Moralia in Job 698

Verses 23, 24.—'Who will grant me that my words may be written? Who will give me that they may be graven in a book with an iron pen, and on a plate of lead, or else be sculpted in flint?' 62. By the plate of lead are designated the hearts of the Jews, by the flint those of the Gentiles.—All the things which blessed Job endured, because that grievous people of the Jews, taught by the strong sentence of the fathers, acknowledged them, were written with an iron pen and on a plate of lead. But because even the hard hearts of the Gentiles came to know these things, how do we see them but sculpted in flint? And it is to be noted that what is written in lead is sooner deleted by the very softness of the metal; but in flint the letters can indeed more slowly be imprinted, but more hardly be deleted.

Not, therefore, without cause is Judea expressed by the plate of lead, which both received the precepts of God without labour, and lost them with speed. Rightly is the Gentile world figured by the flint, which could scarcely receive the words of the sacred eloquence to be kept; yet what it received strongly, it preserved. But by the iron pen what else is designated but the strong sentence of God? Whence also by the prophet it is said: 'The sin of Judah is written with an iron pen, with a point of adamant' (Jer. xvii, 1). In the nail is the end of the body. But adamant is so hard a stone that it cannot be cut by iron. By the iron pen, then, is signified the strong sentence; by the adamantine nail, the eternal end.

The sin of Judah, therefore, is said to be written with an iron pen, with a point of adamant, because the guilt of the Jews is kept, by the strong sentence of God, unto an infinite end. 63. Lead signifies avarice.—Rightly also by the plate of lead we understand those whom the weight of avarice burdens, to whom by the rebuking prophet it is said: 'Ye sons of men, how long will ye be heavy in heart?' (Ps. iv, 3). For by lead, whose nature is of heavy weight, the sin of avarice is specially designated, which renders the mind it has infected so heavy that it can by no means be raised to seek after lofty things. Hence in Zechariah it is written: 'Lift up thine eyes, and see. What is this that goeth forth? And I said: What is it? And he said:

This is an ephah that goeth forth; and he said: This is their eye in all the earth.' (Vetus XXVII.) 'And behold, a talent of lead was carried, and behold, one woman sitting in the midst of the ephah; and he said: This is impiety. And he cast her into the midst of the ephah, and cast the weight of lead upon the mouth thereof' (Zech. v, 5 sqq.). And that he might show that he had learned somewhat more fully concerning this vision of the ephah, and of the woman, and of the lead, following on he added: 'And I lifted up mine eyes, and saw; and behold, two women coming forth, and a wind was in their wings, and they had wings like the wings of a kite, and they lifted up the ephah between earth and heaven. And I said to the angel that spoke in me: Whither do these carry the ephah? And he said to me:

That a house may be built for it in the land of Shinar' (ibid., 9 sqq.). Which testimony of the prophet we should have brought forth uselessly as a document concerning lead, if we did not also, repeating it, expound it. For he says: 'Lift up thine eyes, and see. What is this that goeth forth? And I said: What is it? And he said: This is an ephah that goeth forth' (ibid.). God, wishing to show the prophet the human race, from what fault it especially slips away from Him, by the image of the ephah designated, as it were, the gaping mouth of avarice. For avarice is like an ephah, which holds the mouth of the heart open in its circuit. And he said: 'This is their eye in all the earth' (ibid.). We discern many men of dull sense, and yet we see them cunning in evil deeds;

the prophet too testifying, who says: 'They are wise to do evil, but to do well they know not' (Jer. iv, 22). These, then, are dull in sense, but in those things which they desire they are stirred up by the goads of avarice; and those who are blind to seeing good things become, when rewards stir them, watchful to accomplish evil. Whence rightly concerning this same avarice it is said: 'This is their eye in all the earth. And behold, a talent of lead was carried' (ibid.). What is the talent of lead but, from that same avarice, the weight of sin? 'And behold, one woman sitting in the midst of the ephah.' Which woman, lest perchance we might doubt who she was, the angel forthwith made known. For there immediately follows: 'And he said: This is impiety.'

'And he cast her into the midst of the ephah.' Impiety is cast into the midst of the ephah, because assuredly in avarice impiety is ever held. 'And he cast the weight of lead upon the mouth thereof.' The weight of lead is cast upon the mouth of the woman, because, namely, the impiety of avarice is weighed down by the burden of its own sin. For if it did not covet those things which are below, it would in no way exist impious toward God and neighbour. (Vetus XXVIII.) 64. Pride and vainglory, two principal vices. By these is avarice sustained.—'And I lifted up mine eyes, and saw; and behold, two women coming forth, and a wind was in their wings.'

What else do we understand in these two women but the two principal vices, namely pride and vainglory, which are without any doubt joined to impiety? And they are related to have a wind in their wings, because in their actions they serve the will of Satan. For the prophet calls him a wind [spirit], concerning whom Solomon says: 'If the spirit of one having power ascend upon thee, leave not thy place' (Eccle. x, 4). And concerning whom the Lord says in the Gospel: 'When an unclean spirit is gone out of a man, he walketh through dry and waterless places' (Matt. xii, 43). There is a wind [spirit] in their wings, because pride and vainglory, through everything they do, serve the will of Satan.

'And they had wings, like the wings of a kite.' The kite ever strives to lie in wait for the nature of chicks. These women, then, have wings like the wings of a kite, because their actions are without doubt like the devil, who ever lies in wait for the life of little ones. 'And they lifted up the ephah between heaven and earth.' Pride and vainglory have this as their own property, that they exalt him whom they have infected, in his own thought, above other men, and now through the ambition of things, now through the desire of dignities, they lift up, as it were to a height of honour, him whom they have once held captive. But he who is between heaven and earth both deserts the depths and by no means attains the higher things.

These women, then, lift up the ephah between heaven and earth, because pride and vainglory so exalt the mind captured through the avarice of honour, that, despising any of their neighbours, they as it were desert the depths, and, boasting, seek the heights. But all such, while they are proud, both pass over in mind those with whom they are, and are by no means joined to the higher citizens. The ephah, therefore, is said to be lifted up between earth and heaven, because all the avaricious, through pride and vainglory, both despise their neighbours beside them, and in no wise lay hold of the higher things which are beyond themselves.

They are borne, therefore, between earth and heaven, because they neither hold the equality of brotherhood in the lowest things through charity, nor yet by exalting themselves prevail to attain the highest things. 'And I said to the angel that spoke in me: Whither do these carry the ephah? And he said to me: That a house may be built for it in the land of Shinar.' For that same ephah a house is built in the land of Shinar. For Shinar is interpreted 'their stench.' And just as a good odour is from virtue, Paul testifying, who says: 'He maketh manifest the odour of the knowledge of Him by us in every place, for we are the good odour of Christ unto God' (2 Cor. ii, 14), so, on the contrary, stench is from vice. For 'the root of all evils is covetousness' (1 Tim. vi, 10).

And because any evil whatever is begotten through avarice, it is fitting that the house of avarice be built in stench. It is also to be known that Shinar is a very wide valley, in which a tower had begun to be built by the proud, which, the diversity of tongues being made, was destroyed. Which tower, namely, was called Babylon, because of that very confusion of minds and tongues. Nor is it without cause that the ephah of avarice is placed there, where Babylon, that is, confusion, is built; because, since it is certain that all evils arise through avarice and impiety, rightly are this same avarice and impiety declared to dwell in confusion. 66. The Church demands that her words be engraved on hearts heavy and hard with avarice.

—These few things we have said by way of digression, that we might show the weight of sin to be expressed by the plate of lead. Yet these words of blessed Job also befit the holy Church, which, keeping the two Testaments of the sacred eloquence, seeks, as it were a second time, that her words be written, saying: 'Who will grant me, that my words may be written? Who will give me, that they may be graven in a book?' And because she, with a strong sentence, speaks now to hearts made heavy through the weight of avarice, now to hard hearts, she writes with an iron pen on a plate of lead, or else in flint. But we rightly say that blessed Job uses the voices of our Redeemer and of His Church, if we find anything concerning our same Redeemer which he speaks openly. (Vetus

XXIX.) For in what manner is it to be believed that he intimates anything concerning Him through a figure, if he does not show Him to us with open voice? But let him now open what he feels concerning Him, and take away from us all the windings of surmises. There follows: