behold, we turn to the pagans." These are the sons of the bridegroom of whom it is said in the voice of the Bridegroom himself, "The sons of the bridegroom will not go hungry, as long as the bridegroom is with them." These are the ones who feast in the house of the first-born son, for to this point the apostles enjoy the delights of sacred scripture only for the purpose of gathering the Jewish people.
249
and the Sabaeans swept down and drove them all away and put the shepherd boys all to the sword. I alone got away to tell you.' (Jb 1,14-15)
The cattle represent those who do good work; the she-asses stand for those who live simple lives. They pasture near the cattle because even though simple minds cannot understand abstruse ideas, they are closer to their brethren simply because they believe in the good their brethren do out of charity. They do not know how to envy others' intellect, for we see that they do not separate themselves apart in the pasture. The she-asses refresh themselves along with the cattle because the slower brethren are joined to the more clever and are nourished by the learning of the latter. "Sabaeans" is translated "captors." What do they stand for if not the impure spirits who lead all the people they subject to themselves into infidelity as captives? They smite the shepherd boys with the sword because they wound them terribly with the spears of their temptation--the ones that manly staunchness has not yet rendered completely free and robust. They begin good works well, but in their tender years they are soon overthrown by the impure spirits. The enemy puts them to the sword in that he transfixes them with despair of eternity.
250 What does it mean when the messenger comes and says, "I alone got away to tell you?"
Who is this messenger who escapes when the others perish but the prophet who, while all the evil things he foretold come to pass, is the only one who returns safe to the Lord? He is known to have spoken the truth about what would befall those who died, and that is what it means to say that he alone has lived in the midst of the dead. This is why a boy is sent to Rebecca about to marry Isaac, for when the church is betrothed to the Lord, a prophet comes between to serve them. When the Sabaeans sweep down, it is only a boy who escapes to tell of it, for the words of prophets grow strong when the evil spirits lead the minds of the weak into captivity. A prophet foretells that captivity: "My people is taken captive because it did not have knowledge." It is as though prophecy is saved when it comes to pass that the captivity which it foretells is revealed.
251
from heaven and laid waste sheep and shepherds. I alone have escaped to tell you.' (Jb 1,16)
"Heaven" is the right name for those who were entrusted with the office of preaching in the synagogue, for they were believed to have wisdom of things above. When Moses was rousing the priests and people to hear the words of his admonition, he said, "Give an ear to heaven and I will speak; and let the earth hear the words that come from my mouth," representing by "heaven" the order of rulers, by "earth" the flock subordinated to them. So in this place we can not inappropriately take "heaven" to be the priests, or the Pharisees, or the doctors of the Law. They performed the duties of heaven before the eyes of men and seemed to glow with light from above. But they were deeply moved to oppose our Redeemer, so it is said that fire fell from heaven because the flame of envy flashed forth from those who were thought to teach the truth and the ignorant populace was deceived by this. By the evangelist's witness we know that those who were jealous of the teachings of the Truth looked for a chance to betray the Lord but in fear of the crowd did not dare to let what they were doing become known. Hence it is written in the gospel that they said to the people (in order to sway them): "Has anyone of the leaders believed in him, or any of the Pharisees? But this crowd which has not known the law, they are cursed."
What shall we see in the sheep and the shepherds if not those who are innocent but still weak? They fear to bear the hostility of Pharisees or leaders, and so they are consumed by the fire of infidelity. Let it be said therefore: "The fire of God fell from heaven and laid waste sheep and shepherds," that is, 'The flame of envy burst forth from the hearts of their leaders and burned up whatever good there was stirring in the masses.' Seeking their own honor in the face of the Truth, these evil leaders turn the hearts of their followers away from all righteousness. So it is added fittingly: "I alone have escaped to tell you," for when the cause of malice is accomplished, the words of the prophet who said, "And now fire consumes the adversaries" escape the doom of error. It is as if he said openly, 'Fire consumes the wicked not only long afterwards by punishment but even now through jealousy; for those who are to be punished later with the torments of retribution now besiege themselves with the torture of jealousy.' The shepherd escaping alone comes back and reports that the sheep and shepherds have perished from the fire: this is what happens when the prophet abandons the Jewish people but proclaims that he has spoken the truth, saying, "Zeal lays hold of the uninstructed people." This is as if to say, when the people fails to grasp the words of the prophets but gives its faith to the words of the jealous, then the people perishes in the fire of zeal because it has burned itself up with the flame of envy.
252 attacked the camels, and drove them away, and put those herdsmen to the sword: and I alone have escaped to tell you.' (Jb 1,17)
We know "Chaldaeans" means "ferocious people," so the the Chaldaeans here stand for the authors of persecution who burst out with open cries of wickedness and said, "Crucify! Crucify!" They made three bands of themselves to put questions to the Lord: Pharisees, Herodians, and Sadducees. They were defeated by the words of Wisdom, but because we must believe that they dragged some foolish people after them, we understand that they made up robber bands and carried off camels. Each of those groups corrupted the hearts of the weak with their wicked ideas; and by persuading them to go to death, they took the twisted minds of the weak into captivity. When the Lord was preaching in Samaria, many of the Samaritans were called to our Redeemer himself; but not those who despaired of the resurrection and tested the Lord with the question of the seven husbands of one woman trying to lead believing Samaritans (whom we know were ignorant of the hope of the resurrection) away from the faith. Since they accepted some things of the Law, but rejected others, they are like camels, a pure animal in that it chews its cud, but impure in that it has the uncloven hoof.
But, chewing their cud, the camels with uncloven hoof also stand for those in Judea who heard the sacred history in the literal sense, but were unable to discern its spiritual power. The Chaldaeans in their three bands drive them away when the Pharisees, the Herodians and the Sadducees turn them by their wicked arguments away from all right sense. At the same time they put the shepherds to the sword, because even if there were some in the people who could use their powers of reason, the leaders opposed them not by means of reason but by the authority of their office, putting themselves up as examples to be imitated by their subjects, by the authority of their regime leading them to ruin even if some of the followers could have understood something. The one youth who fled from them and reported the disaster stands for prophetic discourse remaining strong even when Pharisees, Herodians, and Sadducees worked their wickedness, as when the prophet said, "And the ones who possess the Law did not know me."
253
and drinking wine at the house of your first-born son, suddenly a violent wind blew up from the desert and smashed into the four corners of the house, which collapsed and crushed your children, and they were killed.' (Jb 1,18-19)
A little before we said that the sons and daughters were the apostles who preached and the peoples who listened: they are said to feast in the house of the first-born because they were fed on the delights of holy preaching while still living among the Jews. "Suddenly a violent wind blew up from the desert": The desert is the heart of the unfaithful, abandoned by all when the Creator deserts it. The violent wind must be taken as strong temptation. A violent wind blew up from the desert when strong temptation came from the hearts of the Jews at the passion of our Redeemer to tempt his faithful ones. The desert can well be taken as the abandoned multitude of impure spirits. Whence a wind blows up and smashes into the house, because temptation comes from these spirits and stirs the hearts of the persecutors.
254 But this house in which the children were feasting had four corners.
We know that there were three ranks of rulers in the synagogue: the priests, the scribes, and the elders of the people. If we add the Pharisees to them, we find the four corners of this house. A wind blew up from the desert and smashed into the four corners of the house when impure spirits of temptation swept down on the minds of these four orders and drove them to the evil of persecution. The house collapsed and crushed the children because when Judea fell into the cruelty of persecuting the Lord, it overwhelmed the faith of the apostles with fear and despair. They saw only that their Master was held prisoner and they fled in different directions, denying him. And although inner strength kept their spirit presciently on the path of life, base fear temporarily uprooted the life of faith. The ones who abandoned their creator when Judea raged against him are like the ones killed when the corners of the house gave way and the house collapsed. And what are we to suppose happened to the flock of the faithful then, when we see that even the rams, their leaders, had fled? But in the midst of this there was one who escaped to tell the tale, because prophetic discourse remained strong to announce this, saying of the persecuting people: "My beloved has committed many crimes in my house." Saying of the good preachers who fled in time of passion: "My nearest and dearest stood a long way off," and saying of all those who feared greatly, "I shall smite the shepherd and the sheep of the flock shall be scattered."
Gregorius Moralia EN 229