Chapter XXVII.
Job also added, taking up his parable, and said: As God lives, who has taken away my judgment, and the Almighty, who has brought my soul to bitterness. While he allows the innocent to suffer the punishments of the wicked, he has also filled the bitterness of his soul with present misery. As God lives, who has taken away my judgment. According to the form of a servant that he assumed, the judgment of human will: and it was said in the person of the assumed man, the one praying said to the Father: My Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from me. And therefore my judgment was pronounced, because it demonstrated the weakness of the human race in the truth of the assumed man. And the Almighty, who led my soul to bitterness. Bitter was the cup of death, for which our Savior came to drink: from the bitterness of that cup, he said to his disciples: My soul is sorrowful even unto death. However, the word is to be understood according to the Apostle, who says of God the Father: He who did not spare his own Son, but delivered him up for us all. For he was not unwillingly handed over to death. In another place, the same Apostle says about the Savior: He gave himself for our sins.
Because as long as breath remains in me, and the breath of God is in my nostrils, my lips will not speak wickedness, nor will my tongue meditate deceit. Far be it from me to be your judge. This is also what is written about the Lord in Isaiah: Cease from man, whose breath is in his nostrils, for he has been esteemed. However, the adverb 'donec' in this context, according to the understanding we have explained regarding our Savior, we do not take it to mean, 'Until the breath of this life is in me,' that is, until I die, but rather we understand it to mean 'as long as' or 'for always and forever' in this passage. As the Lord himself says to the people through the prophet: I am, says the Lord, and until you grow old, I am. For even after the old age of humans, God will not cease to exist, but rather, he will remain perpetually with the same people as they grow old. But concerning what the Psalmist says: The Lord said to my Lord, sit at my right hand. Until I make your enemies a footstool for your feet. What then shall we say? Shall we say that after his enemies have been subjected, Christ will not sit at the right hand of God the Father? And where shall be that which the angel says: And his kingdom shall have no end? Therefore, in such places, as I said, it is to be understood as everlasting. Likewise, that which is said about Joseph and the blessed evangelist Mary, He did not know her until she brought forth her son. For who is so blasphemous concerning the venerable virginity of the blessed Mary, that they would dare to think that she knew a man after giving birth to her Son, the Savior God? Therefore, according to the truth of the Catholic faith, let us always understand, as it was said above, forever. Therefore, Jesus the Lord says, because the breath of divinity is always in me, for according to what I am as a human, I am begotten and created in God: I have in me the spirit of my Father, substantially mine. Therefore, it follows as he says: Until I fail, I will not depart from my innocence. Therefore, because I did not acquire innocence through the industry of character, but I am just and innocent in the same way I was born.
I will persevere, I will not stray from my innocence. For even if I die in these torments, I will not stray from my innocence, which you falsely claim to have lost through blasphemy.
I will not abandon the justification that I have begun to hold. The Savior could have said this, as a man assumed into God, whose beginning is according to the flesh from the virgin Mary: but the sin of man neither had in being born, nor contracted by working: and therefore He alone truly says:
For my heart does not condemn me in my whole life. Like the wicked, my enemy, and my adversary, like the unjust. In this place, all life, the present life, must be understood, at the time when he said this: as if he were saying: my whole conduct is now beyond reproach. For my heart does not condemn me in my whole life: that is, to those who give bad advice, as you also do, urging on blasphemy that I do not consent to: which my wife also urged me to do. For my heart does not rebuke me in all my life. Like an impious enemy and an adversary, like an unjust one. For he does not curse by vow, but predicts by prophesying, and speaks according to the merit of sinful men: predicting what each person remaining in sins will receive from him. Now let us return to that place:
For what hope is there for a hypocrite if he greedily seizes and God does not deliver his soul? A hypocrite is understood to be false in friendship, or deceitful. How much desire, and almost a thirst for greed, do you suffer, he says, in my destruction, that you would drag me down to Tartarus with your prayers? Therefore, with this wicked desire: what hope of forgiveness will you have before God, if you do not submit to God's care to reform yourselves in this life.
Will not God hear his cry, when distress comes upon him? In the time of his retribution, there will be no remedy for sinners: for the Lord will not listen to their prayers on the day of vengeance.
Will he be able to delight in the Almighty and call upon God at all times? He will be able to delight in God and call upon him, who is well conscious of himself and presumes rightly, and who has shown himself in such a way as to deserve to be heard at any time.
I will teach you by the hand of God, who has all power and will not hide. Behold, you all know, and why do you speak in vain without cause? This is the portion of the wicked man with God, and the inheritance of the violent, which they receive from the Almighty. That which God has in his hand and power, and in his secret judgments, he says.
If his sons are multiplied, they will be in the sword, and his grandchildren will not be satisfied with bread. In his sons and grandsons, he marked all the remaining descendants of the evil generation. Sometimes in the Scriptures, not only by physical descendants, but also by similarity of character, they are called sons.
Those who remain from this shall be buried in destruction, and their widows shall not weep. This seems to indicate to me that through time to the highest poverty or misery, the offspring of the impious man or generation must be brought forth, and their widows, overwhelmed by excessive imminent evil, will not be able to cry.
If he acts as if the earth were silver, and prepares clothing like clay. He says that this impious man has an insatiable desire and an unquenchable abyss.
Indeed, he prepares, but the just shall be clothed with them, and innocent silver shall be divided. And Solomon said: He that increaseth his riches by usury and interest, gathereth them for him that will be bountiful to the poor.
He built his house like a moth, and made a shelter like a watchman. With these words he says that the wicked man has labored in vain: because, either quickly passing things, or moths destroying, his state of house is compared. Otherwise: If he has amassed silver like dirt, and prepared clothing like clay: he will indeed prepare, but the just man will be clothed in them, and innocent silver will be divided. He built his house like a moth, and made a shelter like a watchman. So, this impious one, whom we previously said is the devil, in the transgression of Adam made precious and illustrious men like earth and vile clay, from whom he also took away virtues and the good things of nature like garments, and their gold, by which the riches of the mind are signified. For these men had been made beautiful and composed to the image and likeness of their Creator by means of these riches, and by taking them away from them, he reduced them to the utmost poverty and ignominy. Therefore, in these things, men are compared, in Adam, as I said, deceived by the devil, which seem more vile in the creature of the world. But the just Lord, and our God, by taking away the spoils of captives from the devil: also freeing the captives themselves, whom the enemy had prepared for destruction, he exhibited to himself a holy Church from them: cleansing it by the bath of water in the word, and making it without spot, and wrinkle: that is, pure from sin, and simple in the confession of faith, he clothed it with precious clothing. Silver is also understood to represent clear and distinct things in this world: the innocent Lamb of God, and the spotless one who separates and sends believers to blessed and eternal life and glory, and unbelievers to destruction. Whether it is silver with its bright and shining secular eloquence, taken away from the world through Christ: so that the eloquence of believers, adorned with shining and pure speech, may be clothed in his Gospel; for just as the souls of men are clothed in the garments of virtues, so also the senses are, in a certain way, clothed in words when they are expressed in the preaching of the evangelists. He built his house like a moth, and like a watchman he made a tent. As the moth consumes and destroys its dwelling, so the devil builds the house of his lost people to its destruction: he prepared for himself a temporary and gradually loosening habitation, to possess eternal punishments. This, therefore, is that wicked hypocrite who greedily seizes. In not turning back, there will be no hope of forgiveness, since even upon these things, with a certain savage greed, he seizes men unto destruction. Why is he called a hypocrite? Because he transforms himself into an angel of light, whose cry for mercy the Lord will not hear, when he is confined within the narrow bounds of punishment. In God, he will not have any pleasure in good conscience, nor will he be able to boast in his confession, as he will be struck by the divine sentence of God's sword, like the countless sons. Nephews also, in whom those are understood who are led astray by them whom the devil himself had previously deceived: nephews, I say, will not be satisfied with the bread of the vision of God, since they will certainly suffer hunger and want. Because all the saints who contemplate God are to be refreshed and fed by Him: which now the angels are satisfied with. Likewise, we can understand the remaining progeny of the devil, which, like the devil himself, and his sons and nephews, will be buried in destruction along with the whole body of their people. Those widows also, that is, souls that the devil had enfeebled with their own vices and the enticements of pleasures, and had rendered effeminate, so that they would lose all strength and manliness, they will bewail with no correction and satisfaction, so that at least they may someday repent to God, whom they had lost as a husband, by sticking to vices as if to adulterers.
When the rich man falls asleep, he will take nothing with him: he will open his eyes, and find nothing. In Holy Scripture, the rich man is understood in many ways. He is rich in earthly possessions: but if he trusts in his riches, he will fall. So when this rich man dies in his sleep, he will take nothing of his possessions with him: because he came into the world naked at birth, and he will return naked to the earth when he dies. In the resurrection, he will open his eyes, and find no merit in good works. The Jewish people, because of the innumerable divine benefits: the prophecies and promises of the prophets, as well as the frequent discourse of God himself, are said to be wealthy. Hence the Lord said to the Jews in the Gospel: Woe to you who are rich. The proud, not possessing the poverty of spirit, are also called rich. Philosophers, having eloquence and worldly knowledge, are also called rich. But when they are raised on the day of resurrection, they will find no remedy for their salvation. Every heretic can also be called rich, since he assumes that he has many, indeed all, of the rewards of the Holy Church: the forgiveness of sins, the gift of the Spirit, even the pledge of the Lord's body, and the inheritance with the holy angels of the heavenly kingdom. Therefore, all of these, whether they suffer the scandal of the cross or, through the presumption of their heart, walk in error, have abandoned the path of truth. Whether because they have obscured understanding, the free will of their own choice persists in unbelief. Or because they have become abominable, exalting their heart after the dream of death, in the resurrection they will open their eyes and find nothing.
He will seize him like the lack of water: a storm will overwhelm him at night. The sudden poverty mentioned refers to wealthy people, as if water is about to come, who, in their misery and unexpected distress, which is called a storm, will be suddenly overwhelmed at night, that is, suddenly, while they are unaware: according to the saying of the Apostle: When they say 'peace and security,' then sudden destruction will come upon them.
The burning wind will carry him away and will remove him, and like a whirlwind he will be snatched away from his place. By name the winds have spoken a sentence, that like dust each of them shall be thrown from the face of the earth. And this wind is said to be a burning divine sentence, because it leads or compels to the burning of Gehenna.
He will send upon him, and will not spare. The wind is certainly the sentence of God, or God himself through the sentence of his justice, will send upon him punishments: that is, he will receive the reward of his deeds. For he will not spare, when he will render to him according to his works.
Fleeing, he will flee from his hand. And, he says, he will not be held by the hand of God in order to be saved, from which, like in the manner of flight, he will fall in a swift descent into ruin. But what he says, fleeing he will flee, or as others have said, he will flee in flight: it signifies the sinner perishing forever, because he can never be called back to life, and there will be no place for repentance.
He will stretch out his hand against him and hiss at him, gazing at his place. Others have said, he will mourn over him with his hands and drag him from his place. By certain gestures of human bodies, he describes the displeasure of an angry God and the wrath of a rich sinner, saying: where he now, as if hissing, indicates how terrible a place of punishment is reserved for him. Judas Iscariot went to such a place.