Moralia in Job 1399

The reprobate do not believe in the eternity of punishments, being led into error by the devil. Their false reasonings are answered. That the eternal and incomprehensible judgments are wont to be designated by the name of the deep, the Psalmist testifies, saying: 'Your judgments are a great deep' (Ps. 36:6). But old age is sometimes put for the nearness of an end. Hence the Apostle says: 'That which grows old and ages is near to destruction' (Heb. 8:13). This Leviathan, therefore, will reckon the deep as though it were growing old, because he so befools the hearts of the reprobate that he pours into them a suspicion concerning the coming judgment, as though it would be brought to an end. For he reckons the deep to grow old who supposes that the supernal chastisement will at some time be terminated in its punishments.

Therefore this ancient persuader, in his members, that is, in the minds of the wicked, makes light of the punishments to come, which he marks off as with a fixed end, in order that he may extend their faults without any term of correction; and they the more refuse here to make an end of their sins, the more they reckon that the punishments of sinners must there be brought to an end. For there are even now some who therefore neglect to set an end to their sins, because they suspect that the judgments to come upon them will at some time have an end. To whom we briefly reply: If the punishments of the reprobate are at some time to be ended, then the joys of the blessed are at some time to be ended also. For the Truth Himself says: 'These shall go into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life' (Matt. 25:46).

If, therefore, that which He threatened is not true, neither is that true which He promised. But they say: He threatened eternal punishment upon sinners for this reason, that He might restrain them from the perpetration of sins, because He ought to threaten His creature with eternal punishments, not to inflict them. To whom we reply the more speedily: If He threatened false things that He might correct men from injustice, He also promised false things that He might spur them on to justice.

And who could endure this madness of theirs, who, while by their assertions they maintain that the punishments of the reprobate are to be ended, by that same assertion also confound the rewards and recompenses of the elect? Who could endure this madness of theirs, who try to establish that it is not true which the Truth threatened concerning eternal fire, and, while they are busy portraying God as merciful, do not shrink from proclaiming Him deceitful? How just it is that sinners be consigned to eternal punishments. But they say: A fault that has an end ought not to be punished without end. Almighty God is indeed just, and that which was not committed by an eternal sin ought not to be punished with an eternal torment.

To whom we reply the more speedily that they would say rightly, if the judge, coming as just and strict, were to weigh not the hearts of men but their deeds. For the wicked have therefore sinned with an end, because they lived with an end. Indeed they would have wished to live without end, that without end they might have been able to remain in their iniquities. For they desire to sin more than to live; and therefore they desire always to live here, that they may never cease from sinning while they live. It pertains, therefore, to the justice of the strict judge that those should never be without punishment whose mind in this life never wished to be without sin; and that no term of vengeance be granted to the wicked man, because, as long as he had power, he refused to have a term to his crime.

The righteous, beholding from what punishments they have escaped in the torments of the wicked, are stirred up to the praises of God. But they say: No righteous man is fed by cruelties, and a delinquent servant is commanded by a just master to be beaten for this reason, that he may be corrected from his wickedness. Therefore he is beaten for some end, since his master does not delight in torments. But the wicked, delivered to the fires of hell, with what end will they always burn? And since it is certain that the merciful and almighty God is not fed by the torments of the wicked, why are the wretched tormented, if they are not purified? To whom we reply the more speedily that almighty God, because He is merciful, is not fed by the torment of the wretched; but because He is just, He is not appeased forever from the vengeance of the wicked.

But all the wicked are punished with eternal punishments, indeed by their own iniquity; and yet they are burned for some end, namely that all the righteous both in God may rejoice in the joys which they receive, and in these may look upon the punishments which they have escaped, so that they may know themselves to be forever the more debtors to divine grace, the more they behold, being punished forever, the evils which by His help they were able to avoid. Why the saints do not pray any longer for their enemies consigned to hell. But they say: And where is it that they are saints, if they will not pray for their enemies, whom they shall then see burning, to whom indeed it was said: 'Pray for your enemies' (Matt. 5:44)? But we reply the more speedily:

They pray for their enemies at that time when they can turn their enemies' hearts to fruitful repentance, and by that very conversion save them. For what else is to be prayed for concerning enemies but that which the Apostle says: 'That God may give them repentance, and they may recover themselves from the snares of the devil, by whom they are held captive at his will' (2 Tim. 2:25-26)? And how shall prayer be made for them then, when they can in no way be changed from iniquity to the works of justice? Therefore the same is the reason why prayer is not then made for men condemned to eternal fire, which is even now the reason why prayer is not made for the devil and his angels appointed to eternal punishment.

This is even now the reason why holy men do not pray for unbelieving and impious men who have died, since concerning those whom they already know to have been consigned to eternal punishment they shrink from having the merit of their prayer made void before the sight of that just Judge. But if even now the righteous, while living, have no compassion for the dead and condemned unjust, at a time when they still know that they themselves suffer something judgeable from their own flesh, how much more strictly will they then look upon the torments of the wicked, when, stripped of every stain of corruption, they will themselves already cleave more nearly and more closely to justice?

For indeed their minds are so absorbed by the force of strict judgment, through this that they cleave to the most just Judge, that nothing at all pleases them which is discordant from the subtlety of that inner rule. But since, an occasion having arisen, we have spoken briefly against the Origenists in these matters, let us return to that order of exposition which we had set aside. After the merciful Lord had disclosed the crafty devices of this Leviathan, openly foretelling all that outwardly and vehemently oppresses the elect, all that by his suggestion he inwardly and flatteringly pours into the reprobate, briefly indicating the monstrousness of that one's power, He adds: