Moralia in Job 426

'As an eagle flying to its food.' 48. Just as eagles descend from the highest to the lowest, to be fed on Christ's flesh.—For it is the eagle's custom to gaze at the sun's ray with unwavering eye; but when it is pressed by the need of refreshment, it inclines that same keenness of its eyes, which it had fixed on the sun's rays, to the sight of a carcass; and however high it flies aloft, yet for the taking of flesh it seeks the earth. So, indeed, so were the ancient fathers, who, in so far as the infirmity of humanity allowed, contemplated the Creator's light with uplifted mind; but, foreknowing that He was to be incarnate at the end of the world, they bent their eyes, as it were, from the sun's rays to the earth.

And they come, as it were, from the highest to the lowest, while they acknowledge this One as God above all things and man within all things. Whom, while they behold as about to suffer and die for the human race—by which death, namely, they knew themselves to be refreshed and reformed unto life—they seek, as it were after the manner of the eagle, food in the carcass after having contemplated the sun's rays. It is pleasing to behold the eagle gazing at the sun's rays, which says: 'God the mighty, Father of the age to come, Prince of peace' (Isa. ix, 6). But let it come from the lofty flight of its loftiness down to the earth, let it seek below the food of the carcass. For a little after it subjoins, saying: 'The chastisement of our peace was upon Him, and by His bruise we are healed' (Isa. liii, 5). And again: 'And He is man, and who shall know Him?' (Jer.

xvii, 9, according to the Seventy)? The mind of the just man, then, lifted up into divinity, when it considers the grace of the dispensation from His flesh, suddenly flies, as it were, from the highest, like an eagle to its food. But behold, that Israelite people, long ago infused with the immense spirit of prophecy, lost the gifts of that same prophecy, and did not remain in that faith which it had announced by foreseeing; and it repelled from itself, by denying, the presence of the Redeemer, which it had declared to all its followers by foretelling. Whence also, at once, through compassion, the discourse is turned to their hardness too, and it is indicated how the grace of prophecy is withdrawn from them. For it is subjoined: