約伯倫理 第 1388 章

12. When the angels fell, the good were terrified, and made firm by fear. — Sacred Scripture sometimes so mingles past and future time that we use now the future for the past, now indeed the past for the future. For it uses the future for the past when a woman about to bring forth a male child, who should rule the nations with a rod of iron, is shown to John (Rev. 12:5). Which, because it had already then been done when the Lord came incarnate, a thing accomplished was announced. Again it uses the past for the future, as the Lord speaks through the Psalmist, saying: They pierced my hands and my feet, they numbered all my bones (Ps. 21:18).

By which words indeed the manner of the Lord's passion is described as though already transacted, yet nevertheless is announced as still long afterward to be future. In this place therefore where it is said: When he shall be taken away, the angels shall fear, nothing hinders us from understanding that things past are described under the mode of future time. Nor do we abandon the sense of right understanding, if we believe that, when this Leviathan fell from the citadel of blessedness, even the elect angels were terrified at his ruin, so that, when the lapse of pride cast him out from their number, that very fear made them firm to stand more robustly. Whence too it follows: And being terrified they were purged. 13. In what manner they were then purged.

When others fell, it was given to the rest that they could not fall. — They were purged indeed, because, namely, when this one went out with the reprobate legions, those alone remained in the heavenly seats who should live blessedly forever. This lapse therefore terrified and purged them: it terrified them, lest they should proudly despise their Creator; but it purged them, because, when the reprobate went out, it came to pass that the elect alone remained. And because God, the Maker of all things, knows how to use well even the evil action of the reprobate for the guardianship of the good, He turned the fall of those falling into the profit of those remaining;

and whence the guilt of the proud was punished, thence there were both found and made firm for the humble angels the increases of their merits. For when these fell, it was given to those as a gift that they could not fall at all. For the holy angels, while they behold in these others the losses of their own nature, they now stand more cautiously and robustly in themselves. Whence it comes to pass, the Lord the Author of all things wondrously ordaining all things, that even the losses of their ruin should profit that fatherland of the elect spirits, while thence it is more firmly built up whence it had been in part destroyed. 14. Holy preachers are called angels.

— But because Sacred Scripture often is wont to designate the preachers of the Church by the name of angels, for the reason that they announce the glory of the heavenly fatherland, we can in this place take the holy angels to be the preachers. For hence it is that John in the Apocalypse, writing to the seven Churches, speaks to the angels of the Churches, that is, to the preachers of the peoples (Rev. 1:4). Hence the prophet says: And the angels of peace shall weep bitterly (Isa. 33:7). Hence again the prophet Malachi says: The lips of the priest keep knowledge, and they seek the law from his mouth, because he is the angel of the Lord of hosts (Mal. 2:7). Hence Paul says:

Great is the mystery of godliness, which was manifested in the flesh, justified in the spirit, appeared to angels, was preached to the nations, was believed on in this world, was taken up in glory (1 Tim. 3:16). He therefore who, after he said that the mystery of the dispensation had appeared to angels, subjoined that it was preached to the nations, assuredly by the name of angels designated the holy preachers, that is, the messengers of the truth. 15. These are both terrified and purged by the fall of the angels. — If therefore that which is said:

When he shall be taken away, the angels shall fear, and being terrified they shall be purged, is referred to the future time, when the strict Judge comes, the last damnation of this Leviathan is here designated, because he is taken from this world by the wrath of judgment, who now is tolerated by the wondrous long-suffering of gentleness. And he is shaken hence with so great a weight of terror that even the strength of the holy preachers is troubled; for when he shall be taken away, the angels shall fear, because when he is snatched away by the whirlwind of judgment, those who can be found in bodies, struck with immense terror, even the messengers of the heavenly fatherland tremble.

For although they are already strong and perfect, nevertheless, because they are still set in the flesh, they cannot in the whirlwind of so great a terror be shaken by no dread at all. But when this Leviathan is seized, and when in his destruction all the elements are shaken, the holy preachers—whom, as I have said, that time of judgment shall find still in their own bodies—are gladdened by the hope of the nearness of the kingdom, yet are disturbed in the frailty of the flesh at the manifestation of wrath. There will therefore be in them, in some manner, a joyful trembling and a secure fear, because they are both certain that they will be rewarded with the heavenly kingdom, and yet through dread of so great a whirlwind they quake on account of the frailty of the flesh. 16. If the righteous tremble, how great will be the future shaking of the reprobate.

Let us therefore consider how greatly the conscience of the wicked is then shaken, when even that of the righteous is disturbed. Those who hate the coming of the Judge, what will they do, if even those who love it dread the terror of so great a judgment? And because that dross of vices, if any could remain in the holy preachers, is then burned away by this dread—after Scripture said, 「When he shall be taken up, the angels shall be afraid」 (Job 41:24), it fittingly at once added, 「And being terrified they shall be purified.」 But since we have learned about the end of this Leviathan, let us meanwhile, before he perishes, hear what he does. There follows: