約伯倫理 第 915 章

77. The blessed shall shine in heaven as gold, and shall be translucent as glass. — Who that is sound of understanding would deign to take this according to the letter? Glass, indeed, as we said above, is far more worthless than gold; and after it has been said that gold is not made equal to this wisdom, it is still, as it were by way of increase, subjoined that not even glass can be made equal to it. But the very letter, failing from the historical sense, sends us to search out the mystery of allegory. For we know the metal of gold to shine with a brightness superior to all metals. But it is of the nature of glass that, seen from without, it may shine with pure transparency within. In another metal, whatever is contained within is hidden;

but in glass whatever liquid is contained within, such is shown without, and, so to say, every liquid enclosed in a glass vessel lies open. What else, then, do we understand in gold or glass but that supernal fatherland, that society of the blessed citizens, whose hearts both shine to one another with brightness and are translucent to one another with purity? Which John had beheld in the Apocalypse, when he said: 'And the structure of its wall was of jasper stone; but the city itself was pure gold, like to pure glass' (Rev. 21:18). For because all the saints shall shine in it with the highest brightness of blessedness, it is said to be built of gold. 78. In their countenance the inmost senses of the soul are beheld.

— And because their very brightness lies open to one another in turn in their mutual hearts, and when the countenance of each is regarded, at the same time the conscience is also penetrated, this same gold is recorded to be like pure glass. For there the corpulence of the members shall not hide the mind of each from the eyes of another, but the soul shall lie open, there shall lie open to bodily eyes even the very harmony of the body, and so each one shall then be visible to another, just as now he cannot be visible to himself. [Vet.

XXXII.] But now our hearts, so long as we are in this life, because they cannot be seen from one to another, are enclosed not within glassy but within clay vessels; to which clay indeed the Prophet feared to cleave through the passion of the mind, when he said: 'Draw me out of the mire, that I may not stick fast' (Ps. 68:15). This dwelling-place of bodies Paul names an earthly house, saying: 'We know that if our earthly house of this habitation be dissolved, we have a building of God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens' (2 Cor. 5:1).

In this earthly house, then, so long as we live, we in no way penetrate with the eyes of the mind that very wall, so to speak, of our corruption, and we cannot in turn see hidden things in others. Whence holy Church, desiring to see the beauty of her Spouse in his divinity, and yet not able—because the assumed humanity hid from her eyes that form of eternity which she had longed to behold—mourning says in the Song of Songs: 'Behold, he standeth behind our wall' (Cant. 2:9). As if she plainly said: I desire to see him now in the very beauty of his divinity, but I am still shut out from the vision of him by the wall of the assumed flesh.

So long, therefore, as we live in this corruptible flesh, we do not see one another's thoughts. Whence again through the same Paul it is said: 'What man knoweth the things of a man, but the spirit of a man that is in him?' (1 Cor. 2:11). And again: 'Judge not before the time, until the Lord come, who both will bring to light the hidden things of darkness, and will make manifest the counsels of the hearts' (1 Cor. 4:5). That city, therefore, which manifests its several hearts to one another in turn, is said to be of gold like pure glass, that it may be designated bright as gold, transparent as glass. 79. How the saints are like and unlike to God.

— But although in it all the saints shine with such brightness, are translucent with such transparency, yet they cannot be made equal to that wisdom of whose image they have all that they are. Rightly therefore is it said: 'Gold or glass shall not be made equal to it.' For to this end all the saints attain to those eternal joys, that they may be able to be like to God, as it is written: 'When he shall appear, we shall be like to him, because we shall see him as he is' (1 John 3:2). And yet it is written: 'O Lord God of hosts, who is like to thee?' (Ps. 88:9). And again: 'Or who shall be like to God among the sons of God?' Whence, therefore, are they like, and whence not like, but because to this wisdom they shall both be like as to the image, and yet shall not be as to equality?

For by beholding the eternity of God, it comes to pass for them that they are eternal; and while they receive the gift of his vision, from the reception of blessedness they imitate what they see. And so they are like, because they become blessed; and yet they are not like to the Creator, because they are creatures. And so they have a certain likeness of God, because they have no end; and yet, being uncircumscribed, they have not equality, they who have circumscription. Let it therefore rightly be said:

Gold or glass shall not be made equal to it; for however greatly the saints may shine with brightness and clearness, it is one thing for men to be wise in God, and another for a man to be the wisdom of God. This wisdom he assuredly recognized truly who by no means presumed to compare any of the saints to the Mediator of God and men. Whence it is also added: