Literal Commentary on Job (Expositio super Iob ad litteram)

My spirit shall be wasted, etc. Job had shown above the manifold nature of his affliction, and the humility and innocence of his mind, and the brevity of a life that cannot return, from which the wordiness of his friends was being refuted; and therefore in this chapter he intends to make plain what has been said before, and finally to conclude to their ignorance. First, however, he begins to make plain what he had said about the course of human life, and he sets down beforehand the cause of the brevity of life, when he says my spirit shall be wasted: for the life of the body is through the vital spirits which are diffused from the heart to all the members, which, so long as they endure in the body, the body lives; but when the power of natural heat begins to grow weak in the heart, spirits of this kind are diminished — and this diminution and weakening he designates by the wasting of the spirit. And to this cause he subjoins the effect, saying my days shall be shortened: for the weakness of the vital spirit shortens the days of life. And lest anyone should believe that the wasted spirit would again have to be strengthened according to the species of this mortal life, to exclude this he adds and only the grave remains to me, as if to say: when the few days of this life are finished, nothing of the present life remains to me except the grave and those things which befit the grave.

Then in another way he shows the vanity of their consolation: for they consoled him by saying that adversities of this kind had come upon him on account of sins, and that if he repented of these he would return to prosperity; but he, excluding this, says I have not sinned, namely because he did not have a conscience gnawing at him over any grave sin on account of which he might have incurred such great adversities — whence also below, in Job 27:6, he says "for my heart does not reproach me in all my life," and therefore this is not contrary to what is said in 1 John 1:8, "if we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves," and through this he expresses what he had said above concerning his innocence, "I have suffered these things without iniquity of my hand."

He then adds and my eye dwells in bitternesses; he speaks in the plural, bitternesses, on account of the manifold adversities which he enumerated above; and he says dwells, because although amid his bitternesses he humbled himself, sewing sackcloth upon his skin, nevertheless the bitternesses still persist; he attributes bitternesses to the eye on account of weeping, of which he had said above, "my face is swollen with weeping," and again "my eye drops toward God" — for his eye wept in this way amid the bitternesses, that it was intent only on divine help, and therefore here it is added, deliver me: for he understood that he could be delivered only by him who had shut him up in the presence of the unjust one. But he was not asking to be delivered from adversity in the way that those seek who, after adversity, attain earthly prosperity, but he asks to be led to a spiritual height, whence he adds and set me beside you: for since God is the very essence of goodness, it is necessary that whoever is set beside God be delivered from evil. Now a man is set beside God insofar as he draws near to him in mind through knowledge and love, but this indeed happens imperfectly in the state of the way, in which man suffers assaults, yet because he is set beside God he is not overcome by them; but perfectly a man is set beside God in mind in the state of final beatitude, in which he can no longer suffer assaults, and this is what he shows himself to desire when he says and let the hand of whoever fight against me, because namely, however much some may wish to assail me, if I shall have been set perfectly beside you, no one's assault will trouble me: this, then, is that in which Job, amid his bitternesses, had consolation, hoping that he would be set beside God, where he could not fear assaults.

But this spiritual consolation of Job's own wordy friends did not understand, and therefore he adds you have driven their heart far from discipline, namely your spiritual discipline, by which you teach men to hope for spiritual goods with temporal things despised; and because they place their hope only in temporal and lowest things, they cannot arrive at spiritual height so as to be set beside God, and this is what he adds, therefore they shall not be exalted. And from the fact that they have been made far from spiritual discipline, it follows that Eliphaz was promising Job only temporal things for his consolation, and this is what he adds, he promises spoil to his companions, that is, the acquisition of temporal things, which cannot come to one except by another's loss, whence the acquisition of temporal things is likened to plunder. But it is not universally true that after repentance men recover temporal prosperity, since not even the good always flourish in temporal prosperity, whence he adds and the eyes of his sons shall fail; by his sons he means those who, believing his promise, hope for temporal goods from the good deeds they do, but while they do not obtain them their eyes fail, as if falling from their hope. But just as Eliphaz was promising temporal goods to those who do well, so also he was asserting that all temporal adversities come upon the one who suffers them on account of his sins; and because Job had suffered many adversities, he set him up as an example before the common people, and this is what he adds, he has made me as it were a byword of the people, and his example before them, because namely, to assert his own opinion about the cause of adversities, he set up Job as an example, as if he had been punished for sin. Now it pertains to the zeal of the just that, seeing the rightness of the divine judgments perverted through false doctrine, they should be indignant, and therefore Job accordingly shows the greatness of his zeal in two ways: first indeed through a certain disturbance of mind — for anger through vice blinds the eye, but anger through zeal disturbs the eye, as Gregory says — and therefore he adds my eye has grown dim with indignation, namely the eye of reason, whose keenness is disturbed by the anger of zeal; second, through the fact that anger through zeal also produces a certain commotion in the body from grief — whence it is said in 1 Maccabees 2:24 that Mattathias, seeing a Jew sacrificing to idols, grieved and his reins trembled — and therefore here it is added and my members are reduced as it were to nothing, inasmuch as, namely, through grief the body of man seems to waste away. But someone might believe that this dimming of the eye was against justice, and this indignation against innocence, and therefore to exclude this he adds the just shall be astonished at this, as if he were to say: it also pertains to the just that, seeing the doctrine of the wicked, they should be astonished, and this astonishment he called dimming above. There follows and the innocent shall be roused against the hypocrite, as if to say: it is not against innocence if someone, moved by the zeal of justice, is stirred to indignation against a hypocrite who perverts true doctrine. And because, as has been said, anger through zeal disturbs the mind but does not blind it, thus the just man is astonished or grows dim from zeal, yet without departing from justice, and this is what he adds and the just man shall hold to his way, because namely he will not abandon it on account of the anger of zeal: for such anger does not precede reason but follows it, and therefore it cannot separate a man from justice; for anger through zeal is useful because it makes a man rise up against evils with greater strength of mind, and this is what he adds and he that has clean hands shall add strength, being stirred, namely, by zeal — whence also the Philosopher says in Book 3 of the Ethics that anger assists fortitude.

Therefore turn, all of you, etc. After Job had set forth the things by which the opinion of Eliphaz is refuted, here he gathers together what has gone before and orders it toward showing his purpose. And first he rouses attention, saying therefore — namely, since the aforesaid things are true — all of you, who have gathered together against me, and your fathers, turn back from your errors, and come to consider the truth, which once seen it will be plain how far you are from true wisdom, and this is what he adds and I shall not find among you any wise man, and this he says to repress the boasting of Eliphaz, who had said above in Job 15:9, "What do you know that we do not know?" etc., and again, "the wise confess," etc. Now in this he intends chiefly to show their folly, in that they were promising him the consolation of temporal prosperity; against which he first sets forth that the time of his life has already for the most part passed away, and this is what he says, my days have passed. Then he sets forth the evils he suffers when he adds my thoughts are broken, that is, impeded from the quiet contemplation of wisdom on account of the bitterness of bodily pain, and this is what he adds tormenting my heart, because namely his thoughts were led away from the sweet consideration of truth into the bitterness by which his heart was tormented. Now this torment of heart not even the night interrupted, which is the time appointed for human rest, whence he adds they have turned night into day, because namely, on account of the aforesaid thoughts, he passed the night sleepless as if it were day. Now it is more grievous to suffer lack of sleep at night than in the day, because in the day a man's mind is relieved by the company of men and the sight of light; and therefore, while the night was sleepless for him, he desired that it end quickly, and this is what he adds and again after darkness I hope for light, that is, I hope that the light of day will again come after the darkness of night. But because Eliphaz was urging him to bear all adverse things patiently in expectation of the future, he accordingly shows what seems to him to remain for the future concerning temporal things, whence he says if I endure, that is, if I patiently bear such sorrows, nothing remains to me except the dwelling of the grave, and this is what he says, hell is my house; he calls the grave hell according to the opinion of those against whom he was disputing, who did not believe that the soul of man remained after death but only the body in the grave, which they called hell because it is situated beneath the earth. Now a man lying in the grave suffers darkness both on account of the failure of sense and also on account of the failure of external light, and therefore he adds in darkness I have spread my couch. But just as a man being born takes his origin from his parents, from which he contracts kinship with them, so after death, lying in the grave, he is dissolved into rottenness and worms, which are generated from his body, and therefore he adds I have said to rottenness, you are my father; my mother and my sister, to the worms, as if to say: since no other temporal thing will remain to me, kinship in the grave will remain to me only with rottenness and worms. From these things, then, drawing as it were to an absurdity, he concludes, saying where then is now my expectation? As if he were to say: if I should be consoled on account of the expectation of temporal prosperity, my expectation would be vain. And again he draws to a greater absurdity, adding and who considers my patience? As if to say: if I shall have endured through patience, nonetheless nothing remains but the grave and its darknesses, rottennesses and worms; if therefore I should have patience in order to merit temporal goods from God, it would follow that God does not consider patience, which is to deny providence. And lest perhaps someone should say that even in the grave temporal prosperity would be given to him by God, therefore, as though mocking this, he adds all that is mine shall go down into the deepest hell, that is, whatever is mine will be brought down to the grave, which alone remains to me; do you think that there at least there will be rest for me? That is, must I expect earthly prosperity even there? It is plain that this is ridiculous.