^16:1 But Job, answering, said:
^16:2 I have often heard such things; you are all burdensome comforters.
^16:3 Will windy words have an end? Or is anything troublesome to you if you speak?
^16:4 I too could speak things like you, and would that your soul were in place of my soul:
^16:5 I too would console you with speeches and move my head over you;
^16:6 I would strengthen you with my mouth and move my lips, as though sparing you.
^16:7 But what shall I do? If I speak, my sorrow will not rest, and if I am silent, it will not depart from me.
^16:8 But now my sorrow has oppressed me, and all my limbs have been reduced to nothing.
^16:9 My wrinkles bear witness against me, and a false speaker is raised up against my face, contradicting me.
^16:10 He has gathered his fury against me, and threatening me he has gnashed his teeth against me. My enemy has looked upon me with terrible eyes.
^16:11 They have opened their mouths against me; reproaching me, they have struck my cheek; they are sated with my punishments.
^16:12 God has shut me up with the iniquitous and has delivered me into the hands of the impious.
^16:13 I, that one once opulent, have suddenly been crushed. He seized my neck; he shattered me. He set me for himself as a sign:
^16:14 he surrounded me with his spears, wounded my loins, did not spare, and poured my entrails upon the earth.
^16:15 He cut me with wound upon wound; he rushed upon me like a giant.
^16:16 I have sewn sackcloth over my skin and covered my flesh with ashes.
^16:17 My face has swollen from weeping, and my eyelids have grown dim.
^16:18 These things I have suffered without iniquity of my hand, while I had clean prayers to God.
^16:19 Earth, do not cover my blood, nor let my cry find a place in you to lie hidden.
^16:20 For behold, my witness is in heaven, and the one who knows me is on high.

258. But Job, answering, said, etc. Eliphaz, in his response, had spoken more harshly against Job; whence Job, at the beginning of his speech, rebukes him for indecent consolation, first indeed because he often repeated the same things, both he and his friends, whence he says: I have often heard such things, as if to say: your speech always turns around the same point. For with different words they were tending to the same thing, namely, to accuse Job of having fallen into adversities because of his sins, and therefore he adds: you are all burdensome comforters; for the office of a comforter is to say those things by which sorrow is mitigated; therefore a burdensome comforter is one who speaks things that more greatly embitter the soul. Yet these things could have an excuse when exasperating words were brought forward for some usefulness and contained the truth, or even were spoken briefly and in passing; but if someone pursues exasperating words against one who is saddened falsely, uselessly, and at length, he seems a burdensome comforter. Whence he adds: Will windy words have an end? For in saying, Will they have an end?, he shows that they were dwelling at length on exasperating words; but in saying, windy words, he shows that they were useless and false, having no solidity.

259. He consequently shows that there was not equality on both sides in this disputation, because Job’s friends were speaking without trouble; whence he says: Or is anything troublesome to you if you speak? As if to say: you speak at such length to slander me because you feel no trouble from this; but Job was troubled. And lest someone believe that this disputation was easy for Job’s friends because of their eminent knowledge, but troublesome to Job because of a defect of knowledge, he excludes this by showing that, if he were not pressed down by adversity and were in the state of his friends, he too could speak similar things, whence he says: I too could speak things like you, namely, if I were not weighed down by adversity. And he desires that the opportunity to experience this be given him, saying: and would that your soul were in place of my soul, namely, that you were suffering the adversity that I suffer. He says this not from an affection of hatred or from zeal for vengeance, but so that they might be called back from the cruelty that they were using, embittering Job with their words, when they felt that similar words would be harsh for them if they were said to them. Whence he adds: I too would console you with speeches, namely, with speeches similar to those with which you console me, and move my head over you, as a sign of compassion or as a sign of reprobation, just as you accuse me; and also I would strengthen you with my mouth, lest you fail through impatience, and move my lips, namely, to speak, as though sparing you, that is, pretending that I speak from the mercy I would have toward you, just as you do toward me.

260. Thus, therefore, it would be easy for me to speak as it is for you, if I were in your state; but now I am impeded by sorrow, which is not taken away either by speech or by silence. Whence he adds: But what shall I do? If I speak, my sorrow will not rest, and if I am silent, it will not depart from me. Now sorrow is twofold: one indeed is interior, which is named sadness, arising from the apprehension of some evil inhering; the other is exterior sorrow, which is sorrow according to sense, arising, for example, from the dissolution of continuity or from something of this kind. Therefore the first of these sorrows can be taken away by conversation, but not the second; and therefore he consequently shows that he understands this second sorrow, which is not taken away by words, saying: But now my sorrow has oppressed me, that is, it has impeded me from being able to use reasoning easily and freely, as I formerly was accustomed to do. For when there is vehement pain in sense, the attention of the soul must be drawn away or impeded from the consideration of intellectual things. And that he understands bodily pain, he shows by adding: and all my limbs have been reduced to nothing; for all his members were ulcerated, as was said above, that Satan struck Job with a most grievous ulcer, from the sole of his foot to the crown of his head.

261. And not only do the disfigurements of my members bring sensible pain upon me, but they are also an argument against me: for Job’s friends, seeing him thus ulcerated, argued from this that he had sinned gravely, thinking that this had happened to him as punishment for sin, and this is what follows: My wrinkles bear witness against me; for from infirmities the body is wrinkled because of the consumption of moisture, as also from old age. But how his wrinkles give testimony against him, he shows by adding: and a false speaker is raised up against my face, contradicting me; for Eliphaz had falsely said that he had fallen into this infirmity because of sin. Or it can be said that Job understood through the Holy Spirit that his adversity had been procured by the devil, with God permitting it; whence whatever he suffered, whether in the losses of his goods and children, or in the ulcer of his own body, or even in the harassment by his wife and friends, he attributed all of this to the devil as instigator. Therefore he calls him the false speaker raised up against his face, because he understood that, with the devil instigating, his friends were contradicting him. And according to this sense, what follows is clearer: He has gathered his fury against me;

for the devil seems to have gathered all his fury against Job when he attacked him in every manner of harming him; and not only has he afflicted me in the past, but he also threatens me for the future, and this is what follows: and threatening me he has gnashed his teeth against me. And he speaks by the likeness of a beast that, in threatening a man, makes its teeth ready against him; but he says this because Eliphaz, under the person of the impious man, had foretold that evils threatened him even unto death. But Job understood that threats of this kind, through the mouth of Eliphaz, were procured by the devil, and therefore he said that he had gnashed his teeth against him.

262. But Eliphaz had not only used words of threat against him by foretelling evils, but had also judged evilly concerning his deeds, naming him impious and a hypocrite, and therefore he adds: My enemy has looked upon me with terrible eyes; for someone looks upon another with placid eyes when he interprets his deeds kindly, but when he interprets good things as evil, then he looks upon him with terrible eyes. And therefore he adds: They have opened their mouths against me, namely, my friends, instigated by my enemy; and he explains this, adding: reproaching me, they have struck my cheek; for one is said to strike someone in the face who speaks reproach to him in his face. But Job’s friends had said many reproaches against him, reproaching him with many sins. And because just men, seeing sins punished, rejoice in justice, according to that saying of the Psalm: The just man will rejoice when he sees vengeance, Job’s friends, judging themselves just and Job a sinner, were in a certain way rejoicing over his punishments, as though congratulating divine justice, and therefore there follows: they are sated with my punishments.

263. And lest someone believe that Job was of the opinion that punishments of this kind had not been inflicted on him by God because he had said that he was afflicted by the enemy, to exclude this he adds: God has shut me up with the iniquitous, that is, the devil, namely, by granting me to his power, and has delivered me into the hands of the impious, with regard to those who, by the devil’s instigation, had afflicted him either by deeds or by words. For Job understood that his afflictions had been brought upon him by the devil indeed, but with God permitting it.

And he shows a fourfold evident sign of this:

first indeed, because he did not fall gradually from the greatest prosperity, as is customary in human affairs, but suddenly collapsed totally, which does not seem able to happen by sudden chance but only from divine ordering, and this is what he says: I, that one once opulent, have suddenly been crushed. And in saying opulent, an abundance of riches is designated, while in saying that one, the renown of his fame is designated, by which he was pointed out by all.

The second sign is that he collapsed totally; to signify this he adds: He seized my neck; he shattered me. And he speaks after the likeness of some very strong man who, having grasped the neck of someone weak, would break it and thus totally take him away from life; for in this way Job seemed to have lost totally the state of prosperity.

The third sign is that he was oppressed not by one adversity but by many running together at once, as was narrated above; and with regard to this he adds: He set me for himself as a sign, namely, as something set up to be struck by various arrows, and therefore he adds: he surrounded me with his spears. Here he describes the multitude of his adversities in three ways: first, he shows that he was wounded exteriorly in the things he possessed, and to this pertains what he says: he surrounded me with his spears; for exterior things are around us, as it were, outside us. Therefore a man is surrounded by the spears of adversity when he is harmed in exterior things.

Second, he says that he was struck interiorly with regard to the affliction of persons, and this is what he adds: he wounded my loins, as if to say: not only was I struck with spears all around, but the wounds reached even to the interior things in which he delighted, which are signified by the loins, in which there is delight, or even the origin of generation; hence also, by the loins, his oppressed children can be designated.

And besides this, he shows the multiplicity of the blow from the bitterness of the wound, when he adds: he did not spare, as though drawing back his hand from the blow lest he offend more gravely, but he harmed most gravely; and this is what he adds: and poured my entrails upon the earth, because, namely, he crushed all his sons and daughters to death in one collapse.

Third, he shows the multitude of the blow from the things he suffered in his own person, whence he adds: He cut me, namely, in my own person, with the wound of the most grievous ulcer, upon wound, that is, upon the death of my children.

The fourth sign that his tribulation proceeded from divine providence is that it could not be resisted, nor could a remedy be applied, according to what was said above in 9:13: God, whose wrath no one can resist; and this is what he adds: he rushed upon me like a giant, whom a weak man cannot resist because of the greatness of his power. And all these things can be understood either of God, who shut him up, or, better, of the iniquitous one, namely, the devil, with whom he shut him up.

264. Therefore Job recalled all these things concerning the greatness of his adversity to show that he could not contend with them as an equal, because they were immune from adversities of this kind. But Eliphaz had marked him with pride, saying: Why does your heart lift you up?, etc., which would have been all the more detestable insofar as it could have been corrected by grave adversities, according to what is said against certain men in the Psalm: they were scattered and were not stung with compunction. And therefore, after describing his adversity, he consequently shows that he was humbled, first indeed with regard to exterior habit, when he says: I have sewn sackcloth over my skin; for such a habit is a sign of humility, as is read concerning the Ninevites in Jonah 3:5. Likewise, ashes are applied for acknowledging one’s own frailty—whence Abraham said in Genesis 18:27: I will speak to my Lord, though I am dust and ashes—and therefore he adds: and covered my flesh with ashes; for it is read above that he was sitting on a dunghill as a sign of humility.

Second, he shows his humility through the abundance of weeping, of which he sets down two signs:

first indeed, the swelling of the face, when he says: My face has swollen from weeping; for as much matter of tears rises to the head, the face of those who weep swells;

the second is the hindrance of sight, and this is what he adds: and my eyelids have grown dim, namely, from weeping; for according to the letter, because of the flowing of humors, the sight of the eyes is impeded.

265. But from the things he has set forth concerning the gravity of his adversity and the greatness of his humiliation, someone could suspect that he, as though recognizing the gravity of his sins, had humbled himself by doing penance, judging himself afflicted for his sins, which Eliphaz wished to suggest when he said: Behold, among his holy ones no one is immutable, etc. And therefore, to remove this, he says: These things I have suffered without iniquity of my hand, by which he excludes from himself sins of works; but he adds: while I had clean prayers to God, so as to exclude from himself the sin of lack of devotion and of omission. In this he seems to answer what Zophar had said above in 11:14: If you remove the iniquity that is in your hand, you will be able to lift up your hand without stain. But to exclude Job’s innocence, Eliphaz had already twice used an argument taken from the fragility of earthly nature: for above in 4:18 he had said: Behold, those who serve him are not stable, how much more those who dwell in houses of clay; and afterwards above in 15:15 he had repeated the same, saying: The heavens are not clean in his sight; how much more abominable and useless is man. And therefore, to exclude this, he adds: Earth, do not cover my blood; and by blood he understands the affliction of his body.

But this blood would be covered if it had been poured out for fault, for in that case it would have no glory; and it would be covered by the earth if, on the occasion of earthly frailty, a presumption concerning a preceding fault were presumed. But if his blood was poured out without fault, he had a just complaint against the one who poured it out, as is said in Genesis 4:10: Behold, the voice of your brother’s blood cries out to me from the earth. But this cry would lie hidden if his complaint seemed unjust, as though of one who had been punished for fault, and therefore he adds: nor let my cry find a place in you to lie hidden, namely, so that, because of the fragility of earthly conversation, I should seem to complain unjustly, as though I were punished for fault. Now it is true that it is difficult for man to conduct himself in earthly conversation without the iniquity of mortal sin, yet it is not impossible, with God assisting through grace, who is also the witness of interior purity; and therefore he adds: For behold, my witness is in heaven, as if to say: therefore the earth cannot cover my blood, because the testimony of heaven is greater than the presumption taken from the frailty of the earth. But this witness of heaven is fitting, because he also searches out the secrets of conscience, whence he adds: and the one who knows me is on high, as if to say: therefore my cry cannot find a place to lie hidden in the lowest part of the earth, because my conscience is known on high.