Chapter III, verses 1-3. — After these things Job opened his mouth, and cursed his day, saying: Let the day perish wherein I was born. 1. The historical and mystical sense. — Job did not utter a curse out of impatience. — It is not to be expounded carelessly that it is said, 'He opened his mouth.' For sacred Scripture, from those things which it slightly premises, indicates that what it subjoins is to be reverently awaited. For just as we know not what closed little vessels have within, but when the mouth of the vessels is opened we recognize what is contained inside; so the hearts of the saints, which with closed mouth are hidden, are uncovered with the mouth opened;
and when they uncover their thoughts, they are said to open the mouth, so that with intent mind, as at opened vessels, we may hasten to know what they contain within, and to refresh ourselves with their inmost fragrance. Whence also to the Lord about to speak sublime precepts on the mountain it is premised: 'Opening His mouth, He said' (Matt. 5:2); although there also this is to be understood, that then He opened His own mouth in precepts, in which He had long before opened the mouths of the prophets. But it is to be observed with great care that it is said, 'After these things,' so that indeed the power of the deed which is being done may be truly perceived from the time.
For first the devastation of his possessions, the extinction of his children, the pain of his wounds, the persuasion of his wife, the coming of his friends are described, who are recorded to have rent their garments, to have wept crying aloud, to have sprinkled their heads with dust, and sitting long upon the ground to have kept silence; and then it is subjoined: 'After these things Job opened his mouth, and cursed his day'; so that by the very order of the narration it may be weighed that he by no means uttered a curse through impatience, who broke forth into the voice of cursing while his friends were still silent. For if, moved by anger, he had cursed, then, upon hearing the loss of his substance, upon learning the death of his children, grief would without doubt have roused him to cursing. But what he then said we have heard. For he says: 'The Lord gave.'
'The Lord hath taken away' (Job 1:21). Again, if, moved by anger, he had cursed, at least when smitten in his body, or ill-persuaded by his wife, he could have inflicted a curse. But what he then answered we have recognized. For he says: 'Thou hast spoken like one of the foolish women. If we have received good things at the hand of the Lord, why should we not sustain evil things?' (Job 2:10). But after these things it is described that his friends come, weep, sit down, keep silence; and forthwith is subjoined this, that he is declared to have cursed his day.
It is therefore exceedingly incongruous to suspect that he, with none instigating, none goading, broke forth out of impatience into the voice of cursing, whom indeed we know, amid the losses of his goods and the death of his children, amid the wounds of his body, amid the words of his ill-persuading wife, to have rendered great praises to the Creator with a humble mind. He therefore made manifest with what mind he said these things calmly, who poured forth so many praises of God even when smitten. For neither could he afterward, unsmitten, grow proud, whom grief showed humble even in his smiting. But since we certainly know that sacred Scripture forbids cursing, why do we rightly say at times what we are not ignorant is forbidden by that same sacred word?
2. A curse is one thing from judgment, another from vengeance. — It is to be known that sacred Scripture mentions cursing in two ways: one, namely, which it approves, another which it condemns. For a curse is uttered in one way by the judgment of justice, in another by the spite of vengeance. A curse by the judgment of justice was uttered against the very first man when he sinned, when he heard: 'Cursed is the earth in thy work' (Gen. 3:17). A curse is uttered by the judgment of justice, when it is said to Abraham: 'I will curse them that curse thee' (Gen. 12:3). Again, that a curse is brought forth not by the judgment of justice but by the spite of vengeance, we are admonished by the voice of the Apostle Paul preaching, who says:
'Bless, and curse not' (Rom. 12:14). And again: 'Neither shall revilers possess the kingdom of God' (1 Cor. 6:10). God therefore is said to curse, and yet man is forbidden to curse; because what man does by the malice of vengeance, God does not do save by the examination and virtue of justice. But when holy men pronounce a sentence of cursing, they break forth into it not from a wish for revenge, but from the examination of justice. For within they behold the subtle judgment of God, and they recognize the evils that arise outwardly, that they ought to smite them with a curse; and in that curse they do not sin, in that they are not at variance with the inner judgment.
Hence it is that Peter hurled a sentence of cursing against Simon, who offered him money, saying: 'Thy money be with thee unto perdition' (Acts 8:20). For he did not say 'is,' but 'be,' signifying that he had said these things not in the indicative but in the optative mood. Hence Elijah said to the two captains of fifty coming to him: 'If I am a man of God, let fire come down from heaven and consume you' (2 Kings 1:10). With how great a reason of truth the sentence of both prevailed, the outcome of the matter showed. For both Simon perished in eternal perdition, and the flame coming down from above consumed the two captains of fifty. Therefore the ensuing power bears witness with what mind the sentence of cursing is brought forth.
For when both the innocence of him who curses remains, and yet the curse swallows up unto destruction him who is cursed, it is gathered from the end of both parties that the sentence taken up against the guilty is hurled forth by the one and inmost Judge. 3. Job's curse is from the rectitude of the judge. — Therefore, if we subtly weigh the words of blessed Job, his curse is not from the malice of an offender, but from the rectitude of a judge; it is not the anger of one disturbed, but the doctrine of one tranquil. For he who uttered so upright a curse succumbed not to the vice of perturbation, but expended the mastery of doctrine. For he saw his friends weeping with clamor, he saw them rending their garments, he saw them sprinkling their heads with dust, he saw them growing dumb at the consideration of his smiting;
and the holy man perceived that these, who sought temporal prosperity, had, from the comparison of their own mind, believed him to be broken by temporal adversity. He saw through that they would not weep in despair over one smitten with transitory affliction, unless they themselves withdrew their despairing mind from the hope of inner soundness; and while he breaks forth outwardly into the voice of grief, he shows to those inwardly wounded the virtue of the remedy, saying: 'Let the day perish wherein I was born.' 4. He curses the day of mutability, from the contemplation of eternity. — For what ought to be understood by the day of birth, save all this time of our mortality?
which, so long as it retains us in this corruption of our mutability, the immutability of eternity does not appear to us. He therefore who already sees the day of eternity hardly endures the day of his mortality. And it is to be noted that he says not, 'Let the day perish wherein I was created,' but 'Let the day perish wherein I was born.' For in the day of justice man was created, but in the time of guilt already born. For Adam was created, but Cain was the first born. What is it therefore to curse the day of one's birth, save openly to say: Let the day of mutability perish, and let the light of eternity break forth. 5. The time of our mutability shall one day utterly perish.
The day which here is so wished to perish that it may be in evil, is the apostate spirit. — But because we are wont to say 'perish' in two ways (for we say a thing perishes in one way when we wish that it be not; and in another way we say it perishes when we wish that it be in evil), this, which is added of this day, 'Let a mist darken it, and let it be wrapped in bitterness,' plainly shows that this day is wished to perish not so that it may not be, but so that it may be in evil. For that cannot be wrapped in bitterness which is utterly and entirely lost. But this time of our mutability shall one day perish, that is, pass away, not so that it may be in evil, but so that it may utterly not be, an angel bearing witness in the sacred word, who says:
'By Him that liveth for ever and ever, that time shall be no more' (Rev. 10:6). For even though the Prophet says, 'Their time shall be for ever' (Ps. 81:15), because time fails by moments, he called their failure by the name of time, showing that those fail without any manner of failing who are separated from the consolation of the inmost vision. Since therefore this time of our mortality perishes not so that it may be in evil, but so that it may not be; it is to be asked what that is which is wished to perish not so that it may not be, but so that it may be in evil. For the human soul, or the angelic spirit, is so immortal that it can die; so mortal that it cannot die. For it loses blessed living, whether through vice or through punishment.
But essential living it loses neither through vice nor through punishment. For it fails from the quality of living, but in no manner does it, even in dying, feel the destruction of its subsisting. So that, to say it briefly, it is both immortally mortal and mortally immortal. Since therefore the day is wished to perish, and a little after is said to be wrapped in bitterness; whom should we believe that the holy man wished to express by the name of 'day,' save the apostate spirit, who in the essence of living subsists even by dying? whom the perdition of life does not withdraw, because, set in eternal pain, immortal death extinguishes him by preserving him:
who, already cast down from the glory of blessedness, is still wished to perish, so that indeed, thrust back to worthy punishments, he may lose even the license of tempting. 6. In what respect it is a day, in what a night. What is wished for it, when it is wished to perish. — He indeed shows himself a day, because he entices through prosperous things; but he ends in the darkness of night, because he leads to adverse things. For he was showing a day when he said, 'In whatsoever day ye shall eat thereof, your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as gods' (Gen. 3:5); but he brought in night, when he led to the darkness of mortality. A day, then, is the promise of better things brought in; but a night is the very experience of calamities displayed.
The ancient enemy is a day by nature well created; but he is a night, by desert fallen to darkness. He is a day, when, by promising good things, he feigns himself an angel of light to human sight, Paul bearing witness who says, 'For Satan himself is transfigured into an angel of light' (2 Cor. 11:14); but he is a night, when he darkens the minds of those who consent with the darkness of error. Let the holy man, therefore, bewailing in his own grief the cause of the whole human race, and thinking nothing special in any manner in his special wound, recall to mind the origin of guilt; and by the consideration of justice let him temper the grief of punishment. Let him behold the human race, whence and whither it fell, and let him say: 'Let the day perish wherein I was born, and the night in which it was said, A man is conceived.'
As if he openly said: Let the hope perish that was brought in by the apostate angel, who, feigning himself a day, flashed forth from the promise of divinity; but showing himself a night, darkened for us the light of our immortality. Let the ancient enemy perish, who showed the light of promise and conferred the darkness of sin; who by flattering made himself known as it were a day, but led us on even to the dark night by the blindness impressed upon the heart. There follows: