約伯倫理 第 676 章

Verse 6. — 'At least now understand that God has afflicted me not with an equal judgment.' 36. Certain words of sacred Scripture are deemed depraved, because they are not brought to their inner understanding. — O how harsh sounds the voice of the just man afflicted with stripes; which nevertheless not elation, but grief, expressed! But he is not just who forsakes justice in grief. Yet blessed Job, because he had a gentle heart, sinned not even in a hard word. For if we say that he sinned in this word, we assert that the devil fulfilled what he proposed, saying: 'Touch his bone and his flesh, and see if he will not bless Thee to Thy face' (Job ii, 5). A grave question therefore arises. For if he sinned not in that which he says:

'At least now understand that God has afflicted me not with an equal judgment,' we consent that God (which it is impious to say) did something unjustly. But if he sinned, the devil produced concerning him what he promised. It must therefore be asserted that both God acted rightly concerning blessed Job, and yet blessed Job, in that he says he was afflicted not by God's just judgment, did not lie; and the ancient enemy, in that which he had promised concerning the fault of the blessed man, did lie. For sometimes the words of good men are believed to be depraved, because they are not weighed by their inner understanding. For blessed Job had considered his own life, and weighed the scourges which he was suffering, and saw that it was not equal that he should receive such scourges for such a life.

And when he says that he was afflicted not with an equal judgment, he spoke with free voice that which the Lord, in His secret counsel, had said concerning that adversary of his: 'Thou hast moved me against him, that I should afflict him without cause' (Ibid., 3). For what God says — that He had afflicted blessed Job without cause — this in turn blessed Job asserts, that he was afflicted by the Lord not with an equal judgment. In what, therefore, did he sin, who in nothing differed from the sentence of his Author? 37. To speak good things of oneself, provided they be true, is sometimes permitted. Which is confirmed by the example of Paul and Job. — But perhaps someone may say that we cannot without sin speak that good of ourselves which the Judge has spoken of us in secret.

For he whom the just Judge praises, is not doubted to be justly praiseworthy. But, on the contrary, if one has praised himself, his righteousness is no longer believed to be worthy of praise. Which is indeed rightly said, if what the just Judge declares by an equal sentence, this the one about whom it is spoken presumes afterwards to speak of himself with a lifted-up mind. For if he too, remaining in humble thought, has said true good things of himself when the cause or the grief demanded it, he has departed from justice only in so far as he has in no way differed from the truth. 38. Whence Paul the apostle also narrated many brave things concerning himself for the edification of his disciples;

but in narrating these things he in no way failed, because he departed neither from the path of truth, nor from sure attestation, nor from a humble heart. And so blessed Job, perceiving his own life to be just, may say that he was not afflicted with a just judgment. Nor does he sin in this voice in which he does not differ from his Author; because he whom God smote without cause, himself also asserts that he was afflicted not with a just judgment. But again another question arises, which I have already mentioned as resolved in the beginning of this work (Book iii, chapter and number 3), namely: since Almighty God does nothing without cause, why does He testify that He afflicted blessed Job without cause? For our just Creator, by so many stripes upon blessed Job, sought not to extinguish his vices, but to increase his merits.

It was equal, therefore, in respect to what He did through the increase of good merit; yet it did not seem equal, in respect to that which was believed to be punishing the causes of sin. But blessed Job believed his sins to be blotted out by those scourges, not his merits to be increased; and therefore he calls it not an equal judgment, because he examines his life together with the scourges. Therefore, if life and scourges are weighed, it was not equal — as I said — which blessed Job believed to be done to him through the anger of severity. But if the mercy of the Judge is considered, because through the punishment of the just man the merits of his life are heaped up, it was an equal, or rather a merciful, judgment. And so Job said true things, while he weighed his life together with the scourge; and God afflicted Job not with an unjust judgment, because through the scourge He heaped up his merits;

And the devil did not fulfil what he had promised, because blessed Job, amid words that sound harsh, departed neither from the true judgement nor from a humble mind. But perhaps we understand these words of the afflicted man too little, unless we come to know the sentence of the Judge. For when He gave sentence between the two parties, He says to Job's friends: 'You have not spoken before me what is right, as my servant Job has' (Job 42:8). Who, then, with foolish mind would confess that blessed Job sinned in his speech, when by the very voice of the Judge he is asserted to have spoken rightly?

If indeed we refer this voice to the person of holy Church, we not unfittingly apply it to her weak members, who, in the time of her persecution, while they consider both her merits and her scourges, because they behold the unjust flourishing and the just perishing, in no way suspect that this is just. But it is well added in the voice of the blessed man: