^8:8 For ask the former generation, and diligently investigate the memory of the fathers.
^8:9 For we are of yesterday and know nothing, since our days upon earth are like a shadow.
^8:10 They themselves will teach you, and from their heart they will bring forth sayings.
^8:11 Can the rush live without moisture, or will the sedge grow without water?
^8:12 While it is still in flower and is not plucked by hand, it withers before all plants.
^8:13 So are the ways of all who forget God, and the hope of the hypocrite will perish.
^8:14 His folly will not please him, and his confidence will be like the webs of spiders.
^8:15 He will lean upon his house and it will not stand; he will prop it up and it will not rise.
^8:16 He seems moist before the sun comes, and in his garden his shoot goes forth.
^8:17 His roots will grow thick over a heap of stones, and he will dwell among the stones.
^8:18 If he should be swallowed up from his place, it will deny him and say: I do not know you.
^8:19 For this is the joy of his way: that others should spring up again from the earth.
^8:20 God will not cast away the simple, nor will he extend his hand to the wicked,
^8:21 until your mouth is filled with laughter and your lips with jubilation:
^8:22 those who hate you will be clothed with confusion, and the tabernacle of the impious will not subsist.

146. For ask the former generation, etc. Bildad the Shuhite, in the preceding things, defending the same judgment as Eliphaz the Temanite, had proposed that men divinely punished for sin in the present life would return, after conversion, to a state of prosperity,

and this he now intends to prove. He proves it in two ways:

first, indeed, from experience,

second, from a likeness.

For experience in particular matters is especially effective for proving something, and so much the more insofar as it has been observed for a longer time and found infallible. But those things that require length of time are especially confirmed by the memories of the ancients, and therefore, for the proof of his proposition, he has recourse to the memories of the ancients, both as regards the ancients when he says: For ask the former generation, and as regards those immediately preceding when he says: and diligently investigate the memory of the fathers, that is, those things that your fathers hold in memory. Now the questioning of the former generation is by considering the writings of ancient deeds and the things that are handed down about the ancients by report; and because many things about ancient matters are both written and narrated in a fabulous way, lest someone consider himself deceived by this, he refers him to the fathers, who can narrate the things that they have seen.

He shows the necessity of this investigation by adding: For we are of yesterday, as though born yesterday, and know nothing, on account of this, of ancient things; and he says this to show the brevity of our life, whence he adds: since our days upon earth are like a shadow. For a shadow passes quickly, namely, at once when the obstacle to the light is removed; and when the body moves, by whose opposition the shadow is made, the former shadow passes and another succeeds it. So also the days of man are in continual passing, while some succeed others. What usefulness he obtains from the preceding investigation he shows by adding: They themselves, namely, the former men and the fathers questioned, will teach you the truth concerning the things set forth above, either the fathers by words, or the ancients by writings and report; and from their heart they will bring forth sayings, which he adds to show the truth of this teaching, as if to say: they will teach nothing other than what they have perceived in the heart, because there is no cause in them for deceiving.

147. Then he introduces a likeness, taken from bodily things, for the proof of his proposition. And he sets down an example concerning two plants springing from the earth, one of which requires moisture in the earth for its own preservation, namely, the rush, that is, the reed, whence he says: Can the rush live without moisture? But the other requires watery places, namely, sedges, which are broad grasses, pointed at the top, that grow only in watery places; whence he adds: or will the sedge-bed grow without water? For a sedge-bed is said to be a place in which grasses of this kind grow. And that the rush requires moisture and the sedge-bed water, he shows because, by the withdrawal alone of moisture or water, they are easily dried up, no other cause of drying being present. Now in other plants springing from the earth there is a twofold cause of drying: one is natural, because of age; the other is violent, when they are plucked up. But when both causes cease, the rush and the sedge-bed wither from the withdrawal alone of moisture and water; and this is what he says: while it is still in flower, that is, while it is still in its youth and its vigor, by which the age of time is excluded, and is not plucked by hand, by which violence is excluded, it withers before all plants, that is, more easily than all other plants.

148. But he adapts this to the proposition. Here it must be considered that he understood man’s adherence to God to be the cause of worldly prosperity in the way that moisture is the cause of the greenness of a plant, and this because he judged the good of man to be earthly prosperity. But it is manifest that the good of man consists in this, that man adheres to God; and therefore he believed that, from the fact that he does not adhere to God, his earthly prosperity fails. This indeed is true of spiritual happiness, which is the true good of man, but not of earthly prosperity, which is reckoned among the least goods, as serving instrumentally toward the true happiness of man. And therefore he adds: So are the ways of all who forget God, and the hope of the hypocrite will perish. Here it must be considered that to the two things set down above he here adds two corresponding things: for the sedge-bed requires manifest water for its greenness and withers through its withdrawal, but the rush requires water hidden in the earth and moistening it, and through its lack it is dried up;

similarly also, there are some who, according to his judgment, perish because adherence to God in a manifest way is withdrawn from them, namely, because they manifestly do works contrary to God; these he signifies by those who forget God: for those who do not fear to act manifestly wickedly seem altogether to put aside reverence for God and not to have him in memory. But there are some who, according to his judgment, perish because hidden adherence to God is withdrawn, and these are the hypocrites, who outwardly pretend as though they adhere to God, but their heart is set upon earthly things. And therefore, speaking of the hypocrite, he named hope; but speaking of those who forget God, he named ways, that is, works, because their works are turned away from God, but the hypocrite’s hope is turned away.

149. But how the hope of the hypocrite perishes, he shows when he adds: His folly will not please him. Here it must be considered that the hypocrite has a heart that is indeed vain and negligent toward spiritual things, but solicitous with regard to temporal things; and this indeed pleases him as long as he succeeds well in temporal things according to what he hopes. But if temporal things are taken away from him, then it is necessary that he be displeased that he did not have a true and firm heart toward God. Therefore he says: His folly will not please him, that is, when adversity comes, it will displease him that he did not have an upright heart toward God; and the solicitude that he had about temporal things will fail altogether, and this is what he adds: and his confidence will be like the webs of spiders, that is, those things in which he trusted will easily be broken like the webs of spiders. For he trusted not in divine help but in the strength of his house, that is, in an abundance of riches, a multitude of kinsmen, and other things of this kind; but these will easily fail him, whence there follows: He will lean upon his house, that is, he will have confidence in his own stability in the prosperity of his house, and nevertheless it will not stand, because when divine help is lacking to him, he will fall. Now it happens that someone, foreseeing future adversities, prepares certain supports for himself and his house against adversities; but even this will not avail him, for there follows: he will prop it up, namely, with certain remedies against adversities, just as, for a house that threatens to fall, certain supports are applied, and nevertheless it will not rise, either he himself or his house, to a state of prosperity.

150. Now to this judgment that he had set forth concerning the fragility of confidence, he adapts the preceding likeness of the rush. For confidence seems to be had concerning the rush from two things:

first, indeed, from its own greenness, which nevertheless, when the sun comes and dries up the moisture of the earth, quickly fails; and with regard to this he says: He seems moist, namely, the rush, before the sun comes, which takes away its greenness; and in its sprouting, namely, of the rush, its shoot goes forth: for it seems to grow quickly and to make its own fruit. And similarly the hypocrite, because fortune smiles on him at the beginning, seems to make progress, but when the sun comes, that is, tribulation, his prosperity quickly fails.

Second, confidence can be had concerning the rush from other things, namely, either from the multitude of other rushes adhering to it, or from the solidity of the place in which it grows, when it is born in a stony place:

and therefore he consequently says: over a heap of stones its roots, namely, of the rush, will grow thick, insofar as the roots of many rushes are joined together at once, which he says with regard to the first point;

with regard to the second he says: and it will dwell among the stones. So too some hypocrite can have confidence concerning his own stability, not only because of his own prosperity but also because of a multitude of kinsmen and members of his household, or even because of the strength of the kingdom or city in which he dwells. But this confidence of his fails him, as also happens with the rush, for there follows: If someone should swallow it up, namely, the rush, from its place, its place will deny it and say: I do not know you, as if to say: the rush is plucked out of its place in such a way that not even a trace of it appears in the place, nor does its place do anything so that the same rush may be planted again.

And he adds the cause, saying: For this is the joy of its way—or of its life—that others should spring up again from the earth, as if to say: the process and life of rushes dwelling in some place does not tend by natural appetite to this, nor is it preserved by this, that the same rush in number which was torn out should be planted again, but to this, that others of the same species should be born again. So it is also when someone, by death or in another way, is separated from some society of the powerful: immediately he is, as it were, handed over to oblivion, according to that saying of the Psalm: I have been given over to oblivion, like one dead from the heart; but a society of this kind rejoices in those who succeed him, according to that saying of Ecclesiastes 4:14: Another, born in the kingdom, is consumed by poverty. I saw all the living who walk under the sun with the second young man who rises up in his place. Now these things have been introduced to show that, even if some prosperity sometimes happens to the wicked, nevertheless it is not firm, such that they can trust in it, but quickly passes away; hence it is to be accounted as nothing.

151. From all the things said above he consequently shows what he intends, saying: God will not cast away the simple, that is, he will not distance from himself, so as not to sustain him, the one who adheres to him with a simple heart; nor will he extend his hand to the wicked, that is, he will not give them help so that their prosperity may be confirmed. And because Job could say: whatever you may say and wish to confirm by likenesses, nevertheless I have experienced the contrary in myself, who, though I was simple, suffer adversity, and my wicked adversaries have prevailed against me; therefore, to exclude this, he adds: until your mouth is filled with laughter and your lips with jubilation, as if to say: what I have said is so true that you will feel this in yourself, provided you are simple, namely, that from the prosperity that will follow, your gladness will break forth into laughter and jubilation, which are accustomed to arise from the greatness of joy; and, on the contrary, those who hate you will be clothed with confusion, that is, they will be manifestly and in many ways confounded, so that confusion will be, as it were, a garment for them. And lest this seem impossible to anyone because of the present prosperity in which they seem to flourish, he adds: and the tabernacle of the impious will not subsist: for by the tabernacle, in which many of the Orientals were accustomed to dwell and to have their riches and furnishings, can be understood everything that pertains to the prosperity of the present life. Now it must be considered that Bildad made mention of the hypocrite and the simple because he judged that Job had not been truly holy but had been a hypocrite, and that for this reason his prosperity had not been firm; but if he begins to be simple, he promises that prosperity will come to him.