Moralia in Job 1322

Not even the saints can be excused for an idle word. But they take care to cover the faults of the tongue with the merits of their life. — As if he said: I would defend my speech, if I had uttered it with the weight of reason. But since my tongue is convicted of having used levity, what remains but that it be restrained by keeping silence? There follows: 'I will lay my hand upon my mouth.' By the usage of sacred Scripture, by 'hand' operation is wont to be understood, by 'mouth' speech. To lay the hand upon the mouth, therefore, is by the virtue of good work to cover the faults of incautious speech. But who can be found who, however perfect he may be, yet does not sin in idle speech? As James attests, who says: 'Be not many masters, for in many things we all offend' (James 3:1). And again: 'The tongue can no man tame' (ibid. 8).

The Truth Himself, reproving its faults, says: 'But I say unto you, that every idle word that men shall speak, they shall render an account thereof in the day of judgment' (Matthew 12:36). But holy men, before the eyes of God, endeavour to cover the faults of the tongue with the merits of their life; they endeavour to press down immoderate words by the weight of good works. Whence in holy Church the hand is laid upon the mouth, while in His elect the vice of idle speech is daily covered by the virtue of good action. For it is written: 'Blessed are they whose iniquities are forgiven, and whose sins are covered' (Psalm 31:1). But again, since it is written: 'All things are naked and open to His eyes' (Hebrews 4:13),

how can those things be covered which can by no means be hidden from the eyes of Him to whom all things are naked? But because that which we cover we place below, and that whereby we cover we assuredly draw over above, so that we may cover what is placed beneath, we are said to cover sins which we as it were place beneath when we disavow them, and over them we draw something else when we afterward choose the work of good action for this end, that we may prefer it. He therefore who forsakes his former evils and afterward does good things, by that which he adds covers his past wickedness, over which he draws the merits of good work. Blessed Job, therefore, holding the type of holy Church, and in his own words alleging his own things, designating ours, let him say from himself, let him say from us: 'I will lay my hand upon my mouth';

that is, this which I consider to have displeased the strict Judge concerning my speech in myself, I hide before His eyes under the veil of right action. There follows: Job humbly confesses to the rebuking God that he has sinned. — If we examine blessed Job's past words, we find nothing that he said wickedly. But if we bend his sayings, which were uttered with truth and freedom, into any vice of pride, they will now be no longer two only, because they will be many. But because our speaking is to open a hidden meaning to men by words, whereas our speaking to the divine ears is to show the movement of the mind even by the expression of action, blessed Job, weighing himself on the balance of a most subtle examination, confesses that by his utterance he has twice sinned.

For to speak unlawfully in one way is to do deeds worthy of the scourge; to speak in another way is even to murmur about the scourge. He, therefore, who before the Lord's rebuke was, in every work, set above men, advancing by that very rebuke into the heights, recognized himself both less right before, in his work, and less patient afterward, under the blows. Whence he reproves himself, saying: 'One thing I have spoken, which I would that I had not said; and another, to which I will add no more.' As if he said: I believed myself indeed to be upright among men; but, when Thou spakest, I found myself both depraved before the scourges and rigid after the scourges. To which I will add no more, because now the more subtly I understand Thee speaking, the more humbly I search out myself.

The object of penance is the good neglected and the evil done. The active life belongs to many, the contemplative to few. And because blessed Job holds the type of holy Church, these words of his can fit all the elect, who, knowing the Lord, feel that they have offended in the one and in the other, since they understand that they have sinned either in thought and deed, or in the neglected love of God and of neighbor. To these it is promised that they will add nothing further, because through the grace of conversion they take care by penance to purge daily even what is past.

Yet in that blessed Job by his penance reproves himself concerning two things, he plainly shows that every sinner in penance ought to have a twofold groaning: namely, both because he did not do the good he ought, and because he did the evil he ought not. For hence it is that through Moses it is said concerning him who has uttered an oath, either to do some evil or some good, and has passed this very thing over in forgetfulness: 'Let him offer a she-lamb of the flocks, or a she-goat, and the priest shall pray for him and for his sin. But if he be not able to offer a beast, let him offer two turtledoves or two young pigeons, one for sin and the other for a holocaust' (Lev. 5:6-8). For to utter an oath is to bind oneself by a vow to the service of God.

And when we promise good works, we pledge to do ourselves good. But when we vow abstinence and the mortification of our flesh, we swear to do ourselves ill for the present. But because no one in this life is so perfect that, however devoted to God he may be, he does not sin within his own pious vows, however little, therefore it is enjoined that for sin a she-lamb of the flocks or a she-goat be offered. For what is signified by the lamb but the innocence of the active life; what by the goat, which often feeds hanging upon the highest and steepest crags, but the contemplative life? He therefore who perceives that he has not fulfilled what he promised and purposed, ought the more zealously to gird himself for the sacrifice of God, either with the innocence of good work, or with the sublime pasture of contemplation.

Rightly is a lamb commanded to be offered of the flocks, but a goat is not commanded to be offered of the flocks, because the active life belongs to many, the contemplative to few. And when we do those things which we behold many both to do and to have done, we as it were give a lamb of the flocks. But when the offerer's power does not suffice for the lamb once taken, there is added as a remedy of penance that two young pigeons or two turtledoves be offered. We know that the young of doves or turtledoves have groaning in place of song. What then is designated by the two young pigeons, or two turtledoves, but the twofold groaning of our penance, so that when we do not rise up to offer good works, we may bewail ourselves in a twofold manner, because both we have not done what is right, and we have wrought what is wicked?

Wherefore also one turtledove is commanded to be offered for sin, but the other as a holocaust. For a holocaust is called something wholly burnt. We therefore offer one turtledove for sin, when we give groaning for our fault; but of the other we make a holocaust, when for the fact that we have neglected good things, we utterly set ourselves ablaze and burn with the fire of sorrow. Since therefore a twofold groaning is owed in penance, blessed Job, profiting by the rebuke of the divine voice, and growing in his own self-reproof, confesses that he, doing penance, has said 'one and the other,' as if he plainly said: Both toward good things I have grown sluggish through negligence, and unto evil I have burst forth through boldness.