and from where the devil's envy seethed, from there was drawn his wearied victory. He was tortured in body, and tried in spirit. With restless worms his body bore the doubled torments of pain, while a fertile calamity hardened the rottenness of his failing flesh: no quiet by night, no rest by day. He was tortured, and he prayed. One thing the enemy demanded, another the outcry of the confessor besought. When his sinews were dissolved, a rather rough potsherd scraped the flowing gore, changing his fierce torment. He did not know kings, and his pierced body lay in the dung. In the shipwrecked body justice keeps guard unharmed, and while the members are imperilled, the breast is kept for the author of the wounds. The enemy had seized everything except the spirit. 2.
There was no one to render a reciprocal service in return for wages; the delicate matron serves in others' houses, she who had been accustomed to command. When after the setting of the sun she had harshly passed through the daily toils, she awaited rest; and the matron with wearied fingers led on the coming day with weeping eyes. Bereaved and in grief for her sons, the woman is hired to serve, and has no leisure for tears. Now a matron, now a widow, everywhere a hireling, nowhere a mistress; neither barren nor a mother, she bewails the mangling of her own womb: 'Behold,' she said, 'husband, what you suffer: say something against God, and die.' She alone sinned, who denied mercy to her husband;
Job's wife had learned to forget her husband in her sons, and though he was flowing away in all his members, his spirit alone faithfully resisted. The warrior of the world is tortured in one man, while the torment he inflicts turns back upon its author. 'Behold,' says the Lord, 'I hand him over to you: only preserve his life' (Job 1 and 2). He fights securely who is preserved while the enemy is in fear. Thus the enemy raged, so as to fear; his cruelty inflicts pain, and fails in its own strength. When the pain is put to flight, health returns, and the medicine is rendered happier by the scars. The Lord heals more swiftly than the enemy wounds. Groanings passed over into joys, and in the pits of the wounds were numbered the monuments of victory. On account of Job she became a queen, on account of whom she was also a hireling.
She returns with double interest, so that they could receive double for what was lost. SERMON 51. On blessed Job, II. 1. Job is victor in prosperity and in adversity. The treasure of the just man is faith. In the reading which was read to us, most dear brethren, we heard how that most glorious athlete of God fought admirably against the most cunning enemy: and, according to what the Apostle says, 'A spectacle to God and to His Angels and to men' (1 Cor. 4:9), we deserved to hear it not without immense admiration, and in a certain manner to see it with the eyes of faith. We saw blessed Job fighting bravely and happily not only against the good fortune of the world, but also against poverty and the most bitter pains, and against the bereavement of his children.
For when he was rich, he held no one in contempt; when he suffered want, he blasphemed no one, nor did he presume to murmur against God's dispensation: but wealthy he used to say, 'My house lay open to all travellers, and the shoulders of the infirm were warmed by the fleeces of my sheep' (Job 31:19-20). But afterward, when he was pressed by poverty, in his straits he said, 'The Lord gave, the Lord has taken away; as it pleased the Lord, so is it done' (Job 1 and 2). The devil struggled mightily, but could not overcome the athlete. He roused monstrous waves, and could not move the most firm rock. He applied his devices, and did not cast down the most valiant tower. He shook the tree;
and could not shake down the fruit: and it broke the branches indeed, but did no harm to the root. It pierced the wall, but could not carry off the treasure: and by treasure I mean not that of gold and silver, but the faith of the just man. For the devil was hastening to plunder this treasure of his, when he tormented him, stripped of all his goods, with an intolerable plague. You have seen the waves grow; you have seen the most firm rock; you have seen the impregnable tower; you have seen God glorified and the devil shattered: and by what name I should call this just man, I do not know. Should I call him an athlete? But the abundance of so many crowns surpasses that. Should I call him a rock? But I see him firmer. Should I call him a soldier? But I perceive him stronger in constancy. Should I name him a tower? But his wisdom stands out.
Should I call him a tree? But he is found more comely. Should I call him fruit? But he is shown more precious. Should I name him a treasure? But he is discerned to be more abundant. And by what appellation I should call that holy man, I find not. 2. Both a rich man can be good, and a poor man blessed. How the contempt of the poor is to be shunned. Let the rich hear these things, let the poor hear these things: how this blessed man, in his riches and prosperity, stood forth as a kindly dispenser of his wealth, and in the temptation of poverty bore it patiently and bravely. You are able therefore to know that it is not impossible for a rich man to be rich in good works, and for a poor man, through patience in want, to be able to be blessed. Do not say to me, 'I fear poverty.'
You fear poverty, and do not fear sin? I do not want you to fear poverty: but fear iniquity, which is the mother of torments. The Lord asks a tribute of you, and you are unwilling to give it to Him. For when you hear Him saying, 'As long as you did it to one of these least,' surely if you give to the poor, you lend at interest to Christ. If you draw back your hand from the poor, how and with what confidence will you on that day ask mercy of the Lord? Will He not accuse you, saying: 'You saw Me naked, and did not clothe Me; hungry, and did not feed Me' (Matt. 25:40, 43)? What will you answer to these things, and what pardon will you beg? Will not your conscience make you guilty, and will you not be struck dumb?
And you indeed are sometimes glutted, even to surfeit, with many precious and choice delicacies; and you refuse to hand out even simple food to the poor to drive away his hunger. You go about clad in exceedingly costly garments; and to the naked poor man you do not give even the cheapest clothing. You strive to arrange and adorn your house with every pomp; perhaps you do not receive even in a corner of it a stranger or a poor man. But you who are such, when the irrevocable end comes to you, if repentance does not come to your aid, will go to hell naked of good works, your house remaining with all its adornment as a testimony of your avarice. For each of the passers-by will say: 'This was the house of that plunderer, that robber, that miser.'
How many widows did he afflict, how many orphans did he strip bare, how many wretched did he make, in order to raise up this house at such great expense from things sought by iniquity! 3. In the noble it is not their rank that is to be blamed, but their arrogance. How dear man is to God. But someone says: 'I am noble, and set in honour.' No one reproaches nobility; concerning those dignities no one disputes, which are graciously granted by God to men. Therefore the rich, set in honours, if they live justly and chastely and mercifully, no one ought to reproach. But those are to be pitied and mourned who, puffed up with the pride of their dignities, think that they will be immortal along with the dignity itself;
and they do not consider their own condition, that they are of earth, and shall be reduced to dust, and for the little gladness of this life (if indeed it is to be called gladness or life) they shall endure everlasting torments. You regard the poor man, and despise him, and do not reflect that he is a man, just as you are: man, the dear and beloved possession of God; man, for whose sake heaven was made firm, and the sea was spread out, and the earth was founded; on whose account the sun rises and sets, the moon waxes and wanes, the twinkling stars come up. Do you then despise the poor man, for whose sake God established such and so great things;
and at the last, that I may say yet more, for whose sake the Son of God took upon Himself human flesh, endured revilings and scourgings, bore the cross, and felt the bitterness of the lash, tasted death, descended to the lower regions, and by the price of His own blood freed those who were held liable by the devil? Behold how great and what things the divine mercy has granted to the human race. See therefore whether it is just that any poor man be despised by us, upon whom the divine mercy bestows so many benefits. 4. God's favour toward the poor. Let us love, therefore, most dear brethren, and not despise the poor or strangers; lest He despise us who for our sake became poor, though He was rich (2 Cor. 8:9).
Consider, brethren, and diligently attend, that from the beginning God willed to despise no poor man. For as you have frequently and diligently heard in the divine Scriptures, in order to repress the pride and vanity of the world, God did not choose rhetoricians, nor the eloquent, nor consuls, nor the rich, nor the powerful, to whom He might commit the secrets of His word: but either shepherds, such as the Patriarchs and blessed David; or fishermen, such as blessed Peter and the rest of the Apostles; that through the weak He might destroy the strong, and through the humble cast down the lofty and the proud. Let us love the poor, therefore, that we may be able to have a part with Him who said, 'Learn of Me, for I am meek and humble of heart' (Matt. 11:29).
For because the human race had received a mortal wound through pride, Christ showed forth the medicine of humility. Do not, therefore, despise the humble poor man: he who, though poor himself, can make you rich. For those who are rich, let them imitate blessed Job, humbly giving generous alms. Let them not be exalted in prosperity: and if they suffer something adverse, God permitting, let them not be cast down by adversities; and in nothing murmuring against God's judgments, but with a humble and pious conscience let them say with blessed Job, 'The Lord gave, the Lord has taken away; as it pleased the Lord, so is it done: blessed be the name of the Lord'; to whom is honour and dominion with the Father and the Holy Spirit, unto all ages of ages. Amen.
SERMON 52. On blessed Job, III; and on the words of Psalm 97:5-6, 'Sing to the Lord with the harp,' etc. 1. Who sings with the psaltery and harp. Job the ductile trumpet. Job afflicted for the purging of light sins. Blessed Job, most beloved brethren, of whom yesterday's reading was recited to us, was so holy that in him was fulfilled that which the Holy Spirit said in the Psalm: 'Sing to the Lord with the harp and the voice of a psalm.' Take up not the voice alone, but also works: so that we may not only sing, but also work with our hands. He who sings and works, sings with the psaltery and harp; he who sings with the psaltery, chants divine words from heaven; but he who works with his hands, accomplishes human works.
Stretch out your hands, and give to the poor; clothe the naked, receive the stranger with hospitality. But when you do it, do it piously and cheerfully: recall that you do it to Him who is to say, 'I was hungry, and you gave Me to eat' (Matt. 25:35). See what kind of instruments are joined together in the similitudes. 'With trumpets,' he says, 'that are ductile.' Blessed Job, most beloved brethren, was so full of the Spirit of God, that like a ductile trumpet he sweetly sang forth the praises of the Lord. For thus is it said of such things: 'With ductile trumpets and with the voice of the horn trumpet.' Ductile trumpets are those that are brought forth by hammering. For when are they brought forth?
When we suffer persecution from evil men, if we bear all things patiently, so that we never murmur against the Lord's dispensation, then by being beaten we shall become ductile trumpets drawn out for the praise of the Lord, if we make progress amid tribulation. Tribulation is a hammering; progress is the drawing-out. Blessed Job was a ductile trumpet, when, struck by the devil with such great losses and afflicted even by the bereavement of his children, he in no way murmured against the Lord. By the hammering of so great a tribulation he was made a ductile trumpet. Let us therefore listen whether that very trumpet sounded well. Hear him: 'The Lord gave, the Lord has taken away; as it pleased the Lord, so it is done: blessed be the name of the Lord.'
See, brethren, how and how carefully it sounded, what a sweet sound it gave. Yet this alone did not suffice, unless he should be hammered still further. He was handed over into the power of Satan, that his flesh might be smitten. He was struck, and began to rot, so that swarming masses of worms furrowed him. Yet blessed Job himself, however just he was, was nevertheless not without sin. For he was no better than holy John the Evangelist, who says, 'If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves' (1 John 1:8). For through that most cruel suffering his lesser sins were being purged away. Understanding this himself, he gave thanks to God;
and like a most truthful judge of his own negligences, he scraped off the flowing corruption not with a soft cloth but with a potsherd. Job in weakness was better than Adam whole. Yet of all his goods, only his wife was reserved to him by the devil. His wife Eve was set beside him, as if for his seduction. This was necessary, that his wife should be reserved to him: indeed not for the husband's comfort, but for the devil's service. The woman prompted blasphemy: Job does not comply, but refuses. Adam did not repel Eve in paradise; Job repelled his Eve on the dunghill. Job sat in filth, while he flowed with worms and rotted; but Job full of wounds on the dunghill was better than Adam whole in paradise. Indeed she was still his wife Eve;
but that man was no longer Adam. What then did the woman say? 'Blaspheme God, and die.' The devil is the hammer of the whole earth. Behold, we have heard how this trumpet is hammered. The devil struck him from head to foot with a grievous wound, and rotting with worms he sat on the dunghill. We have heard how he was hammered: let us now, if you please, hear the sweet voice of this ductile trumpet. For he answered his wife: 'You have spoken,' he said, 'like one of the foolish women: if we have received good things from the hand of the Lord, why should we not endure the evil?' (Job 1 and 2). O strong sound! O sweet sound! Whom would that sound not rouse from sleep? Whom would that confidence in the Lord not rouse, so that secure he may go forth against the devil into battle,
not about to shield himself by his own strength, but to be protected by the help of God? For He gave the aid, who permitted him to be tempted. For the devil would not hammer by his own power: for he can do nothing except what the divine dispensation permits. For the prophet, recalling the future punishment of that devil, says, 'The hammer of the whole earth is broken' (Jer. 50:23). By the hammer of the whole earth he wished the devil to be understood. By that hammer, placed in the hand of the Lord, that is, in the power of God, the ductile trumpets are hammered, that is, the holy souls, that they may resound the praises of God. Both the just and the unjust are hammered by the devil. By this hammer both the just man and the sinner are hammered; the one, that he may be proved; the other, that he may be punished;
or at any rate, that the just man may be increased in good things, and the sinner corrected from evils. For under this hammer set in the hand, that is, in the power of the Lord, not only the humble but also the proud are hammered: but the humble are drawn out, the proud are shattered like glass. One and the same hammering brings the good forth to glory and reduces the wicked to ashes: that in them may be fulfilled that which is written, 'And it shall be like the dust which the wind drives from the face of the earth' (Ps. 1:4). For by that hammer, as often as the holy souls are hammered, God dispensing or permitting it, they murmur in nothing, they contradict in nothing at all; but rather humbly, like a ductile trumpet, they proclaim, 'You are just, O Lord, and your judgments are just' (Ps. 118:137);
we still suffer less than we deserve. And these things indeed the holy souls say. But the proud souls, and those liable to sins, as often as we are struck by some adversity, presume rebelliously to murmur against the Lord, saying: 'God, what have I done to you? why do I suffer such great evils?' To whom the divine justice answers in the conscience: 'You say well, O God, what have I done to you? It is true that you have done nothing to me, but everything to yourself: for if you had done any good, you would have done it for me. But when you committed sins and crimes, you did everything for yourself, not for me. And because whatever a man sows, that also he shall reap; it is not unjust that he should gather the thorns and thistles of his sins, who has sown wickedness.'
But let us, most beloved brethren, listen to the Apostle saying, 'Let us sow what is good toward all, especially toward the household of the faith.' Let us fear lest perhaps, if we sow in the flesh, we reap corruption from the flesh, according to the Apostle: but, as he himself testifies, let us sow in the spirit, that from the spirit we may reap eternal life (Gal. 6:8-10); to which may the Lord under his protection lead us, to whom belong honor and dominion for ages of ages. Amen. SERMON 53. On the words of Psalm 49:20-23, 'Sitting you spoke against your brother,' etc. That almsgiving is nothing without the pursuit of justice. Frequently, most beloved brethren, when we sing with the Psalmist that verse by which detractors are struck with the spiritual sword.
For thus it says: 'Sitting you spoke against your brother, and against your mother's son you laid a stumbling block.' But in that he said 'sitting,' he wished to show that he did not detract in passing, nor was it stolen upon him unawares, so that he should speak ill of his neighbor. 'Sitting,' that is, at leisure: as if devoting himself to this, to disparage your neighbor. 'These things you did, and I kept silent.' Let no one, most beloved brethren, deceive himself with false security, and think that he will not come before the tribunal of Christ, nor render an account of his own deeds. For the Lord our God will come, and will not be silent. He is now said to be silent, because he still seems to suspend his vengeance. 'These things you did, and I kept silent.'
What is 'I kept silent,' except: 'I did not avenge, I deferred my severity, I prolonged my patience toward you, I long awaited your repentance'? 'These things you did, and I kept silent.' 'But while I still waited for you to repent, you both despised me, and would not hear the Apostle; but according to the hardness of your heart and your impenitent heart you treasured up for yourself wrath in the day of wrath and of the revelation of the just judgment of God' (Rom. 2:4-5). The same argument treated further. 'You wrongly supposed that I would be like you.' It is too little that your evil deeds please you; you think they please me also. Because you do not at once suffer God as an avenger, you wish to hold him a partner, and, as if a corrupted judge, you wish to have him a sharer of the plunder.
Out of the many things you have plundered, giving small alms, and still not forsaking your sins, you think, as it were, that you can buy off a corrupt judge: whereas, even if you gave everything, and did not forsake the very sins, you would deceive yourself, losing your money and not redeeming your sins. 'You wrongly supposed that I would be like you. I will reprove you.' For when the Lord our God shall come, he will not be silent. 'I will reprove you.' And what shall I do in reproving you? What shall I do to you? Now you do not see yourself: I will make you see yourself; for if you saw yourself, and were displeased with yourself, you would please me. But because, not seeing yourself, you were pleased with yourself, you will be displeasing both to me and to yourself; to me, when you are judged; to yourself, when you burn. 'For what shall I do to you?' he says.
Good deeds should be set behind one's back, evil deeds before one's face. 'I will set you before your own face.' For what do you wish to hide from yourself? You are behind your own back to yourself, you do not see yourself: I will make you see yourself; what you have placed behind your back, I will set before your face. You will see your own foulness, not that you may correct it, but that you may blush. For now, most beloved brethren, all lovers of luxury, and those who commit iniquity with delight, cast their sins behind their back: but if by any chance or on any occasion they have done anything good, they set it before themselves: and thence they continually boast, and say: 'I set that man free, I did him a kindness, I gave him so much.'
And while they attribute to themselves the good deeds which God did through them, they lose through vanity what they seem to acquire through almsgiving. And thus before the tribunal of Christ, the good deeds which they had before themselves being lost, the sins which they had cast behind their back are called back before their face: and without any end they will endure punishment, who, while they lived, refused to provide for themselves a remedy. And these things indeed those men do, who love present things more than future ones. But those who think more attentively about the salvation of their soul do the contrary; whatever good deeds they have done, they cast behind their back; but whatever evils have crept upon them, they set before their eyes: and while they blush over these in the present world;
they strive with all the devotion of faith to heal what is wounded, to raise up what is dead, to wash what is filthy: so that when they come before the tribunal of Christ on the day of judgment, the evils which they had set before their face, and which have been redeemed by good works, may be taken away; the good works which through vanity they had cast behind their back may be placed before their eyes, and they may be counted worthy to hear, 'Come, blessed of my Father, receive the kingdom' (Matt. 25:34). And although these things are so, yet those must not be despaired of who still not only refuse to correct their evils, but even do not blush to defend them: just as neither was that city despaired of, concerning which it was said, 'Three days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown' (Jonah 3:4).
Yet in those very three days it was fit for it to be converted, to pray, to lament, and to earn mercy from the impending punishment. Let those therefore who are such listen, while it is permitted to hear him keeping silent (that is, not avenging in the present). For he will come, and will not be silent, and then he will reprove, when there will be no place for correction. 'I will set you,' he says, 'before your own face.' Now therefore, as has already been said above, whoever you are that are such, do what the Lord threatens to do to you: take yourself from your own back, where you do not wish to see yourself, dissembling about your deeds; and set yourself before yourself. Ascend the tribunal of your mind, be a judge to yourself, let fear torment you, let confession break forth, say to your God:
'For I acknowledge my iniquity, and my sin is ever before me' (Ps. 50:5). Let what was behind you come before you; and when it has come before you, let it be punished by you: lest afterward you yourself be set before you by God the judge, and there be nowhere for you to flee from yourself. The wicked do not praise God, nor do the proud just. 'Understand these things, you who forget the Lord.' Do not think about your evil life: understand yourself, you who have forgotten the Lord. 'Lest at any time he snatch like a lion, and there be none to deliver.' What is 'like a lion'? Like one powerful, like one strong, like him whom no one can resist. For those whom we mentioned above, that is, lovers of the world, seem to praise God with their mouth; but they are proved to practice far otherwise in their works:
according to that which the prophet says, 'This people honors me with their lips; but their heart is far from me' (Isa. 29:13). But the Holy Spirit says to them: 'But to the sinner God said, Why do you declare my statutes, and take up my covenant through your mouth?' As if he said to him, 'It profits you nothing that you praise God. For it profits those who live well that they praise; but you, if you praise (and do not forsake your sins), it profits you nothing. Why then do you praise?' Hear the Scripture saying, 'Praise is not comely in the mouth of a sinner' (Sir. 15:9). For if you live badly, and speak good things, you do not yet praise: but again, if when you have begun to live well, you attribute it to your own merits, you do not yet praise.
I do not want you to be like the robber insulting the cross of the Lord: but neither do I want you to be like that man in the temple vaunting his own merits, and concealing his own wounds. If you have been wicked, and persevering in that wickedness, I do not say to you, 'praise will not profit'; but 'you do not praise me,' I do not reckon that to be praise. Again, if you have been as it were just, that is, humble and pious; and being puffed up over your righteousness you have strutted, and have despised others in comparison with yourself, or have exalted yourself, as if boasting of your merits, you do not praise me. Neither does he praise me who lives badly; nor does he praise me who lives well as if by his own power. But surely that Pharisee was not such as if by his own power, when he said, 'I give you thanks that I am not like the rest of men'?
He was giving thanks to God for the good that he had in himself. Although therefore there be something good in you, profess that what is good is not from you, but that you received it from God. Yet in that very thing, if you exalt yourself above another who does not have it, you will be held as one puffed up, and you will not yet be my praiser. First therefore correct yourself from your worst way, begin to live well, understand that you are not corrected except by the gift of God: 'For by the Lord the steps of a man are directed' (Ps. 36:23). When you have understood this, be favorable also to others, that they may be what you also are: because you too were that which they are. Be favorable as much as you can, and do not despair: for God is not rich only as far as you. For what he has given to you, believe that he both wishes and is able to give also to others.
He therefore does not praise, who, when he has already begun to live well, thinks that his living well is of his own, and not received from God: nor does he praise, who, though he knows that his living well he has received from God, yet wishes God to be rich only as far as himself (and does not wish that God be merciful also to others). Therefore that man who was saying, 'I give you thanks, God, that I am not like the rest of men, unjust, robbers, adulterers, like this publican also'; could he not also have said to him, 'Lord, grant to this publican also what you have granted to me, and supply also to me the things which you have not yet given'? But now, as it were sated, he was belching. But that poor man, that is, the publican, what was he saying? 'Lord, be merciful to me a sinner.'