約伯倫理 第 250 章

Verse 12. — Now a word was spoken to me in secret. The allegorical sense. — 50. The hidden word is the Son of God, or the utterance of the Holy Spirit. This is perceived by few. It can be felt, not expressed. — The hidden word, namely, is called the invisible Son, of whom John says: In the beginning was the Word. And He Himself intimates that it is hidden, when He subjoins: And the Word was with God, and the Word was God. But this hidden word is said to the minds of the elect when the power of the only-begotten Son is made manifest to believers. By the hidden word may also be understood the address of the inmost inspiration, of which John says: His unction teacheth you concerning all things (1 John ii, 27).

For this inspiration, by touching the human mind, lifts it up, and pressing down temporal thoughts, kindles it with eternal desires, so that nothing now pleases it save the things that are on high, and it despises all the things that clamor from below out of human corruption. To hear the hidden word, then, is to conceive in the heart the utterance of the Holy Spirit. And this assuredly cannot be known save by him by whom it can be possessed. Hence also by the voice of Truth it is said concerning this hidden utterance: I will ask the Father, and He shall give you another Paraclete, that He may abide with you forever, the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive (John xiv, 16).

For just as this same Paraclete, after the ascension of the Mediator, another comforter of the human race, is in Himself invisible, so He kindles everyone whom He fills to long for invisible things. And because worldly hearts love only visible things, the world receives Him not, because it rises not up to love things invisible. For secular minds, the more they enlarge themselves outwardly through desires, the more they straiten the bosom of the heart for receiving Him.

And because in the human race there are very few who, purged from the filth of temporal desires, are enlarged by this very purgation for the reception of the Holy Spirit, this word is called hidden, because that which is without doubt perceived in the heart by certain persons is unknown to the greatest part of men. Or certainly this very breathing of the Holy Spirit is a hidden word, because it can be felt but cannot be expressed by the noise of speech. When, therefore, the divine inspiration lifts up the mind without noise, a hidden word is heard, because the discourse of the Spirit sounds silently in the ear of the heart. Hence it is subjoined: