Moralia in Job 1072

Verse 4. — Let us choose judgment for ourselves, and let us see among us what is best. They sometimes make a show of humility, but a feigned one. — But whether he sought this judgment out of a humble heart, we easily recognize, if we weigh his subsequent words. There follows: Verses 5-6. — Who has said, Job: I am righteous, and God has overthrown my judgment. For in judging me there is falsehood; my violent arrow is without any sin. They charge the righteous with false crimes. — He complains that blessed Job said these things, which, however, because he by no means said them, the required words of the sacred history attest. But he who had equally asked for judgment, from the fault which he feigned, at once promulgates a sentence. For there follows: Verses 7-8.

— What man is there like Job, who drinks up scorning like water, who walks with those who work iniquity, and goes with impious men? Behold, seeking judgment, he has pronounced judgment, and after his own allegation, no sentence of blessed Job being awaited, he has judged him worthy of condemnation from the society of the reprobate. For he says: What man is there like Job? — that we may of course understand, none. And he subjoins: Who drinks up scorning like water. But water, when it is drunk, is so fluidly taken in that it is retarded for swallowing by no fatness of its own. But to drink scorning like water is to deride God without any obstacle of thought, so that in that wherein the tongue or the conscience is proud, no trembling gainsays it.

But how far this his sentence upon blessed Job strays from the path of truth, we recognize by that attestation of the Lord, in which He says to the devil: Have you not considered my servant Job, that there is none like him in the earth (Job 1:8)? Behold, him whom the Truth declares righteous beyond comparison, Elihu asserts to be a sinner beyond comparison. But these things are wont to be proper to arrogant preachers: that they desire even to rebuke their afflicted hearers more strictly than to refresh them gently. For they are more zealous to reproach evils by upbraiding than to confirm good things by praising. For they desire to be seen as superiors, and they rejoice more when anger elevates their spirit than when charity makes it equal.

They always wish to find something which they may rigidly smite by rebuking. Whence it is written: In the mouth of a fool is the rod of pride (Prov. 14:3), because clearly he knows how to strike rigidly, but knows not how to have compassion humbly. Holy preachers, when they are about to correct others, send flatteries beforehand. Like skilled physicians, they first stroke, afterward strike. — Righteous preachers too are wont to correct their hearers by upbraiding, wont to rage against their vices with strict reproach. Whence it is written: The words of the wise are as goads, and as nails deeply fixed on high (Eccles. 12:11). And rightly are their words called nails, because they know not how to stroke the faults of offenders, but to prick. Were John's words not nails, when he said:

O generation of vipers, who has shown you to flee from the wrath to come (Matt. 3:7)? Were Stephen's words not nails, when he said: You always resist the Holy Spirit (Acts 7:51)? Were Paul's words not nails, when he said: O foolish Galatians, who has bewitched you (Gal. 3:1)? And again, when he said to the Corinthians: For whereas there is among you envying and strife, are you not carnal, and walk according to man (1 Cor. 3:3)? But it is necessary that we carefully see how righteous preachers, in those very persons whom they correct, when on the other side they perhaps find something of good working, descend to those same words of upbraiding with how great a dispensation.

Behold, Paul, teaching the Corinthians, and beholding them in the fault of division, began by saying: I give thanks to my God always for you, for the grace of God that is given you in Christ Jesus, that in all things you are made rich in Him (1 Cor. 1:4). Assuredly he praised much those whom he called rich in Christ in all things. And behold, he still multiplies flatteries, saying: In all utterance and in all knowledge, as the testimony of Christ was confirmed in you (1 Cor. 1:5). The testimony of Christ, he said, was confirmed in you, as though by work they had accomplished what by doctrine they had learned. And presently, in the consummation of praise, he subjoined: So that nothing is wanting to you in any grace, awaiting the revelation of our Lord Jesus Christ.

I ask you, Paul, to whom you would now direct these so many favors — hint at it. And behold, a little after there follows: Now I beseech you, brethren, by the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ, that you all speak the same thing, and that there be no schisms among you. For it has been signified to me concerning you, my brethren, by them that are of the house of Chloe, that there are contentions among you (1 Cor. 1:10). Concerning which contentions, a little after he subjoined, saying: For whereas there is among you envying and strife, are you not carnal, and walk according to man (1 Cor. 3:3)? Behold with what praises he descends to the open words of correction; behold with what gentle hand of favor he has opened, in the heart of the hearers, the way of strict reproach.

For first he was zealous to bind the arms of the proud with the bonds of flatteries, so that afterward he might be able to cut the wound of pride with the iron of correction. There were assuredly in the Corinthians both things that ought to be praised, and things to be reproved. And so the skilled physician first, by praising, stroked the sound members which were around the wound, and afterward, by striking, transfixed the putrid fold of the wound. Therefore the rule of doctrine has, in holy preachers, its due weight fitted to both things: that it may both nourish the favoring by right things, and cut off the perverse by animadverting. It is one thing to strike when justice goads, another when pride inflates. What measure is to be kept in correction. This the proud know not.

But sometimes even righteous preachers strike rigidly. But it is one thing when justice goads, another when pride inflates. The righteous, when they severely correct, do not lose the grace of inward sweetness. For often, for the restraining of the disquiet of the depraved, they assume the hardness of strict vigor, but inwardly they are melted with the fire of charity, and burn with love toward those against whom they rage with harsh correction; and they even humble themselves inwardly, in the secret of the heart, before those whom outwardly they chastise, as though despising them, with the hard goads of animadversions. But for the most part they even despise without despising, and despair without despairing, that they may make them the more quickly dread and recoil from fault, the more nearly, as it were, they display the pit of death.

Often also, with a certain becoming moderation, they disclose their own faults before their disciples, so that these, hearing, may learn how subtly to reprehend themselves for their own actions. But they temper themselves with so great a dispensation that neither, when they raise themselves up, are they inwardly rigid, nor again, when they humble themselves, are they outwardly remiss, because they both keep humility in discipline, and discipline in humility. Paul held to discipline, when he said to the Corinthians: For whereas there is among you envying and strife, are you not carnal, and walk according to man (1 Cor. 3:3)? But he did not lose humility in discipline, because by entreating he premised, saying:

I beseech you, brethren, by the mercy of God, that you all speak the same thing, and that there be no schisms among you (1 Cor. 1:10). Again he held to humility, when, speaking to the same Corinthians perhaps somewhat more freely than he had wished, he reprehended himself, saying: I am become foolish (2 Cor. 12:11). But he did not lose discipline in this humility, because he at once added: You have compelled me. He exhibited an example of great humility, when he said to his disciples: For we preach not ourselves, but Jesus Christ our Lord, and ourselves your servants through Christ (2 Cor. 4:5). But in this humility he did not forfeit the justice of discipline, who says to those same offenders: What will you? shall I come to you with a rod (1 Cor. 4:21)?

and the rest. Holy preachers, therefore, know how to temper the art of mastership with both kinds of moderation, and when they find the guilt of offenders, they know now to correct severely, now to entreat humbly. But when arrogant men desire to imitate them, they take from them the harsh words of correction, but know not how to take from them truly the prayers of humility. For they can be more terrible than gentle; and therefore they learn whence they may raise themselves up, and neglect to learn how they may subdue their spirit. And when they know not how to admonish offenders calmly, by too great a use of rigor, through the wrath of invective, they are unbridled even against those who act rightly. Holding the likeness of these, this Elihu does not refresh blessed Job, but upbraids him, saying:

Who is the man such as Job is, who drinks up scorn like water, who walks with those who work iniquity, and goes about with wicked men? And because pride is ever a stranger to the truth, it presently breaks out even into falsehoods, saying: