Moralia in Job 595

Verse 34.—And fire shall devour the tabernacles of those who willingly accept gifts. 62. It is a small thing not to receive a gift from the hand, unless we also spurn the gift from the mouth.—For as the body dwells in a tabernacle, so the mind dwells in thought. But fire devours the tabernacles when the heat of avarice lays waste the thoughts. And it very often happens that a hypocrite disdains to accept gold or any bodily goods whatever from men, but, because he does not accept these, he seeks to receive greater praises from them; and perhaps he reckons that he has not accepted a gift, because he refuses to receive bodily goods. Whence it must be known that sometimes a gift is offered from the hand, sometimes from the mouth. For he who bestows a coin has given a gift from the hand;

but he who bestows a word of praise has offered a gift from the mouth. The hypocrite, therefore, even if he refuses to accept outward gifts, which perhaps suit earthly necessity, that is a greater thing which he desires to be repaid to himself, when, desiring to be praised beyond his merit, he seeks a gift from the mouth. And because in that very appetite for praise the heart is kindled with excessive ardour, let it rightly be said: And fire shall devour the tabernacles of those who willingly accept gifts. 63. The fire shall devour those who delight in these gifts.

—But if by their tabernacles we ought to understand the bodies in which their souls dwell, the fire devours their tabernacles, because those who here burn in mind with the fire of avarice are there also burned in the flesh with the fires of Gehenna; and because the mind of the hypocrite is never free from the thought of malice; for whether it be some earthly thing, or praise that he seeks, he envies these to others, which he pants to have bestowed upon himself; and the more he contrives to show others perverse, the more he desires to seem holier than all, so that from the fact that others become despicable, he himself may always appear more reverend. Whence it comes to pass that concerning the reputation of his neighbour, before human judgments, he stretches out the snares of his tongue, that of those whom he desires to please he may capture the esteem.

Whence there follows: