Moralia in Job 282

Verse 9. Who doeth great things and unsearchable and marvellous things without number. 18. The wondrous works of God have grown cheap to human eyes through familiarity. Who could suffice to search out the marvels of Almighty God: that He created all things out of nothing; that the very fabric of the world was arranged by the wondrous power of His might, and the heaven is suspended above the air, and the earth is balanced above the abyss; that from things invisible and visible this whole universe exists; that He made man, so to speak, gathering in small compass another world, but a rational one; that constituting him of soul and flesh, He mingled spirit and clay by an unsearchable disposition of His power? From these things, therefore, we know one thing and are another;

yet nevertheless we neglect to wonder, because those things which are marvellous by their incomprehensible depth have grown cheap to human eyes through familiarity. Hence it comes about that if a dead man is raised, all leap up in amazement; and daily a man who was not is born, and no one wonders, though it is beyond doubt clear to all that it is a greater thing for that to be created which was not, than for that to be restored which was. Because the dry rod of Aaron blossomed, all wondered; daily a tree is produced from the parched earth, and the power of dust is turned into wood, and no one wonders. Because five thousand men were fed by five loaves, all wondered that the food grew in their teeth; daily the scattered grains of seed are multiplied into a fullness of ears of corn, and no one wonders.

Seeing water once changed into wine, all wondered; daily the moisture of the earth, drawn into the root of the vine, is turned through the cluster into wine, and no one wonders. All things, then, are marvellous which men neglect to wonder at, because, as we said before, they grow dull to consideration through familiarity. Rightly, moreover, when he had said, Who doeth great things, he straightway added, And unsearchable. For it would have been a lesser thing to do great things, if nevertheless those things which were done could be searched out. And rightly is it added, And marvellous things without number, because it would be of lesser greatness if those unsearchable things He founded had been few. 19. God's miracles are to be pondered by devotion, not dissected by the intellect. Where faith wavers, whereby it is to be strengthened.

Whence resurrection may be made credible. But amid these things it must be known that divine miracles ought always to be considered by devotion, and never dissected by the intellect. For often the human sense, while seeking the reason of certain things and not finding it, plunges itself into the abyss of doubt. Hence it comes about that some men consider the bodies of the dead reduced to dust; and while they cannot gather the power of the resurrection by reason, they despair that these can return to their former state. Marvellous things, therefore, are to be believed by faith, they are not to be searched out by reason; because if reason should lay these open to our eyes, they would not be marvellous.

But when perhaps the mind wavers in these matters, it is necessary that it recall to memory those things which it knows through experience yet does not gather by reason; so that by the argument of a like thing it may strengthen the faith which it perceives to be shaken by its own shrewdness. For when the dust of human flesh has been considered, the minds of some despair as to when the dust may return to flesh, and compose the revived body through the lineaments of its members; when that dryness of the earth may grow green through living members, and distinguish itself through their kinds and forms. This indeed cannot be comprehended by reason, yet it can easily be believed through example.

For who would believe that from one grain of seed an immense tree could rise, unless he held this as certain by experience? For in the great smallness of a single grain and its almost complete lack of resemblance to itself, where lies hidden the hardness of the wood, and the pith softer or harder than the wood, the roughness of the bark, the greenness of the root, the taste of the fruits, the sweetness of the odours, the diversity of colours, the tenderness of the leaves? And yet because we know this by experience, we do not doubt that all things proceed from one grain of seed. What difficulty is there, then, that dust should return into members, when we daily behold the power of the Creator, who both wondrously makes wood from a grain, and still more wondrously creates fruit from wood? Let him say, therefore:

Who doeth great things and unsearchable, and marvellous things without number, because the greatness of the divine works can neither be dissected by their quality nor numbered by their quantity. Whence it is still further added: