As for the book whose title is Notes on Job, I could not easily say whether it ought to be reckoned mine, or rather the work of those who, as best they could or would, gathered into one volume the notes written in the margins of a manuscript.

For they are pleasing to very few who understand them, while many who do not understand are bound to be put off, since in many places even the very words that are being expounded have not been written out, so that it is not clear what is being expounded.

Then too the brevity of the remarks has been attended by such obscurity that the reader can scarcely bear it, since he is forced to pass over a great many things he does not understand.

Finally, I found the work itself so full of errors in our manuscripts that I could not correct it, nor would I wish it to be said to have been published by me, except that I know the brethren have it, whose zeal could not be denied.

This book begins thus: and he had great works upon the earth.

1. (1:1-21) And he had great works upon the earth: because he was at work in those very works. They held a feast every day, until their number was complete. It is a sign of love. And he offered sacrifices for them, according to their number. We must understand that there are particular confessions, as it were individual sacrifices, but another is the sacrifice for the sins of all and for all, which signifies the Lord. Lest perhaps my sons have sinned, and cursed God in their hearts.

It is well added: lest perhaps; because he suspected that they had cursed in their heart. And behold, the angels of God came to stand before God. The soul's disposition toward the truth could not be narrated otherwise than by being expressed in a sense temporally and spatially. And the devil too came with them. Perhaps it is said with them because he could not hear except through them. And the Lord said to the devil: 'where do you come from?'

The comparison of past action with that from which something is thereafter permitted to be done is an answer to the question; but the question itself is a divine power, in which one is not permitted to do what one pleases—for in the thoughts of the ungodly there shall be questioning (Wis 1:9)—in order to make him manifest to us. But put forth your hand, and touch all that he has: give him power. Unless he bless you to your face. An incomplete utterance, that is: "if he does not bless you to your face when his goods are touched," as though one were to supply, "what do you command?" And the devil departed from the face of the Lord: from consultation to action. And enemies came and took them. According to that text, who now works in the sons of unbelief (Eph 2:2), he stirred these up as well. It is to be noted, moreover, how he had power over men and over the elements, yet a power given by God. Naked I came forth from my mother's womb. It is to be noted how consoling are the words he speaks, even though he made his lament according to custom.

2. (2:6, 8) Behold, I hand him over to you; only preserve his soul: lest he presume that he could snatch away his life. And he took himself a potsherd to scrape off the discharge. Through the Passion of the Lord he signifies the scraping away of the sins of those who confess.

3. (3:3-26) And the night in which they said: 'a man is conceived.' Certain higher powers, which were able to know this. Let that night be darkness: "let it not suffer now what it has suffered," that is, let it be darkness; that is, "let it be given over to forgetfulness." Nor let the Lord seek it from above.

Let it not be restored through immortality; that is, let mortality perish. Nor let light come into it: the light of memory. But let darkness and the shadow of death seize it: this present life, which is the shadow of the punishment to come; so that the sense is: "let the just man, who is light, not see it,

but let darkness, that is, sinners and carnal tribulations from this life, see it." And let them trouble it, like the bitternesses of the day: the precepts of the good life, or the day of judgment, by which carnal people are troubled. And let darkness seize that night: everlasting darkness. Let it not be among the days of the year: among the just, the spiritual ones who enjoy the sun and are greater.

But let that night be sorrow: because it brings sorrow to those who love it. Nor let it be numbered among the days of the months. The just in the Church, on account of the moon as it were a lesser light: to whom it is said, and I, brothers, could not speak to you as to spiritual people (1 Cor 3:1); so that Paul himself belongs to the days of the year.

But let him who curses that day curse it: the Lord, who will curse those who love carnal things. Let the stars of that night grow dark: those who are eminent in sins. Let it abide, and not come into the light. Because they will not be converted, he says by way of prophecy.

Because it did not shut up the gates of my mother's womb: the earthly city, which Babylon signifies. For the gates would be shut, if the sinner were not praised in the desires of his soul (Ps 10:3 (9:24)). Why then did I not die in the womb? before I rose to prominence before you through some action. For conception pertains to hope. I came forth from the womb, and did not at once perish? The figure to be understood in these words, then, is that of one who had grown old in such desires. And why did the knees receive me: that I might there be strengthened? Why did I suck the breasts? the breasts of teaching that nourish unto wickedness.

Now surely I would be sleeping at rest: by dying to this world. With the honored kings of the earth: in the Church. Who gloried in swords. Whence comes the text: and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God (Eph 6:17). Or with the princes, who had much gold: wisdom. Who filled their houses with silver: the eloquence of the Lord. Or like a miscarriage that slips from the mother's womb: so as never to come to prominence. Or like infants who never saw the light: they did not attain to any nobility.

There the ungodly laid aside their fury: in death, away from this world. There they rested, weary in body: either weary in body and not in soul, or having reached the end of bodily things.

They did not hear the voice of the exactor. The judge will hand you over to the exactor (Luke 12:58), hence the saying; that is, that their sins have been forgiven them: for he was speaking of the ungodly. The small and the great are there.

I think it is well understood as said of one person, according to the text, he who humbles himself will be exalted (Luke 14:11). And the servant who does not fear his master. Either according to that text, do you wish not to fear the power? Do good (Rom 13:3); or according to that text, perfect love casts out fear (1 John 4:18). Why then is light given to those who are in bitterness? the honor of sinners. And life to the souls that are in sorrows? in the matter of sorrows, that is, in sins. Who long for death, and it does not come to them: that is, the attainment of the fruit of sin.

Death is rest for the man whose life is hidden: either because it is hidden before God or because it is known to few. But this must be taken of that death by which we die to the world. For in the other there is no rest. For God has closed in against him: by not giving him over to the desires of his heart.

For before my food a groan is present: that tribulations go before the joy of the food of God. And I weep, confined by fear: seeing that I cannot escape what I feared. For the fear that I dreaded has come upon me: the adversities that come about from the mercy of God for our correction. Neither in peace, nor in silence, nor in rest. For the things on account of which he was afraid were false. For wrath has come upon me; the vengeance according to which the just man is scarcely saved (1 Pet 4:18).

4. (4:2-21) The words of Eliphaz. But who will bear the weight of your words? Here, then, he says that he is compelled to speak, because he cannot bear what Job has said. Is not your fear foolish? For you ought to have been prepared for these things, if you were truly counseling others. Nor did you fear such things rightly; when you said, for the fear that I dreaded has come upon me (Job 3:25).

And your hope and the simplicity of your life are as folly: the folly by which these goods are esteemed. The roaring of the lion and the voice of the lioness: the devil himself, and the city of pride, which is often set down even in the manner of a beast by the prophets.

And the joy of the dragons is extinguished: of the proud and the treacherous. The lion-ant perishes, because it had no food. Because in the last days there will be none whom it may lead in and devour. For the godly will be separated from the ungodly.

Here, however, he errs, in that he understood of Job the things he had heard prophesied of the devil. The lion-ant is to be taken either because both are in it, since it both seizes and secretly persecutes the grain, which it makes not to sprout by removing the eye of the seed; or because it lords it over the greedy and over those who store up treasure on earth; or because it persecutes the just, as it were ants preparing food for themselves in summer for the winter, on which it will not feed, when the good have been separated from the ungodly. And the cubs of the lions are scattered from one another.

The conspiracy of the princes of that city has been broken up, who were born of that city of fellowship and of the devil; or because they laid one another waste. Hence comes the text: nation will rise up against nation (Mark 13:8).

None of these things would have befallen you: either those losses and bereavement and the stroke of the wound; or grief of soul would not pierce you, because you would also console yourself, if you had said to others from the heart: does my ear not grasp great things from him? Because the things he says, he says that he says from a revelation. And a spirit met my face. He wishes it to be understood as though he had felt a breath: for he denies in what follows that there was any shape.

We should recall that the Spirit also descended thus upon the apostles. What then? will a man be pure before the Lord? Either he says that he heard these things; or he says that he shuddered because no one is pure before the Lord; or he says that he saw in this way because no one is so pure before God as to see God as he is. Here pure is to be taken according to perfection, so that what he denies above—that the pure man perishes—we may understand in a certain qualified sense.

If he does not trust his own servants. This happened when Elijah said: Lord, they have killed your prophets; and he says to him: I have kept for myself seven thousand men (1 Kgs 19:14, 18). For those seven thousand men were not on that account already pure. For the prophets too were called angels. And in his angels he found something crooked. Either what is said against them, or what they themselves say. Yet this can also be taken of true angels.

But those who dwell in houses of clay: whose manner of life is not in heaven (See Phil 3:20). He struck them as a moth. Either some corruption struck them as a moth, or God struck them: either with this moth, or as a moth strikes, that is, secretly from within, by a corruption arising from themselves through carnal desires, that is, by their dwelling in houses of clay. And from morning until evening they are no more. Either they are no longer in this world, or from prosperous circumstances they pass to tribulation: for they incurred punishment. And because they could not help themselves, they perished: when they have their hope in themselves. They perished, because they had no wisdom: the wisdom of not hoping in themselves.

5. (5:1-27) But call, if anyone will answer you. For an answer is given to those who are pure before God. For wrath kills the foolish man: the indignation by which each one is tormented, as though something had befallen him unjustly, while he does not consider that he is so unclean before God that the angels did not deign to answer the one who called, or to show themselves to him.

For he who does not consider this is foolish, and is killed by an irrational wrath. Or the foolish man cannot hear or see the angels for this reason, that he has been killed by wrath and slain by jealousy. And jealousy kills the one who goes astray: into imitating sinners. But I have seen the foolish putting down a root. "The foolish" is here to be taken as the ungodly, so that conversely the wisdom of man is godliness, as is said in what follows. And let them be crushed at the doors of the weak: of the humble, when these have been received into the chamber by the bridegroom, and the foolish have remained outside (See Matt 25)?

For what they gathered, the just will eat. This can also be understood of the Jews, who gathered the prophecies that the gentiles rather ate; and of those who, in doing so, eat what others command and do not do. But they themselves will not be delivered from evils: although they preach that these things are not to be done. Let their strength be drained away: the strength by which they are proud against the weak. And let it be drained away, so that it may now begin to labor. For labor will not come forth from the earth: that is, let them not complain of the creation, but of themselves. But man is born to labor. It is said that he is born in the sense in which each one is converted from a quiet life to a laborious one. But the young of the vulture fly very high.

The vulture is well understood as the Lord, because from the height of prophecy he saw our mortality, by descending to which he might be fed, converting us into his body. The young of the vulture, then, are called the sons of the bridegroom: and flying very high, having their manner of life in heaven (See Phil 3:20), so that they may be freed from the labor in which man is born. For they followed the voice of him who said: come to me, all you who labor (Matt 11:28). The young of the vulture can also be understood in a bad sense as the airy powers, which are fed by deaths, that is, by sins.

Since the angels who transgressed in this way have not been brought down to the very laborious humility of mortality in which man is born, they are exceedingly proud, that is, they fly very high. Who gives rain upon the face of the earth: as though he shows mercy to those who confess. That their hands may not do the truth. Let them not do what they promise, gaping to lord it over the weak. In the day darkness will meet them: as it met the Jews, who did not recognize who the Lord was.

Or they will grope as in the night at noonday: like those who, though seeing the signs, yet doubt, saying: he is a prophet; others: he leads the people astray (John 7:40, 12); when they would not see even by lamplight. And let them perish in war: in temptations.

And let the weak come forth from the hand of the strong one: of the devil. But let there be hope for the weak. For those strong ones seek their reward here. But blessed is the man whom the Lord reproves.

For in this Eliphaz errs, that Job seems to him to be suffering these things because of his own iniquities, whereas Job is blessed in this very thing, that being reproved in this life he has the possibility of being corrected. And in the seventh evil will not touch you. The mystery of the Sabbath. In famine he will deliver you from death. For he nourishes by his word, and makes one firm against temptations. But in battle he will free you from the hand of the sword: from the power of chains.

From the scourge of the tongue he will hide you: that you may not feel insults; not that you may not suffer them. You will deride the unjust and the wicked: as wisdom will laugh over the destruction of the wicked (See Prov 1:26). And you will not fear the raging beasts; that is: you will not fear the Jews; because the nations will obey you. But these things are to be understood of the Lord.

Eliphaz errs here, because he thinks that the things revealed to him are to be understood of Job, whereas the whole applies to the Lord. For you will have a covenant with the stones of the field. The stones of the field, because among the nations there was no ordering of the Law, so that they might be as stones for a building. For the wild beasts will be at peace with you. Whether of the Jews or of the nations.

Then you will know that your house will be in peace: that is, "the Church." And your children will be like all the grass in the field: without dryness. And you will come to the grave like ripe grain: <to> the Passion. Behold, these things we have thus searched out. Here the authority of this prophecy is confirmed. But know yourself, what you have done. For not unjustly has God allowed these things to befall you.

6. (6:3-30) The words of Job. But as it seems, my words are evil. For Job's words are not words of impatience under the scourges, since they signify a grief that is not peculiar to Job, but one that he had concerning the whole human race. For the arrows of the Lord are in my body. The words of God, by which the soul is pierced through, when it is compelled to confession. Whose fury drinks my blood. For they take away sin.

For when I begin to speak, they goad me. For what I speak, they compel. What then? will the wild ass bray in vain, unless it is seeking food? so that it goes hungry, because it wished to be free. Or will the ox low, when it has fodder in the manger? For the donkey, food is prepared by the labor of the ox, as for the nations by the labor of the prophets and apostles, who were indeed Jews. And so these are the words of one desiring food, that is, help, not of one impatient under grief. Can bread be eaten without salt? As though it were said to him: "why do you speak these things thus through figures?" he answered, "because if he were to say them in his own person, they would be insipid." Or is there savor in empty words?

He means the empty words of men; because the bread is the words of God, but heavenly bread (See Matt 4:4). So neither can my soul cease. Just as bread cannot be eaten without salt, so now I furnish my ministry to the word of God; on account of that text: how will they hear without a preacher? (Rom 10:14) For I see my food to be foul like the odor of a lion.

For my words are foul like a lion: either on account of the pride through which the boastful think them so; or because those who embrace carnal things have the stench of a lion, who delight in their own words. But if he should grant it, and my request should come. By "request" he means the thing he was asking for. And may the Lord grant my hope. For thus, trusting on account of the hope of the consolation to come after tribulation, he is opportunely tempted.

And he well says hope; because when the thing has come, temptation will no longer be necessary: let the city be a grave for me, upon whose walls I used to leap. He wishes that fellowship of Babylon to be a grave for him: not that it may bury him, but that he may know that it covers as dead all who have been in it, of whose firmament as it were and fortification he used to be proud.

I will not spare. For I have not lied: the words are the holy words of my God. Because he said nothing other than what he heard from God. That is, of the man who prophesies in a general way, that he needs help in confession. For what is my strength, that I should endure? which his wound signified. Or what is my time, that my soul should hold out? Because when death is imminent men are terrified, so that they may be converted and confess to God the rottenness of their sins, by the consideration of which he says that he is compelled to confession. Is the strength of stones my strength?

Those hard and impenetrable to the darts of God's words, who are not moved to confess. Or did I not trust in him, when it was well with me: that is, when I was immortal after the image of God. But the help departed from me.

I was made mortal by wishing to trust in myself. And the visitation of the Lord has despised me. According to that which is said: or the son of man, that you visit him? (Ps 8:4 (8:5)) My kinsmen did not regard me. I shuddered at the angels.

Like a failing torrent. For mercy once overflowed me; and I dried up, and was not a fountain to myself. Or like waves they have passed me by: as though consolations were drink. Those who feared me have now rushed upon me: the devil with his angels. I have perished, and have been made an exile from my house: either from the heavenly dwelling, or from conscience. For this reason he sat outside, beyond his house. See the ways of the Temanites, look upon the paths of the Sabeans.

He signifies those who trust in temporal things, on whom he—that is, the man whom he signifies—says that he does not rely. But now you too have risen up against me without mercy: thinking the happiness of men to consist in abounding in carnal things. Because they were mocking, rather than showing compassion. But seeing my wound, be afraid. Understanding what it signifies, fear the punishments to come. What then? did I ask anything of you? or do I need your strength? Because weak before him is the one who is able to save him. Teach me, and I will be silent. For they ought to have been patient toward his teaching, because they themselves could not teach him. But, as I see, you call the words of a true man crooked.

He calls a true man the one who represents the person of one doing penance, by conversion to God, whose words they were calling crooked. For I do not seek help from you. For a true man seeks help from God. For that man is true who confesses. Hence the text: he who does the truth comes to the light (John 3:21). For neither will I endure the utterance of your speech. For he said that he endured the speech of God, by which he might be instructed. Yet you have rushed upon an orphan.

As far as concerns you, you wished to mock me, although you did not understand what it signifies. Because they ought not to have mocked even Job, whom they saw; therefore: yet. But now, looking upon me, attend to me: having nothing to teach me. And again, be at hand for justice. Because at first they seemed to themselves to be compelled to speak by justice.

For there is no iniquity in my mouth; and did not my throat meditate wisdom? He says that he did not accuse God, but brought forward a man accusing his own iniquities, as his speech was understood above. This he calls the meditation of wisdom.

7. (7:1-21) Is not human life upon the earth a temptation? Here he now shows more openly in whose signification he was speaking above. By temptation he means as it were the arena of the contest, where a man either conquers or is conquered. And his life is like that of a daily hired laborer: like one awaiting a temporal wage, so that the life of those who await the fruit of their righteousness in the future is not upon the earth.

Or like a servant fearing his master, and having gained a shadow. This is signified by Adam's hiding from the face of the Lord, and his covering of leaves from which a shadow is made (See Gen 3:7), which man gained by forsaking God. Or like a hired laborer who awaits the wage of his work. This man differs from the former in that the former had, while this one desires to have, these very temporal things. So I too have awaited empty months. He has already called the temporal goods empty, that is, a shadow.

And nights of sorrows have been given me: in which both the light of wisdom is lost, and there is matter for punishments. 'If I sleep,' I say: 'when is it day? and if I rise, again: when is it evening?' When a man suffers the desire for business in leisure, and for leisure in business. But I am filled with sorrows from evening until morning: by which he set, away from God. Hence too, walking in the evening, God sent them away (See Gen 3:23):

which signifies the willing ones, for whom there is no expectation of remedy except the morning. Of which it is said: in the morning I will stand before you (Ps 5:3 (5:4)); that is, when after the judgment God will be revealed in the morning to the just. Hence too the Lord is buried in the evening, and rises in the morning (See John 19–20). This life, then, he can compare as it were to the morning star.

And my body grows together with the rottenness of worms: with a multitude of worms. I pour out clods of earth, scraping off the discharge. The expression of the desires or cares of confession, in which the wicked rejoice; for they turn into an occasion of sinning the things that others confess through penance: hence they are the dogs who licked Lazarus's wounds (See Luke 16:21). And my life is thinner than speech. For I do less than I say.

Remember therefore that my life is a breath: that is, "in spiritual hunger." And I will not return to visible things. The eye of the one who sees will not know me: because I will be changed; so that by "the one who sees" here we may understand the envious devil.

Your eyes are upon me, and I do not stand. For you slay in me the carnal life in which I was. Like a cloud purged from heaven: or purged through heaven; as we say "purged from iron": so that here he signified that there was help for him from heaven, that he might be purged: or indeed so that it is no longer a cloud, but is thinned into pure air, as it were purged by the rays of the sun, so that the darkness of flesh and blood may not be in heaven.

For flesh and blood will not possess the kingdom of God, when this corruptible has put on incorruption, and death will be swallowed up in victory (1 Cor 15:50, 54). For if a man goes down to the lower regions, he will not ascend again. To this end, then, remember, that you may not go down. And he will not return again to his house: that is, "to his rest."

Therefore I too will not spare my mouth: by confessing, while there is time. Am I the sea, or a dragon? For you have not driven me back as you did the ungodly or the devil. That you have set a watch over me: that I may not move into disturbance, as are the bounds of the sea. Because I said: 'my bed will console me': carnal things, in which he was resting.

And I will refer to myself the consolation upon my couch. For I ought to refer my consolation to you. You terrify me through dreams, and through vision you astound me: through the tribulations of this life, which are dreams in the same way that the goods of this life are dreams. You will release my soul from my spirit: on account of the visible terrors, from which the soul will be freed when it fears to come to them.

And from death I have repelled my bones. For my bones would have gone to death, had I not, terrified by these things, been stronger and more patient, which is the firmness of the bones. For I will not live forever, that I should bear patiently. By the brevity of life and the fear of death I have corrected myself. Hence the devil is unconvertible, because he does not die, but is damned. The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom (Sir 1:16 (1:6)), hence the saying.

Depart from me; for my life is empty: because I do not endure temptations. Or because you have directed your understanding upon him?, for which reason he is rational. Hence that text: but we have the mind of the Lord (1 Cor 2:16). By the office of reason he means the extension of the understanding. And in rest you will judge him: worthy of rest.

How long will you not let me go? bound by tribulations. Nor leave me alone, until I swallow my spittle? that in grief and scourges I may hold back and absorb the flow of pleasures, admonished through tribulations. If I have sinned, what can I do to you?

The sense here is this: "if I have sinned, I can do nothing to you. Or perhaps men are troublesome to you by speaking? You then, who know the understanding, why did you constitute man so that he should speak against you, so as to be a burden to you? But if the sin of man harms you neither by deed nor by word, why do you not forget his sin, but rather purge it; unless because the things said above are referred to your goodness?"

For what is man, that you have exalted him? His friends, not understanding these things, thought that God was being reproached by him. For if you do not make temptations for me in order that I may restrain my flowing motions, so as thus to take counsel for me; what other cause is there that you should rebuke man?

For he cannot harm you by sinning; or do you feel as it were the adversity of his speech, when you know the human mind, and could surely refrain from constituting what is adverse to you? And why have you not forgotten my iniquity? if not for this cause, that these temptations might profit me, so that it might be wholly of your goodness, even that you rebuke me?

But now I will go into the earth. For when you purge my sin, it yet remains for me still to go into the earth through bodily death. In the morning I will awake, and will be no more: in this earth.

8. (8:1-22) The words of Bildad the Shuhite. He has sent their iniquities into his hand. "Into his hand" he has sent, either as vengeance, or by reckoning he has shown them to be debtors, that is, sinners. And he will restore to you the life of justice: which is owed to justice, that is, the blessed life. And your former things will be least: in comparison with the later ones, which will be infinite.

Or will these not teach you, and tell you? Because the authority of some is greater. Here too, about to speak of Christ, he relates what he has heard, as Eliphaz related a revelation. Does the bulrush grow green without water?

So then the ungodly too will wither without the mercy of God. Does it still stand on its root, and will it not be cut down? If it has no water. Before any plant drinks, does it not wither? unless it drinks: for the ungodly never once flourished before. And his tent will be filled with spiders: useless works. But now he seems to speak of the Jews and the Lord. But even if he props up his house, it will not stand: either by the Holy Scriptures, or by the hope of the Lord's promise, or the kingdom itself.

And when he has begun, he will not remain: to follow God; which befell the Jews, who did not follow once they had begun. For he is moist before the sun: rotting through the flux of carnal things.

Before the sun, that is, "under tribulations," so that before signifies "under," as we say: "do it before me." And from his rottenness his shoot will ascend. For unless they had been so evil, the Lord would not be exalted through the Passion, he who was born of them according to the flesh (See Rom 9:5).

He sleeps among heaps of stones. For the great ones will crucify him. And he will live in the midst of small stones: of the humble, of whom the apostles were. If he is swallowed up, the place will deny him.

If he hides that he is the Son of God, it will be said that he is not the Son of God. It is necessary, then, that he himself reveal himself: for in this place divine things cannot be known. But from the earth another will spring up: either the Lord by rising again, or another kind of godly people, that is, of Christians.

For the Lord will not approve the innocent. Or, will he not reject? or this: "the ungodly will not approve the innocent?" Nor any gift: that is, "the sacrifices that the Jews had." But the mouth of the truthful he will fill with laughter: of those who confess. And the tent of the ungodly will not remain: either the Temple itself, or the kingdom.

9. (9:2-35) The words of Job. Truly I know that it is so; that is, "that he has restored these things to me according to my iniquities: but not as you suppose; but because no one is just in his sight." They will not answer him one of a thousand.

For in all things he will convict them. Who brings the mountains to old age, and they do not know it: that is, to weakness; as is the text: I have grown old among all my enemies (Ps 6:7 (6:8)). Who turns them in wrath. "By growing angry he turns them," that is, "so that they find something other than what they desired," since he who exalts himself will be humbled (Luke 14:11).

Who shakes the world from its foundations: through the calling that has come about, by which the eminent ones in the world were shaken. And its pillars will be moved. Who commands the sun, and it does not rise: so that either wisdom is not understood, or those who have written; as is the text: seal the book (Dan 12:4).

Who stretches out heaven alone: the Church, which is properly the seat of God, which he stretches out over the whole world; alone, to signify the unity of the Trinity. For surely all things were made through the Son in the Holy Spirit. And walks upon the sea as upon land. Upon land, that is, firmly establishing the Church in the world, or by subjecting sinners to himself, in whom he is not submerged, by not yielding to their temptations.

If he passes beyond me, I will not see. If he is higher than I, or has grazed me in his swiftness, I will not recognize him. It is necessary, then, that he both accommodate himself to my weakness, and not forsake me. For if he hands me over to death, who will turn it aside? For he hands over to death, when he either passes beyond, or passes by so as not to be known.

This is the death of the soul, that it does not know God. For his wrath cannot be turned aside. For the wrath of others can be turned aside by one more powerful. By him the rest are made subject under heaven: except heaven itself, that is, the rational creation; because if it had subjected the rest to itself, it would never be punished through the things it had subjected to itself:

but because God subjected those things to it, it is punished through them, when it offends him who subjected them. But even if I am just, he will not hear me: if I beseech him, presuming on my own justice. For comparing it with the unchangeable and everlasting things that are with him, he will not hear me as one unjust. Therefore his mercy is necessary to me. I will beg his judgment: because I cannot judge myself to be just.

Hence the text: but neither do I judge myself; he who judges me is the Lord (1 Cor 4:3–4). But if I call upon him, and he does not hear; I will not believe that he has heard my voice. When I beg his judgment, if he does not hear, I will not believe that he has ever heard me: for he heard me for hidden reasons, not by the merit of my entreaty. Or indeed, I will not believe that I am not heard now: for at some time I have been heard.

Or thus: because if he hears what I ask, I will believe also that I am heard: for if I do not believe, although what I ask comes about, yet I am not heard; so that the believing of the one who asks is the sign of being heard. Lest perhaps he crush me in a whirlwind? For this reason I seek his judgment, lest he crush me in a whirlwind.

For he has made my many tribulations without cause: whose cause was hidden from me. Or indeed it is the voice of one confessing, confessing that he has not been corrected by the scourges of God, and therefore can be crushed by a whirlwind, as by a greater punishment. For he does not let me breathe: so many are my tribulations. And because he is able, he prevails.

He conquers, so that I do his will, not my own. But even if I am just, my mouth will speak ungodly things: if I think myself just. Yet my life will be taken away.

Although I do not know whether I have acted ungodly, yet my life will be taken away, so that I suffer what I do not wish, or do not do what I wish.

There is one thing I have said, 'wrath destroys the great and the powerful.' That is, for this one purpose tribulations come upon men, that no one may seem to himself great and powerful, presuming on his own strength. Because wicked men will be in a great death: not in a moderate one, in which even the just are, when they are afflicted and mocked by them.

The earth has been handed over into the hands of the ungodly: either the body of the just, not the soul, when they persecute them, or when the ungodly is permitted to rule. It can also be taken that the sinful man is in the hands of the devil according to his mortality. Doing his judgment, he covers it: either the judgment of the ungodly man himself, or of the just; for in this time it is covered.

Or indeed by this very thing he does his judgment, that is, he punishes him by that whereby he hides his providence from him; as is the text: in the greatness of his wrath he will not seek it out (Ps 10:4 (9:25)).

Or by this he avenges the just man, that he hides his judgment from his persecutor, that is, his providence, so that through impunity he may be more tightly caught in the snares of his sins. But if it is not so, who then is it? This can be understood of the Lord, who was both mocked, and whose earth, that is, body, was handed over into the hands of the Jews, and who, doing his judgment, hid his majesty. But if it is not he, who then is it, who does greater things than he himself did?

Or thus: "but if God does not do the judgment of the just or the ungodly, who can do it?" But my life is swifter than a runner. He calls men fugitives, departing from justice; like that younger son who set out into a far country (See Luke 15:13). Or like a flying eagle, seeking food. From the higher things, in which the rational souls are by nature blessed, that is, the works of justice, they bent themselves down to earthly pleasures. But even if I speak, I forget while I speak. Speech;

just as he had an inclination toward outward things, so the soul, while it advances to the things that are without, in the desire of enjoying the creation, forgets the inner Creator. Bending down upon my face I will groan. For sorrows follow that bending down. I am shaken in all my members: the fear by which it begins to run back. And because I am ungodly, why am I not dead, and why do I labor? "I know," you supply. Or he says that he labors, because he is not dead to ungodliness. And if I am cleansed with clean hands: either God's hands, or his own; that is, by good works through regeneration. You have dipped me enough in filth: having brought me into this mortality.

And my garment has abhorred me: immortality, with which we long to be further clothed (See 2 Cor 5:4); but because we cannot in this corruption, therefore he says: my garment has abhorred me. For you are not a man, as I am, whom I might contradict. For to a man I could demonstrate my justice; but in your judgment I am found unjust.

Would that there were an arbiter between us! He seems to blaspheme, unless he is understood to be longing for that Mediator of God and men (See 1 Tim 2:5), that through him he may present his prayers. For in this way he, placed between the two, hears and reproves man. For the Father has given all judgment to the Son (John 5:22).

One who would both reprove and hear between the two. Let him take his rod away from me. Let the fear of the Law pass, that I may be joined to him by the freedom of adoption and by love. For I am not with myself: because I cling to the things that are without.

10. (10:3-21) I will bring forth words against myself. These are the words of one confessing. And I will say to the Lord: 'do not teach me to be ungodly.' Do not tempt me beyond what I can bear, nor allow to befall me the things by which ungodliness might be urged upon me. Or is it good for you, if I act unjustly?

But it is not good for you, if I act unjustly: therefore you have not constituted me thus unjustly. Because you despise the work that your hands have made? If indeed you despise the work of your hands. Have you given heed to the counsel of the ungodly? but not of that ungodliness which appears to men. And: have you given heed to the counsel of the ungodly? not because it pleases him that they act unjustly. Or do you see as a man sees? for surely you do not see as a man; therefore you have given heed to the counsel of the ungodly. For there is an ungodliness that you alone see, and which is not seen by men.

Or is your life human? that is, brief, so that you cannot judge of perpetuity. And you have searched out my sins. For the things that are hidden from men could not be hidden from you.

For you know that I have done nothing ungodly. For as far as men are concerned, I have done nothing ungodly. But who is there who may snatch out of your hands? the hands of you who judge.

As God you judge, since you see even those ungodly deeds that man does not see. But afterward, changed, you struck me: he himself being changed, that is, not God; because a changed man perceives a changed God, just as through the long duration of darkness changed eyes perceive a changed sun. Remember that you formed me from clay. Therefore I need your mercy. You will turn me again into earth: by death, which is the punishment of sin.

Did you not milk me out like milk? Because he showed mercy even to the now mortal, when he formed men from men out of a shapeless beginning. Since these things, then, are in you, I know that you can do all things: because they are of such great goodness that they fashion even the carnal substance. But even if I sin, you will guard me: either that you may not destroy me, or that my sin may not be hidden.

And if I am just, I cannot breathe: in the sight of men. For you see the sins that are hidden from men. For I am full of reproach: in your sight. And I am taken like a lion to the slaughter. There is a sin of pride that is hidden from men, since it can creep in even in praiseworthy deeds. But again, changed, you torment me most cruelly: after the punishment of sin, by which man was made mortal.

He speaks of those tribulations that men suffer in this life; because very many tribulations befall suddenly, which disturb the quiet of this mortal life itself, when it is in health, or in the security of things, however temporal, which he reckoned to the mercy of God. Renewing my torments in me. Because mortality itself is already a torment, out of which other tribulations arise. Why then did you bring me out of the womb? from obscurity to recognition, which alone is the matter of greater misery, when it is overturned: this generation he also recalled above. And I would be as though I had not been: utterly unknown. Hence the text: he calls the things that are not, as those that are (Rom 4:17), that is, according to their lowliness.

Or is not the time of my life small? For it is not on account of the length of my life that I am not dead; since surely what I live is small. Let me be, until I rest a little. After the mercy by which you made me from mud, and, changed by mortality, you struck me, and by that very mortality you consoled me, you then exercised me with tribulations.

Let me be, then, that I may rest in you: before I go to the punishments whence it is not permitted to return. For from those that he recalled above it is permitted to return, if a man turns himself to God. But he wishes to rest before he goes to the eternal punishments, to this very end, that he may not go.

Just as if we should say to someone: "correct yourself, before you are damned"; for when he has corrected himself, he will not be damned. Where there is no light, nor is there seeing the life of men. For that is the life of men, where there is the true light, which enlightens every man (See John 1:9). The land of the living is one thing, the land of the dying another.

11. (11:2-19) The words of Zophar the Naamathite. Or will the eloquent man seem to be just? For he thinks that Job abounds in words rather than in works. Blessed is the man born, short of life. He throws back at him his own statement, which he wishes to be understood as said loquaciously and emptily. Since there is no one to contradict you. Because, when he was speaking, no one contradicted him. But how does the Lord speak to you?

Rather speak the things by which God may have mercy on you. Because he will be double over you: by rebuking, and by consoling. And then you will know that things have been worthily repaid you by the Lord for the things in which you have sinned: illumination following after correction. Or will you find the footprint of the Lord: so as to wish to reproach God.

Heaven is high, and what will you do? so as to find out the mysteries of heaven. For you ought not to reproach him whose works you do not comprehend. Who will say to him: 'what have you done?' For this too will have been rightly done, if God has done it: because he cannot do anything except rightly. For he himself knows the works of unjust men.

It is not "of an unjust work." Hence he wishes it to be understood that this man, whom he thinks unjust, has foolishly reproached God: for so he supposed him to speak. But man wavers otherwise with words.

Now God pleases him, now God displeases him; whereas with God there is firmness. And the man born of woman will be like a wild ass in the desert: in the desire of freedom, impatient of a master and a tamer.

And stretching out your hands to him: that he may accept your works. If there is anything unjust in your hand. He repeated the same two things, but in changed order. And let not iniquity remain in your house. By this he meant the heart. For thus your face will shine like pure water: the conscience. Like a wave that does not pass by, and you will not be terrified: unless it touches all in this life.

And your prayer will be like the morning star: it will go before illumination; as though these things too, pertaining to the prophecy of the holy city or to the people of God, are said as heard or revealed, just as they were said by his friends above. And many will entreat your face. All these things concern the Church.

12. (12:4-25) The words of Job. But the just man and one without crime comes to be derided. He is to be understood of the Lord. The sense: "it is no wonder, then, if I too have come to be derided by you."

And his house, that it might be laid waste by the unjust: the Church by persecutors. Nay rather, let no one, when he is wicked, trust that he will be unpunished: because judgment begins from the house of God (1 Pet 4:17). As though there will be no inquiry against them: let them not be confident. But yet ask the four-footed beasts, whether they will answer you.

Therefore he rightly inquires into the unjust, because from the works they could have recognized the Creator, and ought to have worshiped him. For they ought not to have been taught by the answer of creatures; since they had received the reason by which they might recognize these things. Is not the soul of all living things in his hand? From this, then, it is known that he created all things, because the soul of all living things is in his hand.

And the spirit of all the flesh of man: of all human flesh, that is, the rational soul. For the ear discerns words. Just as the senses discern sensible things, so the spirit discerns spiritual things, which ought to have recognized, since it is in the hand of the Lord, the works of the Lord. In much time there is wisdom. Not indeed in much time; but with the Lord, from whom it is to be sought. If he destroys, who will build? he destroys on account of power, and shuts up on account of wisdom, so that one may not come to it. If he holds back the water, he will dry up the earth: wisdom itself; but by the earth, man.

But if he also sends it forth, he will destroy by overturning the earth. For when many are made wise, sinners will be troubled. Who leads counselors away captive. For he subjugates to himself those who consult him. But the judges of the earth he has cast into dread: either the Jews, or Pilate, or those who judge with an earthly mind. Who sets kings upon thrones: that is, the apostles. And he has girded their loins with a belt: that is, with continence. Who sends the priests away captive: so that they are led by men; and the Jews are signified.

Who changes the lips of the faithful. He changes them for good, so that they presume not on their own justice, but on his grace. And he has recognized the understanding of the elders. He to whom the understanding of the elders is pleasing. Hence the text: you have been recognized by God (Gal 4:9): to which the opposite is: I do not know you (Matt 25:12).

And he well began from faith, and came to the gray hairs of understanding. Who reveals the deep things out of darkness: by opening the prophecies. And he has brought forth into light the shadow of death: that is, "he brought it about that this life should be known to be a shadow of death."

Deceiving the nations, and destroying them: those who thought they were harming the Church of God, when they were harming themselves; which is to be understood of the ungodly. Laying the nations low, and leading them into the way: to humility, like that ass.

Reconciling the hearts of the princes of the people of the earth: reconciling to himself either the Jews or the kings of the earth, who at first persecuted the Church. But he led them astray into a way they did not know: by undermining the works of the Law, that they might be understood simply; hence he seemed to them a sinner. By which error they were darkened like a drunkard.

13. (13:3-28) And I will reprove in his sight, if he wills it: that he may reprove himself; which belongs to confession. And you are all healers of evils. For the good you cannot heal by consolation. Hear therefore the rebuke of my mouth: against you. And before his sight you bring forth deceit: when you wish to seem just, which you are not.

Or do you withdraw yourselves from being made judges? Can you dissemble, and not judge, that I speak the truth about you? For if you do all things, you will be added to him: that is, "even if you keep all the precepts, he will find in you something to reprove. For no one is just in his sight." But if you have also secretly admired persons: your own, by justifying yourselves, not only before men, but even before yourselves.

But a body of clay: that at least by the consideration of your own frailty you may fear. Taking my flesh in my teeth. I will not spare myself, so that I may reprove not only you, but also myself. And I will put my soul in my hand: to be examined, that I may conceal nothing, or that I may reckon up my sins. Even though he who is mighty slay me, who has also begun: although he slay my sins. Yet I will speak, and before him I will reprove myself: I will not justify myself, hiding my sins.

Behold, I draw near to my judgment: that I may judge concerning myself; as though this itself were the justice of man, not to spare himself in confession. Then from your face I will not be hidden: as sinners are hidden.

Take your hand from me: that there may be nothing in me to be chastised, and that there may be love in me. And let not your fear terrify me. How many are my iniquities? From this it can be seen that he said the words: I will put my soul in my hand: for the reckoning.

Or do you think me to be opposed to you? When surely I am weak, and as though you fear this, lest if I were justified I should be your equal; whereas I am a leaf. Therefore there is some hidden cause, since this is not it. And you have laid upon me the sins of my youth. So that this is the cause why he says that his sins are hidden from him, because he has been proud, which is the sin of youth.

And you have put my foot in a fetter: in the bond of mortality. And you have contemplated the roots of my feet: my desires. I who grow old like a wineskin: so that I cannot carry the new wine: or (as a garment sewn with a new patch) like a garment that is eaten by moths.

14. (14:1-22) For man born of woman, short of life, and full of wrath: of punishment. And you have made this one come into judgment before you? Although he is so mortal, yet he too has something whereby he may render an account: for what he can is required of him, although he can do very little. For his months are numbered with you. For by the very fact that he is temporal, he is convicted of sin: for you had made him eternal.

Depart from him; let him rest: according to the opinion of the carnal and animal man, to whom this whole life is the good. And therefore he wishes to be spared, that he may enjoy this life. For there is hope for a tree. These things are to be pronounced derisively. For surely there is more hope for a man: which the carnal are unwilling to believe.

But a man, when he has died, is gone. And here too, ironically. For in time the sea will diminish; for afterward it is filled. He speaks of those places where there is an ebb and flow, or because all the shores secretly diminish and increase, namely by the hours of the moon, when the moon rises, it grows, for us or for others, up to mid-heaven, and from there it diminishes.

As long as heaven exists, it will not be aroused: to newness, that is, to heaven itself. And would that you had guarded me among the lower regions. So far is there hope of the resurrection, that I might already be free even from these uncertainties of life. And had hidden me, until your wrath should rest. Hence the text:

hide yourself a little, until the wrath of the Lord pass by (Isa 26:20); that is, "until this mortality pass by, and one come to the resurrection."

For if a man has died, he will live. For this is not life. When the days of his life are completed: then he will live. Then you will call, and I will answer you: obedient to you, without the impediment of mortality. You have sealed up my iniquities in a bag: that you may repay me.

You have noted if I have erred unwillingly in anything: this too you have noted. But to err unwillingly is the punishment of sin. And indeed a falling mountain flows away. So too man has fallen from his height and firmness. And a rock grows old in its place: as man in his kind and his condition. And by the washing away of frequent floods: as though man too has thus been brought to thinness, when he is worn down by the frequent floods of desires.

But you have destroyed the hope of man. He made stages from the mountain to the rock, from the rock to stones, from stones to sand; because these suffer carnal diminishments. And he well says now you have destroyed. For you have driven him to the end: to consumption. So that this hope may perish, in which the carnal rejoice.

You have changed his face, you have sent him away: when the image of God in him was destroyed. And though his sons be many, he does not know it: because he dies, although offspring is propagated. But his flesh grieved over him: that is, man grieves carnally over such a condition of his, and laments it in an animal way. For the spiritual man knows that, even though the outer man is corrupted, yet the inner is renewed from day to day (See 2 Cor 4:16): because he feels this happening in himself.

15. (15:2-35) The words of Eliphaz the Temanite. And he has filled his belly with grief. For the spirit of knowledge heals from griefs rather by consolation: but you who fill the belly with grief do not answer with the spirit of knowledge. Have you not <also> cast away fear? You did not fear God, saying such things against him.

And you have chosen the tongue of the evil: by which men curse. What then? were you born the first man? that you are so proud. Or were you formed before the hills? The mountains too are to be taken under the name of hills, that is, before all the powers, the mighty spirits. But both an old man and one decrepit is among us. One who knows even what we do not know is among us. What did your heart dare? and what did your eyes endure? they hoped.

For what is man, that he should be without crime? which you too have said. If in his holy ones there is no faith: on account of the uncertainties of the times, by which they are often deceived, so that they say many things and do not do them. And heaven is not clean before him: for "those who dwell in heaven"; or indeed heaven is put for the holy ones themselves, because in them God dwells.

The things the wise have said, and have not hidden from their fathers. Because the apostles preached even to the Jews. To them alone the earth has been given: to be inhabited. Nor did any stranger come upon them: neither a holy man nor an angel; that is, they will possess it in security. When they have thought themselves to be now at peace. He says this as though he thinks this has befallen Job himself.

He does not believe that he can be converted from the darkness: he does not believe that he can be converted from his sins. And he has been decreed as food for the vultures: of the airy powers, which are fed by the deaths of sinners. Like a commander he will fall in the front line. He is bold, and does not bear tribulations.

Who lifted up his hands against God. Or, because he lifted them up? And ran against him insolently: by doing the things contrary to what he commanded. In the thick neck of his shield: presuming on his own protection. Because he covered his face with his fat. Through fat, that is, through the exaltation of his pride, he hid God from himself.

And he made a halter upon his thighs: that he might be bound by his lusts, by which bond he might be led to death. For the things they prepared for themselves, others will take away: even the earthly kingdom itself, or whatever temporal hope, which the just will receive together with the whole world. And his substance will not be enriched, nor will it remain: the ungodly man's, that is. He will not cast a shadow upon the earth: that is, "he does not grow green."

But the wind will dry up his stock: temptation. His cutting will be corrupted before its hour: before he hopes. Let him fall like the flower of the olive. Let him fall from peace, or because better things follow these, as fruit follows the flower. For the testimony of the ungodly is death: the sign. And fire will consume the houses of those who accept bribes. For these are the ungodly who set temporal gifts before justice. He will conceive groans also in the womb. The things he hopes for turn to his punishment.

16. (16:2-22) The words of Job. I have heard many such things: not only the things you say. You are all consolers of the evil. You can console the evil, because they imitate you, not the good: and it is a vocative. For from none of you have I heard anything good. What then? is there order in the words of the spirit? of pride. Or in what will it be troublesome to you? although you do not love what you say.

And I too speak according to you: as you deserve. If your soul were placed for mine. If you were to suffer what I do; I would speak with words, not deeds: thus it is nothing to speak what you do not do. For if I speak, I will not grieve over the wound. You show that you are prudent neither in speaking nor in being silent. For the wise, even when they speak, grieve together in their consolations; or, speaking in their own confession, they grieve over their wound; or, when they are silent, they are silent prudently.

But now he has wearied me, and made me foolish, and rotten: that I might not speak against you, God has broken my pride; that, having been made foolish, I might become wise. You have laid hold of me, and I have become a testimony. You have convicted me of my sins, and I am a witness against myself. And my lie has risen up against me: when I seemed just to myself.

I have answered against my face. This is: I will set you before your face (Ps 50:21 (49:21)). Using wrath he cast me down. He blessed, using wrath; for he does not suffer it: but he cast me down as proud. He gnashed his teeth over me. He rebuked me; so that teeth are taken for words.

The arrows of his pirates have fallen upon me. The airy powers, which God uses, and permits them either to exercise the good, or to punish the evil. Pirates, because they lie in wait for those sailing on this sea. With the edge of his eyes he rushed in. He did not overlook my sins, but as it were gave a nod that I should be punished. For he himself is as it were the light, showing the punishers those to be punished. His regard was a ruin to me. Or thus: "he brought it about that I should see my sin; for before it had not thus been brought home to my perception."

The mighty God struck me sharply, and together they ran upon me. For God striking, those angels of Satan ran together upon me. While I was at peace, he tore me apart. He tore me from peace itself or from my very self, so that I was torn to pieces by my adversaries and by those opposing me. And taking my hair he pulled it out: through my sins he divided me against myself.

He set me up like a target: at which they might shoot, as a target is usually set up for those shooting, by which they may direct their darts.

They surrounded me with lances, sending them into my reins; they did not spare: on account of the carnal desires, which he says were driven into him, through the evil persuasions of evil angels. They poured out my gall upon the earth: that I might envy earthly goods in those who abound in them. They cast me down with a great prostration: lest we should understand a carnal prostration.

They sewed sackcloth to my skin: inner sins, by which he recalls that he had been among good things. And over my eyelids the shadow of death. I wish to see, and carnal habit impedes me. Let not the earth cover over the blood of my flesh: that is, lest, if my prayer be unclean by longing for earthly things, a heap of earth be added upon the bond of mortality; which he signified by the name of blood: that is, lest by earthly desire I be covered with greater calamities of voluntary sin, which is that natural sin from the mortal condition:

Nor let there be a place for my cry. Let the merit of my prayer be cut off. And now behold, my witness is in the heavens. He seems to speak of the Lord, because he had not yet descended to earth. And my fellow witness is in the heights: on account of his participation in mortality. Let a man be judged with the Lord. Let the Lord come, that a man may be judged with him, as John with Christ.

In whose mutual judging is understood what distance there is between a perfect man, and God made man. As the son of man to his neighbor: the Lord, having taken on a man, to him who had fallen among robbers (See Luke 10:30). For the numbered years have come to me: that I should be helped through Christ in the fullness of times (See Gal 4:4). And I will enter upon the way by which I will not return: the way of renouncing the world.

17. (17:1-15) I have failed, agitated in spirit: the order is: "I have failed in spirit, shaken by labors." I pray that I may be buried, and it does not befall me: that the mortal may be swallowed up by life (See 2 Cor 5:4).

For we groan, being burdened, in that we do not wish to be unclothed, but to be further clothed (2 Cor 5:4); that is, "let us be changed rather than die." Which surely, although man desires it, does not befall him. For he owes death by the condemnation of sin. I will offer prayers with labor, and what have I done?

I have done something by obtaining. Strangers have stolen my goods. He signifies that very immortality, of which he is despoiled, who was left half alive by the robbers (See Luke 10:30). Who is this one too? who is to help me, signifying the Lord.

But he says: who is it? because he was to be among men, so that he could scarcely be distinguished from them. Let him be bound to my hand: by the bond of love, that he may guard me, and lead me where he wills.

Because you have hidden their heart from prudence. Those who did not recognize him you have hidden. For this reason you will not exalt them: because they were not humble, therefore they were blinded, and could not be exalted by the humility of Christ. Let evils be announced to a part. That blindness has come upon a part of Israel (Rom 11:25), or because the things Christ announced seemed evils to them, so that they said:

he leads the crowds astray (John 7:12); or the things announced through the prophets about the blindness of Israel befell, not indeed the whole, but a part. And the eyes over their children have wasted away: in wonder at the miracles, to whom it was said: if I cast out demons by Beelzebub, by whom do your sons cast them out? (Matt 12:27)

But you have made me a byword to the nations: the man whom you redeemed, that is, the Church of which the nations would speak, or which would speak to the nations. And I have become a laughingstock to them: either to the nations, when they disparaged it; or to the Jews, who spoke to the nations.

My eyes have been darkened because of wrath. The eyes of the Church, that is, the apostles, have been darkened, when they were not understood by those who were to be punished with this punishment.

And I have been greatly assailed by all. For both Jews and gentiles assailed the Church. And the truthful wondered over this: either why power was given to the ungodly against the Church, or why the Gospel was not recognized by the ungodly.

But let the just man rise up over his enemy: he who temporally falls under persecutions, that afterward he may rule over the unbelievers.

And let him who is pure in hands take boldness: the boldness of hope, that he may confess Christ even in persecution. For he has not found the truth in you. For grace is necessary to all, both to Jews and to others. And the joints of my heart have been torn apart: that I may not conceal my sins.

They have made night into day: the ungodly. Hence the text: woe to those who say that what is good is evil, and evil good; who put darkness for light, and light for darkness (Isa 5:20). If I endure, the lower regions will be my house: if I bear with my sins, so as not to confess. I have called destruction my father. I will not be a son of life.

But God has named. My mother and sister, corruption. From the fact that they cling inseparably, as kindred. For what hope is there now for me? understood: "if I endure." Or will I see my goods? by which one is seduced, has refused to be converted, and has borne with the sinner.

18. (18:5-19) The words of Bildad the Shuhite. And the light of the ungodly will be extinguished. Do not wonder, then, if your light too, like that of an ungodly man, has been extinguished. His light was darkness in the house: the brightness of his house; that is, it was either the devil or the Antichrist. And the lamp over him will be extinguished: the scant and earthly light. Let the lowest seize his substance.

The things he wished to have, let the humble have. For his foot has been sent into a snare. For he himself has been caught, by persecuting the Lord. He will strengthen the thirsting over him: that those who hunger and thirst for justice may overcome him. His cord has been hidden over the earth: by which he may be caught, that is, the things that are as it were granted to him. And his trap is on the paths: by which he passes.

Let sorrows destroy him round about: on every side. And let many come about his feet in the straits of famine: many who follow him, or who attend upon him. Let the branches of his feet be eaten: of his teachings, that is, by which he goes. Let health be broken from his dwelling: the tranquillity of this life.

And let the necessity of a royal cause hold him: the opportunity of his punishment, which will avail for the glory of God, on account of which his desire is now permitted to him. He calls it a royal cause, because he will boast himself to be Christ. Let it dwell in his tent in his night.

Let the necessity of a royal cause torment his conscience; the craving for tyranny: in his night, in the punishment of his blindness, when he is damned. Let his beautiful things be sprinkled with sulphur: the things in which he took pleasure, let them be burned up with foul fire. And from above his harvest will rush upon him: from God.

And let not his name be in the face of the streets where he was: let it be taken away from the memory of the people. And let him not be recognizable among his own people. Let him come to such abasement that he is not recognized by his own. Nor let his house be saved again under heaven. For some will be saved again. But let others live among his people. Let his people be subjugated to others.

19. (19:2-29) The words of Job. And you destroy me with words. You weaken me, you who ought to have consoled me. Know only that God has done thus to me: before whom I can be convicted of sin, not before men. And he has set his rampart around me. A ditch is around walls; by which I have been forced to confession.

Behold, I laugh at reproaches, and do not speak. He speaks of the usefulness of confession; because if he wished to laugh at his sin, and not to speak it out, he would cry out, and not be heard. He has put darkness in my countenance. He has taken from me the illumination of my countenance; which befalls those who are turned away.

And he has taken the crown from my head: the spiritual dignity that wisdom gives. And he has broken me apart on every side, and I am gone. I held all things, and he took them from me, contrary to the power of holding all things that he had received.

And he has judged me as an enemy. He so judged me, as though I would harm him, if I were his equal. And they surrounded my tent; my heart and conscience. My brothers withdrew: in hope of correction, because they are brothers: although at first they spurned my correction; and followed those who would urge upon them what was alien, that is, pernicious, to them.

And my friends have become unmerciful: in spiritual evils, those who suffer with their neighbors, but rather mock them; whom they would not mock when set in carnal evils. And those who knew my name have forgotten me: not recognizing me, because I have been changed.

The neighbors of the house, and my handmaids: with whom I shared secrets; the flatterers, who withdraw from him who confesses to God: for these are said to play the handmaid. I called my servant, and he did not answer: either the body, or those who served him for evil ends.

My mouth entreated, and I begged my wife: as though saying: why are you sorrowful, O my soul? and why do you trouble me? (Ps 42:11 (41:12)) that is, desiring that it consent to him: I called, coaxing the sons of my womb: whom he had begotten, persuading them to the hope of the world. And those whom I had loved rose up against me: in that life.

My flesh has rotted within the skin. By the love of the things that are felt outwardly, my inner parts have rotted. For surely it is a trivial thing, if we take it literally, as though he had a scab. And my bones are in my teeth. My firmness and strength are in words, not in deeds.

Have mercy on me, have mercy on me, O friends. He seems to ask the angels to pray for him, or indeed the saints to pray for the penitent. For it is the hand of the Lord that has touched me. He says he has been touched by the hand of the Lord, that he might grieve over his wound, which had been without feeling to him.

Why do you persecute me, as the Lord also does? you loathe and shudder at me as the Lord does; or you rebuke me, when I now confess. Are you not satisfied with my flesh? You do not rejoice, if I live carnally. <With> an iron stylus and lead? that just as lead yields to an iron stylus, so the hearts of men may yield to my words.

Or let them be carved on rocks for a testimony? that those may learn them who are firm for evangelizing. For I know that he who is to set me free is eternal: because he can restore me. Of which things I am conscious to myself: because I have deserved them. Which my eye has seen, and no other. This is:

no one knows what goes on in a man, except the spirit that is in him (1 Cor 2:11). And all things have been completed for me in the bosom: in the inner parts where no one sees, that is, in the conscience. But if you say: 'what shall we say against him?' According to that which is said even to spiritual people:

watching yourself, lest you too be tempted (Gal 6:1). And shall we find the root of the matter in him? so as to convict him out of his own words. For wrath will come upon the unjust. Those who extol themselves over sinners, and think that they cannot be such, these he calls the unjust.

20. (20:2-29) The words of Zophar the Naamathite. For you do not understand more than I. He turns to the others, who were consoling Job along with him. I will hear the instruction of my confounding. Obliquely he wishes Job to hear the instruction of his own confounding: for then he can also attain the spirit of wisdom. This way of speaking is customary, when we say: "it is good for me to beware, for it will go ill with me"; when we wish another to beware.

Do you not know these things from the ages? Since the ages have been, you know these things. And he thinks that Job, as an ungodly man, is ignorant of these things. The eye will see, and will add no more. For he will not be seen.

Let the ungodly one destroy his sons: either the devil destroys his imitators, or those seduced by him. And let his hands be set on fire with sorrows: let them be tormented by his works.

His bones are filled with his youth. He is proud of his firmness. He will hide it under his tongue. He will not show it, like a deceitful man, that he may use it secretly. He will spare it, and will not leave it. Loving it, and unwilling to be without it, he does not pursue it; or, the Lord will spare it, and by this impunity will not leave it.

And he will hold it in the midst of his throat: as something that delights him. And he will not be able to help himself. Not for that reason will he free himself. The gall of an asp is in his belly: in the inner parts, having in secret the malice of harming. The riches unjustly gathered will be vomited up: with the torment of the inner parts and the pressure of the heart. An angel will drag him out of his house. Whenever his hidden things will be made manifest through tribulations.

And he will shine forth with the fury of dragons: so that he who was at first hidden, betrayed by tribulations, may now shine forth openly with the fury of dragons.

Let the tongue of the serpent slay him. Let the devil seduce him. And let him not see the milking of the flocks: the fruit of the sheep, that is, let him not do the works of justice, so as to understand that he can thereby be redeemed.

Nor the pastures of honey and butter: good works with love and cheerfulness of heart, and the generosity of the giver. For butter is rich milk.

In vain and to no purpose he has labored: because he does not understand these things, by doing the works that pertain to mercy. Hence the Lord too is said to eat butter and honey (See Isa 7:15), because these are offered to him in his humble ones. Which will be like something hard: which cannot be chewed or swallowed. This hard something is iniquity or pride. In his desire he will not be saved: because he desired unjust things.

There will be no remnants of his food. His desires pass away. When he has thought himself filled, he will be confined. There is not so much satiety from the fullness of desires as there is pressure. If only somehow he may fill his belly. Such necessity will come upon him that he is in doubt whether he may fill his belly; whereas surely these things are sought for this very purpose, that necessity may be driven off. He said this because the more he has, the more he desires.

And he will send upon him the fury of his wrath: because he did not see to do good works. Let an arrow of bronze wound him: a perpetual one. Let a dart pass through his body. Let temptation pierce him, so that he is wounded both by the things he hopes for and by the things he forsakes, as though pierced from the breast through the back. Lightnings in his tents: sudden terrors in his thoughts. Let a stranger harm his house: the devil, who is an outsider come to tempt; if indeed a man has also his own temptations. And let heaven uncover his iniquities: the heavenly judgment. And the possession of his goods by the bishop. These things God will bestow on him.

21. (21:2-34) The words of Job. And let not this be a consolation to me from you: by which you think that one should rejoice in temporal goods, whereas they are common to the godly and the ungodly; and that, if ever anyone were unjust, vengeance is taken on him through them: whereas Job says that these goods remain to the ungodly even to the grave, and that vengeance is not taken on them through them.

What then? is my chastisement human? My chastisement is from God. And so he himself can console, not you. Or why should I not be angry? Do not, then, console me thus: for surely I see the happiness of the ungodly. Look upon me, and be amazed: as one speaking empty things. For if I remember, I am troubled. He confesses the indignities of human life, returning to a past disposition from this one in which he now is. And my flesh is held by sorrows: I grieve carnally.

Why do the ungodly live? He asks of them the cause, because they kept saying that vengeance is taken here on the ungodly. And do their sheep endure, as it were by old age? in whatever way they can persist by old age; for they will not be forever. But their goods were in their hands. He did not take their goods from them, when they were saying these things.

Nay rather, the lamp of the ungodly will be extinguished: the temporal brightness, even if not as these understood it. Let his goods fail his sons: the goods he persuaded them of, namely temporal ones, either of the Antichrist, or of the devil. Let his eyes see his own slaying. He signifies that this prosperity too is unknown to those who rejoice in it: but in the future it will be brought home even to the perception of the ungodly. Because there is no will of his in his house after him: because in their conscience they did not follow the Lord in their tribulations.

Although the number of his months be halved: although he worshiped the present God, yet because he did not also hope for the future things, which is the full number of months. For does he judge murders? Because the ungodly, when they have persuaded to ungodliness through the love of carnal ungodlinesses, surely slay for the age to come. Yet men do not judge such murders, but God alone.

This one will die in the strength of his simplicity. He seems to pursue hidden murders, recalling one generous man, and another greedy; because men who abound, and who are generous, are thought also good. His entrails are full of fat: he has gladness. And their marrow is poured out: the marrow of the entrails; because he does not keep his goods within himself, but spends them either on himself, or on others.

And so I know that you press upon me boldly. For you speak inconsiderately.

Because you say: 'where is the house of the prince?' either of the ungodly or of the proud man; because they thought that goods are taken away from them here, whereas very many even full of these things have ended their life, being destined to be punished through them.

And where is the covering in the tents of the ungodly? the honor. Ask those who pass along the way: those who are not delighted by the way, but pass along it.

And you will not be ignorant of their signs: either the signs the ungodly give to passersby, telling them what is to come for them; or the signs by which the ungodly are recognized. Who will announce his way before him? Before the ungodly man no one but the Lord announces his way confidently, because he himself answers him.

And yet he too, the Lord, was led into the grave. Thus the reward of godliness is not to be hoped for here. And over the heap he kept watch. For he himself rose again before the heap of those who rise again rose. The stones of the torrent were sweet to him: those whom the world does not overthrow, that is, his disciples. And after him every man follows, and before him are innumerable. Either after him every man, that is, one man: and before him innumerable, who now are reckoned in the number of men. Or after him the crowd of believers, and before him the patriarchs and prophets. How then do you console me emptily? by urging present goods or evils.

22. (22:2-30) The words of Eliphaz the Temanite. Is it not the Lord who teaches understanding and knowledge? As though Job had said that he does not judge rightly; whereas surely God cannot be reproached, except through the understanding by which he is superior, seeing that it is given to man by him. And will he come with you into judgment? that you should be compared to him.

Your light has been turned into darkness: your dignity. And while you slept, water covered you: the flood of tribulation covered you secure. Or does he judge through a mist? as though he could not see through a mist. Are the clouds his hiding place, and he will not be seen? The things that are on earth are hidden from him.

And he traverses the circuit of heaven: the figure, not also the earth. Do you then keep the path of the world? As though Job thought that human affairs are not cared for by God. Because the immature were carried off? immature according to themselves. For they thought they would remain forever. Or indeed before they came to wisdom: but because they had heard this, not because Job's friends perceived these things.

And the thought of the ungodly is far from him, and he fills their houses with goods. And the thought of the ungodly is far from him, because he does not do as the ungodly man hopes; that is, either because ungodliness pleases him, or because he does not see it.

The just, seeing it, laughed: understanding it; although these did not understand, thinking that recompense is made to the ungodly here. And the blameless one mocked them: the ungodly. Be hard, if you endure: patient, that is, endure hard things.

You will put iniquity far from your tent: your manner of life or conduct; although these say this carnally. And you will set it upon a mound on a rock: against that which he said: a river running down their foundations. Because he humbled himself: the light itself. And you will say: 'he has been lifted up into pride': against the proud. Deliver the innocent, and you will be saved <in> the cleanness of your hands. Do not fail in good works, because God cares for human things.

23. (23:2-16) The words of Job. And indeed I know that the rebuke is from my own hand: from my sins. And my hand has become heavy over my groaning. Therefore you struck me, that I might grieve.

And to come even to his throne. That I may be so holy as to come to the number of those who are his thrones. For then I can speak true things, and hear them: hence too the holy ones are called heavens.

And I will know the pleadings that he will speak to me: the renderings of causes, by which he shows that he judges all things justly. And I will perceive the things he announces to me: now close to him. Or will he contend with me in much power? so as to resist me through might.

By no means. Only let him not abuse me in terror: on account of my sins, for which I now fear, while I am in terror, let him not abuse me. But when I have come to him: in that freedom in which I will be numbered to his throne, I will love all things, and his power will not resist me;

although now he can abuse me, as a sinner: that is, let him do with me what he wills, even with my punishment, yet justly. For truth and rebuke are from him: that is, he does not rebuke unjustly. He brings my judgment to its end. Even if now he rebukes, afterward he will make it manifest.

For if I walk first, afterward I will not be. Let me not hope arrogantly, let me not despair faithlessly: that is, not to turn aside to the right or the left. Hence the text: if I ascend into heaven, you are there (Ps 139:8 (138:8)). Who can drive me thence? and so on. On the left, what he will do, I will not lay hold of. He repeats the things above. By "on the left" he means that he will not lay hold of one given over to temporal things. He will turn to the right, and I will not see. Therefore I ought not to be on the left. He said he will turn, because he himself is among the spiritual things, from which I turn myself away, if I am on the left.

But he himself knows my way: so that, even if he leads me through tribulations, I will follow. He has tested me like gold: in temptations. I will go forth in his precepts. Let me come out of my darkness, but yet in his precepts. But if he himself has judged thus: that he should test me like gold through tribulations. Therefore I have hastened to him: because he has afflicted me, therefore, leaving temporal things, I have hastened to him.

And being admonished I was anxious about him: that by these carnal punishments I might avoid eternal punishments. Therefore at his face I will be troubled. Now I will be troubled, that I may beware, thinking of the future judgment, where his manifestation will be.

And the Lord softened my heart. And the very fearing, by which he guards against future punishments, he reckons to the mercy of God. For he would not know the punishments and darkness coming upon the evil, unless the Lord softened his heart by present tribulations: against that text, that God hardens the heart of Pharaoh (See Exod 7:3).

24. (24:1-25) Why were the hours not hidden from the Lord: wherefore, or: and so. They transgressed the end: Christ.

And they turned the poor aside from the just way: so that either they imitated them, or thence supposed that there was no divine judgment, because they saw unpunished the malice by which they harmed those forsaking justice.

Together the meek of the earth were hidden: together with those who turned aside from the just way, the meek were hidden, lest they bring me help. For there are three kinds of men in the Church, when persecution comes: some consent, some flee, some suffer, whose person Job sustains.

And the wild asses in the field rushed upon me. The foolish and untamed, and for this reason proud, rush upon me confessing, that is, the Church. And going forth to their work. For this is their work, to rush upon me, that is, to this they are destined by God.

Bread became sweet to him among the young. To the ungodly man and persecutor he calls bread sweet, that is, persecution, which he gladly enjoyed, when he carried it out against the young: so that by the young we take either lovers of pleasures, because these easily consent to such men; or those who have advanced in the Church only so far that they have passed beyond the simplicity of childhood, but have not yet come to that manly strength by which even a persecutor is despised.

They reaped the field that was not theirs before its time. Either he speaks of kinds of persecutions, so as to terrify someone by the loss of his field:

or by the field the Church is to be understood, which they wished to reap by persecutions before its ripeness, that is, before the tares should grow up together, so that at harvest time they might be separated. They will be soaked by the drippings of the mountains: fleeing naked to the caves, where the rocks drip. They snatched the orphan from the breast. The orphans and the widow are generally to be taken in the person of the Church: it is the people under torment.

And him who had fallen, they humbled: one deserted either by the help of God, or of anyone; which is of great cruelty, not to spare such people. In the straits they lay in wait unjustly: in their necessities. From the city and from the houses they were being cast out. By them others were being cast out. But the soul of the little ones was in groaning exceedingly: it was.

But God himself took no care of them: of the ungodly, because now, by taking no care of them, he made them despair of the judgment of God; because they did evil with impunity. And therefore they have been handed over into darkness: of ignorance of the judgment of God.

And suddenly like a thief: that day will overtake them. The eye of the adulterer watches for the darkness. He wishes to show into what darkness the ungodly are handed over through impunity: not the darkness that adulterers seek, and the rest who do evil by night, lest they be recognized by day; but that darkness which is upon them even in the morning.

He digs through houses in the darkness. He recalls other evil deeds. By day they sealed themselves up: they hid themselves. They did not know the light, because the shadow of death abides with them together: not because the night has withdrawn does the shadow of death therefore desert them.

He is light upon the face of the water: in comparison with the earth, those are to be taken as more shining whom the light penetrates, and an image of lightness; and therefore the shadow of death is light upon them. For they too bear it, by the condition of the flesh.

Or: he said he is light upon the face of the water, upon those who confess in Baptism. Let their portion be cursed upon the earth. Let what they have chosen be barren. For from the bosom of orphans they snatched: from the heart of the weak the word, through evil persuasion.

Then his sin was remembered: which he thought would come into oblivion. Let every unjust man be crushed like incurable wood: which he does not heal. For he did not deal well with the barren woman: who is without the consolation of sons.

Rising up, then, he does not believe against his own life: he does not believe against his own life; for he ought to have believed that he had an evil life, and by that very fact to rise up. When he has begun to grow weak, let him not hope for health: that is, to be afflicted.

But he falls into languor. For such an ungodly man seeks consolations in adverse things, by which he becomes weaker. He has withered like a mallow in the heat: his height, because it did not bear the heat of tribulation; a mallow, on account of weakness. Or like an ear of grain falling of its own accord from the stalk. Because it was empty at its very top. For he chooses for himself such consolations as make him worse in his weakness. Otherwise, who is there to say that I speak a lie? if they are otherwise.

25. (25:1-5) The words of Bildad the Shuhite. For what is the beginning but fear of him? This addition seems to agree with those words in which Job says: therefore at his face I will be troubled, I will consider and will fear him. Let no one think there is delay for the pirates. Without delay, according to his permission, they tempt.

For upon whom will their snares not come? that is, when he himself permits. By snares he means "temptations." Or how will a man be just before the Lord? Therefore he justly permits him to be tempted. Or how will one born of woman cleanse himself? for unless he is cleansed by God, he is unclean. If he commands the moon, and it does not shine. For if the reasons and order of his own providence require that the moon not shine, he will command that it not shine, and it will not shine.

But why? Does he wish it to be seen thereby that the moon is not clean before him, because he commands it, and it does not shine? Or is perhaps the nature of the rational soul figuratively suggested here, to which the intelligible sun is that true light, which enlightens every man?

And since the moon shines to earthly sight the more, the more it recedes from the sun; but when it approaches the sun, it is destroyed to the earth: let us understand that the soul is divinely commanded, that, having overcome its earthly and mortal birth, by which its splendor appears to those who see with earthly perception, it may appear and draw near and be subjugated to wisdom, so that, exulting most secretly in its light, it may beware of doing its justice before men, that it may be seen by them (Matt 6:1),

but that he who glories, let him glory in the Lord (1 Cor 1:31). Because even when it appears to men, it appears by the gift of the Creator: nor are the stars clean before him: in comparison with him.

26. (26:2-14) The words of Job. Whom do you assist, or whom are you about to help? when, indignant as it were at their injustice, he thought they were to be punished by God. But, speaking truly to himself, he calls himself back, so as rather to leave their judgment to God, lest he seem either to assist God, or to wish to help him, as though feeble, in coercing or correcting men; or to give counsel as to what he should do with them; or to follow him, as one who would attain the cause why he allows deceitful men to be and to live, whereas he surpasses every soul that seeks him by an incomprehensible power; or as it were to announce to him something about them, whereas man has from him even the breath, when he announces anything.

Will the giants be reduced to nothing? It is therefore no wonder if God spares these, when he does not reduce the giants to nothing. And lest it be said: "but they have been thrust down to the lower regions"; he added that God sees the lower world: and yet he has ordered them there where they have deserved to be; just as he has ordered the just, whether now as they are, or afterward as they will be, although he never removes them from his face, because all things are naked before him; so that you may take even these proud consolers as near to the giants.

Beneath the water are their neighbors too. Or is beneath the water to be supplied with "they are held," or something of the kind? And there is no covering for perdition. Even perdition is not hidden from him. Stretching out the north over nothing.

The north can signify the devil, and the earth the sinner; since for both the one and the other the hope is empty. Hanging the earth over nothing: in the air. Binding the water in his clouds: on account of the obscurity of prophecy. And the cloud is not rent beneath him: beneath the truth that the cloud held, which is not rent for those who understand the Scriptures: for they are not called "contradictory," as those who do not understand suppose.

Who holds the face of the sun lest the sun of justice be recognized by the ungodly. And he stretches his cloud over it: the flesh that the Lord assumed. He has set a precept around upon the face of the water: the peoples. Even to the consummation of the light: the end of this life, that is, the end of the age, or until they are consummated, that is, perfected, the men to whom it was said: for you were once darkness; but now you are light in the Lord (Eph 5:8).

The pillars of heaven trembled, and were astounded at his rebuke: which happened to Peter through Paul. By his power he calmed the sea: he appeased the world, from which the Church was suffering persecution. Hence too the pillars of heaven having trembled at his rebuke can be understood in this way, that the strongest of the Church trembled for the weak, at the rebuke of the Lord permitting the temptations of persecution.

For the pillar cries out: who is weak, and I am not weak? who is made to stumble, and I am not inflamed? (2 Cor 11:29) And by his prudence the sea-monster has been wounded. He calls the devil wounded with grief, because the just would not yield to him.

And the bars of heaven fear him: either the angels, or those who received the keys of the kingdom of heaven. And by his precept he has slain the deserting dragon. He has called the same one also the sea-monster. But now he shows how it was wounded, when those who renounced it received the precept.

Behold, these are parts of his way: by which one comes to God. But who will know the power of his thunder, when he will do it? By thunder he means the most evident voice of his manifestation: or perhaps that voice which he gave through the son of thunder: in the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God (John 1:1): so that the order is: "when he will do it, will anyone know the power of his thunder?"

27. (27:3-23) And the Divine Spirit is in my nostrils. Here it is shown that he speaks prophetically the things he says, and prophetically knows that these consolers of his are full of deceit. Far be it from me to call you just, until I die: even if you persecute me to death, because I reprove you freely.

For I will not separate the innocent: namely, lest I separate you. For neither am I conscious of having committed anything unjust. For those usually spare others who fear that something true may be brought against themselves.

For what is the hope of the ungodly? That he waits. Lest anyone should think that he had wished evil to his enemies, here he made clear in what spirit he said it. For he wishes their ungodliness to be overturned, and their pride to perish: which happens when the soul that was held guilty is loosed from ungodliness; and it is loosed through the confession of the penitent man, and the grace of the forgiving God.

Therefore: for what is the hope of the ungodly? the question: and the answer: that he waits, and trusts in the Lord, whether perhaps he may be loosed, or the Lord may hear his prayers.

Another sense too can indeed occur in these words, but it is not so woven together both with the book and with the faith, as though the whole were of despair, that the ungodly man has no hope at all:

since against this it is written: but to him who believes in him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is reckoned as justice (Rom 4:5). And therefore what follows is understood to speak of the grace of the Lord. Or if necessity befalls him: therefore we ought to await the grace of the one who looses. For did he, in necessity, that is, in temptation, have confidence of his merits in the sight of God?

Or if he calls upon him, will he hear him? if he calls as it were in confidence of his own works, which are nothing. Therefore I will announce to you what is in the hand of the Lord: what God disposes. Behold, you all know that you speak empty things emptily:

for this reason grace is now to be awaited. For how did he allege the merits of his works, speaking empty things emptily? But the possession of the mighty will come from the Almighty upon them: so that the mighty may possess them, that is, the devil and his angels. He calls them mighty for this reason, that these will be weakened by following vanity, so that over them those leaders and princes of vanity may prevail: just as the Lord too calls him strong (See Luke 11:21), for no other reason than that he holds the feeble.

But if his sons are many, they will be for slaughter. He calls his sons those who invite him to seduce, the persuader of false doctrines, unto damnation. But if they have become young men, they will be in need: that is, if they have been confirmed in error, they will be in need; for vanity has not satisfied them.

And those who are around him will die the death: those who are most like him in seducing. And he will not have mercy on their widows: the common people whom he seduced together with them, deserted by the death of the husband, as though he had kept conjugal faith with them in the promise of error.

But if he gathers silver like earth: that is, if the prudent and wise, while they are still earth and clay, that is, while they still perceive foolish and carnal things, consent to him; afterward, corrected and recognizing it, they will turn to the just. For their houses will be like the moth and the spider, which it has kept: the heart, or the conscience. Or by houses he means the fortifications by which they protect themselves, indeed cunning and full of lurking-places, but most feeble, like the moth's little husk in which it hides itself, and the spider's cavern, into which by withdrawing it covers itself, and closes it.

But which it has kept is understood as itself in that cavern; because not all spiders do this: on account of the spontaneous and inner corruption of unjust thought, and on account of the useless works that the ungodly man has, as it were carefully, kept for himself in his house. The rich man will sleep, and will add no more: because after death he will not add riches to his very ungodlinesses. He opened his eyes, and it is no more. For in the resurrection he will not find himself rich, as he had thought.

The heat will take him away, and he will depart: either the heat of the sea, the tribulation of the world; or the heat by which the grasses wither that have no root. And it will winnow him from his place: either from his hope; or God will winnow him from his place, that he may not be in the place of God, that is, in the people whom God has inhabited. And he will cast upon him, and will not spare: as it were a heap of punishments.

He will clap his hands over <him>: as it is said: and I too will laugh over their perdition (Prov 1:26): for he will not mourn over the perdition of the ungodly.

28. (28:1-27) For there is a place for silver, whence it is produced: the prudent, who are more in action. But a place for gold, where it is purified: the wise, who are in contemplation. For iron is produced from the earth. These metals are to be taken indifferently in a good sense; for he said iron because it makes no difference, as though he were speaking above of iron: although by iron the strong can be understood.

For indeed there is no distinction in wisdom among the men who are in it. But bronze is shut out in like manner as stones: because the whole is separated from the earth: so as to show that the good are mingled with the evil for a time for this reason, that the good are set apart from the very evil, and are purified through them like metals necessary for a work or a building; whereas they have need to be smelted out and shaped from the earth itself, whence too they are to be separated, so that after this separation the earth may have its place and order, as the ungodly do through damnation according to their merits.

And he himself has found every limit: what he should bring to what end. He said found for "appointed." The stone, darkness and the shadow of death. The stone, that is, the Old Testament, was given to darkness and to the shadow of death, that is, to those pursuing carnal things, although they awaited these from one God: where the proud did not divide the torrent, that is, did not pass through the lapse of temporal things to some solidity, but were carried along by the lapse itself.

And there came about a dividing of the torrent from the ash: that is, from one confessing his sins, and not being proud of the merits of his works: which came about through the grace of the New Testament.

The dividing of the torrent from the ash: from men. And they were moved by men: by flatterers, with God not rebuking, by losing their primacy from the very things that had been promised them.

The earth from which bread came forth: to be supplied: I mean those moved, from whom, as from the earth, the bread of the Lord came forth. And he is about to burn it: the unbelieving, by the heavenly judgment of the Lord.

The place of the sapphire are its stones: the order is, "the place of the sapphire, that is, of what is precious and necessary for the building of the heavenly city." And its mounds are gold: gold is for it not in small measure, but in mounds. The path that the bird has not known: the humility of the Lord.

Nor has the eye of the vulture seen it: of the devil. The lion has not passed over it: being proud through strength. Upon the hardest stone he has stretched out his hand. For God is able from the stones to raise up sons of Abraham (See Matt 3:9). And he has broken open the banks of the rivers: that he might water the whole. For by rivers he meant the preachers of the word. For they wished to be contained within their own banks, so as to preach the whole only to the circumcision.

But my eye has seen everything precious: the human eye, through the Word made flesh. He has revealed the depths of the rivers. The powers of enduring persecutions in martyrdom are hidden and deep in man, until they are revealed by the temptation of persecution.

And he has shown his power in the light: in those to whom he said: you are the light of the world (Matt 5:14). Through whom too no small part of the Jews was converted. The abyss said: 'it is not in me.' Therefore men established in the abyss could not find it, because it is not in him. Enclosed gold will not be given for it: that is, treasure. It will not be inferior to the gold of Ophir: as though he said: "seek it even thus, since it is not inferior to the gold of Ophir."

Gold and glass will not be equal to it. Either some beautiful glass is to be understood; or because there are men who love glass more than wisdom. And its exchange are golden vessels: "are not," you supply. And the heights and Gabis will not be in memory: they will be in oblivion in comparison with it. Or the heights and Gabis, as though all proud things are not in memory, so that through humility you may draw wisdom from hidden things.

Whence has wisdom been found? he says, because man could not find it except through grace, therefore the heart must be turned to God. It is hidden from the eyes of every man: because it is not in things without sense. Perdition and death said: the lost and the dead, while they live in delights.

The Lord has commended its way: humility, which is hidden from the birds of heaven. And he himself knows its place. What is the place of wisdom, if not the Father? For when it is said: I in him, and he in me (John 10:38); they are mutually as it were places to each other. For he himself perceives everything that is under heaven. He knows these things in the way in which he made them, and not by sense.

The balancings and measures of the winds. The whole creation is signified by a part. And he well said that all things were made by weight, measure, and number, in which the Creator is understood.

When he made them, as he saw, he counted them. He did not see outside in order to make; but in himself, like a craftsman.

And the way of the storms by their voices: storms is put for "temptations"; and "temptations" for "those who are tempted": just as one might say "the voices of the shipwreck," for "the voices of the shipwrecked." Then he saw it, and set it forth. In predestination the Lord saw the way by which the tempted would turn themselves. He prepared and searched it out: in predestination, not in action.

29. (29:2-25) Who will restore me to the months of former days? These things seem to be said in the person of the Church together with her head Christ, as though the whole man himself speaks in the time of an abundance of tribulations and temptations, as in those days of which the Lord says: days will come when you will long to see one of these days, and will not see it (Luke 17:22).

For in that time when the Lord was on earth, there was no anxiety, although the Christian people was still small, consisting of those who had believed in him, among whom were more than five hundred brothers, to whom he deigned to appear even after the resurrection, as the Apostle says (See 1 Cor 15:6). There was then no anxiety, lest the Church should either be ill governed by the wicked, or be torn by the snares of heresies or schisms. For neither did it suffer the bodily persecutions themselves; it endured no adversities either within or without. And so Job speaks in the person of the man, that is, of the people belonging to the New Testament, longing for those days, as the Lord had foretold. And perhaps for this reason he called them months, not "years," because from the time the Lord chose the disciples, up to the Passion, there were not years, but months. When his lamp shone over my head: either the flesh of the Lord visibly present, or the word from the mouth of him bodily present.

When the word of the Lord looked upon my house for diligence in guarding my conduct. And around me my servants: who attended humbly, ministering what was necessary. When butter rained along my ways: through my conduct, the exultation of faith and of good works.

When my mountains abounded with milk: the prophets were well expounded to the little ones. When I went out early into the city: either when the brightness was already dawning, the darkness of fear being past; or in the beginning of the Church, so as to be not quite hidden, not quite manifest.

And in the streets a seat was set for me: by the crowds the authority of teaching was conferred on me. The young men, seeing me, hid themselves: given over to desires.

But the old men rose up: the prudent. And the powerful ceased to speak: those proud of their doctrines.

Because the ear heard, and called me blessed. A people whom I did not know served me, at the hearing of the ear it obeyed me (Ps 18:44 (17:45)). And the eye that saw me turned aside: of the unbelieving Jews. And the mouth of the widow blessed me: of that soul which renounced wedlock with the devil.

Behold, the only son of his mother, who was a widow, was being carried out dead (Luke 7:12). And I was clothed with judgment as with a cloak: in preferring spiritual things to carnal ones, let not your left hand know what your right hand does (Matt 6:3), that is, with what intention one acts: for with the left hand covered, the right is put forth in wearing the cloak; which he does who rightly judges to what end what he does is to be referred.

I searched out the judgment that I did not know. Behold, we have left all things, and followed you; what will there be for us? (Matt 19:27) He says it was part of his happiness that he had one of whom to ask about the future judgment.

I broke the millstones of the unjust: that they might no longer devour the people as food of bread.

My age will grow old <and> like a palm tree, I will live a long time: it will be prolonged, and I will be like a palm tree in everlasting honor, and loftiness, and uprightness. And the dew will linger on my harvest. From the time the field is sown and sprouts, it is called harvest.

My glory is new with me: that is, of the New Testament. And my bow will go forward in my hand: I will do what I command. And to my word they added nothing. He signifies the perfection of the Gospel: for the word given to the Synagogue needed addition. But they rejoiced when I spoke to them: because the former utterance had fear, the latter love.

And even if I smiled upon them, they did not believe: concerning the things he spoke in parables in such a way that they were not understood; yet he was not thought to speak empty things, as the words seemed to sound.

This is the laughter of Sarah (See Gen 18:12), which signified that they had done all things in prophecy: hence those who say something figuratively. I chose their way, and sat as chief: either by taking on mortality, or by feasting with publicans and sinners, but so that I was chief to them unto salvation.

And I dwelt like a king girt about with mighty men: who, having left their own, followed him. As one consoling the sorrowful. He means those who rejoiced in hope, while they were sorrowful concerning the present life. Blessed are those who mourn (Matt 5:4 (5:5)), as it was said; and: as sorrowful, yet always rejoicing (2 Cor 6:10): those who cannot hold that greatness of which it was said: but he who does and so teaches, will be called great in the kingdom of heaven (Matt 5:19).

30. (30:1-31) But now the lowest deride me, now those younger in time admonish me: because afterward such people too were born in the Church, and do not make much progress. He said they admonish me, because through ecclesiastical honors they receive the power of preaching to the people, the things they themselves do not do. Whose fathers I despised. He called those their fathers, by whose imitation they are sons, to whom it was then said: woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites (Matt 23:13).

And the strength of their hands was as nothing to me: the power of the fathers, who at that time could do so very much that they crucified the Lord. In them all life was perishing: because they did not correct themselves even at the end. Unstable through want and hunger: insatiable through various desires.

Who fled into the desert yesterday: betaking themselves to the excuse of the Law, which they did not understand simply; and because they received it in the desert, fleeing into the desert yesterday.

For just as today pertains to the New Testament, so yesterday to the Old: for concerning the New it was said: today if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts (Ps 95:8 (94:8)); and: you are my son, today I have begotten you (Ps 2:7). Who gnawed the bark of trees: because they held as food the figures of the Law, by which useful things were covered.

Whose food was the root of plants: the sacraments which they were bidden to celebrate bodily, as it were clinging to the earth; from which, however, the fruit of simple understanding would rise, and be borne above the earth into freedom, to which they could not attain.

Without honor, and abject, and in need of every good: having lost the honor of primacy, from the hope of the promise; because they had lost even the earthly gift itself according to their merits, and do not hold the kingdom of heaven. Who ate the roots of trees, on account of great hunger. What was said of the roots of plants, on account of the fruit of grain, this is to be understood of the roots of trees, on account of the fruit of wine and oil.

For the Church received all these spiritual fruits, whose roots, entangled in the earth, were the sacraments that the Jews were compelled to observe bodily: the Sabbath, circumcision, and the sacrifices, and other such things of spiritual foods. Thieves rose up against me: those who attained to undue honors, which are proper to the just, through dark deceits. Whose houses were the caverns of rocks: who defended their desires, and covered them with certain obscurities of the Divine Books. And among the trees they cried out. Their sins were manifest, although they tried to cover them with the obscurity of the Scriptures, as with the shadows of trees. Hence the text: the cry of Sodom has come up to me (Gen 18:20). And in very many places Scripture puts cry for "manifest sins": so that the word is whatever is conceived in the heart; the cry, when it proceeds into deed.

Who remained under the stocks of the earth. Not at least in the stocks, but those can be understood to remain even below the stocks, who keep the precepts carnally. For the stocks are not now the fruits themselves, but that whence the fruit-bearing parts rise, whether of trees or of plants: if, that is, it is a fruit-bearing kind, because the stocks of a non-fruit-bearing kind are also so called. The sons of the foolish and the ignoble: of the Jews; for these he called above their fathers on account of imitation, because these too walk under the name of God, whom they do not worship. He calls the Jews foolish and ignoble, who on the contrary not only trusted that they were leaders of the blind, but also that they were sons of Abraham, boasting that by this father they were noble. But when they hear:

they are blind, leaders of the blind (Matt 15:14); they are shown to be foolish: and when they hear: if you are sons of Abraham, do the deeds of Abraham (John 8:39); by degenerating they are shown to be ignoble. Their name and honor extinguished from the earth. For it existed, but has been extinguished.

But now I am their lyre: of these, whose fathers those are, who held me at the ear, not at the heart. And they hold me for a tale: an empty and useless narration and hearing, although they both narrate me and hear me. They abominated me, withdrawing far off: made far from justice by sinning, and execrating the precepts of justice by their evil ways.

Nor did they refrain from spitting in my face. For the face of Christ is to be execrated by those who shrink with contempt from his precepts. Or, they made me ill known by the depravity of their ways. For opening his quiver he afflicted me: the secret things of affairs, whence temptations arise. And they put a bridle in my face: that I might unwillingly consent to them, carrying them as they led me where they wished, to their depths.

And those sprouting on the right rose up: by favoring and by good admonishing they indeed arose, that they might fulfill their desires, not by persecuting. They bound my feet with fetters: of ecclesiastical offices, that they could not flee them. My paths were worn away: so that they did not appear, the paths by which the good are wont to walk, seeking not their own things, but Christ's (See Phil 2:21).

For he stripped me of my robe: my former authority, to which one is wont to yield; which happens when the multitude and habit of sinners prevails.

And with his darts he wounded me: with precepts, by which I see evils, and because I cannot restrain them, I am tormented. He abused me as he willed: God used even my calamity and misery for his own justice, as he willed. I am wrapped in sorrows: I suffer both in myself and in others.

Battles without, fears within (2 Cor 7:5). Who is weak, and I am not weak? (2 Cor 11:29) And my sorrows are repeated; my hope departs like a breath. As though turned to something empty, to the hope of temporal things, holding what I promise.

And like a cloud my salvation has passed away: not hoping for the promised salvation, in the love of present salvation. And now my soul will be poured out over me: by sinning.

But in the night my bones were broken: the firmness it had, he said was snatched from him. And my sinews were loosed: past actions. With great power he laid hold of my robe: to show his power, now by afflicting, and afterward by restoring. And like the hem of my garment he surrounded me: he left me a little of authority.

My portion is in earth and ashes: in penance, because it is the last thing. They stood and considered me: while I lay, the proud stood, seeking what to reprove in me. And you cast me away from salvation. He grieves over those who have lost the hope of restoration.

For earth is a home to every mortal. Therefore he says he fears death, because his manner of life is not in heaven (See Phil 3:20), like many who are evil in the Church, and live in an earthly way. And would that I could kill myself: that I might die to the world.

Or beg another, and he would do this for me: either a better angel, or God, through whom I might be corrected. I was waiting for good things. He grieves, because these things befell him suddenly. My belly boiled over, and will not be silent: the inner parts, or the memory by which he recalls what he was at first, and how it is afflicted in groans.

And I stood in the assembly crying out: because in the throng he was not heard by those who would not correct themselves. My skin has grown very black: from the things he suffered outwardly. My lyre has been turned to mourning: the good works by which he praised God rejoicing.

31. (31:1-40) I made a covenant with my eyes. Did I begin to hope for visible things? That I might not think of a virgin: so that "far be it" is to be supplied. Hence he now begins to recall the merits of the Church, in those who persevere to the end in great temptations, with iniquity abounding, and the love of many growing cold (See Matt 24:12–13). And I will not think of a virgin: the incorruption of wisdom, or of justice.

And what other portion of God is there from above? understood, "I will not think." Or thus: "and what is there, except that one?" If I have walked with mockers. Now it is difficult even for the good who are in the Church not to associate with such people.

Or if my foot has hastened to deceit: hypocrisy. Let me sow, and let others eat my fruits: as happened to the Jews, that is, to say the things that others rather than they themselves do. Let me be without root upon the earth: so that I easily wither. For he is firm upon the earth as upon a rock who does what he says.

If my heart has followed a woman: so as to seek its own glory among the people of God, rather than God's, to whom alone it is rightly owed. Or if I have besieged her doors: I have insidiously caught at the desires of his people, or the fear by which they might be driven, so that it might serve me rather than God.

Let my wife also please another: my reputation the devil, to whom when we are pleasing, we displease God. For he rejoices in our evils. And let my sons be humbled: my deeds, or my imitators. For the fury of my soul, to defile a man's wife, is untamed: by claiming her for myself.

But if I have despised the judgment of my manservant or maidservant, when they were being judged before me: according to that which was said: if then you have secular judgments (1 Cor 6:4). By servants he meant the laity still given over to secular things. But if, even at the visitation, what answer will I give? in the tribulation, which I have on my conscience, because I despised these things? Was I not conceived in the womb as they too were? For the same things are preached in all the sacraments, they believe the same things.

And were we likewise in the womb? For the one renounces no otherwise than the other, who is to serve God fully. And from my mother's womb I was a guide to them. For from her very beginning the Church does these things.

Or if I have despised the naked man perishing, and have not covered him. If I have not, by the faith of the forgiveness of sins, as though he had no tunic, veiled from the nakedness of foulness, that is, of sin, the one perishing. For he now despairs through the multitude of his sins. And hence the text: and those whose sins are covered (Ps 32:1 (31:1)). If the shoulders of the weak have not blessed me: by the hope of immortality, as though covered over with a cloak. But lest, after the faith of the forgiveness of sins, they should think it enough to be free from the fear of past punishments, and begin to hope for temporal things, he well added:

They were warmed from the shearing of my sheep, because from the cold of earthly hope they were delivered by the consideration of those, if they laid aside carnal things through renunciation, after the example of the shorn flock (See Song 4:2).

If I have lifted my hand over the orphan: who, by not finding a father, could follow a creature or a man. Trusting, because there is much help for me: wishing to lord it over them. Let my shoulder depart from my collarbone: which happens to those who separate themselves from the Church, while they wish to lord it over the peoples, so that they suffer cutting upon cutting. By the shoulder or the arm, actions are signified.

For fear held me back: lest I should lift my hand over the orphan. And by his weight I will not bear up: if I should wish to oppress the orphan in this way. I made gold my strength: did I presume on the doctrine or wisdom of God? But if I trusted in a precious stone: as though on my own works.

If I rejoiced, when my wealth was great: as though it were my own; whereas he who glories, let him glory in the Lord (2 Cor 10:17). If I placed my soul in innumerable things. (To all this is to be supplied: let my arm depart from my shoulder): that I should be loved by many. And my heart was secretly deceived:

the order is: if I placed my soul in innumerable things, and my heart was secretly deceived: if I consented to such a thought, so as to presume on myself. But if I kissed my hand, putting it to my mouth: I rejoiced as though over my own works. But if I rejoiced over the ruin of my enemy: of the Church, as are the persecutors of the Church.

Let my ear hear my curse: let it be brought home to my perception. Let me be defamed as a reproach among my people: to the people of the saints, that I may be separated as one mocked. But if my maidservants have often said: the flatterers. Who will grant us to be satisfied with his flesh? since I was good enough: that they might imitate carnal happiness in me. Yet I did not do these things; for lest they should say these things, I did not show myself good in such matters.

The stranger did not lodge outside: I received the pilgrim in the world. But if, sinning willingly, I hid my sin. For when we sin willingly, after we have received the knowledge of the truth (Heb 10:26). Or if I let the weak man go out my door with empty bosom: so that he went out the door for this reason, that he was with empty bosom.

Who will grant me a hearer? Who will grant me to be heard? If I did not fear the hand of the Lord: with which he wrote: if you do not forgive, neither will your Father forgive you (Matt 6:15). If I have any written record:

the order is: if I have any written record. And if I did not tear it up over my shoulders, and crowned, I will read publicly, lifting it over my shoulders: and crowned, I will read publicly, that is, against my own face. I will set you before your face (Ps 50:21 (49:21)). Because I will be confounded by the crown of the people; because I did not do the commandment of the Lord, which I had already said I did, by denying at first that I had a written record, which is afterward laid against me.

If ever the earth has groaned over me: those supported by the Church, because I am evil. Or its furrows have wept together: where the seeds are received, and whence the fruits are given; because I am both evil, and was sowing evil seeds: therefore together. Or if I have eaten its strength alone without price: that very mercy, by which the one catechized shares with the one catechizing (See Gal 6:6); that is, alone, not repaying him who would give.

Or if, deceiving the earth, I have saddened the soul of the Lord: by not showing myself worthy of the Passion of him who poured out his soul for me. Do not sadden the Holy Spirit who is in you (Eph 4:30). Instead of wheat let the nettle spring up for me: instead of spiritual teachers, masters of those with itching ears, through the chafings of men corrupted in mind, and destitute of the truth (See 1 Tim 6:5). And instead of barley, a thorn: instead of the carnal who obey, sinners who resist. For Job was just in his own sight; in his conscience.

32. (32:1-22) The words of Elihu the Buzite. God cast him off, and not a man: so that I may give this as the cause why they were silent. And I will not answer him with your words. For I will say such things that he cannot answer me as he answered you. Because, then, I waited, and they did not speak: he says this as though turned to Job.

My belly is like a wineskin full of new wine. Scripture commends this man, because he is about to speak in prophecy. And like the bellows of a smith, burst: to loosen hardness, I speak of force; hence too he is said to be angry. For there would be no need for me to speak, if you had answered him. Otherwise the moths will eat me too: either like you, or like all who admire persons.

33. (33:3-30) My heart is clean in words: not double. The Divine Spirit who made me: supply "is"; so that it reads: "it is the Divine Spirit who made me." How then do you say: I am just, and he did not hear me? as though Job had said it to his adversary. For the Lord speaks once: as though the Lord made the calling of all the just once, and divine providence does this temporally with respect to individuals.

Through a dream, or in a nocturnal visitation: either in ignorance or in tribulation. Or as fierce fear falls upon men, when they sleep in their chambers: secure. And he rescues his body from ruin: figuratively, like "bones."

And he spared his soul from death: when he has converted him, he will spare him. Because war is to come, and he will reprove him again in weakness on his bed: after conversion he now tests him, lest he presume on himself. And the multitude of his bones has withered: confidence in himself.

And he will not be able to take any food: consolation from temporal things. And he will renew his body, like a plastering on a wall: a change of life: and here figuratively, on account of the building, that is, into fellowship. And he will soften his flesh like a little child's: lest he be hard with pride,

according to what Elihu seems to mean, the humble Job is tested through renewal. And he entered with a cheerful face, with profession: prepared for temptations. Save my soul, that I may not come into corruption: here the temptation of death. Three turns with a man: of conversion, of testing, of death. But he rescued my soul from death: because this of death still remains. That my soul in the light may praise him. Therefore prayers will then cease, because there will be no need.

34. (34:1-35) But Elihu, answering, said. As it is said: "and he added." And you who have knowledge, perceive with your ears: spiritual ears. Because the ear tests words: this carnal ear. What is good, that Job said: 'I am just'? What good did he say in saying it? And in my judgment he has lied. Hence the text: I was waiting for good things (Job 30:26): therefore contrary to hope, which is, he lied.

What man is there like Job? These are still the words of Job. For he said: 'he who walks with God will not be visited.' Here he thinks him deceived, because in hoping this he did all those things: or indeed, because he thinks that he who walks with the Lord is not visited for good.

Far be ungodliness from the Lord: either that he should not visit for good the one who walks with him; or that, even if he visits him in temptation, he should act ungodly and unjustly.

He is ungodly who says to a king: 'you act unjustly.' But you ought not to say that, you who are not ungodly. He well says, who says; not, "who has said," lest it should already be so even on that account: just as it is said, "it is done," of one who does this.

Most ungodly, to the princes: as though he says to the angels: "unless Michael is your prince, you act most ungodly." Or "if it is said so most ungodly to princes, how much more to a king?"

For they abused unjustly when the weak were shut out. They made evil use of their exclusion, when on account of weakness they were shut out from that vision, in which all things are seen to be ordered and administered divinely in the most orderly way.

But in this they made evil use of it, because they preferred to follow their own spirit, that God does not care for these things: for from this it will come to them in vain, that in their necessities they cry out and beg a man, when they ought to have begged God.

Nor will there be a place, and there is no shadow of death, that those who do unjust things may lie hidden. The shadow of death is not for this, that they may lie hidden: as is the text: the old do not have wisdom (Job 32:9); because old age is not the cause of wisdom: and: do not greet a heretic (Titus 3:10), lest you do so on the score by which he is a heretic.

And he will overturn the night, and they will be humbled: so that what was beneath them may be above them; that is, that what was subjected to them may press upon them. And he extinguished the ungodly; they seemed to themselves to shine.

And they did not recognize his justices. He says what good God has done out of their iniquity: that the cry of the poor may be brought to him. He himself will give rest, and who will be able to condemn? Not the kind of rest that men seek, which is troubled by those tribulations.

If God justifies, who is there to condemn? (Rom 8:34) And <against a nation> and against a man together: against the gentiles and the Jews. Who makes a hypocrite man to reign on account of the perversity of the people: to whom it is said: you then who teach another, do you not teach yourself? (Rom 2:21)

Apart from me I will see; you show me: in reproaching you, do I perhaps not see that I myself am to be reproached? To be pronounced as a question. If I have done iniquity, I will not add to it: corrected by you. Does he exact it from you, because you have driven it back? because you have reproached.

And the wise man will hear my word: that God cares for all things. But Job has not spoken in wisdom: by thinking that something has befallen him unjustly from God.

35. (35:2-16) Why did you reckon this in judgment? why did you judge this? Who are you, who said: I am just, before the sight of the Lord? Before the sight of the Lord you said: I am just. For both are reprehensible in a man: one, if it be either said proudly, or be false that he is just, even according to human justice; the other, because it can never be truly said by a man that he is just before the sight of God, compared to whom anyone whatever is unjust.

Or you say: 'what does it profit you, or what shall I do, if I have sinned?' For this is what Job seems to him to have said to God, as though either his sin profited God, so that by this grief he might be driven to godliness, where he says: do not teach me to be ungodly: or is it good for you if I act unjustly? (Job 10:2–3) Or that he harmed God by sinning, and therefore God so pursued him as though pressing his own enemy, lest he suffer some evil from him.

For he had also said this: if I have sinned, what can I do to you? (Job 7:20) To both, then, Elihu replied, in the words that follow. I will give you an answer, and your three friends. Look into heaven, and see; behold the clouds, how high they are above you. If you have sinned, what do you do?

He confirms what was said by him: if I have sinned, what can I do to you? Or if you have done many unjust things, what will you be able to do? It is more, you have done many unjust things, than what he said above, you have sinned. But yet what will you be able to do to God; when you cannot even harm the clouds? And if you are just, what will you give him? Conversely, just as your justice profits him nothing, so your injustice harms nothing.

Or what will he receive from your hand? even if you wish to give; on account of the sacrifices, which the foolish think God wishes to take, as though needing them. Your ungodliness is to a man like you, and your justice to a son of man: it either harms the one, or profits the other.

But by these verses he confirmed rather than refuted the statement that Job made: if I have sinned, what can I do to you? Consequently, then, it is fitting that he show why in this life men are afflicted by the injuries of the evil, among whom the devil too with his angels is numbered, the prince of all injuries and iniquities. For since sinners cannot harm God, why does he hand them over into power to be afflicted by the evil?

And he sets it forth thereafter, saying: 'from the multitude they will cry out, they will clamor from the arm of the many.' And he did not say: 'where is God who made me?' For they suffer these things to this end, that they may seek God, not that they may clamor in vain. And what he says, made me, is for a proof, that he will not forsake the one seeking him, whom he himself made.

Who distributes the night watches: the times of this age ordered under certain powers, because he who made man will not leave him without a watch even in this night of error. Who separates me from the four-footed beasts of the earth, and has made me wiser than the birds of heaven. For the Lord is to be sought in the afflictions of this life in such a way that we do not desire earthly goods from him; because we are already better than the beasts, before we receive those things.

There they will cry out; and you will not hear. There, he said, in the multitude, in the affliction of those crying out, and from the arm of the many: or indeed: there, for this reason; as is the text: there they fell who work iniquity (Ps 36:12 (35:13)). And you will not hear what he said, he said of him. From the injuries of the evil: to be supplied, they will cry out.

For the Lord does not wish to see empty things. He does not wish to help those who ask empty things, and who therefore do not clamor in affliction in order to attain everlasting goods, although they have for that reason been separated from the four-footed beasts of the earth, and made wiser than the birds of heaven: but they clamor, because they are not happy in the iniquity of this age.

For the Almighty himself perceives those who do justice, and he will save me. Just as he himself sees those who do it, who perceives the inmost things of the heart, so he saves them with that salvation which he himself sees in secret. Because neither has eye seen, nor ear heard, nor has it entered into the heart of man, the things that God has prepared for those who love him (1 Cor 2:9). Therefore, even if the empty salvation of man is troubled, yet the Father gives help out of tribulation, who sees in secret (Matt 6:4).

And so judge him, if you can praise him, as he is. For this is what Job seemed to say, when he said: would that there were an arbiter between us! (Job 9:33) And now because he is not visiting his wrath, nor has he known offenses vehemently. He knew them unto vengeance. Hence the text: for I know my iniquity: and in the same place: turn your face from my sins (Ps 51:3, 9 (50:5, 11)). He knew the offenses, then; for men suffer tribulations in this age for this reason: but not vehemently, because, correcting in parts, you give a place for repentance. And Job has opened his mouth in vain; in his ignorance he multiplies words.

36. (36:2-34) Bear with me a little, that I may teach you: for there are still words in me: receiving my knowledge from afar. For as long as we are in this body, we are pilgrims away from the Lord (2 Cor 5:6). But of my works that are just, I will speak. Lest it be said to him what God says to the sinner: why do you recount my justices, and take up my Testament through your mouth? But you hated instruction? (Ps 50:16–17 (49:16–17)) Therefore here one must speak by works: for knowledge is received from afar in part and in a riddle.

But when what is perfect has come, what is in part will be taken away (See 1 Cor 13:12); and it will no longer be from afar, for we will see him as he is (1 John 3:2). In truth, and you will not unjustly understand unjust words. The very things that Job was suffering, he says are the words of God in truth, and not unjust:

but he thinks they are unjustly understood by this man, whom he supposes to complain that he suffers undeservedly, although even of the tribulation of the just it was said: it is time that judgment begin from the house of the Lord (1 Pet 4:17).

And know that the Lord will not cast off the innocent: although he reproves whom he loves, and scourges every son whom he receives (See Heb 12:6). Strong in firmness of heart, he does not give life to the ungodly: although he seems to spare him for a time. And well: strong in firmness of heart, because he will not give him life then, when he seeks a place for late repentance with tears, and will not find it, nor bend to mercy the one who judges firmly, whom he now despises as he admonishes mercifully.

And he will give the judgment of the poor: by which he may judge those from whom they suffer iniquity. And well of the poor, so that above you may understand the ungodly man as the rich, that is, the proud.

He will not take his eyes from the just man. Even when he tests him as it were in a furnace by the temptation of tribulation (See Sir 27:6 (27:5)), he will not take from him the understanding by which God is known and worshiped. From which he sufficiently shows that the punishment of the ungodly is that very blindness, even when they seem to be spared.

And with kings on a throne: to be supplied, he made them sit, that is, the just. He calls kings those who rule their own flesh; whence the text: what king is there who goes to wage war with another king (Luke 14:31), and so on. And he made them sit forever, and they will be exalted. And here is supplied what he said above, with kings on a throne. They will be exalted he said, because they were humbled. And those who are fettered with fetters. From which bond the Apostle says it is good for him to be released, and to be with Christ (See Phil 1:23); that is, the bonds of this life, in which the body that is corrupted weighs down the soul (Wis 9:15).

They will be caught in the cords of poverty. They will be convicted by the long habits of carnal delights, which are from the want of things, by which the mortal life is sustained and carried on. And their works are announced to them. Not indeed good works, whether these very concupiscential things, of which it is said: I know that good does not dwell in my flesh (Rom 7:18); which, even if they do not reign in our mortal body so as to obey them, yet are not lacking: or those by which man has deserved to come to these things from the propagation of sin.

And offenses, when they have been strengthened. These are the works he spoke of above. For they cannot easily be announced, that is, made manifest, to the weak; but to those who have so advanced that they have passed beyond all that iniquity which is commonly known in the most open shameful and criminal deeds.

But he will hear the just man: namely the one who lives by faith (See Hab 2:4), so that he reckons to the grace of God, not to his own merits, not only that he has been justified according to the measure of this life, but also what remains, that he be freed from the whole evil of offenses:

which the truth announces to the faithful, when they have been strengthened, when they are caught in the cords of poverty; for still they are fettered with fetters, not yet exalted, that they may sit on a throne with kings forever. And he said, that they will be converted from iniquity. And he said, to be supplied: "God."

If they obey, and serve, they will complete their days in good things, and their years in glory. But then there will be no sin in man, because there will be no struggle of death, that is, the want of mortality, which came about from sin, when it will be said: where, O death, is your struggle? (1 Cor 15:55) But the ungodly he will not make safe; because they were unwilling to know the Lord. This seems to pertain rather to the gentiles.

And when they were admonished, they were disobedient. This pertains to the Jews, and to all who are like them through disobedience, even in the Church.

And the hypocrites in heart will lay up fury: by which they crucified the Lord. They will not cry out, because he has bound them: by the honor of his name over all the nations.

Let their soul therefore die in youth: in the pride by which they extolled themselves as it were over the merits of their own works. And let their life be wounded by the angels. It is more fittingly taken "by the messengers of the truth," to some of whom they are an odor of life unto life, to others an odor of death unto death (2 Cor 2:16). Because they afflicted the weak and feeble: that weak thing of God, which is stronger than men (See 1 Cor 1:25). But the judgment of the meek he will establish: the Lord himself, by the example of his own meekness deferring even the vengeance of those who imitate him, but yet certainly to come.

And because the abyss deceived you from the mouth of the enemy. The depth of this age deceived Christ, as it seemed to his persecutors, from the mouth of the false witness: for he turns his speech to the Lord himself. Poured out beneath these things: to be supplied, "they deceived you"; for those weighed down by earthly desires are said to be poured out beneath the abyss.

And your table came down full of richness: the sacrament of his Body and Blood, the bread that came down from heaven (John 6:50). Judgment will not fail the just. Although the poor eat, and are satisfied, to imitate the passions of the Lord, ready out of the fullness of love; yet not for that reason does he fail to do their judgment quickly.

And wrath will be upon the ungodly, on account of the ungodliness of the gifts they were receiving by their iniquities. He calls gifts all temporal advantages whatever, on account of which advantages iniquities are committed. Let not the will of the mind turn you aside. It is said to the Lord, not with the authority of one admonishing or the boldness of one commanding, but with the utterance of prophecy foretelling future things through the imperative mood; as is the text: gird your sword upon your thigh, O most mighty (Ps 45:3 (44:4)).

From the prayers of the weak: when they are in necessity, crying out: wretched man that I am, who will free me from the body of this death? (Rom 7:24) And all who have strength: presuming on their own works, and wishing to establish their own justice (Rom 10:3). Do not draw out through the night. Let it be manifest that you separate them from the people, whether those proud ones who were broken off from the olive, or the branches cut off from the vine, whence heresies and schisms have arisen.

That peoples may ascend in their place; that the weak things of this world may be grafted in, the strong being confounded (See 1 Cor 1:27). Since he who humbles himself will be exalted; and he who exalts himself will be humbled (Luke 14:11). But take care that you do nothing unseemly: lest the name of the Lord God and the teaching be blasphemed, while those say, whose judgment is just: let us do evil that good may come (Rom 3:8).

For this you have chosen over want. Not only have you chosen the want of one confessing, but over this the comeliness of life and conduct, that saving teaching may be adorned in all things.

Behold, God will console, or, he will be strengthened in his strength. Because although he was crucified out of weakness, yet he lives by the power of God (2 Cor 13:4). For who is powerful as he? or who is there to scrutinize his works? as though judging concerning him, when he himself is the judge of the living and the dead. Or who is there to say: 'he has acted unjustly?'

Remember that his works are great, which men have praised: the evangelists and all preachers of the word, whose life accords with their ministry. Every man looks to him: mindful of human weakness. Whatever men are pricked with compunction: by repentance for sins, they are men.

Behold, God is great, and we will not know. Great, because just as sin abounded, grace superabounded (Rom 5:20). We will not know is said in the person of those, a part of whom were blinded, until the fullness of the Gentiles should enter in (Rom 11:25).

The number of his years is infinite: it is put on account of eternity. But to him belong the innumerable drops of rain. For this, that the Gospel filled the men who are preachers, is numerable until the consummation of the age, until the knowledge that is in part be taken away, and what is perfect come, face to face (See 1 Cor 13:12). The shower will be poured out along his paths. For the ways of the evil will not contain him.

The clouds will flow, and grow dark over very many men. Because although the Gospel is veiled, it is veiled in those who perish. He has appointed an hour for the cattle, and they know the order of their resting place. Since the ox knew its owner, and the ass its master's manger (Isa 1:3).

In all these things his mind is not astounded. The beginning of wisdom is the fear of the Lord (Ps 111:10 (110:10)). Nor is your heart changed from the body: so that, lifted up from the earth, it may be held above unto the Lord.

If he should think to stretch out a mist: that those who see may become blind (John 9:39). He spreads it out just like a tent. For dwelling in mortal flesh as in a tent, through it he was not recognized by his persecutors, while he yielded to them, and stretched it out and spread it on the cross. Behold, he pours out his light over all things, the light he had hidden, when the blindness of part of Israel came about, he pours out over all the nations. And he has covered over the roots of the sea. He refutes the desire of the world. For the light covers not for hiding, but for manifesting. For in them he judged the peoples, by showing them their sins through the light of truth.

He will give food to very many: namely to those who recognize their sins when they are reproved, and who hunger and thirst for justice. In his hands he has covered over the light. If from the fact that they are monstrous; for those who do not forgive sins to men, when they wish them forgiven to themselves by God:

but if from the fact that they are hands; for those who are extolled out of their own hands, that is, out of their works, justifying themselves. For he has covered over the light, he said to this end, that it might not be seen by them; because their foolish heart was blinded (Rom 11:25).

And he commanded concerning it to the contrary: that those who do the truth, whether by forgiving so that it may be forgiven them, or by confessing their evils so that they may be made subject to the grace of God, may themselves come to the light so that their works may be made manifest, since they were wrought in God (See John 3:21), not in themselves.

For he is contrary both to the monstrous as merciful, and to the proud as humble.

That he might announce concerning it to his friend: concerning that light, that is, concerning what he had covered over, so as to hide it from the monstrous and ungrateful; that he might announce it, that is, open it, not now to a servant under the Law, but to one reconciled through grace (See Rom 6:14); or to his friend, his imitator: because the Son of man too came not to be ministered to, but to minister (See Matt 20:28).

A possession against those who strive to ascend: that they may possess the light itself, who draw themselves away from earthly things. For it is announced to those who still strive to ascend; because when they have ascended, there will be no need of one to announce, to those who see face to face. But what he says, against those who strive to ascend, not as opposing them, but as going to meet them; as the Apostle says: to meet Christ (1 Thess 4:17).

37. (37:1-23) But in this too my heart was astounded: with wonder. And it was torn from its place: from the earthly things in which it was delighted, that it might be held above unto the Lord. Hear the sound of the terror and of his voice. Hence it appears that he says these things in the spirit. For he begins to say why his heart was torn from its place, namely by the authority of the Gospel sounding terribly throughout the whole world: repent; for the kingdom of heaven has drawn near (Matt 3:2).

And at the noise of his mouth they go forth: namely to those who are outside, in the delights of visible things. He goes round beneath the whole heaven, and his light is in the ends of the earth: while the Church is spread through all the nations. After him a voice will roar. After his first coming, the last trumpet of his second coming will thunder in glory (See 1 Cor 15:52; 1 Thess 4:15).

In the sound of his pride. Pride he put for "loftiness"; because the first coming was in humility. And he cannot be searched out, when his voice has been heard. Now, then, let the Lord be sought, while he can be found (See Isa 55:6), that is, grasped unto salvation through unfeigned faith. For then he cannot be, when he has come to judge, and his voice has been heard saying: go into the eternal fire (Matt 25:41). For then the repentance of unbelievers will be late, and fruitless.

The mighty one will thunder wondrously in his voice. Because that voice of his first coming was not of his strength, but of our weakness from the participation in mortality, of which it was said: what is weak of God is stronger than men (1 Cor 1:25). For he did great things that we did not know. These in the first coming; and therefore afterward, to exact the things he gave, he is to come as judge.

Which we did not know is said in the person of those from whom the divinity of the Lord was hidden, beholding the weakness of the flesh. Commanding the cloud: 'be over the earth': his flesh, that it may be received through the sacrament, in his memory (See Luke 22:19-20), for the imitation of humility and the forming of love. And the storm of rain, and the storm of showers of his power. For there is indeed a cloud over the earth: but when it is pressed out to water hearts through the rain and showers of the word, which happens when the sacraments are understood, it is not in our power, but in his.

In the hand of every man he sets a seal. He signifies to him through his works how guilty he is, so that every man may know his own weakness, and cry out: wretched man that I am, who will free me from the body of this death? (Rom 7:24) But the beasts went in under protection, and rested in their lair. And sinners went in under the indulgence of grace, and rested in conscience, their sins being forgiven.

From the storerooms the storm comes: temptation from the hidden order of things. And from the storerooms cold: from the secret places, judgment upon those who do not persevere; so that their love grows cold from the abundance of iniquity (See Matt 24:12-13). For it rightly befalls them, while they put their hope not in God, but in men.

And from the spirit of God ice will be given. Not only from the abundance of the unjust will those grow cold who put their hope in men; but even from the good works of those in whom is the spirit of God, certain ones harden as it were with the ice of spite, to whom Paul is an odor of death unto death (2 Cor 2:16).

And for these things who is sufficient, to understand that rightly and justly ice will be given from the spirit of God? For just as it befalls men who praise carnal things to grow cold out of the iniquity of men by despairing; so it befalls those who desire to be praised by men for carnal things to harden out of the justice of men by envying.

But he governs the water as it pleases him: so that it rains upon one city, and upon another it does not rain (See Amos 4:7); which pertains to the spiritual shower, according to the merits of souls subjected or not subjected. And he watered the grain with the cloud. Let us therefore be grain, if we desire to be watered. The cloud has scattered abroad its light: the Gospel of his incarnation. And it is turned round about: it is handled throughout the world. By the helms, to do all things that he has commanded them. The helms by which that cloud is turned round about are the preachers of the word, through whom the Churches are governed to do all the commandments of God. These things have been established by him over the earth: by our Lord Jesus Christ.

Whether in a tribe, or in his own land. Whether in the tribe of Judah, whence according to the flesh he was born, and suffered, and rose again, and ascended into heaven: for from this tribe the apostles had been begotten, and many brothers found near and saved; whether called through him before his Passion, or after the ascension through the apostles in Jerusalem itself, and in the Churches of Judea, which were in Christ, as the Apostle Paul recalls, for the truth of God, to confirm the promises of the fathers. Or if he should wish it to be found in mercy: namely that cloud, he should wish it to be found in mercy by the believing Gentiles. For this follows: but the Gentiles to glorify God for his mercy (Rom 15:8-9). Give ear to these things, Job. As though he renews his attention, about to speak of the calling of the Gentiles.

Stand, and be moved at the power of the Lord. Do not be moved in mind by attributing anything to yourself. We know that God has set forth his works: surely reproving those who glory in their own works.

When he made light out of darkness: when he justified the ungodly. For you were once darkness; but now you are light in the Lord (Eph 5:8). He knows the difference of the clouds: of the evangelists, some believing in him before the Passion, others after the Passion. And the great lapses of the evil: not of those who lapsed by crucifying him, so that they afterward repented, and were baptized in him; but the lapses of those who could not even be corrected, persevering in persecuting the Church even afterward: for of these the lapses are not small, but great.

But your robe is strong: proud dignity; for it is said as it were against him who dares to be extolled out of his own works. While the earth is at rest from the south, will you make firm with him the heavens, which have been spread out equally for seeing? By the earth from the south we fittingly understand those of the Jews who believed in Christ. For just as the sun is more remote from the northern earth, but nearer to the southern; so those whom the Apostle says were found near to the light of the evangelists (See Eph 2:17) are not absurdly taken as the earth from the south.

But just as we are wont to take the heavens as the evangelists, as is the text: the heavens declare the glory of God; for of these it was said: their sound went out into all the earth, and their words to the ends of the world (Ps 19:1, 4 (18:2, 5)): so we rightly take the earths as the peoples to whom the Gospel was preached.

And since the peoples who had believed from Judea, after they came to rest in going out from this earth (for now they are not here), yet the authority of the evangelists was made firm in the Churches that are of the Gentiles, made firm by the mercy of God, the authority of the Churches of Judea, which is in Christ, no longer assisting; therefore the sense here is, to be pronounced as a question: "will you, while the earth from the south is at rest"; that is, there now being no Christian people from the Jews existing in this life, "make firm with him the Evangelists, and the books of the Divine Scriptures, which through the mercy of God have been spread out equally for seeing not to the Jews alone, but also to the Gentiles?" For he commends the grace and mercy of God, lest anyone glory in merits, which was the pride of the Jews.

Therefore teach me what we should say to him, and let us rest from saying many things. Because there is nothing they can say to him, convicted as they are that they have no merit through themselves, but need his mercy. Are you a scribe or a clerk standing by me, that, standing, I may make a man be silent?

Why then do you not speak, if you have something to say? For you do not take down what I dictate, so that you say nothing; but surely we converse together. But the light that shines back in the clouds is not visible to all.

He returns to the things he was saying about the hope of the forgiveness of sins and the illumination of grace through the mercy of God: for the light shines back in the clouds. Yet it is not proper to the clouds themselves; for they are illuminated. For it is one thing to shine by one's own light, another to shine back when illumined. But it is not visible to all. For many think that souls shine by their own light, when they are wise.

Hence come those who, saying that they are wise, became foolish (Rom 1:22). And a spirit passes, and will cleanse them. Here he meant the spirit of which it was said: at the rebuke of the spirit of your wrath (Ps 18:15 (17:16)); and: where shall I flee from your spirit? (Ps 139:7 (138:7))

For through the reproofs of temptations their merit is shown to men, because they themselves are darkness by their sins, and lack the glory of God (See Rom 3:23), so that they may wish to be illumined by his light, giving honor to him, not to themselves; and thus, pride being laid aside, they may be cleansed from great offense: for the Spirit of sanctification does not pass, but remains.

From the north, clouds of a golden color. From the most wicked ungodliness, far removed from God, they come nonetheless cleansed and converted, and illumined with wisdom: whence, except through grace, by which not merits are regarded, but sins are forgiven?

Hence that man, when he wished to be forgiven: I will teach, he says, the unjust your ways, and the ungodly will be converted to you (Ps 51:13 (50:15)): like clouds from the east or the north now of a golden color, their darkness being illumined. In these is the great glory and honor of the Almighty. To whom much is forgiven, loves much. Since he who is almighty can justify even the ungodly.

And we find no other like his power. For he alone committed no sin, nor was deceit found in his mouth (1 Pet 2:22). For God alone is truthful, but every man is a liar (Ps 116:11 (115:11)): whence God made man conquered, when he was judged. He who judges justly, do you not think that he hears?

Let not a man, then, by despairing of pardon, add sins to sins, as though already given over to damnation, because he is certain of the justice of God, under which he cannot be unpunished. For God judges so justly that he also hears those who beg pardon; and so much the more, the more justly he judges. For it is not of a just judgment to mingle suppliant penitents with those who refuse the humility and satisfaction of penance.

Therefore men will fear him: if they remember that they are men, by confessing their sins; because they are still men, to whom it is said: "are you not men?" The wise of heart too will fear him: lest, by attributing to themselves what they received, and saying that they are wise, they become foolish. For what is given to the humble can be taken away from the proud.

Therefore, although the wise are wise by the illumination of the heart, not by the boasting of the tongue, and are kings, spiritually judging the earth, but are themselves judged by no one (See 1 Cor 2:15), let them yet serve the Lord in fear, and exult with trembling, lest they perish from the right way (See Ps 2:11-12). For it is God who works in them both to will and to work, for his good pleasure (Phil 2:13).

38. (38:1-41) And after Elihu ceased to speak, the Lord spoke to Job through the whirlwind of a cloud. Even if that voice was made in this way, in which it was made to Moses, or in which the Lord showed himself to the three disciples on the mountain (See Matt 17:1-5); yet, because it was not said simply, "through a cloud," but, through the whirlwind of a cloud, I think this is signified, that Job was questioned, that is, tested, not through healthy flesh, but through the tribulation and disturbance of the flesh. Who is it that hides counsel from me, holding words in his heart, and thinks that he is hidden from me?

There is no one, then, who may say that he suffers something harsh undeservedly; because if not by deeds, at least by words one sins; and if not by words, at least by rash presumption within in the heart, or by the discourses of thoughts: and since these are not hidden from God, let no one who is scourged say that he receives discipline unworthily, as though there were no further good by which through it he might profit.

For it is to be known that Job was thus praised at the beginning of this book by the testimony of God to the devil, and at the end to his three friends, yet so that God knew how much was lacking to him for perfection, to which even men praiseworthy according to this life, and already pleasing to God, are brought by fatherly scourges;

which he was unwilling to remove from the Apostle, saying: my grace is sufficient for you; for power is perfected in weakness (2 Cor 12:9).

Gird your loins like a man. He signifies that the servants of God suffer hard and bitter things in this age to this end, that they may gather and bind up all their affections from the flux of earthly delights. I will question you; and you answer me. Where were you when I founded the earth? Hence he now begins to commend the eminence of our Lord Jesus Christ, because in him is the salvation of all who were struck by the venomous persuasion of the serpent, lest anyone think that salvation is in himself for himself.

For he is God, not as it was said: you are gods, and sons of the Most High (Ps 82:6 (81:6)); but one for whom it is no robbery to be equal to the Father (See Phil 2:6): and son of man, not as the sons of men in whom there is no salvation (Ps 146:3 (145:3)); but beyond his partners (Ps 45:7 (44:8)).

For he is not only just, like Job, like Paul, like the Church; but also justifying, as the only-begotten from the Father, full of grace and truth (John 1:14). To suggest, then, the difference of his divine humanity, in whom the prince of this world found nothing (See John 14:30), because in the Passion he was then paying back what he had not snatched away (See Ps 69:4 (68:5)), and the justification of the saints through the forgiveness of sins—the saints who, gathered into one, become his body the Church, of which Job too is a particle according to history, because he was justified, and a figure of the whole, through prophecy—he begins to say the things he is about to say.

Where were you when I founded the earth? Whether because he did not yet exist, or because it was not founded through him, as it was through the only Son? and this earth, or the Church itself? for it received the cornerstone (See Eph 2:20), of which he is soon to speak. Tell me, if you know knowledge. For these things that were done by the Lord for us temporally pertain to knowledge. Who set its measures, if you know? according to the distribution of spiritual gifts. For to each one of us grace has been given according to the measure of the gift of Christ. Wherefore he says: 'ascending on high, he led captivity captive, he gave gifts to men (Eph 4:7-8).' Because if the whole body were an eye, where would the hearing be? (1 Cor 12:17) For according to the measure of each part he makes the increase of the body, for its building up in love (Eph 4:16).

Or who is it that brought a cord over it? to make it his inheritance, distinguishing it from those to whom he says: I do not know you (Matt 7:23). For the Lord knows who are his (2 Tim 2:19). Or upon what are its rings fastened? Because they bind it together, lest it be dissolved, the Divine Books fastened upon the Lord; because whoever wishes to interpret them without him must needs drift and err.

But who is it that set the cornerstone over it? which the builders rejected (Ps 118:22 (117:22)). When the stars were made together: so many thousands baptized together by the Word of life, shining among sinners as in darkness.

All my angels praised me with a great voice: the evangelists. I shut in the sea with gates: the peoples embittered by the love of earthly things. But why with gates? Perhaps so that he might not only have a means of exercising the just by persecutions, but also so that it might be permitted to the just to go out thence?

When it raged from its mother's womb, wishing to go forth: when it was angry in the council of the city of Babylon, fornicating in the love of this age, wishing to extend its persecutions to destroy from the earth those of whom it was said: I do not ask that you take them out of the world, but that you take them from evil (John 17:15).

I placed a cloud around it as a covering. For not only the good, but also many evil men and lovers of this age, are made subject to the sacrament of the Body of Christ: by whose authority they are restrained from the persecution of the saints.

And I wrapped it in a mist: ignorance, by which they expect earthly happiness thence, and fear earthly unhappiness; and for this reason they fear those whom, were it not so, they would persecute.

For it was not only said: the poor will eat and be satisfied, and those who seek the Lord will praise him; but it was also said: all the rich of the earth have eaten, and have adored (Ps 22:26, 29 (21:27, 30)). And I set bounds for it, placing bars and gates: bounds by which the cruelty may be restrained, not so that it afflict nothing, but how far it may exercise; bars, so that the unjust may not go forth; gates, so that through them the just may go out.

And I said: 'you will come this far, and you will not pass.' Just as the devil himself received a measure, how far he might afflict Job; so that sea, how far it might persecute the Church. But in yourself your waves will be broken to pieces: by the mutual devastation of discords and wars. Or did I establish the morning light with you? that is, did I predestine the time of the resurrection by your counsel? Or did the morning star know its order? to be supplied: "did it with you?"

He calls the Lord the morning star, on account of that morning rising of the resurrection. For it could not be said of another: and the morning star rise in your hearts (2 Pet 1:19). He himself recognized his order, that he might be the firstfruits of those who sleep, the firstborn from the dead (See 1 Cor 15:20), the head of the Church, his body too to follow in the future resurrection of the saints. To lay hold of the wings of the earth: it is said: if I take up my wings straight ahead (Ps 139:9 (138:9)); namely the spiritual powers of the faithful, by which they are lifted up from worldly enticements.

To shake the ungodly out of it. For to this end he rose first so long before, recognizing his order, that he might suggest the faith of the resurrection, and, preached everywhere through the very wings of the Church, by the ministry of the messengers flying about, justly lay hold of them for the work of judging the twelve tribes of Israel, when he will come to shake the ungodly out of the Church, who now before the judgment are tolerated mingled in.

And did you, taking the mud of the earth, form a living thing? whether he recalls Adam himself, or that now in the sixth age of the world, as then on the sixth day, out of sinners, as out of the mud of the earth, a man was made according to the image of him who created him (See Gen 1:27; 2:7). Surely the Church did not do this, but rather was made in this, through the Word incarnate at the opportune time, through whom all things were made (See John 1:3).

And did you set him as famous over the earth? This man is set as more famous over the earth, who was made in the sixth age of the world, than that one who was made on the sixth day, before the other men existed, through whom he might be made famous: unless perhaps because he has now thus become known. And did you take the light from the ungodly? like him who came, that those who do not see may see; and those who see may become blind (John 9:39).

Or did you crush the arm of the proud? their power, like him who chose the weak things of the world, to confound the strong (1 Cor 1:27).

Or did you come to the source of the sea? like him, at whose coming there lay open, by confession, whatever was hidden in the hearts of the ungodly, who by believing in him were justified. For what better do we take as the source of the sea, than the secret place whence bursts forth all this most bitter ungodliness, which stirs up the huge waves of evil deeds now manifest, which men see in open deeds, who cannot see the source itself? Or do you walk in the footprints of the abyss?

The abyss is here rightly understood as the worldly life, whatever is in the depth of evils, where, as it is written, when the sinner has come, he will despise (See Prov 18:3). Because they too, the most desperate, made subject to grace through the forgiveness of sins, were saved and emerged, and received Christ: not into the abyss where they were pressed down; but into its place,

so that where he was walking, treading upon them, Christ might walk, dwelling in them; in the footprints of the abyss, remaining through the memory of their sins, so that, while they recall where they had been, they may love the more him whom they received, by whom so much was forgiven them (See Luke 7:41-47). Or are the gates of death opened to you in fear? For to all who die the gates of death are opened, but not in fear, as to that one alone who died for the destroying of death. Or indeed they are opened for rising again.

Or did the gatekeepers of hell, seeing you, fear? like that one alone, in whom the prince of the world found nothing worthy of death, whom they released so quickly, whom they admitted unwillingly. By the gatekeepers of hell some lower powers set over death are to be understood.

Or have you known the breadth under heaven? as he knew who through it spread the Church abroad. Tell me, then, how great each thing is. For who would know this, except one whom he has taught? Or in what land does light dwell?

For he teaches, because the manifestation of his words enlightens, and makes the little ones understand (Ps 119:130 (118:130)).

Or what is the place of darkness? This too he teaches, who says: draw near to him, and be enlightened (Ps 34:5 (33:6)). For from this he shows that those grow dark who withdraw while they refuse to be little ones.

For the beginning of man's pride is to apostatize from God (Sir 10:14 (10:12)). Hence those who did not glorify God, or give thanks, became vain in their thoughts, and their foolish heart was darkened (Rom 1:21), and became a place of darkness. Unless perhaps the place of darkness is that which receives those persevering in their sins, so that they themselves are the darkness, of which it is the place, which truly no man knows.

Likewise too the land in which light dwells can be understood as that land of the living, that is, the blessedness about to receive those persevering in faith and hope and charity, who were once darkness, but now are light in the Lord (Eph 5:8). If you will lead me to their boundaries? how far those who are such attain. For what is there where the wisdom of God is not, which reaches mightily from end to end, and orders all things sweetly (Wis 8:1)?

To whom surely no man is to be compared. But if you have also known their paths; do you know that you were born then, and that the number of your years is great? But if you have also known the paths of the ungodly, who are either darkness or a place of darkness; because all, even those who have now been converted to God, walked in those very paths, before they received from God the grace that justifies the ungodly:

do you yet know that there then arose for you a cause of being born mortally in this age, when the first parents of all men entered upon those same paths, who, ungodly by transgression, summoned death by hands and words, so that all might die in Adam? For the number of a man's years is not to be reckoned so small from the time each one appeared in this life, but from the time the first mortal birth came about.

For when, for example, Abraham was born, then all the Hebrews were born in him. The number of years, then, is great for each one according to the origin of mortality, which arose in the paths of the ungodly. But who remembers that he existed, or, when he existed, could know that he was in the loins of his father? Since no one even recalls that time in which he was born not in his parents, but in himself; at which time surely no one doubts that he already existed, and lived, and had perception. But all those things that Wisdom knows, which forms all things, not only those things above the heavens, but also these mortal things.

And because Christ is the Power of God and the Wisdom of God (See 1 Cor 1:24), he knows these things, who also was born mortally, not by a mortal condition, because free among the dead, but by compassion for mortals, that he might make them free from death.

Or have you come into the treasuries of snow? that is, have you attained to that knowledge, as he knew even the opportune, secret, and hidden causes of imminent scandals? For he calls them treasuries for this reason, that they serve to test and exercise the hearts of the spiritual, when he cried out: woe to the world because of scandals! for scandals must come; but woe to that man through whom the scandal comes! (Matt 18:7)

For lifted up on high through pride, they freeze in the manner of snow, and fall; from whose abounding iniquity the love of many grows cold: but those who await the Lord, acting manfully (See Ps 27:14 (26:14)), and fervent in spirit (Rom 12:11), let them persevere to the end, and they will be saved (See Matt 24:13). Or have you seen the treasuries of hail? The unjust are hail, when they not only are torpid, having no fervor of spirit, but even with obstinate hardness bruise others by persecuting or rushing upon them.

Which are laid up for you for the time of the enemies, and for the day of fight and war? Even from this, who would not see whose person Job bears in prophecy? For these things are not laid up for this one man for the time of the enemies, and for the day of fight and war, but surely for the one people of God.

For it is the time of the enemies, until iniquity pass away, which, the more it abounds, the more sharply one must fight and wage war against the devil, lest the love of those persevering grow cold. But whence does the hoarfrost proceed? Who knows this, except that these are as it were the beginnings of birth-pangs? For hoarfrost is the tiniest hail. And the south wind is scattered under heaven? The south wind, although it is felt as oppressive to mortal flesh, yet I do not recall that it ever signifies anything evil in the Holy Books, just as the north wind never signifies anything good: the former, because it blows from that quarter where the light shines; the latter, because it blows from that quarter where the light is more remote.

The south wind, then, is scattered under heaven, so that against all those iniquities some help of God may be understood, as long as we are not yet in heaven, but under heaven. Who has prepared the channel for the strong rain, and the way for the voices of the storm? See how briefly he has comprehended those three things, which the Lord sets down in the temptations as to be despised by those who build upon the rock, and as ruinous to those who build upon the sand (See Matt 7:24-27).

He recalled the rain, and the channel, and the voices of the storm, where we understand "winds." A man is tempted by rain, then, who from the very loftiness of the Divine Scriptures takes occasion for sinning by understanding them wrongly: as if, hearing: he to whom little is forgiven, loves little (Luke 7:42-43), he should say to himself: let us do evil, that good may come (Rom 3:8); and remain in sin, that grace may abound (See Rom 5:20): and many things of this kind, by which men overthrow themselves by interpreting the divine word wrongly, promising themselves impunity, when the mercy of God is commended in the Divine Books.

But by a channel, when he is tempted by men who have understood and taken these things in this way: for by channel he now means that which is collected from the rain, and is called a torrent, when he says: who has prepared the channel for the strong rain? which it may fill, and along which it may run.

Such are the vessels of wrath fitted for destruction (Rom 9:22), which take the Scriptures in the way I have said. For through them that pernicious interpretation has a freer course, which the fruitful fields do not receive; and it drives, and casts down, and drags whatever it has found unstable, with so much the greater force, the more it seems to have been taken up from divine authority. But a man is tempted by winds, whom the empty persuasions of proud men puff up, that is, of those who boast empty words on their own authority.

He, then, who by the judgment of God is fitted for destruction, by not obeying his words, which is to build upon the sand, does not resist such winds, and by falling becomes a way for the voices of the storm.

I think it was said strong rain for one difficult to grasp, that is, to understand. That it may rain upon the earth where there is no man: to be supplied: "who has prepared?" By "man" he seems to signify the Law, which was given to the Jews. Therefore we understand the shower of the Gospel upon the Gentiles.

In the desert, where there is no man: among the Gentiles themselves, where there was no authority of one knowing God. That it may satisfy the pathless and uninhabitable, and that the greenness of grass may sprout.

Many are the children of the deserted woman, more than of her who has a husband (Isa 54:1). But in all these four verses, "who has prepared" is to be supplied. Who is the father of the rain? like the bridegroom, who sent his sons to water the earth by the preaching of the kingdom of heaven.

And who is it that has begotten the clods of dew? those who receive that preaching well. For he says clods of dew in the same way that "vessels of wine" are said to be made for this, that they may receive wine.

From whose womb does ice proceed? Is ice to be taken in a good sense, on account of stability and abstinence from flux, so that it was said: from whose womb does ice proceed, just like that: who is the father of the rain?

Or is womb put for the secret place, so that from its womb ice proceeds, as God gave them over to a reprobate sense (Rom 1:28)? Or rather does ice proceed from the womb of that one, who by persuading to the ungodliness with which he is inwardly full, makes men grow cold and hard, the warmth of love being lost?

for who knows this one, like him who said to the hard and resisting the Gospel: you are of your father the devil (John 8:44)? Or who begot the hoarfrost in heaven? which comes down like a river of water. What we perceived of the ice in the last sense, this too I think is to be taken of the hoarfrost.

Yet it is not added in vain, in heaven, so that it may be understood of those who are in authority, imitating indeed the good messengers of the truth, who transform themselves as ministers of justice (2 Cor 11:15).

To which pertains what was added, which comes down like a river of water. Or who has melted away the face of the ungodly? that is, confounded it: who, except he who those whom he justified, them he also glorified (Rom 8:30)? Or have you understood the bonds of the Pleiades, and opened the enclosure of Orion? Or will you open Mazzaroth in its time, and lead the evening star over its building?

Is astrology too to be searched out, to know the properties of these stars, so that we can understand this passage? I doubt whether this accords with our discourse, and it is certainly far too long: we pass on, then, to other things. Or, certain stars being named, by the figure of speech by which the whole is understood from a part, are all the stars to be taken?

(If, however, Mazzaroth too is a star, the meaning of which we do not find even in the Greek language: for that it is a Hebrew name is sufficiently clear.) For thus the whole is understood from a part also in what is written: before the morning star I begot you (Ps 110:3 (109:3)). For the morning star is not created first in all creation, so that before the morning star, "before all creation," might seem to be said: but through the morning star all the stars, which is the whole from a part; and through all the stars all times are understood (for of the stars it is written: and let them be for signs and for seasons (Gen 1:14));

so that the Lord, born before all times, surely not born in time, and therefore coeternal with the Father, might be suggested. The mention, then, of the Pleiades, and of Orion, and of Mazzaroth, and of the evening star, by way of summary persuades us to understand all the stars.

For if by one morning star, how much more, with so many named, may the rest too be taken by a manner of speaking of this kind?

Why, then, is it said in one place, you have understood the bonds; in another, you have opened; in another, opening in its own time; and in another, you will lead them onto its building up? Do these belong properly to each of the things mentioned in order?

Or could it also rightly be said, "you have opened the enclosure of the Pleiades," and "you have understood the bonds of Orion"? And so the other two can likewise be exchanged: just as in the case of that verse in the Psalm, he who dwells in the heavens will laugh at them, and the Lord will deride them (Ps 2:4), nothing of the sense would be lost even if it were put this way: "he who dwells in the heavens will deride them, and the Lord will laugh at them."

For just as he who dwells in the heavens is himself the Lord, so, whether the name of the Pleiades or of Orion, it has the same meaning, if by either of them all the stars are understood. And so, under the name of all the stars, all in the Church are to be understood who have their manner of life in the heavens (See Phil 3:20).

Their bonds are understood to be those by which they are bound both to one another and to God so that they do not fall. But love never falls (1 Cor 13:8). And who would have known this unless he had shown it who says, a new commandment I give you, that you love one another (John 13:34), and, he who loves me will be loved by my Father (John 14:21)? Their enclosure is that by which they are fenced in—the divine Scripture, which they do not transgress.

And who opens this except him to whom one passes over so that the veil may be taken away? The time of their opening, that is, of their being shown and made manifest, is when the Lord will come and will bring to light the things hidden in darkness, and will make manifest the thoughts of the heart, and then each one will have his praise from God (1 Cor 4:4-5).

For he alone will do this in its own time, since when he himself who is our life shall appear, then we also shall appear with him in glory (Col 3:4). And he will lead them onto their building up who will make them possess that which they have here built up. For if anyone's work which he has built upon it remains, he will receive a reward (1 Cor 3:14). You know the changes of heaven. Is it for the worse, like those who, although they knew God, did not glorify him as God? For they were unwilling to be the seats of God, and on this account they were changed when they became vain in their thoughts (Rom 1:21).

Or is it for the better? For we shall all indeed rise again, yet we shall not all be changed. But who they are that will be changed he makes plain when he says, and we shall be changed (1 Cor 15:51-52). For when the righteous are changed, heaven will be changed, because the throne of God is heaven (Matt 5:34), and wisdom is the Word of God, and the Word was God, and the throne of wisdom is the soul of the righteous. Or is it rather both? For he did not say the change of heaven, but its changes.

Or all the things that come to pass alike under heaven. For just as the changes of heaven affect the things that are under heaven, so too, when the righteous are changed, whether for the worse or for the better, they affect the carnal in both directions.

You will call a cloud with your voice: either with the inner voice, or with that by which it was said, follow me (John 21:19), or with that by which it was said, Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me? (Acts 9:4)

And with the trembling of mighty water they will obey you: the powerful peoples, when they hear, work out your own salvation in fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you both to will and to work, for his good pleasure (Phil 2:12-13).

Will you send forth the rivers with power, and will they go? He says, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water (John 7:38). And he says with power—that is, the confidence with which they did not fear their persecutors, since those also who do violence carry off the kingdom of heaven (Matt 11:12). Or will they say to you, 'What is it?'

that is, will they not ask of you either the intent of your command, as Saul said, what do you bid me do? (Acts 9:6) or the hope of their reward, as they said, behold, we have left all and followed you; what then shall we have? (Matt 19:27)

Who gave to women the wisdom of weaving, and the knowledge of varied things? In Solomon too the woman wove garments for her husband (See Prov 31:10-24). And so the works of the Churches are to be understood, by which God is honored.

For the very weaving—that is, to bind together the weak brothers, as it were the downy weft, with the strong and upright spiritual ones, as by an interlacing of warp threads—is the greatest and singular work of the Churches. And the knowledge of varied things avails for this: that, just as in a damask there is that variety of colors by which the beauty of unity is not disturbed, so among the brothers the gifts may be diverse in such a way that, with no discord of envy, they cohere with one another, bearing with one another in love, eager to preserve the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace (Eph 4:2-3).

Or who is it that numbers the clouds in wisdom? For the Lord knows those who are his (2 Tim 2:19): but who among men, he says, knows this? And who has bent down the instruments of heaven to the earth? The heavenly angels, through whom the divine utterances are wont to be announced. For they did not fall like that one, but were bent down to the earth by the bending of obedience, especially when the Lord himself was on earth.

For the Evangelist says, and the angels ministered to him (Matt 4:11). But it was poured out like earth as ashes, and he glued it together like food among stones. The humility of penance was poured out widely and abundantly, to this end: that the Lord, who resists the proud but gives grace to the humble (1 Pet 5:5), might cleave to them as by the glue of love, man to men; that he might be the mediator of God and men (See 1 Tim 2:5), giving himself to them as food through the sacrament of his Body and Blood, choosing the foolish things of the world as stones, that he might confound the wise (1 Cor 1:27).

For to the angels he is food insofar as he is the Word of God with God; but that he might be food to the stones, the Word was made flesh and dwelt among us (John 1:1, 14). Therefore he will be glued to men, with penance going before, as ashes are poured out making a way for him.

Hence too that one who said, bring forth therefore fruits worthy of penance, and do not say to yourselves, 'we have Abraham for our father'; for God is able from these stones to raise up children to Abraham (Matt 3:8-9): by which stones he announced that he was to be glued together as food. But if the humility of doing penance does not go before, he will not be glued to them, since he knows the lofty from afar (Ps 138:6 (137:6)).

Or will you catch food for the lion, or fill the souls of the dragons? Of the devil it is said, and you will trample the lion and the dragon (Ps 91:13 (90:13)): because of his snares and his wrath. All his angels, therefore, are compared to lions and dragons.

But he catches food for them, and fills their souls, who hands over to their power those convicted of impiety. For they wish their impiety to lie hidden, but when they are brought forth, they are indeed caught, so as to be in the power of the devil and his angels, to whom they have consented.

For they are fearful in their lairs: in the hiding places of their snares. For if they were not fearful, who would stand? But they fear the command of him under whom they cried out, why have you come to destroy us before the time? And just as it is plain in the case of the swine that they would not have gone into them unless they had been permitted (See Mark 1:24; 5:11-13), so it is to be understood that they can do nothing against anyone unless permitted:

but that they are permitted by the justice by which all things are governed, whether for the sake of testing, or of punishment, inflicted either for damnation or for correction. And they sit in the woods lying in wait. For the will to harm does not rest in them, even when the power is not given. But they watch in their ambushes, in so wooded a thicket of carnal occasions, for who may be caught by the divine laws—that is, convicted of his sin—so as to be deemed worthy to be counted among their food. But who prepared food for the raven? For its young ones cry to the Lord, wandering and seeking food:

as it is in the Psalm, and to the young ravens that call upon him (Ps 147:9 (146:9)). To which sentence this passage is most similar. Nor can they be understood in a bad sense, since they call upon him. So they signify the black ones, that is, sinners not yet whitened by the remission of sins.

But they are young ones because they are already humble; they are wandering because they have not yet known the truth, which nevertheless they devoutly seek when they cry to the Lord. And food can be prepared for the raven because of the foreknowledge of him who knows that even one not yet humble will be converted; but still the young ones, that is, the humble, cry to the Lord.

39. (39:1-35) Do you know the time of the bringing forth of the wild goats among the rocks? [MISSING GREEK TEXT] is "he-goat," [MISSING GREEK TEXT] is "stag": the wild goat (tragelaphus), then, is an animal compounded of a he-goat and a stag. It therefore signifies the mind serving the Law of God according to the inner man. But it sees, insofar as it is still in part a he-goat, another Law in its members fighting against the Law of its mind, and taking it captive under the Law of sin (Rom 7:22-23).

But he who has set the firm foundations of examples in the Scriptures has brought forth rocks for such ones at the fitting time, in which those who are at rest may not despair of themselves—those whose flesh lusts against the spirit and the spirit against the flesh, until, the serpent's persuasions being overcome by the liveliness of a stag, they live by the spirit and follow the spirit (Gal 5:17-18), that sin may not reign (whence the likeness of the he-goat is drawn) in their mortal body, so as to obey its desires (Rom 6:12).

Or have you watched over the bringing forth of the hinds? Over that of the Churches in the number of the spiritual, who with maternal affection persuade others to imitate them, whom the serpent's opinions can no longer harm: yet even such are watched over, presuming not upon themselves but upon God.

And have you numbered the months of their bringing forth? For they do not bring forth except through the Gospel, which the Lord preached from his baptism up to his passion and ascension by the authority of his teaching over a fixed number of months. And have you loosed their pains?

For it was not without pain that it was said, my children, of whom I am again in travail until Christ is formed in you (Gal 4:19). But these pains are loosed when the offspring has been brought forth, that is, when the truth has been made persuasive to those for whom there is such groaning, the word of God doing this in the inward parts of the conscience.

And have you nourished their fawns without fear? Not timid in the milk of the sacraments. For they did not receive the spirit of slavery again in fear (Rom 8:15). You will send forth their offspring: into the freedom of a richer spiritual pasture. Their young ones will break off: the chains of worldly desires. They will be multiplied in wheat: with the more solid food of wisdom, after the nourishment of milk.

They will go out, and will not return to them. They will go out, as it were from the straits of the teaching that is handed on through men to beginners; and they will not return to their mothers, no longer having need of milk, nor lacking human teachers. Indeed, these three verses are not to be pronounced as questions.

But who is it that has let the wild ass go free? It is a wonder if he does not signify by the wild ass those few who, free from all business, serve God. And who has loosed its bonds? The bonds of carnal and popular affections. For I have set its dwelling place in the desert and its tents in the salt land: whence it may cry out, my soul has thirsted for you (Ps 63:2 (62:2)).

Laughing at the multitude of the city: which Scripture calls Babylon, walking along the broad way that leads to perdition (See Matt 7:13). And not hearing the complaint of the tax collector: owing nothing to anyone. It has considered the mountains of its pasture: the greatness of the revelations. And it seeks after everything green: everything everlasting.

But will the unicorn be willing to serve you? The one proud with the dignity of this world; for Christ has subdued even such, and made them ministers of the Church: for [MISSING GREEK TEXT] is the unicorn, which signifies pride.

Or sleep at your manger? as at the humility of him who, an infant, is even placed in a manger (See Luke 2:7). One rests there in the security of the pardon of sins, and in the forgetting of the cares of a bad conscience. And will it bind its yoke with thongs? Bearing the light yoke bound with thongs, that is, by the authority of those who have mortified and subdued the flesh. Whence John too was girded with a leather belt (See Matt 3:4), not with the rough ropes of sins.

Or will it draw the furrows for you in the field? It will open the breasts of an obedient people to obtain the kingdom of God. But do you trust in it, because its strength is changed? so that it does not seek the vanity of human praise and honor even in the ministry of the Church, as it used to seek it in the world.

Or will you leave your works to it? like that one for whom the Apostle says he serves as an ambassador, exhorting men on Christ's behalf to be reconciled to God (See 2 Cor 5:20). And will you trust it, that it will return to you the seed? It will claim nothing of this for its own lordship. For by "seed" he means the work of sowing.

And will it bring it into your threshing floor? So as to be among those whom the Lord himself bids to entreat the Lord of the harvest, that he may send laborers into his harvest (See Luke 10:2): not, however, that it should wish to make a threshing floor for itself, as does the founder of heresies and schisms, and whoever seeks not the glory of God but his own. For it is most difficult that this unicorn should be willing; but even this is brought about and effected in the mind of a man by him who alone does wondrous things (Ps 72:18 (71:18)), destroying counsels and every height that exalts itself against the knowledge of God, and taking every understanding captive unto obedience to himself (2 Cor 10:4-5).

The wing of the ostriches is mingled with the wings of the heron and the hawk. By this verse it is to be understood that to those slow of wit, whom the ostriches signify (because they cannot fly), it has been granted, through the grace of him who chose the foolish things of the world (See 1 Cor 1:27), that they be made equal to the swiftness of the clever who believe alongside them, who are signified by these birds that he has mentioned.

And it has left its eggs on the earth. Now he begins to speak of the ostrich, that is, of those whom he signifies by this animal. For their slow feathers would not be mingled with the wings of the swift birds so as to fly alongside them, unless they left on the earth their former hope, which he signifies by the eggs. And in the dust they grow warm. Because, even if it does not attend to what it hoped for in the world, it generally comes about that the lovers of the world favor it, who are compared to the dust.

And it has forgotten that the foot will scatter them, and the beast of the field will trample them. But if even the adverse desire of someone and the iniquity of this world should disturb and crush such hope of his, like its eggs which it leaves on the earth, it cares nothing for it, so that, as though forgetful, it does not feel it.

It has hardened itself against its children, that they may not be its own: even if there is now no longer a hope like the eggs, but the very thing itself, like children already born—that is, temporal happiness—it strongly despises it, unwilling that this should be its happiness, because it desires that which is true. In vain it has labored without any fear. This is before it is converted: for it labors with the hope of the world without fruit, and—what is more foolish—without any fear, while it presumes on uncertain things.

Because God has despised it in wisdom, and has not imparted understanding to it. For what is more foolish than to trust in vanity, and to labor to acquire things that will perish, without any fear of losing them?

For very many conceive this disposition to whom a long worldly happiness comes, especially if it is drawn from grandfathers and great-grandfathers in continuous succession, so that they do not believe they can suddenly become unhappy. And because they are wont to appear great on earth, yet do not enjoy the feathers of the virtues by a heavenly manner of life, they are rightly compared to ostriches.

But mark what follows: when the time has come, it will fly up on high, and will deride the horseman and the rider. After the fullness of time came (Gal 4:4), so that the rich of this world were charged not to be proud in mind, nor to hope in the uncertainty of riches, but in the living God (1 Tim 6:17), they began to have their heart lifted up to the Lord, and to deride the proud persecutors, whom the Lord cast into the sea: for then the wing of the ostrich, mingled with the swift birds, seeks heaven, and the rest of what was said above about this animal comes to pass.

Or have you surrounded the horse with strength? He seems to be describing the martyr, the fearless and eager witness of saving faith—yet not by his own strength, but by that with which the Lord has surrounded him. And have you clothed its neck with neighing? Put on the armor of God, that you may be able to resist in the evil day (Eph 6:11, 13).

And the boldness of the glory of its breast. This is the boldness with which Isaiah dares and speaks (See Isa 65:1; Rom 10:20). And the glory of the breast is the conscience (See 2 Cor 1:12) that approves a man's work, so that each one may have his glory in himself and not in another (See Gal 6:4). Going forth into the field it luxuriates. Coming out into the light of freedom, by the ease of good work it exults in the breadth of love. And it goes forth into battle with strength: against the temptations of adversities.

And meeting the dart it scorns it: because the arms have been placed around it, among which is that shield of faith, in which the fiery darts of the enemy are quenched (See Eph 6:16). Nor does it turn away from the sword: either from visible death, or because there are some both hard, so as not to consent to the truth, and sharp, so as to persecute, from whom it does not turn away, since it is commanded to love even them.

For over it the bow and sword rejoice. For through its confession both the threat of God is affirmed, which foreannounces invisible punishments far off, and the testimony of the word, by which it overcomes all errors as though at close quarters.

For it is one thing to threaten that the punishments of sinners are far in the future, which is like aiming arrows with a bow; it is another to overcome present desires hand to hand, as it were, with the sword of the word.

With the trembling of the lance and spear. What is it that, with the trembling of the lance and spear, the bow and sword rejoice over it? Is it that, unless it too trembles—that is, fears the death to come, which the divine justice hurls—it cannot scorn the present death which the persecutor threatens, so as to have a fearless confession and proclaim the truth with confidence, which the enemies cannot resist:

and so rejoice over it—that is, that through it the teaching of God may be freely affirmed, by which it threatens the impious with future ruin, and slays present iniquity? For unless the joy of our hope were joined with trembling at damnation, that very security and proud presumption in us would be careless; nor would it be said to us in the Psalm, rejoice in him with trembling (Ps 2:11).

And with anger it overturns the earth. Being angry at himself, so as to overturn in himself earthly desires and carnal fears, by which anyone is turned away from the endurance of suffering. In this sense it was perhaps said, be angry, and do not sin (Ps 4:4 (4:5)). For with most healthful anger each one ought to seize himself by way of correction, saying, why are you sorrowful, my soul? And why do you trouble me? Hope in God, for I will confess to him. For since confession is made with the mouth unto salvation (Rom 10:10), there at once follows, my God is the salvation of my countenance (Ps 42:6-7 (41:6-7)).

Nor will it believe until the trumpet has sounded. For before the time of temptation, even if the earthly trembling has been overturned, it does not appear, nor is it easily to be believed, until the very time of temptation has taught it. But when the trumpet has sounded, it will say, 'Well done.' When the time of temptation has come, then indeed his soul will please him, if he glories in tribulations; because tribulation works patience, and patience approval, and approval hope (Rom 5:3-4): so that he may no longer say to his soul in anger, why do you trouble me? but glorying may say, praise the Lord, my soul (Ps 146:2 (145:2)).

And from afar it smells the battle: not, as it were, in persecuting men who are seen, but from afar, that is, far from the eyes; knowing that its wrestling is not against flesh and blood, but against the principalities and powers, and the rulers of this world of darkness, against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places (Eph 6:12)—this is from afar. And it was fittingly said, it smells, because of the prince of the power of this air. For odors are perceived by smell, whether good or bad. It therefore smells the battle who understands that the prince of the power of this air works in the children of unbelief (Eph 2:2), whose wraths or snares, as they persecute, it endures, so that it may fight with spiritual arms against the spiritual forces of wickedness, not with bodily arms against flesh and blood, that is, against evil and lost men, whom it sees with the eyes of the flesh.

The thunder of the captains and the shouting: "it smells" is to be understood. But I think thunder was said because of the air itself, in which those same spiritual forces of wickedness are engaged. For these spirits were not called rulers of the world because they rule heaven and earth, but as the Apostle himself explains.

For lest it be so understood, he at once added what he meant by rulers of the world; of this darkness, he says, that is, of the impious: to whom, when they have been converted to the Lord, he says, for you were once darkness, but now you are light in the Lord (Eph 5:8). For it is in the will of each whether he is darkness or light: but when he is darkness, it is in himself, that is, in the sins that are his own; but when he is light, it is not in himself but in the Lord, by whom he is enlightened, so that, as Isaiah says, his darkness may be as the noonday (Isa 58:10).

It is also said in the Psalms, you will enlighten my darkness (Ps 18:29 (17:29)). Those, then, whom the Apostle calls rulers of darkness are also called captains in this verse. For the darkness, that is, the impious, are also led by these, so as to persecute the godly—that is, those who suffer persecution for the sake of righteousness, not those who suffer for their own impieties and iniquities.

And he says that the martyr smells the shouting of such captains: not because any sound from there is heard by the ears of the body, but because they cry out by the ears of the heart through faith, how great are the things that the devil and his angels contrive against the servants of God: whence the Apostle says, for we are not ignorant of his devices (2 Cor 2:11).

Against which shouting of the captains the ears of unbelievers are altogether deaf. Does the hawk grow feathers by your wisdom? as in the wisdom of God, which is Christ, the new man is little by little renewed, about to have his manner of life in the heavenly places. With wings spread, motionless, looking toward the south? with the virtues of the twofold love unfolded from every worldly hindrance, remaining unshaken in faith; yet in this very thing not presuming upon himself, but hoping in God, and recalling his attention to him from whom that very ardor of love is breathed, so as to keep his strength toward him (See Ps 59:10 (58:10)), saying, will not my soul be subject to God? For from him is my salvation, for he himself is my God and my savior, my upholder; I shall not be moved any more (Ps 62:2-3 (61:2-3)).

And is the eagle exalted at your command? as at the command of him who says, when I have been exalted, I will draw all things to myself (John 12:32). For he was about to die for us, and to lift his body by the resurrection into heaven: where the body is, he says, there the eagles also will be gathered together (Matt 24:28). For he has satisfied with heavenly goods the desire of him whose youth, like the eagle's, will be renewed (See Ps 103:5 (102:5)). The exaltation of the eagle can also pertain to what the Apostle says, for whether we are beside ourselves, it is for God; so that the verse which there follows about the vulture may pertain to what there also follows, or whether we are sober, it is for you.

For there follows: or will the vulture sit and remain over its nest on the rock? because it seems to be said of the disposition not of contemplating lofty things by an ecstasy of mind, but of providing for lower things through the temperance by which one accommodates oneself to human affairs; so that the impious, who are reckoned as dead, being justified through the word—that is, as it were devoured by the mouth—may be converted into the body of the Church. For the vulture feeds on the dead;

and therefore over its nest, where, as it were as its young, it places the works necessary for this life. And therefore on the rock, because, when the Apostle had said, or whether we are sober, it is for you, he at once added, for the love of Christ compels us (2 Cor 5:13-14): and the rock was Christ (1 Cor 10:4).

And rightly it will sit and remain, according to what was said: but I am compelled from two sides, having the desire to be dissolved and to be with Christ, for that is far better—so that this pertains to the exaltation of the eagle; but to the vulture sitting in the nest and remaining: to abide in the flesh is necessary for your sake (Phil 1:23-24). And because the whole Church is also well understood by the rock, on account too of Simon, who for this reason was called Peter by the Lord (See Mark 3:16), the summit of the rock is the head of the Church.

To this is added the verse that follows: on the summit of the rock and in the cave? The summit refers to that which is the head, but the cave to that whereby our life is hidden with Christ in God (Col 3:3). And when it has been there, it seeks food: of which it was said to Peter, kill and eat (Acts 11:7), that he might incorporate into the Church those of the Gentiles who would believe.

From afar its eyes look out, and its young ones are tossed about in blood. By the hope of future immortality it stretches out its attention far into eternal life: although its works are tossed about in the weakness of the flesh, that is, it is shaken by uncertain movements, while human ignorance holds it uncertain, out of the things it mercifully does, what may profit whom in regard to God—yet, with its eyes looking far out for the sake of eternal salvation, it dispenses with sincere love.

But when such a worker and dispenser has found those who, through the affection by which they renounce the devil, are already dead to this world, then without any doubt he furnishes them with the ministry of the mouth in the work of the word, by which he may carry them over into the body of the Church, already most ready: and therefore there follows, wherever the corpses are, there they are at once found.

40. The Lord answered and said. Because the Lord now, as it were, takes up his discourse again, although it was he who was speaking, it is understood that Job, at the things that had been said, had been struck dumb in silence and had kept still, daring to say nothing more. So in the two verses that follow the Lord exhorts him to answer. Does he who disputes with the Almighty keep still? that is: Why do you keep still while disputing with the Almighty? Will he who reproves God answer thus? "surely not" is to be understood; so that the sense is, "surely he does not reprove God who, disputing, will answer?"

For one disputes with the Almighty by inquiring, not by convicting or refuting. It is not, therefore, because he is Almighty that one must keep still from disputing with him. For nothing is sought from him by disputation, as from the Truth itself, in order to reprove him. It can also be understood thus: "surely he who disputes with the Lord does not keep still?" that is, because he who disputes with the Almighty does not keep still, one must not dispute with him in order to keep still. For one who disputes is wont to contradict; but he who contradicts God cannot keep still—that is, he does not find rest—unless he consents to his will without any contradiction.

For he who reproves God will answer thus; that is, when by disputing he answers God, he reproves God, and therefore he does not come to rest. Whence it was said, O man, who are you to answer back to God? (Rom 9:20) But what such thing had Job done? For God does not take him as one contradicting him, as his friends did, not understanding; since he bears such witness to him both at the head of the book and at the end.

Or was it said on account of the person whom Job bore, that is, of the body of the Lord, which is the Church, in which there is a great part of the weak—not indeed of the despairing, yet still of those in peril in their progress, whose feet are almost moved, and whose steps are almost spilt, while they are zealous over sinners, beholding the peace of sinners? Who say, how does God know, and is there knowledge in the Most High? Behold, these very sinners, and abounding in the world, have obtained riches. Have I then justified my heart in vain, and washed my hands among the innocent, and been scourged all the day long, and my chastisement was in the morning? (Ps 73:2-14 (72:2-14))

For from this rather Job himself seems to answer in the following verses.

And Job answering said, 'Why then should I be judged, being admonished and rebuked by the Lord, hearing such things, when I am nothing?' that is, "why then do I set up a judgment for myself, when the Lord admonishes and reproves me, if I should contradict him";

hearing such things, that is, understanding with what great justice and mercy I am thus dealt with, when through myself I am surely nothing? What answer shall I give? that is, what shall I be able to say against the truth? I will put my hand to my mouth, that is, I will hold and check my loquacity. Once I have spoken; I will not add a second time.

Unless it be taken in a mystery, how did Job, who spoke so many times, speak only once? Or how will he not add a second time, when he is about to speak a little later? But speaking here is to be understood as the soul's going forth into these outward things, whereby it leaves God and resists him.

Whence this greater going forth is even called a cry in Scripture, when God says that the cry of the Sodomites had reached him (See Gen 18:20). To which speaking and crying out the contrary is that most blessed silence, of which it is said, and it will be silent without fear from all malice. And so he rightly says that he has spoken once, by a kind of continuous speaking throughout the whole life of the old man, when he was a spirit going forth and not returning (Ps 78:39 (77:39)). But now, putting his hand to his mouth, that he may not go forth further, he promises not to add a second time, that he may not depart from God. Amen.