Cornelius a Lapide
Table of Contents
Synopsis of the Chapter
He alternates his discourse about the wise and the foolish son, that is, the good and the wicked, the industrious and the idle, the simple and the perverse, about charity and hatred, and especially about the good tongue and its evil counterpart, and their punishments and rewards.
Vulgate Text: Proverbs 10:1-32
1. A wise son makes a father glad, but a foolish son is the sorrow of his mother. 2. Treasures of wickedness shall profit nothing, but justice shall deliver from death. 3. The Lord will not afflict the soul of the just with famine, and He will overthrow the plots of the wicked. 4. The slack hand has wrought want, but the hand of the strong prepares riches. He who relies on lies feeds on winds; and the same man pursues birds in flight. 5. He who gathers in the harvest is a wise son; but he who snores in summer is a son of confusion. 6. The blessing of the Lord is upon the head of the just; but iniquity covers the mouth of the wicked. 7. The memory of the just is with praises, and the name of the wicked shall rot. 8. The wise of heart receives commandments; the fool is beaten on the lips. 9. He who walks simply walks confidently; but he who perverts his ways shall be found out. 10. He who winks with the eye shall give sorrow, and the fool of lips shall be beaten. 11. The mouth of the just is a vein of life, but the mouth of the wicked covers iniquity. 12. Hatred stirs up strife, but charity covers all offenses. 13. In the lips of the wise, wisdom is found; and a rod is for the back of him who lacks sense. 14. The wise hide knowledge, but the mouth of the fool is near to confusion. 15. The substance of the rich is the city of his strength; the dread of the poor is their want. 16. The work of the just is unto life, but the fruit of the wicked is unto sin. 17. The way of life is for him who keeps discipline; but he who forsakes reproofs goes astray. 18. Lying lips conceal hatred; he who utters slander is a fool. 19. In a multitude of words sin will not be lacking; but he who moderates his lips is most prudent. 20. The tongue of the just is choice silver, but the heart of the wicked is as nothing. 21. The lips of the just teach many; but the unlearned shall die in the poverty of their heart. 22. The blessing of the Lord makes men rich, nor shall affliction be joined to them. 23. As if in sport, the fool works wickedness; but wisdom is prudence to a man. 24. What the wicked man fears shall come upon him; to the just their desire shall be given. 25. As a passing tempest, so the wicked shall be no more; but the just is as an everlasting foundation. 26. As vinegar to the teeth and smoke to the eyes, so is the sluggard to those who sent him. 27. The fear of the Lord adds days, and the years of the wicked shall be shortened. 28. The expectation of the just is joy; but the hope of the wicked shall perish. 29. The strength of the upright is the way of the Lord, and dread is for those who work evil. 30. The just shall never be moved; but the wicked shall not dwell upon the earth. 31. The mouth of the just shall bring forth wisdom; the tongue of the perverse shall perish. 32. The lips of the just consider what is pleasing, and the mouth of the wicked, what is perverse.
Verse 1: A Wise Son Makes a Father Glad
1. A WISE SON MAKES A FATHER GLAD; BUT A FOOLISH SON IS THE SORROW OF HIS MOTHER. — The Arabic has: 'saddens, or makes sad his mother.' A 'wise son' is one who is good, modest, obedient; a 'foolish' one is wicked, insolent, obstinate. So throughout this book the wise man is called good, and the fool wicked, because true wisdom is virtue and goodness itself, and conversely the highest folly is vice and wickedness. He says therefore that the son's goodness is a joy to his father, but his wickedness is a sorrow to his mother, because a son is part, flesh, and blood of his parents: therefore the virtue and vice of a son directly redounds upon his parents, and brings them either joy or sadness. Under 'father' understand also the mother, and conversely under 'mother' understand also the father. He assigns, however, joy to the father and sadness to the mother: first, for the sake of rhetorical abundance; second, because fathers, being sanguine in temperament, are more inclined to joy, while mothers, being phlegmatic and melancholic, to sadness; third, because fathers educate and punish their sons more severely, which causes sons to adopt good manners, by which they gladden their father; but mothers treat their sons more gently and indulgently, which causes sons to become vicious, insolent, and obstinate, and thus bring sorrow to their mother — all the more so because she herself through excessive indulgence was the cause or occasion of the sons becoming such. She grieves, therefore, because she herself gave the occasion for grief. So Baynus says. Quintilian speaks truly: "That soft upbringing," he says, "which we call indulgence, breaks all the sinews of both mind and body." Fourth, because a wise son is raised to public honors, offices, and chairs, which the father observes, and therefore rejoices; but a foolish son lives privately with his mother an idle and pleasure-seeking life, and is burdensome and rebellious to her — therefore she, seeing these hidden disgraces and shames of her son, continually grieves and mourns. So R. Solomon, R. Levi, and Aben-Ezra.
Finally, mothers love their children more tenderly than fathers, both because they are women, and because they are more certain that those are their children than fathers are, and because they contribute more to their children than fathers do; for, to say nothing of other things, for nine months they nourish and carry them in the womb with great pains, discomforts, and anxieties; then they give birth to them with immense suffering and danger to life; and finally they nurse and nourish the newborn with their own milk for several years. Hence it happens that they are more anxious about their children's lives and conduct, and grieve and mourn more if they turn out badly — children whom they bore and raised at such great cost, labor, and pain. It is also the case that sons, for the reasons already stated, more closely imitate the disposition of their mother than of their father; therefore the mother is blamed and reproached more than the father if a son turns out insolent and wicked. Therefore she grieves over both the disgrace and fault of her son and her own. Here is fitting that saying of Menander: "A wise son is the joy of his father." Conversely, Valerius Maximus, book I, chapter 2, gives this reason why Dionysius the tyrant did not pay the penalty for his crimes while living: "Through the disgrace of his son, he repaid in death the penalties which he had escaped in life."
Now Solomon places this maxim in the first position in order to admonish parents to raise their children honorably and punish their vices, so that their children may be a joy to them, not a sorrow; and also sons, to conduct themselves rightly and be obedient to their parents; for thus they will bring them joy, not sadness. For sons are usually moved by love and reverence for their parents, and so this is the greatest spur to virtue for them, which Solomon accordingly applies here. Thus St. Augustine, by his heresy and fornication, was a sorrow to St. Monica his mother, whose pains and tears, by which she gave birth to him a second time, as it were, he himself recounts at length in his Confessions. So Blanche, the holy queen, raised St. Louis, king of France, her son, with great care, and was the cause of his sanctity. For she repeatedly impressed upon him: "Son, I would rather see you dead than committing any mortal sin by which you would incur God's offense and hatred." Thus not infrequently wicked sons, by their wickedness, afflict their mothers with immense grief, indeed consume and kill them; therefore they are truly parricides and matricides.
Mystically, the 'wise son' is the faithful and good man, especially the repentant sinner; he 'makes glad his father,' that is, Christ, who begot him with His blood, and his mother, that is, the Church, who bore him in the womb of baptism; but the wicked man saddens them. A type of this grief is found in the widowed mother of the city of Nain, mourning her only son already dead, whom Christ, moved by the mother's tears, recalled to life (Luke 7:11), as St. Ambrose, St. Gregory, St. Augustine, Bede, and others explain there.
Again, wise sons are disciples, subjects, and penitents; for if they conduct themselves well, they gladden their teachers, superiors, confessors, etc.; if badly, they cause them great grief, because, as Sextus the philosopher says in his Sentences, number 164: "The sins of students are the reproaches of their teachers." For they have toward their subjects the affection of both a mother and a father. Hence someone said to a Prelate: 'You have the rod of a father; have also the breasts of a mother.'
Let them say therefore with Jeremiah 9:1: "Who will give water to my head, and a fountain of tears to my eyes? And I will weep day and night for the slain of the daughter of my people."
Verse 2: Treasures of Wickedness Shall Profit Nothing
2. TREASURES OF WICKEDNESS SHALL PROFIT NOTHING; BUT JUSTICE SHALL DELIVER FROM DEATH. — First, some, following Hugo, understand this generally of any treasures and riches, even those justly and lawfully acquired; for all wealth is called 'of wickedness,' that is, wicked, in the sense in which Christ calls it 'the mammon of iniquity' (Luke 16:9), namely: first, because riches are often acquired through injustices — hence the saying: 'A rich man is either unjust, or the heir of the unjust'; second, 'of iniquity,' because wealth is the occasion, material, and stimulus of every sin, especially injustice; third, 'of iniquity,' that is, unjust, that is, unfaithful, deceitful, fleeting, vain, and lying, not true, not faithful and stable, as Christ explains in the same chapter at verse 11; fourth, St. Au Here there is an ἐπαλλαγή (interchange) of a sentence consisting of two members, or an elliptical alternation, where in one member one thing is expressed and in the other another, yet in each member both are to be understood. gustine (Sermon 35, On the Words of the Lord) adds: 'of iniquity,' because the wicked consider these alone to be true riches; for they do not know spiritual, heavenly, and eternal riches, which no one can take from them. Hence for 'treasures of wickedness' some here translate 'treasures of disquiet, disturbance, agitation, sedition'; for all these things the Hebrew רשע (resha) signifies. So the meaning will be, as if to say: Treasures, however great, do not profit but rather harm, because they bring to the mind perpetual disquiet, disturbance, and as it were a sedition of passions, so that now the fear of losing them conflicts with the desire to retain them, now the hope of increasing them conflicts with the fear of diminishing them, now the anxiety of preserving them conflicts with the obligation and pain of restoring them or distributing them to friends or the needy. For this reason Christ calls riches 'thorns,' which prick and lacerate whoever touches them (Matthew 13:22).
Hence St. Gregory and St. Bernard teach that riches are not to be loved, since they are such that "when loved they defile, when possessed they burden, when lost they torment." Therefore Clement of Alexandria, Pedagogue, book VI, chapter 6: "Riches," he says, "are like a serpent, which if one does not know how to pick up safely from a distance, seizing the beast by the tip of its tail, it will coil around the hand and bite. So too riches, if grasped by an unskilled man, cling and bite. But if someone, showing himself magnanimous, uses them rightly and knowingly, he will remain unharmed." See St. Chrysostom, Homily 82 on Matthew, where he demonstrates at length that the miser is like the demoniac, and that the one is tossed about by a thousand surges, rages, and goes mad no less than the other.
Second, properly and genuinely, 'treasures of wickedness' are riches acquired through wickedness, as Pagninus translates, that is, obtained or preserved through impiety — for example, through usury, robbery, unjust contracts, through lack of mercy, through violation of feast days and other divine or human laws. For although these may seem to profit for a short time, while the wicked rich man enjoys them, yet in the end they do not profit him but harm him: both because 'ill-gotten gains are ill-lost'; and because, even though among men they sometimes profit, with God they do not: for God will punish his impiety often in this life and always in the next — for God cannot be bribed with gold, as judges and princes are bribed; and finally because at the hour of death they will not deliver the wicked rich man from death, either present or eternal — for the wicked man is guilty of death, according to that saying of Christ (Matthew 16): "For what does it profit a man if he gain the whole world, yet suffer the loss of his soul?"
But on the contrary, 'justice shall deliver from death,' because, even though sometimes among men, as Jansenius says, the just are killed on account of their justice, yet with God a man's justice frequently brings it about that he escapes some common divine vengeance and human persecution, as was shown in Daniel and the three youths; and it always brings it about that a man is delivered from perpetual death (which alone is true death), for escaping which the treasures of the wicked profit nothing. In this part, moreover, it is sufficiently implied that treasures justly acquired and distributed are profitable, according to that saying: "He has distributed, he has given to the poor; his justice endures forever and ever." Furthermore, just as the prior saying is an exhortation to wisdom, through which parents are gladdened, so this one is an exhortation to justice, through which one more surely attains what the wicked strive to attain through their riches.
Solomon therefore signifies that one should devote oneself to justice rather than to heaping up riches; because the former profits and the latter harms — and there is an antithesis between wickedness and wicked treasures on one hand, and justice and just treasures on the other: the latter deliver from death, the former by no means do, indeed they are the cause of death. This is what Sirach 40 says: "The substance of the unjust shall dry up like a river, and shall resound like a great clap of thunder in the rain." And Christ: "Fool, this night they demand your soul of you; and what you have prepared, whose shall it be?" (Luke 12:20). And Abraham to the rich man placed in hell: "Son, remember that you received good things in your life, and Lazarus likewise evil things; but now he is consoled here, and you are tormented" (Luke 16:25). Thus the rich in hell, wise too late, groan and wail: "What has pride profited us? Or what has the boasting of riches brought us? All those things have passed away like a shadow" (Wisdom 5:8).
Moreover, the Septuagint translates: 'treasures shall not profit the ἀνόμοις (lawless),' that is, those who transgress the law. They allude to νόμισμα (money), which is derived from νόμος (law), as if to say: νόμισμα shall not profit the ἀνόμοις; coins shall not profit the lawless, because since a coin is named from the law, it is fitting and profitable only to those devoted to the law; but to the lawless it is unfitting and harmful. For numisma is derived from νόμος, and numus is quasi νόμος with a ν added to make νοῦμος, with the first syllable lengthened, because when the old custom of exchanging goods for goods was abandoned, coin was stamped by law and a value was assigned to it. Hence coin is called 'moneta,' because by the mark of the coin men were reminded (monerentur) of its value — so say Festus, Pompeius, Ambrosius Calepinus, and Nicolaus Perottus on epigram 40 of Martial's book V; although Isidore, Etymologies book XVI, chapter 17, says: "Coins (numi) are named from Numa Pompilius, the second king of Rome, who was the first among the Latins to stamp them with images and inscribe them with the title of his name. Hence also numisma is so called, because it was stamped with the names and likenesses of princes." Peter Gregorius (On the Republic) adds, and from him our Salazar, that coins are called from νόμος (law), because they must be acquired and spent according to the laws and canons of justice. Therefore since the wicked mint or hoard them illegitimately against right and duty, as unjust possessors they will be stripped of them by God; indeed they will be punished with death, just as those who mint illegitimate and counterfeit coins are punished with death.
Hence St. Ephrem, in his tract Against the Rich: "If," he says, "the law punishes those who counterfeit money against the laws, God also rightly strips those who procure for themselves counterfeit riches against His laws. Moreover, Plutarch, in his Moralia: "He who adds riches and glory to a wicked man," he says, "ministers wine to one who is building, honey to the bilious, and delicacies to the dyspeptic — things that increase the sickness of the soul, that is, folly."
Mystically, the author of the Greek Chain says: The treasures of wickedness are the arts, eloquence, and learning which both heretics and vain, ambitious men acquire with great effort. But all these will profit them nothing, nor deliver them from present and eternal death. Our Thomas the God-taught (Thomas a Kempis) says admirably in the Imitation of Christ, book I, chapter 3: "When the day of judgment comes, we shall not be asked what we have read, but what we have done; nor how well we have spoken, but how devoutly we have lived." And book III, chapter 48: "The time will come when the Master of masters, Christ the Lord of Angels, will appear to hear the lessons of all, that is, to examine the consciences of each; and then He will search Jerusalem with lamps, and the hidden things of darkness will be made manifest, and the arguments of tongues will fall silent."
BUT JUSTICE SHALL DELIVER FROM DEATH. — What is this justice? First, Vatablus understands it as wisdom: Wisdom, he says, which begets justice, delivers from death. Second, R. Solomon and R. Levi understand it as almsgiving, according to Psalm 111:9: "He has distributed, he has given to the poor; his justice (that is, his almsgiving) endures forever and ever." And that saying of Tobit to his son (4:11): "Almsgiving delivers from all sin and from death, and will not suffer the soul to go into darkness." Third, Lyranus understands justice properly so called, which is the virtue of rendering to each his due; for this is opposed to injustice, and to riches unjustly acquired. Fourth, the author of the Greek Chain understands by justice repentance; for by repentance the penitent, justly punishing his sin, delivers himself from the death of the soul. Fifth, and best, you may understand justice here universally, insofar as it is a general virtue, or the combination of all virtues that makes a man just, pious, and holy: for it is opposed to wickedness and to riches impiously, that is, wickedly, acquired. This justice often delivers the just from present death (as it delivered Noah from the flood, Lot from the burning of Sodom, the three youths from the fiery furnace, Daniel from the lions, Jonah from the belly of the whale), and always from eternal death.
Verse 3: The Lord Will Not Afflict the Soul of the Just
3. THE LORD WILL NOT AFFLICT THE SOUL OF THE JUST WITH FAMINE (Chaldean: will not make him hunger), AND HE WILL OVERTHROW THE PLOTS OF THE WICKED. — God commanded the Jews to afflict their souls through fasting, but fasting is the health of the soul and body. 'He will not afflict with famine,' therefore — namely, with forced and harmful famine — so as to destroy them against their will by hunger. Hence the Septuagint translates: 'The Lord will not kill the just soul with famine'; St. Jerome, on Isaiah 65: 'will not kill'; Symmachus and Theodotion: οὐ λιμαγχονήσει, that is, 'He will not strangle with famine as with a quinsy the just man'; for famine, like a quinsy, constricts the throat and thus suffocates the starving person. The meaning therefore is, as if to say: God will not allow the just man to be afflicted with famine so that his soul, that is, his life, is taken from him and he is as it were strangled; but rather He will supply him with food by a wonderful and unexpected providence — as He fed Daniel in the lion's den through the angel who carried Habakkuk, and Elijah He fed through ravens, and the three million Hebrews He fed in the desert with manna for forty years. On the other hand, God threatened and sent famine upon the wicked Jews — as when in the time of Elijah He closed the heavens so that it would not rain for three years. Again, when He reduced the Jews who had despoiled the Christians of their goods (as the Apostle attests, Hebrews 10:34) to such famine that mothers ate their own children, and strangled many thousands of them with famine as with a quinsy. Hear Hegesippus, book V, On the Destruction of Jerusalem, chapter 24: "With the passages of the throat already blocked, they were being strangled; the interior of the bowels had stiffened, the ducts for food were blocked, the veins of the liver which draw in food had dried up; the ability to eat had perished, yet craving only increased; strength had failed, yet appetite remained."
Therefore this saying restrains the avarice and error of worldly men, who, lest they suffer want and famine, heap up riches by fair means and foul. For they are deceived, and through this are reduced to famine.
You may object: Do we not sometimes see the just afflicted by famine? Do we not read that many Martyrs were tortured in prisons, indeed killed by famine? I answer: These sayings signify not what always happens, but what often happens. In the Old Testament, God ordinarily did not allow the just Jews to be afflicted by famine, because He had promised them abundance of wealth and produce if they observed His law. But in the New Testament He promised Christian just men a supply not so much of temporal as of spiritual goods. Therefore when God allows the just to go hungry, He supplies them with an abundance of spiritual nourishment, namely of grace and consolations of heaven, and with this nourishes, strengthens, gladdens, and enriches the soul. For he keeps his promises who, instead of the lesser thing promised (e.g. a denarius), gives something greater (e.g. a gold piece). Therefore God, having promised temporal things, if He substitutes spiritual things, which are of far greater moment, is certainly to be said to have kept His promises. Moreover, even in the New Law God rarely allows the just (I except the Martyrs, for in their case famine is part of their martyrdom and triumph) to be consumed by hunger; indeed He often feeds them miraculously — as He fed St. Mary Magdalene at La Sainte-Baume by angelic rapture and song; and St. Paul, the first hermit, in the desert through a raven, which for sixty years daily brought him half a loaf of bread, and when St. Anthony arrived, it doubled the provision and brought a whole loaf. Thus He fed many Martyrs in prison through Angels. Thus He daily feeds so many thousands of poor monks and nuns, especially mendicants, that it borders on the miraculous — for in the single Order of St. Francis, God continually feeds through the alms of the pious more than a million, that is, ten hundred thousand Religious (for they equal and indeed exceed this number, if all the men and women who follow the poverty of St. Francis and St. Clare are counted), who have no income, no revenue, but are rich in poverty alone, and only in the blessing of St. Francis, who gave this as a provision to his followers: "Cast your care upon the Lord, and He Himself will nourish you." Here then is fulfilled that saying of the Apostle, 2 Corinthians 6: "Having nothing, yet possessing all things." This is the hundredfold promised by Christ to the poor in spirit (Matthew 19:29). This is the majesty of evangelical poverty, which claims for itself the possession of the whole world. "For to the faithful the whole world is a treasury of riches," says St. Bernard, Sermon 21 on the Canticle.
Now by 'just' here understand anyone, but especially the alms-giver, according to that promise of Christ: "Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy." Hence St. Cyprian, On Good Works and Almsgiving: "Do you fear," he says, "that your patrimony will fail if you begin to give generously? When has it ever happened that the just lacked the necessities of life, since it is written: 'The Lord will not kill the just soul with famine'?" As if to say: It is impossible that God would allow the one who feeds the hungry to perish of famine, that God would snatch away by famine the life of one who sustains the life of the starving who are perishing from hunger.
Mystically, St. Basil on Isaiah chapter 1, Bede, and Hugo understand this of spiritual famine, that is, of the lack of the word of God, grace, and the Sacraments. Hence St. Basil notes that it says here, 'The Lord will not afflict the soul of the just with famine': "For He is not speaking here," he says, "about bodily hunger (for then He would have said 'the bodies of the just'), but about the starvation of souls." Hugo, however, understands the famine of vices. What is lust, he says, but an insatiable hunger for pleasure? What is pride but an insatiable hunger for rank? What is avarice but an insatiable hunger for wealth? These things harmonize with what John said: "Whatever is in the world is either the concupiscence of the flesh, or the concupiscence of the eyes, or the pride of life." Hence St. Thomas, in his treatise On the Eucharist, uses this saying to draw men to frequent Communion: "The Lord will not afflict the soul of the just with famine," because the Eucharist quenches the above-mentioned hunger of vices; again, it quenches the hunger of the soul panting for it, and all its other wishes and desires; indeed, not rarely even bodily hunger. Thus John the Abbot, according to Palladius in the Lausiac History, chapter 61, lived for many years without food, nourishing himself solely on the Eucharist received on Sundays. St. Catherine of Siena lived for a long time on the Eucharist alone; indeed, having received it, she found all bodily food repulsive, and when compelled by her confessor's order to eat, she immediately rejected it, her stomach refusing.
AND HE WILL OVERTHROW THE PLOTS OF THE WICKED. — For 'plots' the Hebrew has הות (havvat), for which the Septuagint, reading חות (hovvat), translated 'life': "But the life of the wicked," they say, "He will overthrow." But the others read havvat, that is, vanity, wickedness, plots, ruin, destruction. Hence the Zurich version translates: 'but He will drive away the cunning (Vatablus: calamity, harm, destruction) of the wicked.' And so there is an antithesis with the preceding hemistich between the justice of the just and the plots of the wicked; for God protects and nourishes the former, and overthrows the latter — meaning: God will not allow the just and good to be despoiled of their goods and afflicted with famine; but the wicked, who through fraud and plots try to strip them of their goods and reduce them to famine, He will drive into the same ruin that they devised against the good, so that they are caught by their own tricks and ensnared by their own arts as by nets, and thus He will overthrow them. Hence Pagninus: 'and because of the wickedness of the wicked, God will drive them out.'
With a double benefit, therefore, God favors the just man, and as it were with a double weapon fights for him. First, by driving famine away from him; second, by scattering and overthrowing the plots of the wicked who try to reduce him to famine, according to Psalm 33:11: "The rich have suffered want and hunger; but those who seek the Lord shall not be deprived of any good thing." Moreover, David compares the plots of the wicked to the ambushes of lions lying in wait for prey and pouncing upon it: "He lies in wait in secret," he says, "like a lion in his den; he lies in wait to seize the poor, to seize the poor man when he draws him in" (Psalm 9:9); but God crushes these ambushes of the lions. Hence he adds in verse 15: "Break the arm of the sinner and the malicious; his sin will be sought and not found."
Finally, the Chaldean translates havvat as קנינא (kiniyana), that is, possessions; R. Saadia and Baynus as substance and wealth. Hence the Syriac: 'He will destroy the possessions of the wicked'; the Chaldean: 'He will drive out the possessions of the wicked,' meaning: God will protect the goods of the pious so that they are not afflicted with hunger, but He will overthrow the goods of the wicked so that they are tormented with hunger. For the Hebrew havvat is derived from חיה (haya), that is, to be, to subsist; hence it signifies substance, that is, possessions, and alludes to הון (hon), that is, riches. Again, you may translate havvat as 'being,' in this sense, meaning: God will overthrow the being and living of the wicked, that is, He will take away their life, as the Septuagint translates.
Verse 4: The Slack Hand Has Wrought Want
4. THE SLACK HAND HAS WROUGHT WANT; BUT THE HAND OF THE STRONG PREPARES RICHES. — The meaning is clear, as if to say: Labor begets wealth, idleness poverty; diligence enriches, negligence impoverishes; zeal is the parent of abundance, sloth of want.
For 'want' the Hebrew has ראש (rash); which, if read with a different vowel pointing as ראש (rosh), signifies poison, venom, as if to say: Laziness is like a slow poison, which gradually creeping through infects the whole man, and wears him down and kills him by torpor as much as by hunger. But the correct reading is rash, that is, want, not rosh, that is, poison; for the Septuagint, our Translator, the Chaldean, and the rest read rash. Understand 'want' literally as poverty of resources. Allegorically, Bede understands want of goods in heaven, meaning: Whoever has lived slackly and lazily in this life will lack all goods in the world to come.
The Hebrew has: 'He becomes poor who acts with a slack hand.'
For 'slack' the Hebrew has רמיה (remiyya), which signifies both deceitful and slack, that is, lax, listless, and lazy. For the lazy customarily extend their torpid hands from listlessness, indeed throw them about; likewise, because they do not want to work, they become deceitful and thieves in order to procure food for themselves, as we see in lazy beggars. Again, he who relies on fraud becomes slack and listless, because he thinks fraud suffices to procure his sustenance; but both are deceived, because both fraud and laziness are the cause of want — for God punishes the deceitful and reduces them to poverty, as experience shows. Hence the Chaldean translates: 'poverty diminishes the deceitful man, and the hand of the upright enriches'; the Syriac: 'but the hands of the just shall be enriched'; Pagninus: 'the deceitful hand makes poor'; the Zurich version: 'he who works with a deceitful hand is destitute.' Vatablus translates 'deceitful' as our Translator does, 'slack,' and connecting both explains it thus: He who by evil arts wishes to increase his estate, as the idle do who deceive others in order to live, will be reduced to want. R. Solomon, R. Levi, and Aben-Ezra translate כף רמיה (kaph remiyya — which our Translator renders 'the slack hand'; others, 'the deceitful hand') as 'deceitful scales.' Hence they transfer it thus: He will be destitute, whoever has deceitful scales, so as not to give the just weight of goods when selling, and to weigh them beyond the just weight when buying. The Septuagint translates: 'Poverty humbles a man,' that is, it makes his hand thrown down and abject, as the lowly and humble tend to be; the Arabic, following the Septuagint as usual, translates: 'poverty oppresses a man; the hands of the bold shall be enriched.'
Some understand the 'slack hand,' namely one slack in giving, as the miserly hand, meaning: כף (kaph), that is, the curved and closed hand, miserly and tenacious of goods, will bring want and penury; but on the contrary, the hand of the strong, that is, the open hand, that is, the liberal hand, lavish in almsgiving, heaps up riches and fortunes. Hence Sirach 4:36: "Let your hand," he says, "not be stretched out to receive and closed when it comes to giving." For, as the saying goes: "Many store up riches, very few distribute them." But this meaning is too narrow; and 'the slack hand' properly is not miserly but slothful and lazy, just as the hand of the strong is not liberal but laborious, diligent, and industrious.
For 'strong' the Hebrew has חרוצים (charutsim), which the Syriac translates 'of the just'; the Chaldean, 'of the upright'; the Septuagint, ἀνδρείων, that is, 'of the manly,' who act manfully; the Zurich version, 'of the diligent'; Baynus, 'of the attentive,' such as merchants careful about business tend to be; hence Pagninus translates: 'and the hand of diligent merchants shall enrich them.' Properly charutsim signifies keen men, who pursue vigorously what they conceive and begin, and do not desist until they bring it to its intended end. For the root חרץ (charats) signifies to sharpen, to whet, to exercise one's strength and ability, to act keenly and energetically, to press on, to bring a matter to its conclusion. Others translate charutsim as 'cut, concise, precise,' such as those attentive to business who demand or arrange their affairs precisely to the penny or the moment. Hence merchants have this axiom: 'If you wish to grow rich, be attentive to all things, even the smallest; neglect nothing, let no opportunity for profit, however small, pass by,' because from many small things something great and excellent comes about. Our Translator renders 'the strong,' that is, the diligent, the industrious. For he who is strong presses a matter vigorously and pushes it through to the end. For 'prepares riches' the Hebrew has תעשיר (ta'ashir); which if read with a different vowel pointing as תעשיר (ta'asir), that is, 'tithes' or 'makes tenfold,' the meaning will be: The vigorous labor of the diligent gains ten from one and multiplies the capital tenfold — just as fertile earth from one grain sown produces ten, indeed 30, 60, and 100.
Moreover, this saying holds true for spiritual riches (namely, wisdom and virtue) no less than for temporal ones. For the one devoted to the virtues will accumulate great heaps and treasures of them, while the negligent and lazy person will remain destitute of them — as the Comic poet says: 'The heavenly ones lend all things to mortals at the cost of sweat; / Whatever is in the world, all serves diligence. / By labor virtue and wealth both grow.' Therefore, just as merchants intent on wealth daily add profit to profit, coin to coin, gold piece to gold piece, so much more should the merchant of merits daily add virtue to virtue, act to act, degree to degree, and consider that day lost on which he has advanced nothing in virtue, on which he has given no alms whether bodily or spiritual, on which he has not conquered himself in some matter — and therefore let him flee sloth and idleness as a plague.
Of St. Anthony, Sozomen writes (Ecclesiastical History, book I, chapter 13): "He himself never took it into his mind to be idle, and he exhorted whoever wished to lead a virtuous life to labor." And St. Athanasius says that he gathered the honey of virtues from the company of the Saints like a bee: from one who excelled in humility he learned humility, from another patience, from a third charity, from a fourth another virtue in which he excelled. St. Ephrem, in his Spiritual Canticles: "He who loves idleness," he says, "will never prosper." St. Ambrose, On Cain, book I, chapter 4: "Not to the sleeping," he says, "not to the idle, but to the watchful are rewards promised, and recompense is prepared for labor." St. Leo: "The kingdom of heaven does not come to the sleeping, nor is eternal blessedness thrust upon those torpid with ease and sloth." St. Jerome, or whoever is the author, in the Letter to Demetrias: "The spirit must always be stirred," he says, "with spiritual spurs, and daily renewed with greater ardor. The urgency of prayer, illumination, reading, the solicitude of vigils — these are its daily and nightly stimuli. For nothing in this pursuit is worse than idleness, which not only fails to acquire new things, but even consumes what has been prepared... the plan of a holy life rejoices in progress and grows, but grows torpid and fails through cessation." St. Bernard, in the book On Consideration to Eugenius, chapter 13: "If rightly," he says, "the Wise Man urges that wisdom be written in leisure, one must beware of leisure itself being idle. Therefore idleness must be fled — the mother of trifles, the stepmother of virtues." St. Basil, in the Monastic Constitutions, chapter 5: "What of the Apostles? Did they not also imitate the Lord? Were they not assiduous in labors? Consider Paul laboring ceaselessly." Of Blessed Alcuin, who flourished in the time of Charlemagne in Gaul for his reputation in learning, the author of his Life writes: "He fled idleness by every means. For he was either reading, or writing, or teaching his students, or devoting himself to prayer, or to the chanting of psalms, indulging only the unavoidable necessities of the body." St. Bonaventure, in the Rule for Novices, chapter 8: "Let your whole life run through these three things: that you always either pray, or read, or serve — especially the elderly, visitors, and the sick; and when services are done, do not stand idle with the brethren, but go at once to your cell and pray or read there."
This was once the sole pursuit of Religious and Anchorites, who were therefore called Ascetics, that is, trainers, because they trained themselves in continuous battle with vices and in victory, and in the perpetual practice of the opposing virtues. Such was Barlaam, who, exhorting his disciple Josaphat to the same asceticism, said among other things that "the virtues are the ladders of heaven"; therefore, just as heaven is separated from us by an immense distance of height, so by many great steps we must strive and climb there by the ladders of the virtues. See Damascene, in the History (of Barlaam and Josaphat), chapters 11 and following. If we were to grow daily in charity, humility, and patience — if we were to add three degrees daily — we would ascend to heaven by as many steps, as it were; and after a year, indeed after ten or twenty years, how high we would see ourselves to have climbed, what great heaps of virtues and merits we would see ourselves to have accumulated, and would rejoice! Think of eternity. Life is short: live, endure, labor, trade for eternity.
Abbot Athanasius, says John Moschus in the Spiritual Meadow, chapter 130, was caught up in ecstasy and saw choirs praising God, and when he desired to enter among them, he heard: "No one enters here who is negligent; go, strive, despise the vanities of the world." Thus one goes to the stars. And in chapter 105, an Angel said to Christopher: "Pray that we may light your candle." Then he said to himself: "Christopher, greater labor is needed."
HE WHO RELIES ON LIES FEEDS ON WINDS; AND THE SAME MAN PURSUES BIRDS IN FLIGHT. — This saying is now absent from the Hebrew, the Chaldean, some Latin manuscripts, and the Complutensian Septuagint, although it is found in the Roman editions — not in this place, but in the preceding chapter, after verse 12. However, the Roman Latin editions have it, and St. Augustine read it (Against Cresconius, book III, chapter 9), as did Clement of Alexandria (Stromata, book I), Antonius in the Melissa (Sermon 22), and others. Therefore it seems to have once existed in the Hebrew and to have the canonical authority of Sacred Scripture. Akin to this is the Arab proverb: "A lie is weakness, and truth is health. A lie is baseness, and truth is magnificence, or nobility."
By 'lies,' first, understand riches acquired through fraud and lies, so that this maxim pertains to the one that preceded: 'The slack hand has wrought want,' for which others translate 'deceitful' — as if to say: He who strives to grow rich through lies and fraud feeds on winds, that is, he labors vainly and fruitlessly, as if he were feeding winds; or, as the popular saying goes, hunting winds with a net — for the winds immediately burst through it. In the same way, riches which the miser seeks through fraud will fly away from him like wind and birds in flight; he will pursue them but not overtake them. Hence St. Gregory Nazianzen says admirably: "What need is there," he says, "to store up many riches amid the changes of time, which blow unstable wealth from one to another?" The same to terrified citizens: "One should trust winds or letters written on water," he says, "more than riches." And in his oration to Julian, the tax commissioner: "As dust by a whirlwind," he says, "so riches are constantly blown and tossed from one to another, and melt away like smoke, and delude men like a dream, and like a shadow cannot be held in the hands — neither hopeless for those who lack them, nor certain enough for those who possess them." The same to Seleucus, in Iambic 3, asserts that riches "sport with avaricious minds" and imitate 'the wiles of a harlot, who deceives her suitors deceitfully, / playing with this one in one way, that one in another.' Again, they are 'like waves, which with a gentle motion / we see carried aloft, yet quickly fall.'
Hence the Roman Septuagint, at chapter 9:12, after 'He who relies on lies feeds on winds,' appends these two maxims: 'For he has deserted the ways of his own vineyard, and has wandered in the paths of his own little field; he walks through trackless and dry places, through land destined for thirst, and gathers with his hands what is fruitless.' By these words, just as the one who relies on lies was first compared to one feeding winds, and second to one pursuing flying birds, so third he is compared to a foolish farmer who deserts his vineyard and, wandering through his own field (from which, as from his vineyard, if he cultivated both, he would reap great fruits of wine and grain), passes on to trackless, dry, and thirst-parched places, from which he could hope for no fruit — hence 'he gathers with his hands what is fruitless,' or, as the translator of Clement of Alexandria (Stromata, book III) renders it, 'gathering with his hands the barrenness of fruits,' meaning: Instead of fruit and harvest, he reaps nothing but aridity and barrenness.
Hence Clement, applying all this to lying heresy and heretics (Stromata, book III): "He who relies on falsehoods," he says, "feeds on winds and pursues winged birds. The word here does not mean philosophy, since philosophy argues and speaks plausibly to many; but it pursues heresies. It therefore infers: 'For he has left the ways of his own vineyard, and has wandered in the paths of his own agriculture.' These are those who abandon the Church from the beginning. Now he who has fallen into heresy passes through the wilderness without water, traversing thirsty land, gathering with his hands the barrenness of fruits."
Second, by 'lies' understand the deceitful and false hopes which men, having abandoned God, place in friends, relatives, and princes; likewise in their own wealth, strength, talent, and wisdom, in order to attain some favor, dignity, riches, a prelacy, glory, etc. For such a man feeds on winds, that is, he labors in vain, because either he does not attain what he seeks, or, if he does attain it, he will not find in it the rest and joy he was looking for, but vexations, weariness, anxieties, jealousies, and a thousand similar troubles — so that he repents of what he has done and wishes and says: 'Would that I had never sought this dignity! Would that I had never attained it!'
Third, by 'lies' understand false reasonings, errors, paralogisms, and fallacies, by which heretics, sophists, and proud teachers strive to uphold and support their doctrines. For they feed winds, because once the falsity of their reasoning is exposed, their doctrines, honor, and authority collapse and flee from them like birds in flight. So St. Augustine (Against Cresconius, book III, chapter 9), who applies this maxim to Cresconius and the Donatists, and by 'winds' understands demons, who are inflated and inflating spirits like winds: "He who trusts in falsehoods," he says, "feeds winds, that is, becomes food for evil spirits." But this is a mystical interpretation, not the literal one.
Fourth, by 'lies' understand any words and deeds spoken and done deceitfully, by which liars strive to excuse and conceal their vices, or to obtain something. For he who relies on them feeds winds: because once the lie and fraud is detected, he will obtain nothing except the reputation of a liar and cheat.
What it means 'to feed winds' I explained at Hosea 12:1, where, concerning Israel placing its hopes in the Assyrians and Egyptians — but these were deceptive, because through them he was not freed from the hand of Nebuchadnezzar the Chaldean — it says: "Ephraim feeds on wind and pursues the heat." Where I said that 'feeds' can first be taken passively, meaning: Ephraim feeds, that is, eats winds; he lives and feeds on wind. So the proud feed on honor and on the swollen opinion of themselves, as on wind, inflated and puffed up with which they strut about — just as chameleons feed on wind. But just as a chameleon living on wind is juiceless and bloodless, and therefore changes colors and takes on the color of what it is placed upon, so too the ambitious man, dried out by ambition and bloodless from fear of losing his honor, is now ruddy and cheerful, now pale and sad, now fortunate, now wretched; and therefore he cannot be happy. So Aristotle, Magna Moralia, book I, chapter 3.
Second, 'feeds' can be taken actively, so that 'feeds winds' means the same as 'gives food to winds,' namely gives himself as food to the winds — so that the winds, namely the Assyrians in whom he trusts, may devour him. Or 'feeds,' that is, rules, and leads winds to pasture, as a shepherd rules and leads to pasture cattle, sheep, goats, etc. For this is what the Hebrew רעה (ra'a) properly means, according to Psalm 22 (23):1: "The Lord rules (in Hebrew ra'a, that is, feeds as a shepherd his sheep) me, and I shall want nothing; in a place of pasture there He has placed me." For it is foolish and impossible to rule winds like sheep and lead them to pasture — even if through magic, magicians sometimes seem to feed winds.
For the people of Methone, says Pausanias (in Corinthiaca), offer a cock to the raging wind, and having torn it apart and buried it under the vines, they calm the harmful blasts of the south wind. Eunapius and Suidas, and after them Sigonius (On the Western Empire, book IV), relate that Constantine the Great beheaded the philosopher Sopater because he had detained the winds by his incantations, preventing ships from bringing grain to Constantinople when it was afflicted by famine. The Finns and Lapps of the Septentrional (northern) peoples would sell winds to merchants, offering them three knots consecrated by magic art hanging from a leather strap; when the first was untied they would have gentle winds, the second stronger, the third the most violent. So Olaus (book III, chapter 16) from Saxo Grammaticus. They use this art against sailors at their discretion, as it seems more or less favorable to them; thus they stop and stir breezes and rivers, says Ziegler in his Scandia. See more in Alexander ab Alexandro, Genial Days, book III, chapter 12. But these are superstitious and magical practices, and therefore supremely harmful. For magicians pledge their own souls and bodies, and those of their clients, to the devil in exchange for wind. Setting aside the magical, take the physical. When once the Etesian winds blew so violently that they damaged the crops, Empedocles ordered donkeys to be skinned and made into bladders, and these to be stretched on the promontories to catch the wind; when it subsided, he was called κωλυσάνεμος (kolusanemos), that is, 'preventer of winds,' says Suidas — on his own authority. For this too is difficult to believe; and even if it were true, this is not feeding, that is, ruling winds at will, nor providing them pasture. For God alone, who creates the winds, also feeds and rules them, and in this shows His magnificence and omnipotence.
Hence He is said to walk, indeed to fly upon the wings of the winds (Psalm 17:11); and the winds are the angels, that is, the messengers of God, according to the saying: "Who makes His angels spirits," that is, winds (Psalm 103:4). And Job 28:25: "Who made," he says, "a weight for the winds, and weighed the waters by measure." And Amos 4:13 calls God "the one who forms the mountains and creates the wind," where I said more on this matter. Hence when the Emperor Theodosius fought for God, the winds of God fought for Theodosius against Eugenius, turning the weapons of the enemy back upon the enemies themselves, so that Theodosius may be said to have fed the winds and in turn the winds to have fed Theodosius — concerning whom Claudian says in the Panegyric: 'O beloved of God beyond measure, for whom the heavens fight, / And the conspiring winds come at the trumpet's call.'
Note: A lie is rightly compared to wind and to flying birds. First, because just as wind is fluid, light, and fleeting, and immediately vanishes into thin air, so too a lie, like wind and smoke, is scattered and vanishes. "Those things which deceive," says Seneca (Epistle 8), "have nothing solid in them; a lie is thin, if you look at it closely."
Second, just as wind does not remain but passes by most swiftly, so too a lie. Hence Petrarch elegantly, in book II of On the Solitary Life, comparing a lie with a diver who lives under water: "Pretenses," he says, "are immediately exposed, the disguise is washed away by sweat, and even a clever lie yields to the truth, and is transparent when scrutinized more closely. No one lives long under water; he must burst forth and reveal the face he was hiding, so as to feed on wind and gentle air."
Third, just as from one wind many others are generated, some contrary to each other, which conflict and struggle among themselves, so from one lie many more are born, and these mutually contrary and conflicting.
Fourth, wind, though thin and empty, inflates wineskins — and liars swell with the wind of vanity and pride. Furthermore, wind makes birds sing; for swans breathed upon by the west wind sing more sweetly. For the dense plumage of their wings is raised, resembling the tuned strings of a lyre, and the zephyr immediately provides the plectrum. Moreover, just as there are hydraulic organs driven by water, so there are also wind organs (anemaulica), which, with wind artfully captured, produce harmonious sounds. I have seen such instruments at Tusculum, in which nightingales and other birds, fashioned by art to resemble living nightingales and birds, sang and warbled by the marvelous artifice of wind. In a similar way, the wind of vanity and ostentation drives liars to compose and declaim their lies artfully and elegantly; but just as in those instruments there is no fruit beyond the sound, so also in these. For liars are like sounding brass and a tinkling cymbal.
Fifth, St. Basil, Homily 6 on the Hexameron, says: Vultures and roosters, carried up into the airy regions, conceive eggs by the sole breath and intake of winds — which, because they come from wind, are therefore called wind-eggs, that is, sterile, empty, and wind-born. So liars, from wind, that is, from the devil who is the father of lies, conceive lies, frauds, and wiles, which are outwardly attractive but inwardly empty and vanish into smoke; they feed no one but the devil, whose eggs and offspring they are. Hence St. Augustine, Against Cresconius, book III, chapter 9: "Moreover," he says, "if cursed is he who places his hope in man, how much more he who places his hope in the falsehood of human opinion? So that he falls into that other saying which is written: 'He who trusts in falsehoods feeds winds, that is, becomes food for evil spirits.'" Of such people, Hosea 10:13 says: "You have ploughed wickedness, you have reaped iniquity, you have eaten the fruit of lying; because you trusted in your ways, in the multitude of your warriors."
Sixth, wind, though thin, is sometimes so powerful that it levels and overthrows trees, towers, and houses; so too a lie, though empty in itself, is sometimes so disguised and armed with deceptions and frauds that it stirs up wars of extermination between kings and peoples, and overthrows cities, kingdoms, and empires.
Tropologically, those are windy and feed winds who chase after popular opinions and rumors, and who delight in flattering themselves and detracting from others; for many lies are mixed with these things. For as Jeremiah says (9:3): "They have bent their tongue like a bow of falsehood." Therefore such people feed winds, and like stupid dogs chase flying birds, until they realize their folly too late, repent of it, and laugh at and condemn it. So Hugo.
Finally, those who trust in creatures rather than in the Creator. For all creatures are wind and shadow compared to the Creator. Hence the Psalmist, in Psalm 4:3, exclaims in compassion: "Sons of men, how long will you be heavy of heart? Why do you love vanity and seek after lies?" And Isaiah 28:15: "We have made lies our hope, and with lying we are protected, etc. Hail shall sweep away the hope of lies." And Jeremiah 13:25: "This is your lot, and the portion of your measure from Me, says the Lord, because you have forgotten Me and trusted in lies." And 16:19: "Truly our fathers possessed lies, vanity that profited them nothing."
After the maxim just explained, the Septuagint here appends another, which is not found in the Hebrew or in the Latin Vulgate, and it is this: "A well-taught son shall be wise, and shall use the imprudent as a servant." St. Augustine reads it (City of God, book XVI, chapter 2) and explains it thus: "The wicked customarily disturb the peace of the Saints; but this turns to the benefit of those who are progressing, according to that saying of the Apostle: 'There must be heresies, so that those who are approved may be made manifest among you.' Hence also it is written: 'The well-taught son shall be wise; but he shall use the imprudent as a servant,'" meaning: God's providence brings it about that the wicked, for example heretics, harass the faithful and pious, for their testing — so that they may grow in faith and virtue; therefore the imprudent, that is, the wicked, although they seem to dominate the pious, in reality minister and serve, because God uses them as servants to sharpen the virtue and glory of the pious.
Again, meaning: A son trained in discipline and well-formed in conduct is wise; yet often, by God's arrangement, it happens that he has an imprudent servant, so that the servant may exercise both his patience and his prudence, and so that the imprudent servant may be wisely governed by his prudent master and learn prudence. Moreover, servants, because they are of servile temperament — if they find a wise master, that is, a gentle and pious one, they grow insolent and troublesome to him; but if they find a harsh and imperious one, they submit. Therefore a wise man should treat servile temperaments in a servile way, and use that saying of Melania in Palladius, Lausiac History, chapter 117: "Against the foolish, one must use pride of spirit as one uses a dog and a hawk."
Third, and very aptly, you may explain it thus: to signify the power, authority, dignity, and majesty of wisdom, which is so great that it commands and rules even the foolish — meaning: A well-trained and prudent son will not only be wise for himself, but will be able to govern others, indeed will know how to use the imprudent and foolish as servants; for by his wisdom he will know how to tame and govern them, and to which tasks to assign them, so that they may learn to be wise themselves and useful to others. This is what Ecclesiasticus says, following Solomon (10:28): "Free men shall serve the sensible slave." See what was said there.
Verse 5: He Who Gathers in the Harvest
5. HE WHO GATHERS IN THE HARVEST (Chaldean: who works in summer) IS A WISE SON; BUT HE WHO SNORES IN SUMMER (Chaldean: in the harvest) IS A SON OF CONFUSION. — In Hebrew: 'a son who brings shame,' both upon himself and upon his parents, household, and family. This is a precept or admonition of economic prudence. Therefore, grammatically and literally it signifies that the farmer (such as the ancient patriarchs were, and most people in the first ages of the world) must labor during the summer harvest, by God's command (Genesis 2:15 and 3:17), to prepare food for himself and his family for winter: for if he is idle and snores and lets the harvest pass, in winter he will go hungry and be forced to beg, or he will be consumed by famine — which will be a great loss to him, as well as confusion and disgrace. Parallel to this maxim is that saying from Ben Sira's Alphabet 2, letter Lamed: "Do not sleep in your youth, and in your old age do not marry an old woman."
Symbolically, therefore, beneath the surface of the letter and the parable it is signified, first, that one must labor in youth so that sustenance may be prepared for old age. Again, in youth one must devote oneself to wisdom and virtue, so that we may enjoy them in old age. For youth is rightly called summer and harvest, because it is vigorous, spirited, fervent, suited to study and labors, teachable, and talented; for just as the mind and body are formed and habituated either to virtue or vice, either to labor or idleness, in youth, so it endures and perseveres through nearly the rest of life. Hence the Septuagint translates: 'The intelligent son escaped unharmed from the heat' (they read for אגר [oger], that is, 'gathering,' with other vowels אגר [agur], that is, 'gathered, preserved, unharmed'); 'but seized by the wind, the wicked son is made in the harvest' — meaning: A wise young man in adolescence, when the heat of blood and desire usually boils over, escapes from it unharmed, because he extinguishes this heat by taming and mortifying his passions; but the foolish one, who allows himself to be swept away in youth by the burning wind or blight of desire, 'becomes a wicked son in the harvest,' that is, in old age, when men usually reap what they sowed and learned in youth. For the virtues and vices of youth cling to a man until old age and death. Blight is a burning wind that dries out grain — that is, the ears of wheat — so that they are empty and yield no flour; so too desire dries out all the vigor and marrow of virtue, and makes a man empty and void of all good and virtue.
The author of the Greek Chain explains the Septuagint version thus, meaning: Crosses and calamities accepted with a patient spirit bring life, but with an impatient spirit they bring death. "The intelligent man," he says, "who has been refined and tested through crosses and calamities, no differently than gold is tested through a burning furnace, brings forth the joyful fruits of justice. On the contrary, the wicked man is often corrupted, depraved, and utterly destroyed even by those things through which he ought to have become better." Didymus in the same place: "He who is strong in natural wisdom and understanding," he says, "neither the sun burns by day nor the moon by night. By 'heat' he designates the cares and troubles of this life. Those who are cast down and as it were fail because of such things, he calls hay. Christ our Savior, in the Gospel parable, calls those afflictions and persecutions which sometimes come on account of the word of God 'heat.'"
Second, summer and harvest are a symbol of opportunity, or the fitting time for accomplishing something well, meaning: He who seizes the opportunity to complete a task while it presents itself is wise; he who neglects it is foolish — for "opportunity is hairy in front and bald behind."
Third, summer is a symbol of the present life, winter of death and the state of the world to come, where there is no time for laboring and reaping — meaning: He who by laboring accumulates for himself in this life the merits of good works, so as to gather from them the rewards of eternity, is truly wise; but he who neglects these things in this life and gapes and sleeps over the body, gluttony, and luxury, is foolish and will be confounded on the day of judgment — because then he will see that he is condemned for having neglected this time, and tormented in hell with eternal flames. Hence the wise Ecclesiastes admonishes (9:10): "Whatever your hand is able to do, do it earnestly; because neither work, nor reason, nor wisdom, nor knowledge shall be in the underworld, where you hasten." Therefore St. Gregory Nazianzen in his Tetrastichs says that the present life is a marketplace in which all things may be purchased, after which there is nothing: 'Believe me, this life is a marketplace; / If you know how to trade, you will gain profit, / Exchanging passing things for lasting goods: / After this time, no other will be given.' So Gregory Nazianzen.
Mystically, Hugo says: Tribulations and labors, with which men are continually afflicted in this life, are the heat and summer, in which one may gather a great harvest of humility, patience, charity, and other virtues. Therefore he who is wise seizes this time; but he who is foolish lets it flow by and loses it through impatience, listlessness, and sloth. To this purpose serves the example of the ant proposed by Solomon (6:6): "Which prepares its food in summer and gathers in the harvest what it may eat." Where I recounted many analogies between the ant and diligence.
Verse 6: The Blessing of the Lord Is upon the Just
6. THE BLESSING OF THE LORD IS UPON THE HEAD OF THE JUST; BUT THE MOUTH OF THE WICKED COVERS INIQUITY. — The Complutensian edition and some others read 'iniquity' [as the object]; in Hebrew: 'blessings upon the head (or for the head) of the just; but the mouth of the wicked covers iniquity, or iniquity [as the object],' as Symmachus and Aquila translate; Theodotion has 'robbery'; Vatablus, 'injury.'
Now first, Vatablus gives this meaning: The just man is accustomed to be blessed, but the wicked man always plans evil, namely to inflict injury, calumny, and robbery on others. But here no antithesis between the just and the wicked is apparent.
Second, Cajetan: meaning, the disposition and character of the just man is to bless others, that is, to wish and do them well if he can; but 'the mouth of the wicked covers iniquity,' or, as he translates it, 'is covered with iniquity,' because it is full of curses, calumnies, reproaches, etc. Here the antithesis between the blessing of the pious and the cursing of the wicked is clear.
Third, some explain 'upon the head' as meaning 'with head uncovered,' and he displays it openly: 'The blessing of the Lord is upon the head of the just,' that is, they say, the just man displays and publicizes openly what he has earned justly and acquired by honest industry. For so it is said below: "Glorious is the fruit of good lips." And in Acts 20:34, St. Paul said boastingly: "You yourselves know that these hands have ministered to me and to those who are with me." On the contrary: "The mouth of the wicked covers iniquity," or robbery, or injustice (all amount to the same thing), that is, he conceals and hides his gains, and does not dare to publicly expose the arts and frauds by which he has grown rich; for frauds and crimes, because they are shameful, flee the light and love the darkness.
Fourth, meaning: 'Blessing,' that is, the grace of God, covers the head of the just; but iniquity and crime covers the mouth and head of the wicked — meaning: Grace and sin distinguish the just from the wicked; for grace belongs to the just, sin to the wicked. Therefore the works of the just are works of grace and virtue, while the works of the wicked are robberies, frauds, and crimes. Hence the Chaldean translates: 'in the mouth of the wicked, robbery is covered.' And R. Levi: "Upon the just man's head," he says, "blessings flow down, so that he may be wise-hearted; for he will continually be engaged in thinking about good things. Or the word 'head' suggests the beginnings of a matter: for at the outset the just man reveals the blessings with which he proceeds, laden; but the wicked man conceals the iniquity he devises, lest, if it be detected, he be prevented from carrying it out. This signifies therefore that the just man, whenever he undertakes something, always finds himself increased by blessing; and also that goods are heaped upon him and help is provided so that he may enjoy the desired end — since he has nothing in his wishes except what is honorable and beneficial to others. Therefore at the beginning of an enterprise one may hope that blessings will be bestowed upon him; for if others are aware of his intention, they will most willingly lend their aid. But for the wicked it is otherwise. For they always fear lest they fail to obtain what they eagerly desire, if others perceive it; therefore they wish their crime to remain hidden from others — the crime they wickedly plot to accomplish. In this regard, a similar thing is related of them, since the memory of the just man is in blessing," etc.
Fifth and genuinely, meaning: 'Blessing,' that is, an abundance of all good things, will flow down and, as it were, rain from heaven upon the head of the just man; but the mouth and head of the wicked iniquity will cover, that is, the punishment of iniquity, which, because it is just, will so shut their mouths that they dare not even mutter or whisper against God or men, according to Psalm 106 (107):42: "The upright shall see and rejoice, and all iniquity shall stop its mouth." Therefore confusion, condemnation, and punishment for frauds, lies, injuries, and other iniquities which they committed with mouth and head (for there reside reason and will) shall cover the wicked.
Where note: first, that by 'mouth' the head and face are understood synecdochically; but he says 'mouth' because the wicked perpetrate most of their frauds, injustices, and crimes with their mouth. Second, 'iniquity' is taken metonymically for the punishment of iniquity, both here and often elsewhere. Hence the Septuagint translates: 'but the mouth of the wicked shall be covered with untimely mourning,' in Greek πένθος ἄωρον, which the translator of the Greek Chain renders in the nominative as 'untimely wailing and mourning.' Hence Origen explains it there: "For the just man, who is prudent and virtuous, even difficult and afflicted matters become easy; but for one in a different disposition, even light things that have some consolation seem difficult." The meaning of the Septuagint therefore is: Quickly will the wicked be punished, even before the time they expected, and therefore they will mourn — even though they sometimes try through confusion to conceal their mourning and cover and hide it by putting on a cheerful face. Again, this will be untimely wailing, that is, before the time of the last judgment and of hell, so that this mourning is a prelude to the eternal wailing. Third, by 'just' understand anyone, but especially the merciful and the alms-giver; for in Scripture he is peculiarly called just, and he, being beneficent, is accustomed to be blessed by God and men.
Hence to this is aptly opposed חמס (chamas), that is, violence, injury, and iniquity, which the wicked man customarily inflicts on others, and therefore incurs punishment and retribution, according to Psalm 108 (109):17: "He persecuted the poor man and the man of a contrite heart, to put him to death; he loved cursing, and it shall come upon him."
Therefore our Salazar explains it thus: 'The blessing of the Lord is upon the head of the just,' that is, an abundance of all good things will come to the merciful man; 'but the mouth of the wicked covers iniquity,' that is, the punishment of iniquity — namely God's curse, poverty, and Blessings upon the head of the just: all justly pray for his prosperity. And: 'but the mouth of the wicked covers injury, or violence': upon the wicked, whose mouth speaks nothing but injurious things, all who know them call down curses, which God will hear. The imprecation of curses is to be supplied from the opposite ('blessings'), just as often one member must be supplied from the other. Indeed, such sayings, in which the meaning is not immediately obvious, are constructed in this way so that they may sharpen and engage the mind of the hearer or reader, arouse the desire for knowledge, and exercise the powers of the intellect through inquiry itself. want, shall press upon the merciless and the miser — especially when on the day of judgment, together with their fellow merciless ones, they will hear from Christ the Judge: "Depart, accursed ones, into eternal fire. For I was hungry, and you did not give Me to eat"; while on the other hand the merciful will hear: "Come, blessed of My Father, possess the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. For I was hungry, and you gave Me to eat" (Matthew 25). Hence St. Chrysostom, in his homily That Almsgiving Is the Most Profitable Art of All: "Almsgiving," he says, "is a garment that will rise with a man; in these garments they will shine who then hear: 'You saw Me hungry,'" etc.
A notable example of this saying is found in Joseph (Genesis 49:25), to which Solomon here alludes: for Jacob his father, about to die, blessed his son Joseph, just and holy, saying: "The Almighty will bless you with the blessings of the breasts and of the womb," etc. See what was said there.
Verse 7: The Memory of the Just Is with Praises
7. THE MEMORY OF THE JUST IS WITH PRAISES; AND THE NAME OF THE WICKED SHALL ROT. — In Hebrew: 'the memory of the just is for (or unto) blessing'; the Septuagint: 'the memory of the just is with praise, but the name of the unjust is extinguished'; the Chaldean: 'the memory of the just is a blessing'; the Syriac: 'in blessing'; the Zurich version: 'the memory of the just has praise' (Vatablus: 'is famous and celebrated'); 'but the name of the wicked stinks' (Vatablus: 'shall wither and rot'). The meaning is: The memory of the just man is pleasing, sweet, and honored, so that both God and sensible men, when they mention him, bless, praise, and celebrate him; but the name, fame, reputation, praise, and glory of the wicked gradually deteriorates, becomes foul, is rejected, and is abolished. Thus Sirach 44 and following praises Abraham, Noah, Moses, Aaron, David, and other just men of the Old Testament, and the Apostle does the same in Hebrews 11.
Again, Aben-Ezra translates and explains it thus: "The memory of the just is with blessing," that is, God will remember the just man on account of the blessing with which He will heap him, according to Psalm 113 (115):12: "The Lord has been mindful of us, and has blessed us." Therefore He will remember the just man and pursue him with blessing; but the name of the wicked shall rot, that is, it will be consigned to oblivion like a rotten tree that does not grow again. And Baynus says: It can happen that the wicked man, while hiding his crime, enjoys the reputation of a just and good man for some time; but as a flower gradually withers, and flesh not preserved with salt rots, so the fame of the wicked man, lacking the fruit of virtue and the salt of divine wisdom, withers and decays.
The infamy of the wicked is aptly compared to putrefaction. First, because putrefaction occurs when some part of a whole becomes corrupt, which gradually infects and corrupts the other parts. So one vice creeps to another, and consequently one infamy to another, which gradually infects and stains the whole man.
Second, putrefaction occurs when the decaying parts are separated from the healthy and whole ones. So infamy arises when vices are separated from virtues, and when someone separates himself from the company of the good and associates with the wicked; for these rub off their own wickedness upon him and breathe infamy upon him.
Third, first moist things rot, then dry things, namely when the parts that decay separate themselves from nature and from their natural balance of heat and cold, moisture and dryness. "Therefore all other things rot except fire; for earth, water, and air rot (and indeed also wood, stones, and metals); for all these are matter for fire," says Aristotle (Meteorology, book IV, chapter 2). So when someone departs from his duty — that is, from the moderation that his state and rank require — then he contracts vice and infamy.
Fourth, Aristotle in the same place defines putrefaction from its principles and causes thus: "Putrefaction," he says, "is the corruption of the heat which exists properly and according to nature in each moist thing, by an alien heat — that is, the heat of the surrounding environment. Therefore, since it suffers according to a deficiency of heat, and since everything that is deficient in such power is cold, both will be causes: putrefaction is a common affection of both one's own coldness and alien heat. For this reason all things that rot become drier, and finally turn to earth and dung. For when the proper heat departs, the moisture that exists according to nature evaporates, and that which induces moisture is no more — for the proper heat drew it in." In the same way the soul rots from internal cold and external heat — namely when the love of God grows cold within it and the love of the world is kindled: the love of riches, honors, and pleasures. For through the latter, all the vital sap of charity and the virtues gradually evaporates, and in its place succeeds the decay and corruption of concupiscence.
Fifth, Aristotle concludes from what has been said that things rot more easily in summer than in winter, in lukewarmness than in fervor, and in rest than in motion. "And in cold weather," he says, "they rot less than in heat; for in winter there is little heat in the surrounding air and water, so it can do nothing; but in summer there is more. Nor does what is frozen rot, since it is colder than the warm air and is therefore not overcome; but that which moves dominates. Nor does what is hot or fervent rot, since the heat in the air is less than that in the thing, and so it does not dominate or cause any change. Similarly, what moves and flows rots less than what does not move; for the motion produced by the heat in the air is weaker than that which pre-exists in the thing, and so it causes no change. And the same reason explains why a large quantity rots less than a small one: for in a larger body the proper fire is more ample, as is the cold, than the powers of the surrounding environment can master. Therefore even the sea, when divided into parts, quickly rots; but the whole does not. And other waters behave in the same way."
In a similar way, in summer, that is, in prosperity, virtue and reputation rot more easily through vices than in winter, that is, in adversity. Likewise in lukewarmness rather than in fervor, and in rest rather than in motion — that is, the motion by which one is carried toward good works. For this motion sharpens the heat of virtue and charity, which excludes all the putrefaction of vices — as does the company of the just, which is like a sea of holiness. He who separates himself from it is easily corrupted and rots, as can be seen in apostates from Religious Orders.
Sixth, from putrefaction worms and serpents are born. Hence that saying of Ovid (Metamorphoses, book XV): 'There are those who believe that when the spine has putrefied in a closed tomb, / the human marrow is changed into a snake.' Moreover, reason and experience teach that the corpses and worms of those who indulged in luxuries, the belly, and lust are more putrid, foul, and horrible than those of the sober and chaste. In a similar way, those infamous for their vices beget serpents — that is, sons, grandsons, friends, and companions with serpentine morals; for they themselves taught these by word and example. So the posthumous and putrid fame of Arius, Luther, Calvin, and Machiavelli still today begets Arians, Lutherans, Calvinists, and Machiavellians — especially because their disciples and books survive, continually propagating their sect. For nothing is more venomous and pestilent than heretical, magical, and amatory books; for from these many learn and absorb heresy, magic, and illicit loves.
Seventh, Pliny assigns honey as a remedy for putrefaction. For thus he says (Natural History, book 22, chapter 24): "Honey has such a nature that it does not allow bodies to rot, with a pleasant and not harsh flavor, different from the nature of salt." Therefore, just as salt by its saltiness, so honey by its sweetness preserves bodies from putrefaction. Honey is a symbol of goodness, kindness, affability, and beneficence; for these procure for a man the best reputation and sweeten and correct all infamy. Hence of Josiah it is said (Sirach 49:1): "The memory of Josiah is like the composition of a perfume made by the art of a perfumer. In every mouth his memory will be sweet as honey." See what was said there.
Again, cedar is a remedy for putrefaction; for, as Pliny says (Natural History, book 24, chapter 5), "it preserves dead bodies incorrupt for ages, but corrupts living ones — a remarkable difference, since it takes away life from the living but serves as life for the dead." Hence things 'worthy of the cedar' are called worthy of eternity; for cedar, because it is incorruptible, is a symbol of immortality and eternity. Cedar is moreover a symbol of wisdom, integrity, and strength, as I showed at length in Sirach 24:17. Furthermore, balsam is a remedy for putrefaction, because it supplies a fragrant and powerful sap by which bodies are as it were nourished and preserved. Balsam is a symbol of fragrant and holy deeds, by which fame and glory are nourished lest they rot. Hence Plutarch in his Moralia: "The ship of Delos," he says, "while it is continually repaired and refitted, is rendered perpetual for many ages; so too something must always be added to fame, lest it rot."
Verse 8: The Wise of Heart Receives Commandments
8. THE WISE OF HEART RECEIVES COMMANDMENTS; THE FOOL IS BEATEN ON THE LIPS. — The word 'of heart' goes with 'wise,' not with 'commandments,' as is clear from the Hebrew construction. For 'is beaten' the Hebrew has ילבט (yillabet), which the Septuagint translates 'shall be tripped up'; the Chaldean, 'shall be caught'; Theodotion, φυρήσεται, that is, 'shall be fermented,' shall be kneaded and worn down like dough with leaven; Aquila, 'shall be beaten'; Symmachus, 'shall be tormented'; Baynus, 'shall fall'; R. Joseph, 'shall limp'; R. Solomon, 'shall be wearied'; the Zurich version, 'runs into various things'; Marinus, Vatablus, and others generally: 'stumbles, offends.' All these versions come to the same thing.
Therefore, first the plain meaning is: He who is wise 'in heart,' that is, truly wise, gladly accepts the precepts of superiors and teachers and allows himself to be taught and admonished by them. But the fool is beaten by the lips of the one who teaches and corrects him, because it is painful for him to hear the teacher and the one rebuking his faults; therefore with as many words as he is corrected, he is beaten and punished as with so many lashes. So Bede, Lyranus, Jansenius, Baynus, and others say, and in this sense the antithesis between the wise man and the fool is clear.
Second, 'the fool is beaten on the lips' — his own lips; and as the Chaldean translates, 'by his own lips he is caught,' because, rashly blurting out many things, murmuring against his superior, detracting, threatening, he is easily convicted by bystanders of lying, sedition, fraud, calumny, slander, etc., and not infrequently pays the penalty. And so by his own insolent lips he is beaten, that is, he brings blows, wounds, and lashes upon himself. Hence Pagninus translates: 'on account of his lips he shall be punished.' He therefore contrasts the wise man with the fool: the former receives the teaching, admonitions, laws, and decrees of superiors in silence, patience, and willingness; but the latter, garrulous and turbulent, clamors against them, murmurs, and babbles much against prelates and superiors (as we see happen when new laws are enacted and promulgated) — for which he is punished and brings grave harm upon himself. For it is the folly of such men that the Wise Man here rebukes. This meaning is very apt.
Third, the word 'lips' can, from the Hebrew, be connected with 'fool,' not with 'is beaten,' so that the antithesis is between 'the wise in heart' and 'the fool in lips,' or, as Cajetan translates, 'the fool of lips.' Hence the Septuagint translates: 'he who is not covered (some incorrectly read 'upright' for 'covered'; for the word is ἄστεγος) on his lips, turning aside, shall be tripped up.' The 'fool of lips' or 'of the lips' is said of one who speaks rashly and blurts out whatever comes to his mouth; who cannot conceal or dissemble anything, but betrays his anger, hatred, and passions of soul through words; who is headlong in speaking, wanting to teach before he learns — so that the meaning is: He who is wise in heart will not rashly speak with his mouth what he feels in his heart, nor suddenly leap forward to teach; but rather will prefer to listen to others and receive from them the precepts of life. But he who is foolish, both in heart and in mouth and lips, rashly leaping forward to say anything, to teach rather than to learn — this man will stumble and offend, both incurring the guilt of evil speech and its punishment. For now he will offend truth through lying, now charity through detraction, now reverence through excessive freedom, now peace through quarrels and dissension, etc.; and consequently he will stumble, that is, he will pay the penalty for these faults — now being convicted of lying, now punished as a slanderer, now struck on the head as a seditionary. Hence the proverb of the Arabs: "Beware lest your tongue strike your neck." For not infrequently men are punished capitally for incontinence of the tongue. Therefore St. James admonishes (1:19): "Let every man be swift to hear, but slow to speak."
Moreover, that Theodotion translates 'the fool of lips shall be fermented' indicates that the qualities of leaven befit the fool — namely, that the fool, when corrected by the lips of admonishers, like a mass of dough fermented by the force of the leaven (that is, of correction): first, is inflamed with anger and puffed up with pride; second, is turned to sourness and bitterness, so that he rises up against the one correcting him and tears him apart with quarrels and reproaches; third, spreads this bitterness of his through the whole mass, that is, the whole assembly of the people; fourth, and genuinely: 'shall be fermented' indicates that he is kneaded like a fermented mass by the hands of those who pound it, that is, he is beaten, confounded, worn down, and tormented by words and blows, as our Translator and all the others render it. Some add that 'leaven' here is taken for malice, meaning: The wise man eagerly receives and absorbs the precepts of virtue; but the fool delights in lips that suggest leaven, that is, malice — namely illicit loves, immodesty, obscenity, quarrels, and rebellions. Hence he is immediately fermented by them, that is, infected, polluted, and corrupted, according to that saying: "Because my heart was inflamed" — or, as others translate, "was fermented" — "and I was reduced to nothing, and I knew it not" (Psalm 72 [73]:21). Which words St. Augustine and others understand of the heat of lust, which burns the loins.
Again, that R. Joseph translates 'the fool of lips shall limp' signifies: first, that the speeches of the fool limp, that is, are deficient and teem with defects, and are maimed and mutilated — namely, they mix false with true, base with honorable, imprudent with prudent, inept with apt. Second, that they do not carry out in deed what they teach with their mouth. For speech limps when action does not equally correspond to it; for speech and action are like the two feet of a teacher and preacher, as St. Chrysostom teaches, Homily 20 to the People.
Finally, the Septuagint translates: ὁ δὲ ἄστεγος χείλεσι σκολιάζων ὑποσκελισθήσεται, that is: 'he who is not covered on his lips, turning aside (the Roman edition: acting perversely), shall be tripped up.' For στέγος means roof; and στέγω means the same as to cover, to conceal, to endure, to suffer, to tolerate. Hence ἄστεγος means the same as lacking a roof, a stranger, impatient — one who cannot conceal anything, even what is secret, who cannot endure anything, who is intolerable. Therefore the chatterer is ἄστεγος (roofless), because he is like a house that has a door (for the mouth is a door) but lacks a roof, and is therefore exposed to all the injuries of the weather. So the chatterer is exposed to the ridicule, reproaches, and jeers of all. Hence Plutarch in his Moralia: "Just as a building without a door is useless," he says, "so much more is there no use for a mouth without a lock." The meaning therefore is: A talkative person is like a stranger who, lacking roof and home, wanders through unknown roads and regions, frequently straying from the road and taking crooked paths by which he is carried into trackless places, and from time to time stumbles on stones, is hurled into ditches, cliffs, and precipices. For in a similar way the talkative person holds forth and lets his tongue wander about unknown things in which he is a guest and stranger. Hence he must often go astray from truth, right, honor, and prudence, and stumble into falsehood, crookedness, baseness, silliness, and ineptitude — for which he will be beaten with words and blows.
To embrace the whole matter in a word: "He who rashly blurts out anything almost always stumbles." For the tongue that lashes others is the greatest lash to itself. See what I said about the harms of the tongue at James 3:5 and Sirach 28:16.
Verse 9: He Who Walks Simply Walks Confidently
9. HE WHO WALKS SIMPLY WALKS CONFIDENTLY; BUT HE WHO PERVERTS HIS WAYS SHALL BE FOUND OUT. — The Septuagint: 'he who walks simply (Aquila and Symmachus: in simplicity) walks trusting'; 'but he who distorts his ways shall be known.' Some translate 'shall be known' as 'shall be crushed,' as though for ידע (yada), that is, 'he knew,' by exchanging the letter ד with the similar ר, or rather by catachresis, it were the same as ירע (yara), that is, 'he crushed.' For thus in Judges 8:16, 'to know someone with thorns' in Hebrew idiom means to flog and crush someone with thorns. So R. Solomon, Aben-Ezra, Pagninus, and Cajetan. But all the rest translate 'shall be known,' not 'shall be crushed'; for yada properly means 'to know.'
Hugo explains 'simply' as 'humbly,' meaning: He who walks in humility and self-contempt walks confidently, because since he places himself in the lowest position, he has no further to fall and descend; therefore he does not fear abasement or loss of honor, which the proud fear most of all. Or, he says, 'he walks simply' who walks by only one way, which is Christ — namely, he who follows Christ's life and virtues. But I say: 'He who walks,' that is, lives, acts, and conducts himself, 'simply,' that is, innocently, candidly, without pretense and guile, with integrity, perfectly, this man 'walks confidently,' that is, he is secure, fears nothing, because he has nothing that he must hide, and has nothing evil to fear from others, since he has done evil to no one. For thus the author of the Greek Chain says and develops this: "He who withdraws from wicked action," he says, "will be secure; but he who walks where he should not will lose his own deceit." Procopius translates: "Just as a thief, even if he has concealed his wickedness through a thousand arts, happens to be caught; and he who hopes to hide himself by his wiles is forced to come before the eyes of all — so he who walks rightly retains all freedom with fear banished, and does not worry that anything be exposed which could make him blush; for he walks on a straight path."
Hence the Arabs have the proverb: "Beware lest your tongue strike your neck." For not infrequently men are punished capitally for incontinence of the tongue. Therefore St. James admonishes (chapter 1): "Let every man be swift to hear, but slow to speak."
Morally, learn here how great is the force and strength of simplicity, candor, and innocence, inasmuch as they make a person free from fear, joyful in dangers, confident in adversity, and ultimately superior and elevated above misfortunes and even death itself. Hence the author of the Opus Imperfectum, attributed to St. Chrysostom, hom. 25 on Matthew: "Just as, he says, if you cast a small spark into a great deep, you would immediately extinguish it: so likewise every superabundance of sorrow, cast into a good conscience, is easily extinguished." And Plutarch in the Moralia: "As the nepenthes herb, he says, praised by Homer, when added to cups dispels all sadness (whence in Greek it is called nepenthes, as if 'without grief,' that is, without sorrow), so a good mind implanted in us abolishes every care of life." Finally, St. Gregory, lib. XII Moral.: "There is nothing, he says, that a simple person fears to suffer from others; for he has, as it were, a certain art in his simplicity, nor is he suspected of suffering what he does not remember having done. But on the contrary, a wicked mind is always in labors, because it either plots evils to inflict, or fears lest these be inflicted on it by others."
Examples are found in the Lives of the Fathers. Abbot Theodore used to say: "If the heavens should cling to the earth, Theodore would not be afraid." For he had asked God in prayer to take away fear from him. Abbot Sisois, praying for a disciple seized by a demon: "God, he said, whether You will or not, I will not let go unless You heal him;" and he was healed. Another elder, entering the cave of a roaring lion: "Why are you distressed, he said, O lion? There is room enough for both you and me; but if you do not wish it, depart from here." The lion, unable to endure this, went out. So St. Anthony, trusting in God, laughed at all the specters of demons, and St. Athanasius at all the persecutions of the Arians. St. Pachomius, by his trust in God, trampled serpents and tamed crocodiles. Aeneas Sylvius relates that King Alfonso, when asked who was truly free, replied: The wise man, master of himself, whom neither poverty, nor death, nor chains can frighten.
Famous is that saying of Publilius Syrus: "The guilty man begs, the innocent man grows angry." Hence the symbol of innocence is the salamander unharmed in the flames, about which the Poet says: The salamander walks unharmed through the midst of fires; for integrity always remains uninjured. And the hedgehog rolled into a ball against dogs, about which the Poet says: Integrity and virtue, protected by their own defense, are not exposed to the bites of hostile envy. Hence innocence itself is depicted as fearless with this motto: "No thunderbolts frighten." I do not fear the lightning; the shoots of the laurel drive them away: Integrity despises the assaults of Fortune.
"He who distorts his ways," that is, he who acts wickedly, and especially he who operates fraudulently and deceitfully, "will be found out;" for deceit and wickedness cannot long remain hidden without betraying themselves by some indication and being detected: wherefore they then bring shame and fear upon a person, and moreover harm and punishment. There is here, as in other proverbs, an antithesis, but veiled by metalepsis, by which the consequent is understood from the antecedent, and metonymy, by which the effect is understood from the cause and vice versa. Therefore "will be found out" is opposed to "walks confidently," because he who walks wickedly, since he fears the manifestation of his wickedness and fraud, always proceeds fearfully; but after his wickedness has been made manifest, he proceeds confused and anxious: while the just man walks confidently, that is, fearlessly, freely, undaunted. "For a troubled conscience always presumes harsh things," Wisdom 17. And as Job 15 says, "the sound of terror is always in his ears, and when there is peace, he always suspects ambushes. He does not believe that he can return from darkness." Wherefore St. Cyprian truly says, lib. I, epist. 3 to St. Cornelius the Pontiff, On the Frauds of Fortunatus: "This is, he says, brother, true madness, not to recognize and not to know that deceptions do not deceive for long. It is night only so long as the day has not yet dawned; but when the day is bright and the sun has risen, darkness and gloom must yield to light, and the robberies that raged must cease."
So St. Peter, innocent, about to be beheaded the next day, slept securely in prison, Acts 12, and Daniel in the lions' den. "The ever-unconquered force is one's own innocence." Memorable is what Osorius writes, lib. VIII On the Deeds of Emmanuel, that Albuquerque, the Viceroy of India, renowned for the glory of his exploits, in a severe storm, having seized a child, said: "Relying on this child's innocence, I trust that by Christ's kindness I shall emerge from the waves." Christ heard, was present, and he emerged. So great is another's innocence before God — how much more, then, one's own! Indeed, "innocence is the mother of security. For true innocence does not harm even an enemy."
Verse 10: He Who Winks with the Eye Will Cause Sorrow
10. HE WHO WINKS WITH THE EYE WILL CAUSE SORROW: AND THE FOOL WITH HIS LIPS WILL BE BEATEN. — That is, he will be punished, tormented both in this life and in the next. Hence Salonius: "He will be beaten, he says, that is, he will be condemned, on account of the wicked words he has spoken." It is difficult to see the connection of the first part with the second. I say briefly that they are to be joined partly by antithesis in this manner, namely: He who petulantly winks with the eye causes sorrow to others; but the fool, who speaks petulantly, by his lips causes sorrow to himself, because he will be beaten by those whom he has injured with words. For he compares an unbridled and petulant tongue with an unbridled and petulant eye; that the latter brings sorrows and blows to others, the former to oneself. Partly by similarity in this manner, namely: He who winks with the eye is like a fool with his lips. For just as he who winks with the eye brings sorrow and blows equally to himself and to others, since for his nods and winks he is punished and beaten: so likewise the fool with his lips produces sorrows and blows for himself as well as for others. For just as his tongue lashes others, so in turn he is chastised and beaten by them with both words and blows. Therefore, just as in verse 8 he opposed the fool with his lips to the wise man of heart: so now he compares and pairs him with the one who winks with his eyes; for in several maxims here he attacks the vice and petulance of the tongue.
Moreover, he aptly compares the fool with his lips to the one winking with his eyes, because fools, that is, the wicked, signal with a wink of the eyes the crime they do not dare to speak openly; hence, just as they express the same thing with their lips among their own, so they express it with winks of the eyes before others; therefore they converse as much with their eyes as with their lips.
Moreover, people are accustomed to wink with the eyes for various reasons. First, from wantonness and lust; for thus young men entice girls to themselves by winking their eyes. For the first signs and enticements of love are the glances of the eyes. These cause sorrow both to the husband of the wife at whom they wink, because they arouse his jealousy; and to the wife herself, who is therefore beaten by her husband; and to the winker himself, because he exposes himself to the danger of being killed by the husband as an adulterer. So Clement of Alexandria explains, lib. III of the Pedagogue: "Lustful glances, he says, and to gaze with shifting and as it were conniving eyes, is nothing other than committing adultery with the eyes, since through the eyes desire enters the first preludes of battle. For he who winks with the eye deceitfully gathers sorrows for men. They depict such an effeminate Sardanapalus, king of the Assyrians, plucking purple cloth in bed with his feet raised up, and rolling the whites of his eyes. Those women who practice these things are by their own gaze procuresses of themselves."
Second, flatterers wink with the eyes, and they are the same as fools with their lips, because they are beaten by the same. So our Salazar explains, namely: The flatterer, by winking with the eyes and approving the vices of others, inflicts sorrow on those whom he flatters, because he is the cause of their adding vices to vices, on account of which they afterward fall into grave sorrows and punishments: hence the same flatterer, as a fool with his lips, will be beaten, because from the one whom he flattered and to whom he was the cause of sorrows, he will at last receive blows and wounds. Wherefore Plutarch in the Moralia: "As a painting, he says, is silent poetry, so the flatterer often praises in silence, namely by countenance, nods, and complaisance." And Maximus, serm. 11: "As crows, he says, swooping upon corpses dig out the eyes, so flatterers by their flatteries corrupt the eyes, that is, the reason and mind; therefore a flatterer (kolax) is a crow (korax). Hence the saying: it is better to fall among crows than among flatterers." Ecclesiastes warns that these are to be avoided, ch. 7, v. 6: "It is better, he says, to be reproved by a wise man than to be deceived by the flattery of fools." For, as St. Augustine says on Psalm 59, "the tongue of the flatterer persecutes more than the sword of the persecutor." The flatterer therefore is like the polyp, says St. Basil, hom. On Reading the Books of the Gentiles: "For what is just, he says, he praises among those who regard justice, but immediately censures among the wicked, after the manner of the polyp, which reflects the color of the ground it touches." See Plutarch in the Comparison of the Flatterer and the Friend.
Third, mockers wink with the eyes. For they cause sorrow to the one mocked, and often to themselves. For those who mock others are in turn mocked by them, and they pay for their mockeries with similar mockery, or even with blows and beatings; therefore the mocker who winks with his eyes causes sorrow to others, and consequently he himself in turn, as a fool with his lips, is beaten, since for his mocking lips he is punished with words and blows. So Aben-Ezra, Bede, and Cajetan. Hence the Hebrew word 'procarats' properly means to cut, to incise, and thence by metaphor to wink with the eyes; because the one who winks, as it were, cuts his eyes and eyelids in that frequent and oft-repeated winking, and by that sign seems likewise to cut into the honor of the one he mocks by winking. So Marinus in the Lexicon.
Fourth, thieves, traitors, robbers, and other criminals wink with their eyes to their accomplices, so as to secretly indicate to them the manner and time for carrying out a theft, betrayal, murder, or similar crime, into which they had previously conspired by a secret pact. So Rabbi Solomon, Rabbi Levi, and Baynus.
Fifth, and most fittingly, deceitful, dissembling, crafty, and hypocritical men wink with the eyes, who pretend to be friends, and when the occasion arises, display the enmity they harbor in their hearts and trip up their unsuspecting friend. Hence the Septuagint translates: he who winks with the eye with deceit (the Syriac, with fraud), gathers sorrows for men. For thus in Scripture, especially in Solomon, the deceitful and fraudulent are said to wink with the eyes, as in ch. 6, v. 12: "An apostate man, a worthless fellow, walks with a perverse mouth, winks with his eyes, etc., with a wicked heart devises evil." He alludes to that saying of his father David, Psalm 34:19: "Let not those who are wrongfully my enemies rejoice over me, who hate me without cause and wink with the eyes;" which he explains by adding: "For they spoke peacefully to me indeed, but speaking in the wrath of the earth, they devised deceits." The Zurich Bible agrees, which translates thus: he who winks with the eyes will cause trouble; but he who is foolish with his lips will fall into various things, that is, says Vatablus, he who is disguised and feigns his countenance will cause grave injury; but he who speaks foolishly causes little harm, because he is immediately detected.
Finally, Solomon's customary follower, Sirach, interprets him thus in ch. 27, v. 25, saying: "He who winks with the eye devises iniquities, and no one will reject him; in the sight of your eyes he will sweeten his mouth, and he will marvel at your words; but at last he will twist his mouth, and in your words he will give scandal," and consequently sorrow, as Solomon says here.
Moreover, the Septuagint, for 'tillabet,' that is, 'will be beaten,' reading 'jescallem,' that is, 'will pacify,' translates: he who winks with the eye, with deceit gathers sorrows for men; but he who reproves with freedom, makes peace. The Syriac follows the Septuagint as usual, saying: he who winks with the eye with fraud, gathers sorrows; he who openly reproves, reconciles peace. That is: He who secretly winking with the eye, deceitfully mocks another's vices, or plots evil against him, afflicts him with sorrow, both because he mocks him or plots evil, and because he does it secretly and deceitfully; but he who openly reproves another's vices makes peace, because by his reproof he causes the one corrected to amend the vices that were the cause of hatreds and disputes, and so the former peace returns among friends, associates, and citizens. Or, as the author of the Greek Catena says, namely: The wise man, through free reproof of vices, often brings the sinner to repentance and amendment; but the deceitful man sows nothing but sorrow and enmity.
Verse 11: The Mouth of the Just Is a Vein of Life
11. THE MOUTH OF THE JUST IS A VEIN OF LIFE: AND THE MOUTH OF THE WICKED COVERS INIQUITY. — Some read 'iniquity' [as the subject]. Hence the Syriac: and the mouth of the wicked, iniquity covers; the Arabic: a fountain of life is in the hands of the just, and ruin shuts the mouth of the wicked. Some take "vein of life" as a vein of blood; for in blood the soul and life consist. That is: Just as a vein continually contains vital blood and, distributing it through the body, gives it life: so likewise the mouth of the just flows with blood-like, that is, life-giving words, which bring life to the souls of those who hear them.
But "vein of life" here means fountain of life, as the Septuagint, the Chaldean, Aquila, and Symmachus translate, and so our Vulgate renders Psalm 35:10: "For with You is the fountain of life;" now a fountain of life is so called because it continually pours forth living waters, that is, flowing, clear, sweet, and health-giving waters: for dead waters, opposed to living waters, are called still waters, which do not flow and therefore putrefy, are bitter and salty, and cause harm: such as are in ponds and marshes. Hence the Dead Sea is also called Lake Asphaltites, both because it stagnates and because it nourishes neither fish nor any living thing. The meaning therefore is: The mouth of the just is a vein and fountain of life, because it continually pours forth life-giving words, which inspire in the hearers the life of grace; for it teaches them to live rightly, so that they may obtain from God a blessed and eternal life.
On the contrary, "the mouth of the wicked" in itself "covers" and encloses "iniquity," so that it is like a vein and fountain of iniquity, which continually bubbles forth wicked, lustful, slanderous, blasphemous, fraudulent, unjust, and impious words, which bring ruin and death to those who hear them. Hence the Hebrew reads: the mouth of the wicked covers robbery; the Zurich Bible: violence; the Chaldean: injury. So Aben-Ezra: "The mouth of the just, he says, is like a fountain bringing life to those who have drunk instruction from his lips. Therefore from him life flows forth, when he shapes others by the teaching of morals."
The mouth of the wicked, therefore, is like a pond of dead waters, that is, of putrid, dishonest, harmful, and pestilent things and words, which it pours out upon others, overflowing; indeed, the mouth of the wicked is like the Dead Sea, killing everything, and continually exhaling sulfurous vapors, that is, infernal lusts and passions. That mouth therefore covers iniquity, or iniquity covers it, first, because it is so full of iniquity that the iniquity itself, as it were overflowing, stagnates and covers his mouth; second, because it covers and conceals with the mouth the iniquity that he devises and suppresses in his heart; third, because iniquity, that is, the punishment of iniquity, returns upon the mouth of its author and covers him with confusion and sorrow. Note that under "mouth" the heart is also understood. For the heart is properly the vein and fountain of life and death, that is, of life-giving and death-dealing speeches; but the heart is so connected to the mouth, and conversely the mouth to the heart, that they seem to be one and the same thing in a person. Hugo agrees, who explains it thus: The mouth of the just is like a pure spring of water, because it candidly expresses the feelings of his heart, feigns nothing, conceals nothing; but the mouth of the wicked covers and conceals the iniquity that he devises in his heart, so that in due time he may work it to the ruin of others.
Again, Lyranus adapts these words to the confession of sins, namely: The mouth of the truly penitent just man flows with the life-giving waters of pure and sincere confession of sins, through which he obtains pardon and the life of grace; but the mouth of the impenitent and wicked man covers his crimes, and thus remains in death and mortal sin. At length and elegantly he applies these words to confession, as our Salazar gives. But this is a narrower explanation: for the Sage speaks generally, and is more concerned with the salutary words of teachers, advisors, confessors, and preachers, by which they rouse their hearers to virtue and the life of grace; these, therefore, are the veins and channels pouring forth life-giving words upon all. Add that sacramental confession had not yet been instituted in Solomon's time, and the confessing sinner could not yet be called a mouth of the just, but of the penitent.
Mystically, Hugo says: The vein of life is the mouth of the just, that is, of Christ, he says, who is the just one par excellence, because He is the Holy of Holies; for by Christ's word many souls were recalled from the death of sin to the life of grace, and many bodies from the death of nature to human life.
Moreover, the Septuagint translates: a fountain of life is in the hand of the just; but the mouth of the wicked, destruction will cover. Our Salazar at length and elegantly in his manner explains this of almsgiving, namely: Almsgiving in the hand of the just is like a fountain of life, that is, a life-giving and perennial fountain, which continually pours forth, indeed gushes forth the waters of beneficence and generous gifts; but the mouth of the wicked, that is, the opening of the fountain, namely the liberality of the wicked, is covered by destruction, that is, by a ruinous greed and avarice, by which they want to scrape together everything and give away nothing. And so St. Basil in his homily Against the Avaricious Rich, and St. Chrysostom, hom. 55 to the People, teach that beneficence is like a fountain from which all good things and gifts continually spring forth, because as much as they draw from above by giving, so much springs up from below by receiving, as happens in wells and fountains. But the former sense is required by the Hebrew, Chaldean, Syriac, Aquila, Symmachus, and our Vulgate; for the passage concerns the mouth and words, not the hand and almsgiving. Therefore, lest the Septuagint disagree with the original text and other interpreters, they should be explained thus: A fountain of life is in the hand, that is, in the power, namely in the mouth of the just, by which he brings forth life-giving words at will. Hence by antithesis they oppose to it: "But the mouth of the wicked, destruction will cover," namely: The mouths of the wicked continually bring forth lost, harmful, pestilent words; for these, and no others, they contain within themselves, cover, and conceal. Hence the author of the Greek Catena explains the Septuagint thus: The actions of the just produce salvation and eternal life; but the speeches of the wicked produce and merit nothing other than punishment and penalty: for since most actions are done by the hand, the hand signifies all actions, including speeches, which are made by the mouth. So Salonius.
Verse 12: Hatred Stirs Up Quarrels
12. HATRED STIRS UP QUARRELS: AND CHARITY COVERS ALL OFFENSES. — The Arabic has: almsgiving. The Septuagint: hatred will stir up strife (Symmachus and Theodotion: fights); but over all who are not contentious, friendship will cover. The Scholiast: but love covers all who do injury. St. Athanasius, in the Synopsis of Holy Scripture, ch. 14, for neikos, that is, strife, reads nikos, that is, victory; hence he has: hatred stirs up victory (for victory stirs up rivalry, envy, and hatred. Hence the Arabic also translates: hatred raises up dominion, or superiority, or victory); but all who are not contentious, friendship covers. But the true reading of the Septuagint is neikos, as is clear from the Hebrew, Symmachus, Theodotion, and the Latin Vulgate. The Syriac goes another way: hatred, he says, stirs up judgment, and over all the wicked, shame will cover. The Zurich Bible: hatred stirs up occasions of strife, but love covers all transgressions. Vatablus: charity forgives others all offenses.
The meaning is: Hatred causes the one suffering from it to seize every occasion to find fault with the one he hates and to contend and quarrel with him, even where there is no fault or offense. But love and charity so shun disputes and quarrels that they even cover, conceal, and hide faults and offenses that could be the cause of quarrels. Hence the author of the Greek Catena, explaining the Septuagint version, says: hatred and enmity stir up fights and contentions, but the pursuit of peace generates goodwill and friendship.
Lyranus narrows these words to correction: "Just as, he says, hatred through quarreling makes known the defects of others, so charity conceals them, except insofar as fraternal correction requires;" indeed, this correction must first be done secretly, according to Christ's precept, Matthew 18:15: "If your brother sins against you, go and correct him between you and him alone." On which words St. Augustine, writing, gives the reason: "For if you alone know, he says, and you wish to accuse before everyone, you are not a corrector but a betrayer."
But this maxim is general and not to be restricted to correction alone. Hence St. Peter, citing it in his First Epistle, ch. 4, v. 8, extends it to all the duties of charity: "Above all, he says, having constant mutual charity among yourselves, because charity covers a multitude of sins." And St. James, ch. 5, v. 20: "He who causes a sinner to be converted from the error of his way, he says, will save his soul from death and will cover a multitude of sins." See what was said in both places. For on 1 Peter 4, I explained these matters at length, and showed that charity covers sins both one's own and others', both past and present and future. Therefore I will not add a word here, nor repeat what has been done.
Verse 13: On the Lips of the Wise Man Wisdom Is Found
13. ON THE LIPS OF THE WISE MAN WISDOM IS FOUND: AND A ROD IS ON THE BACK OF HIM WHO LACKS SENSE. — That is, of the foolish man. In Hebrew: a rod upon the heart of him who is diminished in heart. First, the Septuagint translates and explains thus: he who brings forth wisdom from his lips strikes the senseless man with a rod, namely: Wisdom is found on the lips of the wise man; but the fool, because through the same wisdom he sees his own folly and vices exposed and corrected, therefore dreads it as a rod by which he is scourged. Hence some translate thus: on the lips of the wise man wisdom is found, and the same is a rod on the body of him who lacks sense.
Second, Baynus: If anyone seeks wisdom, he will find it on the lips of the wise; but because the fool does not seek it for himself, therefore at last a rod will be found on his back, and affliction will give understanding to him who did not wish to be taught.
Third, Cajetan: The wise man spontaneously and of his own accord speaks wisdom: but the fool only when compelled by the rod, so that unless you drive him with a whip, you will not elicit even a crumb of wisdom from his mouth.
Fourth, others more aptly explain: The wise man spontaneously and willingly utters wisdom; but the fool, who like a donkey must be driven with a rod toward wisdom, so that he may not so much teach it as learn and practice it, must be driven to the same by the reproof and sharp goad of the wise man. That is: The wise man abounds in wisdom; but the fool lacks wisdom and abounds in folly, and therefore needs the rod, so that compelled by it he may learn to be wise.
Fifth, our Salazar aptly explains: On the lips of the wise man wisdom is found, that is, the words the wise man uses testify to his wisdom; but the folly and stupidity of the senseless and witless man are testified to by the beatings and lashes with which he is struck; the welts of the beatings, I say, and the bruises of the blows, which remain impressed. This is what those words mean: "And a rod on the back of him who lacks sense;" supply, is found, that is, the marks of the rod. To put it briefly: The words of an intelligent man testify to his wisdom, while the beatings of a fool testify to his stupidity.
Sixth, more plainly and fully, Jansenius: He indicates, he says, that through wisdom it happens that wisdom is found on the lips of the wise man, which causes him to speak many things wisely, which redounds to the wise man's own honor and glory. But through folly it happens that a rod is found on the back of the fool, that is, on account of the many things he foolishly both does and says, it happens that he is severely chastised and punished with much disgrace to himself. Therefore it signifies that wisdom adorns its possessor among men, while folly disgraces him; and that, just as on the lips of the wise man his honor is found, so on the back of the fool his dishonor is found. These three last explanations are genuine and amount to nearly the same thing. Therefore the antithesis is clear: the wise man bears the honor of wisdom on his lips, while the fool carries the disgrace of folly on his back, namely the welts of the lashes by which he was driven to do, learn, and say something well and wisely. The same allusion and antithesis is noted in the Hebrew words siphte, that is, lips, and schebet, that is, rod: namely, the wise man bears his honor in siphte, that is, in the lips of wisdom; but the fool carries his disgrace and shame in schebet, that is, in the rod, that is, in the welts of the rod on his back.
Morally, Hugo and Salazar note that wisdom is found on the lips of the wise man as a treasure hidden in a field. Therefore, just as a treasure was once sought by the signs of charcoal, or fragments of glass, or nettles (for by these signs they used to mark the place of the treasure they buried): so likewise, he who seeks wisdom and the wise man should diligently look for certain lips that bear uncorrupted words, blackening like charcoal, wounding and drawing blood like fragments of glass, stinging and piercing like nettles. Let him seek, I say, lips that criticize vices, denounce crimes, reprove sins, and that are softened by no flatteries.
Mystically, Bede says: "The rod on the back, he says, is punishment in the latter things, that is, in the next life. Therefore he who does not wish to carry the rod on his back, let him carry wisdom on his lips, speak the praises of Christ, and proclaim His precepts."
Verse 14: The Wise Hide Knowledge
14. THE WISE HIDE KNOWLEDGE: BUT THE MOUTH OF THE FOOL IS CLOSE TO RUIN. — The Septuagint: the wise will hide understanding, but the mouth of the rash, in Greek propetous, that is, of the headlong, the impudent, approaches destruction. For 'ruin' the Hebrew is mechitta, that is, destruction, fracture, whether of body or mind, such as consternation and confusion of spirit. Hence the Syriac translates: the hasty mouth is near to destruction; the Chaldean: ruin is near to the mouth of fools; the Zurich Bible: the wise conceal knowledge, but the mouth of the fool summons terror; Pagninus: the mouth of the fool is destruction nearby; others: the mouth of the fool is his own prostration; Baynus: the mouth of the fool is near to fracture; Vatablus: ruin (disaster) is near to the mouth of the fool. Some, with Rabbi Levi, take destruction and ruin in an active sense, namely: The fool by his garrulity, petulance, caustic wit, and lies disturbs everything, stirs up quarrels, and brings destruction and ruin to many. Others better take destruction in a passive sense; hence our Vulgate translates: is near to confusion. The meaning therefore is: The wise man does not arrogantly display his wisdom, but wisely and modestly hides and conceals it, so as to bring it forth and speak it at the opportune time: therefore he says nothing that has not been well considered and mentally digested; but the fool does not know how to conceal what he knows or thinks he knows; but like must boiling over, whatever he has in his mind he rashly belches forth from his mouth: whence it happens that he says many things that are insipid, arrogant, seditious, and slanderous, for which he is reproved; and therefore he is confounded and stricken with shame and disgrace; indeed, he is crushed, and afflicted with blows and beatings, and sometimes loses his tongue or another limb, or even his life.
Hence Rabbi Solomon: The wise, he says, hide wisdom, that is, they store it deep in their hearts, lest it ever be lost, according to that saying: "I have hidden Your words in my heart." So also Rabbi Levi and Aben-Ezra.
But if sometimes the mouth of the fool is not put to shame, the cause is either his shamelessness and impudence, or the fact that between his words and the mockery of the listeners there lies a curtain of dissimulation. For in his presence they suppress their laughter, or even praise him by flattering; but in their hearts, while he is present, and openly in his absence among themselves, they mock his silly sayings.
Parallel to this maxim are the sayings of the Philosophers. Of Zeno: "We have two ears and one mouth for this reason, that we may hear very much and speak very little. Therefore in talkative people the ears have flowed into the tongue." So Laertius reports, book VII, ch. 1. Of Euripides: "The end of an unbridled mouth and illegitimate folly is misfortune and broken teeth." Of Apollonius: "Talkativeness has many errors, but silence is safe." Of Cato: For it never hurts to have kept silent; it hurts to have spoken. Of Demosthenes: "If you had been as wise as you were verbose, you would never have spoken so much." Of Democritus: "Greed is to want to say everything and hear nothing." Of Theocritus to the verbose Anaximenes: "A flood of words begins, a drop of mind" — indicating that he had much in the way of words, but little mind and wisdom. Of Theophrastus: "An unbridled horse is more to be trusted than an uncontrolled word." Finally, there is the Arabic proverb: "The mouth is the prison of the tongue."
Morally, learn that the wise conceal their wisdom and virtue, because they strive to approve it to God alone; therefore they do not pursue the eyes and praises of men, and say with the Apostle: "Do I now persuade men or God? Or do I seek to please men? If I still pleased men, I would not be the servant of Christ," Galatians 1:10. Such were the first Christians, of whom the same Apostle says, Colossians 3:6: "You are dead, and your life is hidden with Christ in God;" where I said much on this subject. The foremost of these was the Blessed Virgin, who, loving secrecy, hid herself in the temple until the angel's announcement about bearing the Word, "intent on her work, modest in speech, accustomed to seek not man but God as the judge of her mind," says St. Ambrose, at the beginning of book II On Virgins. The Essenes imitated her, and then so many swarms of ascetics, such as St. Anthony, St. Hilarion, who, as St. Jerome says in his Life, "frequently changed his place, fleeing honor and importunity: for he always desired silence and an obscure life;" St. Paul, St. Macarius, St. Pachomius, St. Romuald, and countless others. And how many today in religious orders are men and women outstanding in wisdom and virtue, who, in order to trample worldly glory and devote themselves solely to God and the salvation of souls, say with the Psalmist: "I have chosen to be abject in the house of my God rather than to dwell in the tents of sinners." These, known to God, unknown to the world, fervent for God, offer tears for the whole world; hence the world stands by their merits and prayers. Their axiom is this: "Live for yourself, or rather live for God, and flee far from great renown. He has lived well who has hidden well; lathe biosas, lathe apothanon — live hiddenness, die in hiddenness," so that on that great and decisive day of the age, which will be the horizon of time and eternity, for your contempt of worldly pomp you may deserve to be given and blessed by Christ the Judge with the choirs of heaven and the everlasting glory of the Saints.
This maxim is displayed, as it were, to the eyes by Cyril through a famous fable of the peacock and the hedgehog, adorned with festive parables, in book II of his Moral Apologues, ch. 21, entitled: Against the Vainly Pompous Who Wish to Make a Show. "The peacock, he says, meeting the hedgehog, in order to show off his own glory before him and to confound him about his spiny skin, immediately raised his tail and, as with purple variety, in a wonderful starry display with golden feathers arranged in order, flying about lavishly here and there, offered himself to the gaze of the beholder. But the hedgehog, perceiving by the instinct of prudence that the peacock was being carried away by vainglory, in order to defeat it, curled up into a ball with his little body gathered together and his face hidden, and presented only spines on every side. When the peacock saw that he had been made a fool of, immediately seized with anger, he attacked him with lamenting words and said: Although man always delights to behold beautiful things with wonderful admiration, yet you, with your eyes hidden, not only scorned to see that beauty, but even presented yourself to me as a horrifying ball of spines and an ugly form. To which the hedgehog replied: He certainly does no one an injury who uses what is his own. Nevertheless, I ask you to tell me peacefully which you value more — to seem or to be? Indeed, if you say to be, what do you need with my eyes? For without them you exist no less. But if you desire more to seem, you have already become a shadowy display and you seek a mirror for your eyes.
Remember that the eye of the basilisk kills. Indeed, with your permission, I will rightly tell you what the fox once said to the monkey congratulating herself before a mirror: Rejoice, sister, more in what you are, and not at all in what you appear in the light of a mirror-image. For because you are, you have the substance of your nature; but insofar as you appear in the likeness of the mirror, you become nothing but a shadow of vanity." Then he demonstrates the same point with various parables of the tiger, smoke, seed, leprosy, spices, and the chestnut: "Have you not heard that the swiftest tiger lost the cubs she had seized, because with her eye fixed on a mirror placed along the road, admiring the false likeness of herself, she thought she had already found them, and so on account of a vain appearance she lost the beloved substance of her children? Why then do you scatter yourself with the fan of pomposity and seek only on the surface what is external? Remember that smoke vanishes when it is dispersed; and the earth does not sprout unless it hides the seed cast into its depths. External whiteness clouds the eye, and leprosy spread over the skin contaminates the limb. But hidden beauty shines more brightly, and an aromatic thing, when concealed, delights the sense of smell more. So also the chestnut is hidden under a thorny husk, so that, spurning vain appearance, its inner sweetness may be sought under its true existence. In this way, therefore, I am surrounded by thorns on the outside, so that in substance I may be safe. So (Exodus 34:33) the face of Moses is covered with a luminous veil, and (Exodus 36:14, 19) the Sanctuary of God is covered on every side with coverings."
Finally, concluding with the fable of the ant and the chameleon, he assigns this moral: "If you have heard the counsel of the ant, given to the chameleon who was glorying and rejoicing in its golden color, consider it said to you as well: namely, close your eye, and you will be established in true glory. For with two eyebrows, so that a firmer closure may be maintained, the eye is shut, and with only one, so that the eyelid may rarely be raised, it is opened."
Verse 15: The Substance of the Rich Man
15. THE SUBSTANCE OF THE RICH MAN IS THE CITY OF HIS STRENGTH: THE TERROR OF THE POOR IS THEIR DESTITUTION. — The Chaldean: the possession of the rich man is the city of his riches (the Syriac: fortified cities), and the terror of the poor is their need. Rabbi Solomon: the destitution of the poor is their greatest calamity. Aben-Ezra: the poor, that is, the senseless, were ruined by their poverty. The meaning is: Riches fortify, protect, and strengthen the rich man against poverty, persecutions, slanders, and the other calamities of this life, just as a strong city fortifies and defends its citizens against all enemy attacks, robberies, murders, etc. Therefore the rich man, trusting in his riches as in a fortified city, dwells confidently and courageously: but the poor man, on account of his poverty, is exposed to the injuries of all, because he does not have the resources with which to redeem and defend himself, and therefore he goes about timid and fearful, just as those who are cold and sick, lacking blood and warmth, go about pale and afraid: for "riches are to a man as blood," says the Sage. Hence the Zurich Bible translates: the wealthy man trusts in his resources as in the strongest city: but the poor are made timid by their own poverty. Vatablus: the consternation of the needy is their destitution, that is, the poor lose confidence because of their want. Thus we see the rich walking upright, confident, spirited, fearless; but the poor contracted, abject, faint-hearted, fearful.
For 'terror' the Hebrew is mechitta, that is, consternation, crushing, as Pagninus translates; fracture or breaking, as the Syriac. So Bede: "The rich, he says, trust in their riches as in a fortified city. The poor are afraid lest they fail, because they know themselves to be needy." Hence 'pauper' (poor) is derived from 'parvum aes' (little money) or 'parvus lar' (small household), and the Greek ptochos from ptox, that is, fearful, timid. Hence ptocheuein, that is, to live in want and to beg, is ptossein, that is, to be afraid, to tremble, to be struck with fear. And Lyranus: "The rich man, he says, trusts in the greatness of his riches, as one besieged trusts in the strength of walls: the terror of the poor is their destitution, because evil men do not fear to wrong the poor." For, as Sirach 7:13 says, "as wisdom protects, so money protects." Solomon therefore signifies that the advantages of riches are great, if one uses them rightly: but that poverty is in itself disadvantageous, unless it is supported and, as it were, animated by a higher spirit, namely the Evangelical spirit. Hence also Aristotle, Ethics I, ch. 10, teaches that wealth is the most suitable instrument for acquiring happiness, and that it provides the material for virtue.
Moreover, since this maxim is a proverb, indefinite and general, it can be applied to various things and purposes. Hugo, Cajetan, and our Salazar think it is said against the rich and riches, because these breed pride and boldness; and against the poor and poverty, because this abases a person; and therefore the golden mean is tacitly commended. For Solomon himself sought this in ch. 30, saying: "Give me neither riches nor poverty; grant me only what is necessary for my sustenance." For, as the Poet says: Whoever loves the golden mean, secure, is free from the squalor of a decaying roof, and, sober, free from an enviable palace.
So also our Fernandez on Genesis ch. 17, near the end: "The substance of the rich man is the city of his strength," namely: Enclosed, he says, hedged about, excellently fortified, and finally the rich man holds himself strong and unconquered, indeed even victorious within his wealth, even against the very justice and power of laws and judges. For indeed the case of a wealthy or illustrious man is usually impregnable, even though it is made famous by execrable crimes. What more? As truly as elegantly St. Cyprian wrote in his epistle to Donatus: "There is no fear of the laws; no dread of the investigator or the judge: what can be bought off is not feared. To be innocent among the guilty (add: and poor and ignoble) is a crime." So he says. The one you see acquitted, fear lest he be rich; the one you see condemned, know that he is poor. Such is the world today. So says Fernandez.
Here also belong the senarii of Menander cited by Stobaeus, sermon 89, in which he declares that he recognizes no other gods than silver and gold, which can do all things: I truly think our gods are useful, especially silver and gold: if you dedicate these in your house, whatever you wish, ask, and all things will be at hand for you — land, house, servants, and silver vessels, witnesses, friends, judges: in short, give money, and you will have even the gods themselves ministering to you.
Better still, Baynus, Jansenius, and others refer this to labor and the avoidance of idleness, about which he spoke in verses 4 and 5: "A slack hand has made poverty; but the hand of the diligent prepares riches." The meaning therefore is: Be diligent in work and labor, so that you may procure for yourself sufficient resources for a comfortable life: for these will fortify you like the strongest city; for if through laziness you give yourself to idleness, you will fall into destitution that will make you fearful, as one exposed to the injuries of all. The Septuagint favors this when it translates: the possession of the rich is a fortified city, the ruin of the wicked is poverty. Where, since they oppose the rich to the wicked, they seem to understand by the rich the industrious and diligent, and by the wicked the lazy and idle, and therefore fraudulent and thieving, namely: The industrious by their labor procure for themselves possessions, which are their protection, like a fortified city; but the lazy and wicked by their torpor create for themselves poverty, which crushes them and reduces them to the straits of hunger, starvation, and death.
Hence tropologically it is signified that the riches of virtues must be acquired by labor: for these are like an impregnable city, which protects and fortifies a person against all adversities. Hence Hugo: "This abundance is the city of the elect, he says, whose rampart is contempt of earthly things, whose wall is hope, whose outwork is patience, whose tower is humility, the fountain fortifying the tower is grief, the stream of this fountain the water of tears, the watchman is prudence, the gatekeeper obedience, the king is charity, the guardian soldiers are justice, temperance, and fortitude." Truly the Poet says: "True riches are those that serve the virtues. The greatest riches, you should consider the greatest virtue."
Anagogically, it is signified that we must labor here so that through good works we may acquire the great riches of glory in the heavenly Jerusalem, which will be for us an unconquered and most powerful city. Hence the author of the Greek Catena explains thus, saying: "Men devoted to virtues, who abound in good works, acquire for themselves through virtue the heavenly Jerusalem, which is the most fortified of all cities; but the wicked, who possess no good work, bind themselves with the guilt of everlasting punishment. For by the name of 'destruction' he designated this, just as by the lack of good works he designated death itself." And Bede: "He who is rich toward God through good works, he says, trusts in Him as in an impregnable city, because he cannot be overcome by any enemy. But those who are cramped by the poverty of virtues, they lack heavenly riches because with harmful fear they dread enduring hard labors for the Lord." Note here that Bede takes 'terror' actively, namely: The fear of the lazy, that is, the fear and horror of labor, is the cause of their destitution; just as conversely, fortitude, that is, strong and vigorous labor, is the cause of the rich man's substance. Although more genuinely in the literal sense, 'terror' should be taken passively as an effect, as is clear from 'city of strength,' which is opposed to 'terror': so that the meaning is: Just as the substance of the rich man produces a city of strength, that is, confidence and security, such as citizens have in a strong city: so conversely, the destitution of the poor produces fear in them.
The heavenly Jerusalem is and is called "the city of strength," first, because entrance into it must be gained through fortitude, and no one enters it unless he is strong. Hence in the Lives of the Fathers, in the Life of the Martyrs Epictetus and Astion, we read that Vigilantius, sent by Astion to his parents to console them about his death, when they asked what that region of paradise was, in which he had said their son was living, Vigilantius replied: "It is the region of the strong, of valiant men; the city is called by Christians the heavenly Jerusalem, whose wall is built of the purest gold, having twelve gates, and from each hang pearls." This city, the court of Christ's mighty ones, was foreshadowed by the thirty most valiant soldiers of David's court, 2 Kings 23.
Second, because it is in itself most powerful. Hence Isaiah sings of it in ch. 26:1: "Sion is the city of our strength; the Savior shall be set in it as wall and outwork." Others translate from the Hebrew: the city of strength is Sion for us; God will set salvation both as walls and as a rampart. That is: Do you wish to know how strong that city of the Blessed is? Listen: salvation itself has encircled it with its walls and ramparts; God has placed salvation as its walls and ramparts: therefore salvation itself surrounds and defends the city on every side. And no one can harm that very salvation and safety.
Moreover, St. Ambrose applies these words to almsgiving, which buys heaven not so much by strength as by generosity. For martyrs buy heaven at a high price, because with their blood; but almsgivers at a cheap price, namely with silver and gold, that is, white and red earth. For so says St. Ambrose, lib. III, epist. 25 to the Church of Vercelli, somewhat before the end: "There is, therefore, he says, a place for virtue even in these material riches. You are like helmsmen on a great sea. If someone steers his ship well, he quickly crosses the strait to reach port; but he who does not know how to manage his wealth is sunk by his own load. Therefore it is written: The possession of the rich is a firm city. What is that city, if not the Jerusalem that is in heaven, in which is the kingdom of God? This is a good possession, which produces perpetual fruits. A good possession, which is not left behind here but is possessed there. He who is in this possession says: The Lord is my portion. He does not say: My portion stretches from these borders to those."
Verse 16: The Work of the Just Man Leads to Life
16. THE WORK OF THE JUST MAN LEADS TO LIFE: BUT THE FRUIT OF THE WICKED TO SIN. — For 'fruit' the Hebrew is tebua, that is, produce, such as the harvest of fields and the vintage of vineyards. Hence Aquila, Symmachus, and Theodotion translate: the productions of the wicked. The Septuagint: the works of the just produce life; but the produce of the wicked are hamartiai, that is, sins; or, as the Complutensian edition reads, hamartia, that is, in sins, supply: serve or abound.
First, Rabbi Solomon explains thus: Solomon completed the work of the temple for the life of the Israelites, so that they might atone for their sins there: but the fruit of Manasseh was unto sin, because he introduced an idol into the temple. But this explanation is either mystical or merely by way of example.
Second, others take 'work' as the work of a person, and 'produce' as the fruit of the land, so that 'work' is gain acquired by labor, and 'fruit' is unearned income and revenue, which comes to the idle rich man from the fertility of the land: so that Solomon here prefers the laborious life of those of modest means to the idle and inert life of the rich, namely: The work and labor by which a just man of small fortune seeks his livelihood is better, holier, and happier than the idle ease of the rich, to whom the land or annual revenues spontaneously supply wealth. For labor sustains the life of the body, obtains the life of grace, and merits the life of glory. But idle ease, by which the wicked rich man melts away in wealth and luxury, is for him the cause of many sins, such as pride, gluttony, lust, etc. This meaning is very fitting. The Poet agrees: "Pleasure and luxury are the attendants of wealth."
Third, Cajetan explains: The just man directs his works and labors to the preservation of life, both of body and soul; but the wicked man directs not only his labors but also the produce of the land to sin: for so depraved is his intention that he misuses even the good things that nature spontaneously produces for the purpose of sinning.
Fourth, simply and plainly Jansenius: The just man, he says, works and labors, not so that he may have the means to live luxuriously and satisfy wicked desires, but so that he may live; and the fruit, or as the Hebrew has it, the produce that comes to the wicked from his labors, or even without his effort, is used by him for sin. This, therefore, is the difference between the just and the wicked: the just man seeks work, the wicked man seeks the fruit and produce of works, whether his own or others'. The just man seeks life from his work, the wicked man uses his goods for sin. Wherefore these maxims of the wise correspond to this saying: "Riches are given for sustaining life, not for ruling it. Prudence makes riches clear-sighted. Riches serve the wise man, they command the fool. Riches belong to the wise man; the fool belongs to his riches."
Mystically, under bodily life understand the spiritual life of grace, namely: The just man does all his works to increase the life of grace and glory, so that through the great merits of his good works he may attain great glory in heaven; but the wicked man abuses all his labor and produce for sin, in order to satisfy his lusts; and so he prepares for himself ever greater torments in hell. The antithesis is clear: for the works of the just tend toward life; but those of the wicked toward sin, and consequently toward present and eternal death. So Lyranus, Hugo, Jansenius, and others. Moreover, Dionysius says: The fruit of the wicked, that is, his delight or interior action, tends toward sin, because when lust has conceived, it brings forth sin, James 1. Therefore the thoughts, intentions, and schemes of the just are directed toward good, namely toward virtues, which gain for a person the life of grace and glory; but those of the wicked are directed toward evil, namely toward sins, by which they gain for themselves death and hell; for the glutton is drawn only to delicacies, the miser to riches, the angry man to quarrels, the proud man to arrogance, etc.
Verse 17: The Way of Life
17. THE WAY OF LIFE IS FOR HIM WHO KEEPS DISCIPLINE: BUT HE WHO ABANDONS (the Syriac: hates) REPROOFS, GOES ASTRAY. — In Hebrew mate, that is, causing to err, because not only does he himself go astray, but he also leads others into his error. Now because Hebrew lacks cases, various translators render this variously in different cases. The Septuagint: discipline guards the ways of life; but discipline lacking reproof (in Greek anekselegktos, which the author of the Greek Catena translates as: which has not been examined and tested) goes astray. The Scholiast: the way of life guards the innocent. Symmachus: the path to life of those who keep discipline. Pagninus: the path to life, keeping correction. The Syriac and Chaldean: the way of life keeps discipline.
For 'discipline' the Hebrew is musar, that is, chastisement, correction, reproof, discipline, whether given by man or by God, such as when He sends diseases, famine, wars, and other tribulations. The meaning therefore is: The way of life is the keeping of discipline; or, he who keeps discipline or reproof walks by the straight and royal road to a holy, happy, and eternal life: but he who rejects reproof strays from the way of life and walks straight toward eternal death. Solomon therefore teaches the wise man to submit himself willingly to discipline and correction, both of men and of God, namely when God corrects us, whether through Sacred Scripture, or through internal inspirations, or through external scourges and tribulations, so that we may change our lives and cut away our vices; or so that we may ascend to greater humility, patience, contempt of the world, and other virtues.
St. Chrysostom gives the prior reason in Psalm 8:10: "Inflict punishment, he says, and you will cause vice to cease; for just as rottenness yields to cauterizations and cuttings, so wickedness is warded off by punishment. He who is cut and cauterized enters the path to health." Hence Clement of Alexandria, lib. I of the Pedagogue, ch. 8: "Reproof, he says, is like a kind of surgery of the affections of the soul; and the remedy is the charge of reproach, which dissolves affections that have already hardened, purges the filth of an unchaste and lustful life, and levels the overgrown flesh of arrogance and pride. And admonition is like a kind of diet for the sick soul: it advises what is to be taken and forbids what is not." And shortly after: "To reprove, he says, is a sign of goodwill, not hatred; for both friend and enemy cast reproach, but the enemy mocking, while the friend does so out of goodwill," namely, to lead the one he corrects to virtue and salvation.
Therefore labors, corrections, and tribulations are "the royal road to heaven," says Nazianzen in his Oration on the Plague of Hail: but he who rejects them strays from heaven and goes astray to the underworld. For this is the way our King Christ walked, and therefore He says: "Was it not necessary for Christ to suffer and so to enter into His glory?" Luke 24. If therefore you feel distress in discipline, in correction and tribulation, look to the end: for it will lead you to heaven, lead you to glory. "Do not look, therefore, says St. Chrysostom, at the fact that the way is rough, but where it leads; nor at the other, that it is broad, but where it ends:" for the narrow way leads to heaven, the broad to hell, as Christ says, Matthew 7:13.
The reason is our inborn concupiscence: for this, lest left to itself it run wild and overflow into vices, must be restrained by discipline, just as we restrain the petulance of children with a rod. Blessed Giles, companion of St. Francis, when asked why St. John the Baptist, though he was pure and innocent from sin, nevertheless led so harsh a life in the desert, aptly replied: "Why is flesh rubbed with salt? Surely so that it does not rot; so too innocent flesh must be rubbed with the salt of penance and austerity, lest it be corrupted by pleasure." This is the paradox that St. James establishes as the very principle of his teaching at the beginning of his Epistle, saying: "Count it all joy, my brothers, when you fall into various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces patience. And patience has its perfect work;" where I discussed this matter at length. Here too belongs the saying of the Poet: However many, lilies rise from the midst of thorns: so virtue grows and triumphs amid evils themselves. For virtue, like flour, becomes purest when sifted.
Finally, the Septuagint version should be noted: But discipline that lacks reproof goes astray, because lacking the standard and file of reproof, it wanders aimlessly and strays, and does not achieve its end, which is the correction of morals. Let superiors and preachers who are too gentle and sweet take note of this, and learn from it to mix reproofs and rebukes with their gentleness when necessary: for without them ingrained vices are not cut out; just as ingrained stains on tin dishes are not washed out unless they are scrubbed with a rather strong lye; and more serious diseases are not cured except by the cutting of iron or the burning of cautery. Let both they themselves and their hearers and subjects listen to and learn that saying of the Apostle: "But if you are without discipline, in which all have become sharers, then you are illegitimate children and not sons, etc. Now all discipline in the present indeed seems not to be of joy but of sorrow: but afterward it will yield the most peaceful fruit of justice to those who have been trained by it," Hebrews 12:8.
Such a preacher was Christ the Lord, who began His preaching thus: "Do penance, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand," Matthew 4:17. He repeatedly threatened the Scribes and Pharisees with the woe of malediction and eternal damnation, as is clear from the whole of Matthew 23. Such was John the Baptist, thundering against the Jews: "Brood of vipers, he said, who has shown you how to flee from the coming wrath? Therefore produce fruit worthy of repentance," Matthew 3:7. Such was St. Peter: "Repent, he said, and be converted, that your sins may be blotted out, so that when the times of refreshment shall come from the presence of the Lord," etc., Acts 3:19. Such was St. Paul in the Areopagus: "And, he said, God indeed having overlooked the times of this ignorance, now declares to men that all everywhere should do penance, because He has appointed a day on which He will judge the world in equity," Acts 17:30. The same Paul rebuked Elymas the magician thus: "O full of all deceit and all fraud, son of the devil, enemy of all justice, you do not cease to pervert the right ways of the Lord. And now behold, the hand of the Lord is upon you, and you shall be blind," Acts 13:10; and to the Galatians, ch. 3:1: "O foolish Galatians, who has bewitched you not to obey the truth?" Such were the other Apostles, whose constant sermon, by the precept and example of Christ, was: "Do penance." Such were all the Prophets, as is clear from their books and oracles.
Finally, the paradox of Climacus, step 4, is relevant here, which is the summit of Christian, indeed of Religious perfection: "Drink, he says, with the greatest alacrity the rebukes and mockeries offered you by any person, no differently than the water of life." Why? Because by this means, first, you supremely honor God and offer Him mystical pearls. Second, you are most like Christ, who said: "But I am a worm and not a man, the reproach of men and the outcast of the people." Third, you supremely humble yourself, suffer, and conquer yourself. Fourth, you obtain great grace from God. Fifth, you secure your salvation. Sixth, in this consists true holiness and the summit of perfection. Seventh, you redeem the punishments of hell. Eighth, you give others an example and mirror of heroic virtue. Therefore exult and rejoice in these things, as did Juniper, companion of St. Francis, who would respond to those hurling insults at him: "Friend, cast these pearls into my bosom; for it is these gems that I seek."
Verse 18: Lying Lips Conceal Hatred
18. LYING LIPS CONCEAL HATRED (the Syriac: enmity): HE WHO UTTERS INSULTS IS A FOOL. — In Hebrew: he who brings forth infamy is himself a fool. The Septuagint translates contrarily: unjust lips cover enmity; but those who utter insults are most foolish. But for lips dikaia, that is, just, it seems one should read adika, that is, unjust, as Theodotion translates. For the Hebrew has: lips of falsehood; Aquila and Symmachus: lips of a liar. For 'insults' the Hebrew is dibba, which means an infamous thing, a crime, a reproach, an insult. Hence Aquila and Symmachus translate: reproaches, whether they are made against an absent person through detraction, or against one present through insult.
Now first, from the Hebrew, the Zurich Bible translates thus and explains it as a single two-membered sentence: he who conceals hatred with lying lips, and he who brings forth infamy, is equally a fool. Following this, Jansenius criticizes the Vulgate version; for having recited it, he says thus: In this or a similar manner almost all translate, since neither does the sense properly hold, nor does the Hebrew read so. For the verb is not plural but singular: concealing, or covering, so that it should seem to be translated in this manner: "He who conceals hatred with lying lips, and he who utters infamy, is himself a fool," that is, each of these is a fool. And so two vices of the tongue, contrary to each other, are described here, of which one is to conceal hatred with false words and speeches simulating friendship in order to deceive; the other is to bring forth someone's infamy and insult out of hatred. Both of these, however diverse and contrary they may be, belong to the foolish and stupid: because they are done imprudently and impiously. Our Vulgate text, to arrive at this meaning, is to be understood thus: Lying lips sometimes maliciously conceal hatred lurking in the heart, and yet at the same time with the one who does this, the person who does not conceal his hatred but out of hatred brings forth another's infamy is also foolish: so says Jansenius. But the Septuagint, the Syriac, Pagninus, and the Chaldean agree with the Vulgate version: The enemy, he says, lies in wait with lips of falsehood, and he who utters detraction is a fool. Although mecasse, that is, conceals, covers, hides, is singular, nevertheless by an enallage frequent in Hebrew it is used for the plural mecassim, that is, they conceal, especially because the singular noun sina, that is, hatred, follows, even though it does not agree with it; and siphte, that is, lips, with which it does agree, although it is dual, is used for the plural as well as for the dual and singular: indeed, all dual and plural nouns in Hebrew that lack a singular, or rather that are more commonly used in the dual or plural than the singular — as is siphte, that is, two lips — signify both singular and plural or dual, namely both one lip and two or more lips. Hence the verb or participle agreeing with them may be placed equally in the singular or the plural, and may be translated either way, so that in this passage you may translate either 'the lip conceals' or 'the lips conceal.' Or certainly our Vulgate for mecasse in the singular read mecassot in the feminine plural: for siphte, that is, lips, in Hebrew is often feminine, though sometimes masculine.
And there is an elegant antithesis between the liar who conceals hatred and the fool who utters insults, namely: He who cunningly conceals and hides his hatred, displaying friendship with his lips, is covert and false, that is, a hypocrite, liar, and fraud: but he who does not conceal and hide another's shame and disgrace, which he knows secretly, but brings it to light and exposes it, is a fool. Foolish, that is, wicked, unjust, and impious: because he brings to light the secret crime and disgrace of his neighbor, and therefore sins mortally against charity and justice, as St. Thomas teaches, II-II, Question 72, art. 2, and Question 73, art. 2, and all other theologians in the same place.
Again, he is properly a fool, first, because he betrays his own garrulity, imprudence, and slanderous nature; second, because by the same he provokes the one whose crime he exposes to retaliate in kind and reveal his own hidden offenses; and so he exposes himself to the danger of infamy; third, because he creates for himself enmity, anger, disputes, and grievous evils, and sometimes death; fourth, because it is childish and feminine to hurl insults. For foolish and helpless boys and women, since they cannot avenge themselves with their hands, take revenge with their mouths, hurling reproaches and cartloads of curses at their adversary. I have said more on this at Sirach 23:7 and 15, and 28:15.
Solomon therefore censures here two vices opposite in appearance but in reality often connected and proceeding from the same root of hatred. The former is to conceal hatred: for it is better to reveal hatred than to conceal it. For when revealed, it evaporates and diminishes or vanishes; but when concealed, it intensifies, thickens, and grows, just as hidden fire creeps, grows, and spreads; but when it bursts into flame, it either consumes itself or is extinguished by people throwing water on it. Hence Moses, or rather God, decrees in Leviticus 19:17: "You shall not hate your brother in your heart, but publicly reprove him, lest you bear sin on his account." And also Seneca in his Proverbs: "Graver, he says, is the enemy who lurks in the breast. Every evil that lies hidden from sight is more grievous. For the one who is an open adversary you can easily avoid by being on guard. The Trojan horse deceived because it counterfeited the form of mercy." The same elsewhere: "He who shows his hatred, he says, loves to be hated and recognized." Add that here there is a double wickedness: first, hatred; second, hypocrisy, namely the concealment of hatred and the simulation of friendship. But as Cassiodorus says on Psalm 54: "The gravest kind of enmity is to be an adversary in heart and to pretend with the tongue to be devoted." And Boethius, lib. III On Consolation: "No plague, he says, is more effective for doing harm than an intimate enemy." Wherefore Aristotle in the Ethics teaches that the wise and magnanimous man is open both in love and in hatred, and declares and professes both publicly and freely. For thus he says in lib. IV of the Ethics, ch. 3: "It is also necessary that the magnanimous man openly display both his hatred and his love: for to wish to be hidden is the mark of a fearful person; and he should have greater care for truth than for opinion, and should say and do all things openly."
The latter vice is to utter insults, which arises from the former, namely from hatred: for hatred is concealed for a time so that at the opportune moment it may burst forth into insult and injury. Therefore the remedy for both vices is to cut the root, namely to lay aside hatred: for thus we will neither conceal hatred as liars nor utter insults as fools.
Perhaps this is what the Septuagint meant when it translated: just lips cover enmities, that is, they abolish, destroy, and extinguish them (for charity covers a multitude of sins), lest they burst forth into insults and become irreconcilable. For, as Plutarch wisely says in the Moralia: "Friendships, after mutual insults and lacerations of reputation given back and forth, either do not come back together, or come together scarred." Hence Bede infers: "If therefore, he says, you desire to be truthful and wise, neither cover your hatred in the secrecy of your heart, nor express it through the insult of your mouth, but let your heart be filled with love and your mouth with truth." he who utters insults foolishly creates trouble for himself, if the crime that he casts at another, whether secretly through detraction or publicly and openly through insult, is not true but false. For then the one against whom he detracts or inveighs can justly accuse him of lying and falsehood, and prosecute him for calumny in court and demand the punishment of retaliation from him. But if the latter, being upright and patient, does not do this, all the greater is his resulting praise, and conversely all the greater the shame and disgrace of the calumniator. For, as St. Augustine wisely says, sermon 13 On the Resurrection: "A curse repelled by patience returns to its author, without harming the one at whom it was aimed." Hence also Seneca, epistle 77: "With equanimity, he says, the insults of the ignorant are to be heard, and by one proceeding toward honorable things, contempt itself must be despised."
Verse 19: In a Multitude of Words Sin Will Not Be Lacking
19. IN A MULTITUDE OF WORDS SIN WILL NOT BE LACKING; BUT HE WHO RESTRAINS HIS LIPS IS MOST PRUDENT. — In Hebrew: in a multitude of words transgression will not cease; and he who restrains or holds back his lips is understanding or prudent. The Septuagint: from much speaking, or, as St. Cyprian reads, from much eloquence, you will not escape sin (Symmachus: vice); but he who spares his lips will be sensible. St. Isidore in his Soliloquy: much speaking will not escape fault.
You may ask: what is called 'much speaking' here? For Christ and the Saints spoke and wrote many things holily, as is evident from the Gospels and the books of the Fathers, in which accordingly sin was absent. First, Clement of Alexandria, book II of the Pedagogue, ch. 6, by 'much speaking' understands inept, idle, and trifling words: "Inept trifles, he says, are to be passed over in silence. For Scripture says: From much speaking you will not escape sin." This is true, but not an adequate explanation. St. Bernard agrees, who by 'much speaking' understands idle words. For thus he writes in his sermon On the Threefold Guard, of the hand, tongue, and heart: "How true, he says, is the maxim, brothers: in much speaking sin is not to be escaped! For to pass over other things, if a word is idle because it has no reasonable cause, what account shall we be able to give for what is beyond reason? Let none of us, brothers, think little of the time that is consumed in idle words, since the time is acceptable and the day of salvation. The irrevocable word flies, the irrevocable time flies, and the fool does not notice what he is losing. 'Let us chat,' they say, 'until the hour passes.' O until the hour passes, until the time passes by, until the hour passes that the mercy of the Creator grants you for doing penance, for obtaining pardon, for acquiring grace, for meriting glory. Until the time passes in which you ought to have been reconciling to yourself the divine goodness, hastening to the angelic company, sighing for the lost inheritance, aspiring to the promised happiness, stirring up a sluggish will, weeping for committed iniquity."
Second, Cresconius the Grammarian takes 'much speaking' to mean eloquence, as though the oratorical art or rhetoric were being noted and condemned here. Hence he reads: from much eloquence you will not escape sin. Refuting him, St. Augustine, lib. I Against Cresconius, ch. 1, defines 'much speaking' thus: "It does not say, he writes, 'from much eloquence,' but 'from much speaking.' Now much speaking is superfluous talk, a vice contracted from the love of talking. And for the most part, even those who do not know what they are saying love to talk, etc. But eloquence is the faculty of speaking that fittingly explains what we feel: and it is to be used when we feel rightly. In this way the heretics did not use it." Hence the same Augustine, lib. I of the Retractions, in the Prologue, assigns this reason for writing the books of Retractions: "That saying also which is written, 'From much speaking you will not escape sin,' terrifies me greatly, not because I have written much, nor because many things that were not said have nevertheless been written down as said by me. Far be it from me to count as 'much speaking' when necessary things are said, no matter how great the multitude and length of words in which they are said. But I fear this sentence of Holy Scripture because from so many discussions of mine, many things can undoubtedly be gathered that, if not false, at least appear so, or are even shown to be unnecessary. What believer indeed has Christ not terrified when He says: Every idle word that men speak, they shall give account of it on the day of judgment?" Matthew 12. He concludes his books On the Trinity with this prayer to God: "Before You is my strength and my weakness; preserve the one, heal the other. Before You is my knowledge and my ignorance. Where You have opened to me, receive me as I enter; where You have closed, open to me as I knock. May I remember You, understand You, love You. I know it is written: In much speaking sin will not be escaped. But would that I spoke only by preaching Your word and praising You! Not only would I escape sin, but I would acquire good merit, however much I spoke in this manner."
Therefore 'much speaking' is a vice by which a person is too eager to talk, and therefore, itching to speak, utters more than is proper, and is a spendthrift of words, as those do who have an incontinent and intemperate tongue, who are always eager to talk, who mix in conversation about all sorts of subjects, and rashly pronounce their judgment and criticism on each one. For they easily fall into sins: because with the tongue slipping, the memory failing, and the itch for speaking carrying them away, they easily mix the false with the true, the harmful with the useful, the vain and idle with the necessary; and it is difficult, indeed impossible, for them to exercise the caution and circumspection that is required in all their sayings. Wherefore they imprudently blurt out many things, offend many people, and slip into detraction, mockery, scoffs, and insults by the skipping lightness of the tongue. So St. Ambrose, lib. I On Cain and Abel, ch. 9: "But let us, he says, close the door, lest fault enter, lest any slip of speech go out: fault enters if a slip goes out. Hear how fault enters. From much speaking, he says, you will not escape sin: much speaking went out, sin entered, because in much speaking he who goes out by no means the mind intent on so many things cannot endure in this attention and focus for so long a time without becoming fatigued and slipping: but it is able to give suitable attention to brief speeches and to persist in the same mental vigor for a moderate time. "Bind, says St. Ambrose, lib. I On Duties, ch. 3, your speech, lest it run wild and gather sins to itself by much speaking; let it be more restrained and kept within its banks: a river overflowing quickly gathers mud."
Solomon therefore here suggests the remedy: "But he who restrains his lips is most prudent." In Hebrew maskil, that is, he is prudent, namely par excellence, that is, most prudent. For 'restrains' the Hebrew is chosech, that is, he holds back, inhibits, both through silence, which is "the safe refuge of the soul," says St. Ambrose, I On Duties; and consequently through moderate and circumspect speech: for both are opposed to much speaking and correct it. Moreover, silence teaches one to premeditate what and how one speaks, and thus to speak circumspectly and prudently. He who is silent, therefore, and speaks sparingly, is most prudent; first, because he guards against the damages of an exuberant tongue, which are very many and very great. Again, because he governs the tongue, which on account of its slipperiness is most difficult to govern. And so he who knows how to govern it is wonderfully prudent and perfect, as St. James teaches in ch. 3, v. 2.
Second, because silence is the sign and effect of a mature, composed, and divine mind; for he who is silent speaks with himself and with God. Hence Solon used to say: "A fool cannot be silent; therefore if he is silent, he will be considered wise." And Seneca: "Taciturnity serves the fool as wisdom." Wherefore St. Benedict, Patriarch of Religious in the West, in his Rule, ch. 6, on taciturnity decrees thus: "Let us do, he says, what the Prophet says in Psalm 38: 'I said: I will guard my ways, so that I may not sin with my tongue. I placed a guard over my mouth, I fell silent and was humbled, and I was silent even from good things.' Here the Prophet shows that if one must sometimes be silent even from good conversation for the sake of taciturnity, how much more must one refrain from evil words because of the punishment of sin. Therefore, although concerning good and holy conversations for edification, a rare permission to speak may be granted to perfect disciples out of the gravity of taciturnity, because it is written: In much speaking you will not escape sin." And Diadochus in his ascetical work On Perfection, ch. 70: "Silence, he says, is the mother of the wisest thoughts. Just as if you open the door of a bath too frequently, the heat departs: so the one who opens his mouth too much by speaking loses devotion." And St. Isidore: "A talkative man is ignorant; a wise man uses few words. Knowledge makes speech brief (hence the angels, because they possess ample knowledge, say in one word as much as men say in a thousand, and God who is omniscient says all things in a single Word). To speak much is folly. For the voice of the fool is in the multiplication of words. Let there therefore be measure in one's speech, and a balance in one's discourse."
Another reason why much speaking is a cause of sins is given by St. Antiochus, hom. 102 On Silence: "The immoderate, he says, and unbridled outpouring of words, by which the tranquility of the mind is endangered, not only makes it sluggish and idle concerning spiritual activity; but also delivers and gives it over to the most troublesome demon of sloth. And just as if the doors of a boiling bath are continuously left open, they quickly blow out and expel the inner heat to what is outside: so also the soul," etc.
St. Dorotheus agrees, doctrine 24 On Compunction: "Abstain from much speaking, he says; for this extinguishes the rational and heavenly thoughts that come to the heart," and he gives the comparison of a hot oven (the same applies to heated rooms), which retains its heat as long as the door is closed; but if it is opened, the heat escapes. For in a similar way, the heart preserves the warmth of devotion and the spirit as long as it keeps the door of the mouth closed: but if it opens it, that warmth of spirit escapes through words.
Third, with St. Chrysostom on Psalm 140, precisely and strictly: In any amount of much speaking, even pious, holy, and necessary, sin is not absent, because it is impossible for a weak and fallen person to exercise in each of his so many sayings that circumspection and moderation which is required, just as it is impossible to do something and live for several days without fault and sin, as Francisco Suarez teaches, and indeed Solomon, ch. 24:16: "Seven times, he says, in a day the just man falls." The same holds for an archer, who even if he is most skilled in archery and hits the target with his arrow whenever he pleases, nevertheless, if he shoots at the target a hundred times in succession, it is impossible that he should always hit it and never miss: because the attention and concentration of the human mind is finite and subject to failure, and after many elicited acts it softens, slackens, and slips. Therefore it is better to make sermons and addresses brief and frequent, as did St. Leo, St. Ambrose, St. Augustine, St. Bernard, and others, rather than long and rare. Preachers sin in this matter who exceed an hour in preaching, and thus by their prolixity create boredom for the audience, fatigue for themselves, and the danger of speaking badly. For the mind, like an over-tightened bow, in speech is strained, and inadvertently slips, although to speak beyond measure is not a great sin." And St. Gregory, admonition 15, part III of the Pastoral: "Those who indulge in much speaking, he says, must be admonished to watch vigilantly from how great a state of rectitude they fall when they slip through a multitude of words. For the human mind, like water enclosed, is collected toward higher things, because it seeks again the place from which it descended; but when released, it perishes, because it has uselessly scattered itself through the lowest things. For by as many superfluous words as it is dissipated from the discipline of its own silence, it is drawn out of itself by as many streams, as it were: hence it is not even able to return inwardly to self-knowledge, because scattered by much speaking, it excludes itself from the secret of intimate reflection." These and more things St. Gregory says.
Third, because prudent speech, since it is entirely directed toward others, requires greater circumspection than other human actions; and therefore he who possesses it must necessarily be most prudent. For he who prays, prays for himself and for God: he who fasts, fasts for himself: he who gives alms, gives what he pleases: but he who speaks must foresee what, where, how, when, and before whom he speaks, so that he may edify all and hurt or offend no one. For one must speak one way before superiors, another before subordinates, another before the learned, another with the unlettered, another with the just, another with sinners, another with Spaniards, another with Italians, etc.: for what benefits the phlegmatic person, for example, harms the choleric. See St. Gregory, part III of the Pastoral, where he teaches at length how the proud, the faint-hearted, the gluttonous, the irascible, the fervent, the torpid, etc., are each to be admonished appropriately according to their condition and temperament. Hence the symbol of moderation of the tongue is the elephant, which, though it is the largest of animals in bulk and also the most prudent, nevertheless has a very small tongue, placed far within, so that it almost escapes the eye, as Aristotle attests, lib. II On Animals, ch. 6. Thus the noblest and most prudent of all are sparing in words but effective in deeds: "I do not trust augurs who enrich the ears with words," says Accius in the Astyanax. Following Solomon, Sirach, in ch. 28:29, gravely warns about the care and custody to be exercised over the tongue: "Melt down your gold and your silver, he says, and make a balance for your words, and right bridles for your mouth; and take heed lest perchance you slip with the tongue and fall in the sight of enemies lying in wait for you, and your fall be incurable unto death." Where I said more on this matter.
A memorable example is found in the book of Sentences, or Sayings of the Fathers, ch. 25: A famous anchorite, he says, saw that when the brothers were speaking about Sacred Scripture and pious matters, angels were mingling with them, exulting with a joyful countenance. But when they turned aside to vain conversations, he saw the angels withdrawing with indignation, while demons in the form of pigs were rolling about among the speakers. Therefore going around the monasteries, he would warn them, saying: "Restrain, brothers, your tongue from much speaking and from idle words, because the evil destruction of the soul is generated, and we do not understand that through these things we are hateful both to the Lord God and to the holy angels. For the divine Scripture says: In much speaking you will not escape sin; for these things will make our mind and soul weak and empty."
Verse 20: The Tongue of the Just Is Choice Silver
20. THE TONGUE OF THE JUST IS CHOICE SILVER: BUT THE HEART OF THE WICKED IS WORTH NOTHING. — For 'choice' the Septuagint translates pepyromenos, that is, fired, tested by fire, refined and purified by fire both from earth and dross, and from tin, lead, and other metals. For, as Pliny says, lib. 34, ch. 16, in the same vein tin, silver, and lead are found. For the material, melted by fire, first pours out tin, then silver and lead: "The liquid, says Pliny, that flows first in the furnaces is called tin; the second, silver; what remains in the furnaces is galena, which is a third portion added to the vein. This, smelted again, produces black lead." For the affinity of metals to one another is great, and therefore silver approaches gold. Hence, as the same author says in lib. 33, ch. 4: "In all gold there is silver of varying weight — in some cases a tenth part, in others a ninth, in others an eighth, etc. Wherever there is a fifth part of silver, it is called electrum;" which he attests was valued by the ancients.
The method of extracting and purifying silver the same author describes in lib. 33, ch. 6: "It is found only in shafts, he says, and is born with no hope of its own presence, with no gleaming sparks as in gold. The earth is sometimes reddish, sometimes ashen. It cannot be smelted except with black lead, or with the ore of lead, which they call galena, which is usually found near veins of silver; and by the same action of the fires, part descends into lead, while silver floats on top like oil on water. It is found in almost all provinces, but the most praised is in Spain." He then adds the origin of quicksilver: "There is also a stone in these veins, whose abscess of liquid, called quicksilver, is a poison of all things. It eats through and bursts vessels, permeating them with a dreadful corrosion. Everything floats on it except gold; that alone it draws to itself. And therefore it purifies gold best, spitting out all its other impurities by frequent shaking in earthen vessels, so that when the impurities have been cast off, the quicksilver itself also separates from the gold."
Hence silver, on account of its purity, signifies in Scripture wisdom, law, doctrine, and the words of God, says St. Augustine, lib. XVII On the City of God, ch. 5, and St. Gregory, IV Moral., ch. 28. And this is clear from Psalm 11: "The words of the Lord are chaste, (like) silver tried by fire, proved sevenfold;" chaste, that is, pure, holy, irreproachable, and, as St. Augustine says there, "The words of the Lord are chaste, without the corruption of pretense, proved to sinners through tribulations. Purified sevenfold through the fear of God, through piety, through holiness, through fortitude, through counsel, through understanding, through wisdom," namely through the seven gifts of the Holy Spirit. And Ambrosiaster on Revelation 3:18: "Sevenfold, he says, on account of the sevenfold purification, which is made through the seven virtues contrary to the capital vices." For pride is purged through humility, anger through gentleness, lust through chastity, gluttony through abstinence, envy through love, sloth through fervor, avarice through generosity.
The meaning therefore is: The tongue of the just man speaks words that are wise and holy, namely the words of God, which are pure and precious like silver, because they flow from a wise and holy heart. But the heart of the wicked, and consequently their tongue and words, because they are foolish and impure, are therefore esteemed as nothing and count for nothing.
Note five analogies between silver and the tongue and speech of the wise and the just. For the qualities of silver are five: the first is brightness and luster; the second, value; the third, solidity; the fourth, purity; the fifth, sound. The same are found in the tongue of the just.
Therefore first, just as silver shines, gleams, and sparkles above gold and all other metals, so the words of the wise shine, gleam, and sparkle, and are like a most limpid spring, of which the Poet says: "There was a crystal spring with bright silvery waves." The words as well as the heart of the wise are therefore silvery, that is, shining and pleasing like silver; but the words as well as the hearts of the wicked are leaden, brazen, and iron, that is, dark, foul, heavy, hard, and troublesome. Thus we read of St. Mechtilde in her Life: "She kept silence exactly; but when she spoke, she spoke like an Angel, so that if you conversed with her, you would think you were speaking with an Angel."
Second, just as silver after gold is the most precious among metals, so too the words of the wise are precious, and are listened to, esteemed, and held in great value by the discerning. Hence the common price of goods is silver and silver coinage, which succeeded the ancient, crude, and bronze coinage. Thus the wise man sets the value on virtue, so that what he has said and done, all esteem as honorable and as virtue itself; for life and deeds add greater weight and value to virtue than mouth and words. Hear Pliny, book XXXIII, chapter III: "King Servius was the first to stamp bronze. Before this, Rome used unstamped metal. It was stamped with the figure of cattle; hence it was called pecunia. Silver was stamped in the consulship of Q. Fabius, five years before the first Punic War; and a denarius was set at ten pounds of bronze. The gold coin was struck sixty-one years after the silver." Hence they made Asculanus a god, as the patron of bronze, and Argentinus, as the patron of silver.
Mocking this, St. Augustine, book IV of The City of God, chapter 21, says: "The Romans commended themselves to the god Asculanus and his son Argentinus, that they might have bronze and silver money. For they made Asculanus the father of Argentinus because bronze money came into use before silver. But I wonder that Argentinus did not beget Aurinus, since gold coinage also followed." More truly, the wise and holy man is Argentinus, because he speaks silvery things, that is, heavenly things — for the luster and brightness, as well as the value of silver, represent the sublime, excellent, bright, and shining heaven — and he speaks divine things in a silvery manner.
Third, silver is of a solid nature and is not easily impaired, says R. Levi; so solid are the sayings of the just, both because they are well considered and premeditated, and therefore truthful and circumspect, and because they flow from the dictate of justice and prudence, as well as constancy, since they speak the truth fearlessly and steadfastly, and stand firm for it even unto death — just as pure silver is constant and resists fire. For silversmiths test the purity of silver by its solidity: when they see that silver extracted from fire has lost nothing but weighs the same as before the test of fire, then they judge it to be pure and genuine.
Fourth, choice silver properly is that which has been purged and selected from dregs, dross, and other metals. Hence the Septuagint translates it as pepyromenon, that is, fired and purified by fire. Similar is the tongue of the just: for it first purges what it intends to say from every admixture of falsehood, vanity, flattery, ostentation, obscenity, hypocrisy, and fraud; indeed it speaks only a few things with great selectiveness, and therefore speaks rare and choice words.
You may ask, in what furnace and fire is the speech of the tongue fired and purged? I answer first, in the fire of consideration, discretion, and judgment; for since this is keen and exact, it is called fire in Scripture, as in Daniel VII, 9, where describing the judgment of God: "His throne was flames of fire; His wheels were burning fire. A fiery river rushed forth from His face." Therefore the wise man examines and purges in the furnace of discretion what he is about to say, according to that saying of St. Bernard: "Let words come twice to the file before they come once to the tongue."
Second, this fire is the grace of Christ and charity, and its author is the Holy Spirit, who purges, governs, and inflames the hearts of the just, so that they speak only what is right, true, holy, and burning with charity. This is what Malachi foretold of Christ in chapter III, verse 2: "For He is like a refining fire and like fuller's soap; and He will sit refining and cleansing silver, and He will purge the sons of Levi, and refine them like gold and like silver." Hence St. Augustine assigns to the seven gifts of the Holy Spirit the fire that purges the tongue.
Mystically, this fire is tribulation and persecution, which refines the minds and tongues of Confessors and Martyrs, purges them of all levity, idleness, and concupiscence, and inspires in them constancy and ardent love of God, so that before tyrants and the wicked they fearlessly profess, teach, and preach the faith and law of God, and say with St. Lawrence: "You have tested me with fire, and no iniquity has been found in me," Psalm XVI, 3. For which St. Jerome translates: "You have tested my heart, You have visited in the night; You have refined me, and found that my thoughts do not pass my mouth," so that the truth and profession of the mouth may correspond to the knowledge and confession of the heart.
Just as silver is not only not consumed by fire but is even made purer and more splendid, says Baynus, so the tongue of the just and wise man is so far from being tainted by the lies of the hateful or the detractions of the foolish, or from repaying curse with curse, that it even, following Paul, blesses those who curse it. So far is it from sowing quarrels among brothers that it brings many back to concord, and feeds the hungry with the word of life, by which man lives, not by bread alone. O precious and choice tongue, on which no flame of persecution can impose silence from resounding the faith of Christ, from expelling hatred from the heart and falsehood from the tongue with its sweetest sound. Such was the tongue of Christ Jesus, in whose mouth no deceit was found; who when He was reviled, did not revile in return; when He suffered, did not threaten; to whom the Lord gave a learned tongue, so that He might know how to sustain with a word the one who had fallen. Yet this tongue, however choice, did not penetrate the hearts of the wicked Jews; for the wicked have very little heart and understanding, and because of the deficiency of heart they were not fed by the word of life, but like fools they died of hunger.
Fifth, silver above gold, tin, bronze, and other metals resonates with a silvery — that is, pleasing and agreeable — sound. Hence money-changers are accustomed to test the goodness and purity of silver by its sound. For this reason also God had commanded Moses to make trumpets of silver, so that with them he might summon so many thousands of the people, Numbers X, 2; for silver trumpets are more sonorous and pleasing than those of horn or bronze. Hence when they cast bells from bronze, they customarily mix in silver, and the more silver is mixed in, the more fully and sweetly they resonate. In a similar way the silvery and fiery voices of the wise and just resonate fully and sweetly; such were the Apostles, of whom it is said in Psalm XVIII, 5: "Their sound went forth into all the earth, and their words to the ends of the world." And Elijah, of whom Sirach XLVIII, 1 says: "Elijah arose like fire, and his word burned like a torch."
Thus the wise, such as the Apostles were, are the lantern of the world, who illuminate the globe with their light and with fiery tongues set it ablaze with divine love, "and carry a new sun and new stars." Finally, the tongue of the wise is like quicksilver, or living silver, which balances and moves itself in every direction, and which effectively purges gold. For thus the tongue of the just man, shining with wisdom and burning with charity, moves itself in every direction, so that whatever is vicious — even in Religious men — it may erase and purge. It is memorable what we read in the Life of St. Anthony of Padua: that by preaching with a silvery and fiery tongue, like quicksilver everywhere among the nations, he abolished heresies, hatreds, lusts, usuries, gambling, and other crimes; and therefore he received this reward, that after death, while the rest of his flesh gradually decayed, his tongue alone remained whole and unharmed. Accordingly, 32 years after his death, St. Bonaventure devoutly visiting it and kissing it with tears, said: "O blessed tongue, which always praised God and caused many others to praise Him! Now it clearly appears how great your merit and worth are before Him who fashioned you for so sublime an office of His herald."
BUT THE HEART OF THE WICKED IS AS NOTHING. — In Hebrew, the heart of the wicked is as little; Aquila and Theodotion, as little; Symmachus, syrekis, that is, of vile and no value; the Chaldean, destruction; the Syriac, rebellion. The Tigurine version translates: the tongue of the just is choice silver, which the heart of the wicked despises; that is, the wicked esteem lightly the wisdom which the tongue of the just utters. Vatablus: the heart of the wicked is like a very little, that is, of little value. Baynus translates: the heart of the wicked is as small, which can refer either to quality or to time — that is, the understanding of the wicked lasts but a short time, or the wicked have little good sense and heart.
Aben-Ezra: Very little is what you learn from the wicked; or the knowledge of the wicked is not much approved. R. Solomon: The heart of the wicked is as nothing, because it does not admit the reproofs of the just. R. Levi: The soul and heart of the wicked will have only the briefest time's use in the body. The Septuagint translates: but the heart of the wicked will fail — that is, the heart and tongue of the just, like choice silver, are solid and therefore endure and are constant; but the heart and tongue of the wicked, that is, their thoughts and utterances, are fragile and fleeting, and therefore will quickly fail.
Moreover, the natural growth and decline of the heart Pliny describes thus in book XI, chapter XXXVII: "The Egyptians believe that the heart increases by two drachms of weight each year in a man up to his fiftieth year; from then the same amount is lost, and therefore a man does not live beyond a hundred years due to the failure of the heart." Far greater and swifter is the decline of the moral heart, that is, of the sense and wisdom of the foolish and wicked, because desire always carrying them off, they quickly go to their foolish dainties and trifles. Hence "the fool changes like the moon," Sirach XXVII, 12. Hence Origen in the Greek Catena explains this entire verse thus: "The speech of the just is proved (like choice silver), because it inspires faith by the things themselves. But the heart of fools fails, because it is perpetually changing and fluctuating."
Finally, our translator renders word for word plainly and fully: "The heart of the wicked is as nothing," that is, the mind and sense, and consequently the speech flowing therefrom, of the wicked is of little or no value and moment; whereas on the contrary the heart and speech of the just is precious like silver. You may ask why Solomon opposes to the tongue of the just not the tongue, but the heart of the wicked. I answer: under the heart he includes the mouth and tongue; for what the heart feels, the mouth speaks, especially since the foolish and wicked blurt out with their mouth whatever they have in their heart, according to Sirach XXI, 29: "In the mouth of fools is their heart, and in the heart of the wise is their mouth." Therefore just as the foolish and wicked ruminate in their heart on things that are vile and of no moment, indeed impure, evil, and harmful, so they belch forth the same with their mouth. But the wise and pious, just as they revolve in their heart things that are sublime, holy, heavenly, and divine, so they speak forth the same with their mouth. Of the former, therefore, the heart and mouth are silver; of the latter, leaden, earthy, and sordid.
Verse 21: The Lips of the Just Teach Many
21. THE LIPS OF THE JUST TEACH VERY MANY; BUT THOSE WHO ARE UNLEARNED (in Hebrew evilim, that is, foolish, stupid: so the Chaldean and Syriac), WILL DIE IN THE WANT OF HEART. — For "teach" in Hebrew is iiru, that is, "they will feed," namely by teaching, that is, they will instruct; for lips cannot feed in any other way, according to Jeremiah III: "And they will feed you with knowledge and doctrine." Now therefore the meaning is clear, along with its antithesis: The just so abound in wisdom that they instruct not only themselves but also many others, and teach them the honorable and holy ways by which one reaches the blessed life. But the unlearned and foolish, that is, the wicked, are so destitute of wisdom that they do not know how to instruct and direct even themselves, much less others. Therefore in the want of heart — that is, in their poverty of mind and wisdom, namely in their foolishness and concupiscence and impiety — as they live, so they will die. And therefore the just will be happy and tend toward eternal life; but the wicked, on account of their foolishness and impiety, will be most wretched and will go to hell, where they will be tormented by perpetual hunger of mind and wisdom and by eternal death. For "in foolishness" in Hebrew idiom means the same as "on account of foolishness"; for by its demerit they are punished with death — that is, the wicked bring ruin and death upon themselves by their own imprudence and wickedness. So R. Levi.
Again, with Jansenius one may explain it thus: the meaning is not the difference between the effects and conditions of the just and the foolish, but only describes the efficacy of the words of the just, which however does not reach the foolish. So the meaning is: The lips of the just indeed feed many; but fools, since they refuse to be fed by the just, will die for lack of wisdom. And our translator seems to have followed this meaning, and so our version is rightly consistent. For the meaning is: The lips of the just instruct many; but those who do not allow themselves to be taught by them and remain unlearned will die through the want of heart. Hence it is commonly said, says Lyranus: "He is very poor who is foolish or unlearned."
The Septuagint, reading the letter resh for the similar daleth and substituting other vowel points, instead of iiru rabbim ("they teach many") read iadeu ramim ("they know lofty things"). Hence they translate: the lips of the just know lofty things — that is, they contemplate heavenly and divine things, of which the mind and heart of the foolish and wicked are destitute, and therefore they die the death of sin and of hell. So the author of the Greek Catena: "The just know the reason of sublime things; but the foolish know and seek nothing sublime."
The Chaldean, together with the Syriac, takes iiru in the Chaldean and Syriac meaning, according to which the root raa — which in Hebrew means "to feed" — in Chaldean and Syriac means to think, to will, to love, and to win love. Hence the Chaldean translates: the lips of the just placate many; the Syriac: they love much, or they make others love. For the just man possesses peace and charity, and full of these he breathes and inspires the same in others even by his mere appearance. Hence he easily settles quarrels and brings about peace between those who are at odds, following that beatitude of Christ: "Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God," Matthew V.
Hence St. Bernard, sermon 23 on the Song of Songs: "The tranquil God makes all things tranquil, and to behold one who is at rest is to find rest." The Saints share in this tranquility of God — they who are the seat and throne of God, in whom, as the same author says, "there is no sense of want, no piercing care, no gnawing guilt." The same, book V of On Consideration, chapter V: "God loves as charity, knows as truth, sits as equity, rules as majesty, governs as the first principle, protects as salvation, works as power, reveals as light, assists as piety. All these things the Angels also do, and we do as well, but in a far inferior manner — not indeed by a good that we are, but that we share in."
Therefore St. Chrysostom, Homily On Gentleness, volume V: "If mortal enemies are at odds with each other, they are appeased and made gentle by the correction of a gentle man, even if they are inclined by nature to anger and fury. But those who cannot be reconciled through him are plainly intractable and worthy of no honor." He then adds: "As soon as he appears, he calms the furious; for he has no need of many words or admonitions, but he persuades to peace before he even speaks. Just as the radiance of the sun, as soon as it appears, drives away darkness, so the kind and just man by his presence settles turbulent affairs and renders them quiet and tranquil. And this too is worth noting: that Christ calls only the peacemakers sons of God. And why does He share His title with peacemakers? Because only this man imitates the Son of God with all his strength, becoming for others the author of peace and friendship." And shortly after he gives these similar descriptions: "What sinews are in our bodies, the peacemaker is in the household, in the Church, in the city. For Paul calls the brethren a body and members of one another. Hence the peacemaker has the same power in the household, the Church, and the city that sinews have in bodies, joining and connecting things scattered and separated."
Verse 22: The Blessing of the Lord Makes Rich
22. THE BLESSING OF THE LORD MAKES RICH (in Hebrew, it itself enriches), NOR SHALL AFFLICTION BE JOINED TO THEM. — The Septuagint: the blessing of the Lord upon the head of the just — this enriches; and no affliction will be added to them, or it has no attendant sadness of heart. Vatablus: the blessing of the Lord enriches, nor does it bring any trouble with it. Hence less correctly Cajetan takes "affliction" or "sorrow" as repentance — not of man, but of God, that is: God does not repent of having enriched the just; hence He does not revoke the riches once given to them, for "the gifts of God are without repentance," Romans XI, 29. For "them" in Hebrew is "it," namely the blessing — that is, God's blessing is pure blessing, and therefore no sorrow or curse can be joined to it. But since this blessing of God is found in the rich (namely the just whom God enriches), our translator rightly renders it "them."
The meaning therefore is: Not chance, not fortune, not fraud, not usury, not plunder — by which the wicked strive to grow rich — nor even one's own industry or labor, but God's favor and blessing (that is, His beneficence) is the proper and chief cause that enriches just men. This blessing likewise brings it about that no affliction is joined to them, whether in acquiring, or in preserving, or in spending the wealth given them by God. For the just, placing their hope in God's providence and blessing and trusting in Him more than in their own labor and industry (though they do not neglect it), rest secure in it, knowing that God cares for them. Therefore they labor without anxiety and commit the fruit of their labor to God, content with whatever measure of gain God has given. Whereas on the contrary, the wicked are tormented by a thousand cares and anxieties to acquire, increase, and preserve their wealth, and are never content with it, but always desire more.
By "riches" understand temporal ones; for these were promised by God to Solomon and the Jews, under which mystically understand spiritual riches — namely wisdom, grace, virtues, etc. — promised to Christians, according to Wisdom VII, 9: "All gold in comparison with her is a little sand, and silver will be counted as clay before her." And again: "Her conversation has no bitterness, nor her company any weariness," but charity and joy.
It signifies therefore, first, that it is God's role to enrich, and hence one who wishes to grow rich must seek the favor and blessing of God, both through a just and holy life and through prayer. Second, that the curse of God is the cause of poverty; therefore we see that the poor who strive to grow rich through frauds, thefts, and unjust contracts are impoverished by God's curse upon them, and all their labors are rendered vain and go up in smoke. Third, that riches given by God to the just bring with them tranquility of mind, moderation, gladness, and joy; whereas riches given by the world bring a thousand anxieties, disturbances, quarrels, and sorrows, which overwhelm and extinguish all pleasure of wealth. For this addition of sorrows the world mixes into all its gifts as a kind of surcharge and interest.
Thus God by blessing Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, David, Solomon, etc., enriched them, and they themselves acknowledged this and confessed it with thanksgiving, as is clear from Genesis XII, 2, and chapter XVIII, verse 18, and chapter XXII, verse 17, and chapter XXIV, verse 1 and following. Thus of Religious and Apostolic men the Apostle says: "Having nothing, and possessing all things." "For the providence of God is the income of the poor," says St. Chrysostom, and that income is certain, perpetual, and inexhaustible. Hence St. Francis gave his followers no other provision than this: "Cast your care upon the Lord, and He will nourish you." We see how many and how great estates and revenues the blessing of God has given to the monasteries of the Order of St. Benedict; indeed Trithemius writes that if all were gathered together, they would easily equal a third part of Europe.
Well known is that saying of the king of France about St. Maurus: "This monk has acquired more with his breviary than my ancestors with the sword." St. Jerome gives the reason, namely that the Religious who leaves all things for God possesses God — and God's are all riches. For thus he says in his letter to Pammachius: "For the Religious, Christ is everything, so that he who has left all things for Christ may find one thing in place of all, and may freely proclaim: The Lord is my portion," who is rich in mercy as well as in wealth.
Verse 23: As in Sport the Fool Works Wickedness
23. AS IT WERE IN SPORT THE FOOL WORKS WICKEDNESS; BUT WISDOM IS PRUDENCE TO A MAN. — Salazar takes the word "as it were" not properly, as a mark of similitude, but by catachresis as a mark of truth, as it is taken in John I, 14: "We saw His glory, the glory as it were of the Only-Begotten of the Father." Hence the Septuagint, reading for the letter beth the similar kaph (kischoc instead of bischoc), translates: in laughter the fool does evil; the Chaldean: when the fool laughs, he works wickedness.
The meaning therefore is first: The fool, that is, the wicked man, while he laughs and smiles, while he shows himself cheerful and pleasant, is plotting wickedness and harm. "But wisdom is prudence to a man" — that is, to the prudent man wisdom is a caution, lest he allow himself to be deceived or circumvented by the wicked; for the prudent man investigates from the manner of laughter the mind and machinations of the fool. For, as Seneca says, "there is laughing, guffawing, smiling upon, mocking, and smirking. The sincere laugh, fools guffaw, flatterers smile upon, buffoons mock, the crafty and deceitful smirk. Prudent men clearly discern these."
Second: In laughter, or when he laughs, the fool works evil — that is, laughter and jesting provide the opportunity for great crimes. Aristotle gives the reason, book IV of the Ethics, chapter VIII: Because laughter furnishes license and a certain freer faculty, and amid laughter and jesting modesty departs and shame withdraws. And Pseudo-Augustine: "Frequent laughter corrupts morals; for it relaxes the taut sinews of strictness; but a serious countenance is the guardian of discipline." St. Chrysostom, homily 62 to the People, lists certain places where laughter is more licentious and teaches that in these the greatest crimes occur — namely in theaters, at banquets, and the like.
The meaning is: Laughter and jesting, relaxing the rigor of the mind, are a cause for the soul to dissolve into gluttony, lust, insults, and other crimes. But "wisdom is prudence to a man" — that is, wisdom itself, which the prudent man possesses, imposes measure on jesting and laughter and prescribes laws, lest excess bring license and liberty to sin. Such are in the courts of princes the flatterers who, to indulge the lusts of princes, excuse all their crimes with jesting and guffawing. Such in the court of Henry VIII, King of England, was Francis Bryan, a knight. For when the king, captivated by love for Anne Boleyn — whom they kept saying was the king's own daughter, since Anne's mother had been the king's concubine — asked Bryan (says Sanders, book I of On the English Schism): "What sort of sin would it seem to know first the mother, then the daughter?" Bryan replied: "Exactly the same sort, O king, as to eat a hen first, and then her chick." When the king received this with great laughter, he is reported to have said to Bryan: "Truly you deserve to be my vicar of hell." The king therefore, having first kept the mother Mary Boleyn as his concubine, finally turned his attention to the daughter Anne Boleyn as well.
WISDOM IS PRUDENCE TO A MAN. — In Hebrew, understanding. First, the Septuagint genuinely translates and explains: wisdom begets prudence in a man. Hence Lyranus: Wisdom is knowledge of divine things; this begets prudence in the virtuous man, because through knowledge of divine things one proceeds to direct human acts, about which prudence properly is concerned. And St. Thomas, Part I, Question I, article 6: "The prudent man is called wise insofar as he orders human acts to their due end. Hence Proverbs X says: Wisdom is prudence to a man."
Second, the Chaldean translates: wisdom is to the prudent man, so that through wisdom he may avoid the wickedness which the fool works through laughter. Third, the Tigurine: it is a jest for the fool to have committed a crime, but for one to take notice of this is wisdom. Fourth, Vatablus: wisdom belongs to a man of understanding. Fifth, Jansenius, transposing the words: Prudence is wisdom to a man — that is, to prudently observe and understand how serious a thing it is to commit wickedness and to what great evil it leads a man, is great wisdom. I have already noted many times that wisdom and prudence in this book signify the same thing in practice, namely ethics or practical knowledge. Hence it is pointedly said: "Wisdom is prudence to a man" — that is, in human affairs wisdom is prudence, and the wise man is the prudent man, because he prudently orders the actions of human life toward the ultimate end; for otherwise wisdom taken simply differs in its whole genus from prudence, and is the contemplation of the highest things: God, Angels, and heavenly things. So St. Thomas, II-II, Question XLVII, article 2, reply 1.
Verse 24: What the Wicked Fears Shall Come Upon Him
24. WHAT THE WICKED FEARS SHALL COME UPON HIM; WHAT THE JUST DESIRES SHALL BE GIVEN TO THEM. — In Hebrew: the terror of the wicked — it itself shall come upon them. The Syriac: the wicked shall be drawn to destruction, and to the just what he hoped for shall be given. Vatablus: what they dread comes upon the wicked, but to the just is given what they desire. The Septuagint: the wicked is tossed about in destruction, but the desire of the just is acceptable. Or more clearly, as the translator of the Greek Catena renders it: the wicked wallows in the pit of destruction; but the desire of the just is pleasing to God. He explains: The wicked wallows in destruction, since whenever some temptation assails, without any fear he immediately gives himself over to sin, whereas he ought to have resisted through patience and endurance.
This sentence is connected to the preceding one and limits it by way of anticipation. For someone will say: If the fool works his plans and crimes through laughter, then he is always happy and cheerful, leading a blessed life. I answer: this laughter is mixed with great fear; so outwardly the wicked man laughs, but inwardly he fears and trembles. For while he plots, has committed, or is committing a crime, his conscience immediately suggests to him the army of punishments and evils hanging over him, which shake him with immense dread. Nor is this fear empty and vain, but real and serious; for what he fears from an angry God will come upon him.
These evils are both future in hell and present — namely disgrace if the crime is betrayed, loss of goods, fear lest what he plots may have an unhappy outcome, offense to friends and neighbors, and finally prison and death itself. On the contrary, the just, who with grave and serious countenance display prudence, conceal in their hearts their hopes and joys, because they firmly hope to enjoy their desires. For God promised them this, as in Psalm CXLIV, 19: "He will fulfill the desire of those who fear Him, and will hear their prayer, and will save them;" and He gives the desire itself as a pledge and earnest of this.
For when God wishes to bestow some gift upon someone, He first sends them an intense desire for it: both so that through this they may become capable of it and pray for the gift, and so that the gift may be the more pleasing, the more and the longer it was desired. For this reason God likewise customarily delays the desired thing, so that the delay may increase the desire and prayer, and the desire may multiply the joy when the thing itself is obtained. Therefore there is here one, but virtually double, antithesis: Upon the wicked will come not what he hopes for, but what he fears; but conversely, to the just will come not what he fears, but what he hopes for. Thus we see and experience that God fulfills in good things the desires of His servants, even in domestic and small matters; indeed He anticipates and surpasses them, according to what the Church professes: "O God, who surpasses the merits and prayers of Your suppliants," etc.
We read in the Life of St. Hildegard that many were accustomed to commend themselves to her prayers, and having obtained their wish, gave her thanks. When she marveled because she had forgotten them and had not prayed for them, she received from God the answer that God had granted this to them not because she had actually prayed for them, but because she had intended to pray; for He hears the silent and virtual prayers of His own, even if they do not come to actual expression.
Moreover, God most especially fulfills in His servants the desire for greater virtue and perfection. For this desire is an effective means to seek perfection through prayer and to pursue it through action. Therefore, as Blessed Lawrence Justinian wisely admonishes: "Whoever desires to abound in the delights and riches of that heavenly life, as long as he lives in the flesh and is permitted to work, let him not cease to sow the seeds of virtue, that he may gather sheaves of merits in the heavenly granaries. Let him always strive to advance, and let him never allow the desire for perfection to be rooted out of himself; but rather, however much he has advanced, let him continually say with the Apostle: I do not consider myself to have apprehended. And provoked by these goads of burning love, let him always desire greater gifts and covet the better charisms of the spirit."
Desires therefore are of great importance for attaining perfection, especially ardent and effective ones; they must therefore be increased and sharpened. Therefore, O man of God, when you feel a desire sent into you by God for some grace, virtue, conversion of souls, etc., know that God will actually give the desired thing to you who ask for it; for He sends you its desire and, as it were, dispatches a herald in advance. For just as, according to Alcuin in his Responses to Charlemagne, the fear with which God strikes the minds of the wicked before their punishment is "the herald of divine wrath and vengeance," so fear announces punishment to the wicked in advance, and desire announces to the pious that the desired thing will soon be at hand.
Verse 25: As a Passing Tempest
25. AS A PASSING TEMPEST, THE WICKED SHALL BE NO MORE; BUT THE JUST IS AS AN EVERLASTING FOUNDATION. — In Hebrew: as the whirlwind passes, so the wicked shall be no more; but the just is as the foundation of the world. That is, says Vatablus, as quickly as the whirlwind passes, so quickly will the wicked cease to exist; but the just will remain in life, as the foundation of the world endures. The Syriac: as a whirlwind suddenly passes, so the wicked will be overthrown and not be found; but the foundations of the just will be laid forever. The Arabic: in the passing of the whirlwind the wicked perishes; but the just, when he has turned aside from evils, will preserve himself forever.
The Septuagint translates: when a storm passes over or assails, the wicked is destroyed or vanishes; but the just, declining from it, is preserved forever. For "tempest" in Hebrew is supha, that is, whirlwind or storm, as if devastating and bringing an end to others as well as to itself. For the root suph means to cease, to end, to finish; and soph is end.
The adequate general meaning is: Just as a tempest quickly passes and ceases, so too the wicked; but the just endures both in this life and more so in the future and eternal one. But in particular, since "tempest" can be taken in two ways — passively and actively — there is here a double meaning. The first, taking it passively: When some public disaster, temptation, or tribulation assails, the wicked is seized and swept away; but the just remains firm and unshaken, either because he prudently avoids it, or because he is protected by God, or because he bravely endures and overcomes it. So Jansenius.
This exposition is supported by the Septuagint and the Tigurine: when the storm has passed, the wicked is nowhere to be found, but the foundation of the just is perpetual. Hence Christ compares the just man to a house built upon rock, which withstands every tempest; and the wicked to a house built on sand, which is leveled by the storm (Matthew VII, 24). Similarly Jeremiah XXIII, 19: "Behold, the whirlwind of the Lord's indignation shall go forth, and a tempest breaking out shall come upon the head of the wicked." And Nahum I, 3: "The Lord is in the tempest and the whirlwind of His ways."
The second, taking it actively: The wicked man is like a passing storm and whirlwind, because although for a time he is terrible to men like a tempest, he does not long endure, but in the manner of a passing storm is suddenly taken from life. However long this may seem here, yet in comparison with the eternity that follows, in which he dies an eternal death, it is brief. But the just is compared to an everlasting foundation — that is, one lasting a long time — because according to the promises of the Old Testament he persists a long time in this life; or, even if he is not given to live long here, he does not cease to live, since through bodily death he attains true and eternal life. This meaning is required by the Hebrew, Chaldean, Syriac, and the Vulgate. Solomon's customary follower Sirach XI, 13 says: "The riches of the wicked shall dry up like a river, and shall resound like a great clap of thunder in the rain."
Note that the wicked is rightly compared to a storm and whirlwind. First, because the wicked like a whirlwind rush upon the just and afflict them; but the just man bears these afflictions with a brave spirit, like a firm and unshaken foundation. Second, because just as a tempest, so too the rampage of the wicked is fierce, violent, and horrible — when thunders roar, lightnings flash, winds howl, and torrents of rain pour down, according to Virgil, Aeneid V: "The storm rages without measure, and at the thunder the heights of the lands and the plains tremble; a turbid downpour of waters rushes from the whole sky, darkest with thick south winds."
Third, each is sudden and unexpected; for it arises suddenly, but suddenly passes and perishes. Therefore it must be endured with a brave spirit, with the certain hope that it will immediately pass. Thus Julian the Apostate passed like a tempest, raging against the Christians; for he reigned scarcely two years. Hence when he was expelling St. Athanasius from Alexandria and the Christians were weeping, Athanasius said: "Be of good courage; for it is a cloud and will soon vanish." He was a true prophet, for that same year Julian fell in Persia (Sozomen V, 14). Fourth, each often inflicts enormous damages. Read the history of the ten persecutions of the early Church — of Nero, Domitian, Trajan, Antoninus, Severus, Maximinus, Decius, Valerian, Aurelian, Diocletian — and you will see how great were the slaughters they inflicted on Christians. Fifth, each destroys itself and comes to an end in itself, drawing upon itself the ruin it brings to others — just as the silkworm wraps itself in its own cocoon and dies. The wicked man therefore is sunk by his own tempest; but the just man overcomes it, or passes through it and sails to the harbor of eternal happiness.
Thus Nebuchadnezzar is compared to a whirlwind and tempest, Jeremiah IV, 13: "Behold, he shall come up as clouds, and his chariots as a tempest; his horses are swifter than eagles: woe to us, for we are laid waste." And of Antiochus invading Ptolemy Philometor, Daniel XI, 40: "The king of the north shall come against him like a tempest, with chariots and horsemen and a great fleet." And of Cyrus invading Babylon, Isaiah XXI, 1: "As whirlwinds come from the south, it comes from the desert, from a terrible land."
Moreover R. Levi explains: "As a tempest," that is, when a storm assails, it will press only to abolish the wicked, just as if the purpose of the tempest were to punish the iniquitous with destruction. Thus Aristotle in his Meteorology says that God thunders so that by this crash He may strike wicked men with fear of His divine power. Hence sinners are not rarely struck by lightning — for example adulterers and sodomites when caught in the act — for the air is indignant and roars with thunder against the wicked who abuse it for their crime, according to Wisdom V, 21: "And the whole world shall fight with Him against the senseless. The lightning bolts shall go directly forth."
Our Fernandez elegantly explains this passage on Genesis XXXI: "As a tempest, the wicked shall be no more." The sky is sometimes covered with darkness; then lightnings gleam, the air roars, thunders rumble, the tempest rages — terror and horror on earth. But once the cloud finally breaks into rain, the tempest falls silent, serenity returns, and kindly light revisits the earth. Only mud and filth remain to be seen. So it is with the children of this world: while they live, they resound with the names and titles of honors and dignities, with the noise of the vainest pomp, with the clinking of gold and silver. They are heard, celebrated, a source of admiration and terror to mortals — it is a tempest. But with the intervention of death, when their corpses are buried, likewise their pride and memory are buried.
But the Wise Man most aptly adds: "But the just is as an everlasting foundation." The wicked man is indeed in the eyes and on the lips of men; but the just lies hidden underground, buried like the cement of a wall: despised, oppressed. But how different the end of each! The soul of the former is consigned to everlasting fires, his glory vanishes, and his memory is entombed in perpetual oblivion. But to the just it is said: "Lift up your head, raise your eyes on high, for your redemption draws near; rise from the earth and enter into the joy of your Lord."
Morally, the just man is an eternal foundation, because fixed in God and heaven, he stands unmoved amid adversity and prosperity, and says: "Even if the shattered world should fall upon him, the ruins would strike him unafraid." Hence Aristotle teaches that the man endowed with virtue is like a squared stone, which on whatever side it is turned stands squarely and firmly, and receives every throw of fortune's dice with the squared position of mind. And Seneca defines virtue as the evenness and tenor of life that is consistent with itself in all things. In the Tablet of Cebes, true learning is depicted as standing on a squared stone, but fortune on a rolling sphere. Add that the just are the foundation of the world, because on account of them the world is stable, which otherwise would often be overthrown by God because of the crimes of the wicked. Hence Rufinus: "Who can doubt that the world stands by the prayers of the Saints."
Elegantly St. Augustine on Psalm LXXXVI: "Its foundations are on the holy mountains. Not in vain was the ark of Noah built of squared timbers, which bore the figure of the Church. For what does it mean to be squared? Consider the likeness of a squared stone. Such should the Christian be in every temptation. The Christian does not fall, and if he is pushed, and if he is turned in any direction, he does not fall; for a squared stone, however you turn it, stands. The Martyrs seemed to fall when they were struck; but the voice of the Canticle says: When the just man falls, he shall not be troubled, for the Lord strengthens his hand. So then be squared, prepared for all temptations; whatever pushes you, let it not overthrow you: let every misfortune find you standing." And St. Gregory Nazianzen, Oration 28: "There is a certain tree in legend which when it is cut down grows green, and fights against the axe, lives through death, and sprouts when cut, and when consumed, grows. Such plainly does the wise man appear to be. For he flourishes amid torments and considers the troubles of life a harvest of virtue, and in adversity he rejoices and glories." He adds: "These two cannot be seized and overcome — God and an Angel. The third is the philosopher: in matter, free from matter; in a body, uncircumscribed; on earth, heavenly; in sufferings, impassible; easily enduring being defeated in all things except greatness of soul, and by the very fact that he allows himself to be defeated, conquering those who think themselves his superiors."
Verse 26: As Vinegar to the Teeth
26. AS VINEGAR TO THE TEETH AND SMOKE TO THE EYES, SO IS THE SLUGGARD (the Chaldean: the sluggish messenger) TO THOSE WHO SENT HIM. — Vinegar indeed cleanses and strengthens the teeth, but by its sourness causes them pain and numbness, so that they cannot chew food; for by vinegar the teeth are dulled and become acidy, says Lyranus. Hence Cajetan wrongly contends that instead of "vinegar" the word should be translated as "sharp things": for sharp things harm the teeth, whereas vinegar benefits them. Smoke obscures limpid eyes with its murk, torments them, and draws forth tears. Hence the enigma of smoke in Symposius: "I have, I have tears, but there is no cause for grief. There is a road to the sky, but heavy air impedes me; and he who begot me is not born without me."
The general adequate meaning is: Just as vinegar brings trouble and harm to the teeth, and smoke to the eyes, so the sluggard creates trouble for those who sent him, because he performs sluggishly and imperfectly those things for which he was sent, and returns tardily. In particular, first, Jansenius explains: This saying admonishes us to look carefully to whom we entrust our business. For just as vinegar numbs the teeth and renders them unfit for chewing, and just as smoke dulls and stings the eyes, so the sluggard is harmful to those who sent him, because by poorly attending through his laziness to the case entrusted to him, he brings them harm and pain and makes it so they cannot manage their case well. So also R. Levi and Aben-Ezra. To these add Ausonius, epigram 110: "A healthy sluggard is much worse than a fevered man; he drinks double, and devours double portions."
Second: Just as smoke before the eyes goes into the air and vanishes, so the sluggard sent by his master departs and does not return, and keeps him in suspense. Just as teeth numbed by vinegar cannot chew food, and eyes obscured by smoke cannot discern what is present, so the master eager to know what the sluggard has done — while he delays — neither desires food nor pleasant sights, because the sluggard's return and response keep him anxious.
Third, just as vinegar makes the teeth sluggish for chewing and smoke makes the eyes slow, so the sluggard breathes his laziness upon his master, so that because of his tardiness the master is forced to carry out tardily and imperfectly the urgent matter he had planned.
Fourth, more forcefully, Salazar considers that what is signified here is that the sluggard by his laziness provokes the anger of his master: Just as from vinegar comes numbness of the teeth, from numbness comes grinding and gnashing, and from smoke the eyes grow dark and strained — so because of a lazy servant performing tardily the tasks entrusted to him, those who sent him are sometimes seized by so vehement an anger that their teeth grind and gnash and their eyes grow dim with fury; and at last they pour out all their anger upon that negligent servant. Hence Aristotle, quoted by Stobaeus: "Just as smoke biting the eyes does not permit one to see what lies at one's feet, so anger rising up obscures reason." To this is relevant the saying of the Comic poet: "The tardiness of messengers has destroyed very many of them." And yet sometimes prudence advises using it: "Do not hasten when appointed to deliver sad news."
Symbolically, the sluggard and laziness are a symbol of iniquity and wickedness, which harms the soul more than vinegar harms the teeth and smoke the eyes: both because sloth, or acedia, is one of the seven capital vices, and because it is the source and origin of all evils — for "idleness has taught much wickedness," Sirach XXXIII, 29. Hence the Septuagint translates: just as an unripe grape is harmful to the teeth, and smoke to the eyes, so iniquity harms those who practice it. The author of the Greek Catena explains: "Iniquity is harmful to its own authors; for it takes away sense and gravely injures the mind, and once begun does not easily come to an end." It alludes to Moses, Deuteronomy XXXII, 32: "Their vine is of the vine of Sodom and of the suburbs of Gomorrah; their grapes are grapes of gall." And Ezekiel XVIII, 2 alludes to this: "The fathers have eaten the sour grape, and the children's teeth are set on edge."
St. Augustine on Psalm XLVIII reads and explains it thus: "Just as a sour grape is a vexation to the teeth, and smoke to the eyes, so iniquity is to those who practice it. For whoever has eaten iniquity, that is, whoever has willingly embraced it, will not be able to eat justice. For justice is bread. Who is the bread? I am the living bread who came down from heaven. Therefore, just as when someone eats sour grapes, his teeth grow stiff and numb, and he becomes less fit for eating bread — so he who has practiced iniquity and fed on sins begins to be unable to eat the bread. He praises the word of God but does not act on it. But what do those do whose teeth have been numbed? They abstain for a while from sour grapes and apply themselves to bread. So we too, if we wish to eat justice, let us abstain from iniquities and apply ourselves to justice, and there will be born in our heart not only the delight of praising justice but also the facility of eating it, that is, of doing it."
Iniquity is rightly compared to vinegar and the sour grape, because just as the latter is sour to the teeth, so iniquity is bitter to the mind; for it creates numbness and pains both present and eternal. Again, just as the sour grape is unripe, plucked and tasted before the time of ripeness, so iniquity and the wicked man seek to taste pleasure before the time, and therefore from its bitterness his teeth are numbed; for the time of pleasure is in the future life, but the time of labor and the cross is in the present.
Furthermore, iniquity is rightly likened to smoke. First, because like smoke from secular darkness it clouds the keenness of the mind, says St. Ambrose; for sin blinds the judgment of reason, so that it judges evil to be good. Second, just as smoke provokes tears, so iniquity stirs up many pains. Third, just as smoke soon vanishes, so the pleasure of sin immediately passes, but leaves a sting and guilt fixed in the mind. Fourth, St. Macarius: "Just as a house filled with smoke pours it out into the air, so sin abounding in the soul overflows externally." Fifth, just as flame is close to smoke — for smoke arises from fire and in turn changes back into fire — so iniquity arises from the fire of concupiscence and in turn more greatly inflames it. Sixth: "Just as smoke drives away bees, so lamentable sin expels the guardian angel of our life," says St. Basil. Seventh: "The nature of smoke neither subsists in itself substantially nor consists of any body." So sin is not a substance, indeed it is not a being; for every being is good. Sin therefore is only the privation of being and good. Eighth, just as in smoke light is mixed with darkness, so in sin true things are mixed with false, good with evil. Finally, just as smoke ends in fire, so sin ends in the eternal fire of hell.
Mystically and tropologically, Lyranus says: "Vinegar, which degenerates from wine, and smoke, which ascending from fire vanishes — these are those who withdraw from their ecclesiastical life and charity through pride or negligence, and even attack with words, of whom it is said in 1 John II: 'They went out from us, but they were not of us.'" And Salonius: "The sluggard is a Catholic living badly, who does not labor so as to deserve to attain eternal blessedness. By vinegar and smoke is signified the perfidy of heretics; by the eyes and teeth, the preachers of the holy Church, who are well called eyes because they foresee the right paths, and aptly teeth as well because they minister spiritual nourishment to the faithful. Therefore, just as the perfidy of heretics is contrary to good teachers because it saddens them, so the sluggard — the bad Catholic — is burdensome to the same good teachers who commanded him to fulfill his faith by works."
Verse 27: The Fear of the Lord Shall Lengthen Days
27. THE FEAR OF THE LORD SHALL ADD DAYS, AND THE YEARS OF THE WICKED SHALL BE SHORTENED. — The Septuagint: shall be diminished. Vatablus: shall be cut short, according to that text: "Men of blood and deceit shall not live out half their days," Psalm LIV, 24. Impiety makes the wicked short-lived, but the fear of God makes the pious long-lived. See what was said at chapter III, 2, and Sirach I, 12. These sayings signify not what always happens, but what often happens, especially in that age of Judaism.
Moreover R. Levi explains: "This grants a man a longer span of life; for since he lies in the bosom of divine providence, he escapes the calamities under whose pressure he would be driven to death before the age of natural decline. But the years of the wicked will be cut off, and they will not reach their appointed time; for their wicked deliberation will punish them with premature death" — that is, intemperance or imprudence by which they rashly expose themselves to the danger of death, or at least their demerits, on account of which God punishes them with swift death.
Finally, St. Augustine in the Questions on the New and Old Testament, Question XXVIII, takes the wicked to mean idolaters: "Since Solomon says: The years of the wicked shall be diminished — how then is it that we sometimes see the wicked living to old age? It would indeed have been fitting that all the wicked should not only be deprived of this light sooner, but not even enjoy a single moment of life, since, forgetful of their Creator, they attribute the authority over their entire life to creatures. But Scripture is addressing those wicked who, while they lived under God's law, were more inclined to idols. For they are worse than other wicked people; for knowing God and despising Him, they obey servants." And that this was said about them the Apostle proves, saying: "Now we know that whatever the law says, it says to those who are under the law; but the Gentiles are not reckoned among the number of the living."
Verse 28: The Expectation of the Just Is Joy
28. THE EXPECTATION OF THE JUST IS JOY; BUT THE HOPE OF THE WICKED SHALL PERISH. — For "expectation" in Hebrew is tochelet, that is, hope, expectation; Symmachus: hypomone, that is, patience, endurance, perseverance in an unpleasant situation with the expectation of a better lot. Theodotion: prosdokia; in the same sense Aquila: espadokia, that is, eager expectation, of which the Apostle says, Romans VIII, 19: "The expectation (in Greek apokaradokia) of creation awaits the revelation of the sons of God." The Septuagint: joy abides with the just.
Expectation, or hope, can first be taken properly: The hope of the just is joyful and rejoices even in tribulations, because it is certain from the promise of God that it will obtain the thing hoped for, namely eternal blessedness. Hence the Syriac translates: the hope of the just is in joy. But the hope of the wicked is not joyful but anxious and tormenting, because it fears doubts or despairs of obtaining the hoped-for thing. For if it hopes for temporal goods, it often does not obtain them; if eternal goods, it will certainly be deprived of them. This is what the Apostle says, Romans XII, 12: "Rejoicing in hope," and therefore because of this hope, "patient in tribulation." And Hebrews XI, 1 defines faith joined to hope thus: "Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen."
For this reason St. Francis used to say: "So great is the glory that I await that every suffering delights me." Hence that brief but effective sermon of his, to be constantly meditated upon: "Brief pleasure, eternal punishment. Light labor, immense glory. The calling of many, the election of few, the retribution of all."
Second, expectation can be taken metonymically for the attainment of the hoped-for thing: The happiness which the just hope for, certainly coming to them, will bring them great joy; for when they see that they possess a thing so long hoped for, and abound in all good things, they will rejoice wonderfully. But the wicked fall from their hopes and therefore are afflicted and tormented: both because their whole hope is fixed on present things, which being fleeting quickly pass and perish, says the author of the Greek Catena, and because they do not attain the eternal goods which are the primary object of hope.
Hugo adds a third interpretation: "The expectation of the just is joy" means that joy itself awaits the just in heaven, because heaven is to be honored and adorned by them, and blessedness itself is, as it were, to be ennobled. For its dignity lies in this: that it is not bestowed on the wicked but on the just, whose virtue merits so great a reward. And so the just, just as they are adorned and glorified by blessedness, so in turn they bring beauty and splendor to blessedness and to heaven. So great is the dignity of the just, so great the beauty of justice, so great the splendor of grace and holiness.
Splendidly St. Bernard on Psalm CXI, sermon 4: "If the expectation of the just is joy, and so great a joy that everything desired in this world cannot be compared to it, what will the thing itself that is expected be? Eye has not seen, O God, apart from You, what You have prepared for those who love You," Isaiah LXIV. The same, sermon 67 on the Song of Songs, comparing expectation to adoration and possession to tasting: "The expectation of the just is joy; for the sinner expects nothing. And he is all the more a sinner in that, not only detained by but also content with present goods, he expects nothing in the future, deaf to that voice: Wait for me (says the Lord) in the day of my resurrection. Therefore Simeon was just, because he expected and already breathed in Christ in spirit, whom he did not yet breathe in the flesh. And he was blessed in his expectation, because through the fragrance of expectation he arrived at the taste of contemplation. Finally he says: And my eyes have seen Your salvation, Luke II. Just also was Abraham, who himself expected to see the day of the Lord and was not disappointed; for he saw it and rejoiced. The just Apostles when they heard: And you be like men expecting their Lord. Why not also the just David, when he said: Waiting, I waited for the Lord?" Psalm XXXIX.
Verse 29: The Way of the Lord Is Strength to the Upright
29. THE WAY OF THE LORD IS THE STRENGTH OF THE UPRIGHT, AND TERROR TO THOSE WHO WORK EVIL. — For "upright" in Hebrew is lattom, that is, "of the upright"; the Septuagint: "of the saint"; or in the dative, "to the upright, innocent, perfect." For "terror" in Hebrew is mechitta, that is, destruction, breaking of body or soul — consternation and terror.
First, the Syriac translates: the way of the Lord strengthens the upright and breaks those who work evil. The Chaldean: and destruction to those who practice iniquity. The Septuagint: a fortification like a rampart, and the strength of the holy man is the fear of the Lord; but destruction to those who work evil. For the Hebrew maoz signifies both strength and a strong place — a fortress and citadel. Hence the citadel of the Antichrist will be called Maozim, from fortification, Daniel XI, 39. The Tigurine: the way of the Lord is strength to the upright, but terror to evildoers. Vatablus: consternation of soul is the way, or commandment of God, "because it customarily breaks the spirit of the one who works iniquity." For hence the law threatens the wrath of God and destruction, just as to the one who observes it, it promises the grace and glory of God. The law therefore strengthens the pious and terrifies the wicked.
The meaning is: "The way of the Lord," that is, the law and the keeping of the law — virtue, justice, probity, holiness, by which the just know that they please God and are His care as friends and children, from whom they expect the eternal inheritance — this holiness so strengthens them that they fear nothing adverse and bravely overcome all tribulations. But the same law and holiness strikes, dismays, and makes fearful those who work evil, because destitute of it they know themselves to be hateful and odious to God; and therefore they expect from Him nothing but wrath and vengeance. Rightly therefore they are afraid. This meaning is connected and profound, and therefore genuine. We shall hear a similar maxim in chapter XXI, 13.
Second, more plainly: Just as "the way of the Lord," that is, probity, strengthens and makes courageous the upright, so conversely the way of the wicked who work evil — their malice and wickedness — brings them trembling and fear; for those with a bad conscience expect nothing but evils and punishments. The reason is that the way of the Lord leads to the Lord, and therefore one is directed, protected, and strengthened by Him. Therefore "the strength of the upright is the way of the Lord" is in effect the same as: the strength of the upright is God Himself, according to Psalm XLII, 2: "For You, O God, are my strength" (Hebrew maozi); 2 Samuel XXII, 33: "God who girded me with strength" (Hebrew maoz); Proverbs XVIII, 10: "The name of the Lord is a most strong tower; the just man runs to it and is exalted;" Psalm XXXVI, 39: "But the salvation of the just is from the Lord, and their protector in the time of tribulation."
Now "if God is for us, who is against us?" Romans VIII. And St. Augustine: "Why do you fear, O man, placed in the bosom of God?" Therefore Solomon says below, chapter XXVIII, 1: "The just man, confident as a lion, shall be without terror." Indeed Cicero in his For Milo: "Great is the force of conscience in both directions — that those who have committed nothing should not fear, and that those who have sinned should think that punishment is ever before their eyes." And the Poet: "Let this be your brazen wall: to have nothing on your conscience, to turn pale at no guilt."
The innocent man therefore acts securely amid so many dangers of life, nor is there any terror so great as to move him. For he is fixed in mind upon God and trusts in Him alone. On the contrary, the guilty sinner is everywhere fearful and trembling. "For just as shadows follow bodies, so sins follow souls and present manifest images of their crimes," says St. Basil. And St. Chrysostom: "Just as those who walk at night tremble even if no one is there to frighten them, so also those who sin cannot be of confident mind, even if no one is there to reproach them." For the terrible specter of sin follows them. The same: "Just as those who inhabit prison condemned to death, awaiting condemnation and death, even if they enjoy delights in abundance, lead a life far more troubled and anxious — so also those who are troubled by a wicked conscience." The same: "A safe armor is the fear of God, an impregnable shield."
Verse 30: The Just Shall Never Be Moved
30. THE JUST SHALL NEVER BE MOVED; BUT THE WICKED SHALL NOT DWELL UPON THE EARTH. — For "shall not be moved" in Hebrew is lo iimot, that is, he will not totter. Aquila: me sphale, he will not stumble or fall. Vatablus: he will not be moved from his place. Solomon alludes to those words of his father David: "He who does these things shall not be moved forever," Psalm XIV. "He who trusts in the Lord, like Mount Zion, shall not be moved forever," Psalm CXXIV. "But the just shall inherit the land and shall dwell upon it forever and ever," Psalm XXXVI.
For "forever" in Hebrew is leolam, that is, for the age — for a long time, many years and ages. The literal sense therefore is: The just man and his family, his sons and grandsons, with God's protection will live safe and secure in their cities and homes for many years, and will lead a tranquil and happy life. But the wicked will not long dwell on the earth; rather, they will be quickly expelled from it by God's vengeance, whether by an enemy or by death (thus the law of the Jews is called eternal, that is, lasting for many ages until Christ). God had promised this to the just among the Jews and threatened the unjust with it, Leviticus XXVI, and elsewhere. But whenever this was not actually the case, He compensated for the brevity and troubles of this life with the eternity and happiness of the next life in heaven.
Hence Cajetan considers that here a firm possession of the Holy Land is promised to the Jews if they persist in the worship of God and in justice, but expulsion from it if they should depart from justice. R. Levi: "The just man remains stable in his seat; but the wicked will inhabit a certain place for only the briefest time, for since they are accustomed to criminal actions, they will be hated by very many."
Anagogically, to just Christians is promised the land of the living in heaven, from whose possession they shall never be removed; but the wicked shall not inherit it, but shall be thrust down into hell, says Hugo.
Tropologically, the just man shall not be moved, even if he is struck by heavy tribulation or temptation; but he will stand firm and strong and will not allow himself to be moved from God, from the law, and from justice. Hence Aquila translates: he will not stumble. R. Levi: "The just man, in the age — that is, within his prescribed span of life — shall not be moved," according to Exodus XXIII, 26: "And I will fulfill the number of your days." And the author of the Greek Catena: "The just man is so firmly established in the grace of God that, walking in the way of life, he cannot be disturbed or changed from good to evil."
Verse 31: The Mouth of the Just Shall Bring Forth Wisdom
31. THE MOUTH OF THE JUST SHALL BRING FORTH WISDOM; THE TONGUE OF THE PERVERSE SHALL PERISH. — For "shall bring forth" in Hebrew is ianub, that is, shall bear fruit; the Tigurine: shall propagate; the Chaldean: makes known; the Syriac: speaks. Just as the earth brings forth its fruits — wheat, grapes, apples, nuts, etc. — so the mouth of the just, like fertile earth, produces wisdom, which is something stable and eternal, says R. Levi, and propagates and disseminates it to others; therefore it is worthy that this mouth should remain and endure like a fruitful field or tree. But the tongue of the wicked, because it brings forth empty, foolish, perverse, and impious things — like a barren and harmful tree — deserves to perish and be cut down, and in fact often does. Hence the Hebrew: the tongue of perversities shall be cut off; the Syriac: shall be cut away.
The word "shall bring forth" indicates, first, that the just man speaks nothing except what has been preconceived, examined, and premeditated in the mind, and therefore something upright and perfect like a well-formed fruit. "For speech is the fruit of thoughts," says Clement of Alexandria. Second, the words of the just man are, as it were, his offspring, which he brings forth with great effort, just as a woman brings forth her offspring with great pain. Third, the just man speaks at the opportune time, just as the earth at the set time produces ripe fruits. Such are the sermons of preachers and confessors who bring forth souls for Christ with great labor and groaning, like deer, as St. Gregory teaches on Job XXXIX, 1. Fourth, "shall bring forth," like the Hebrew ianub, denotes the abundant fruit of the speech of the just; for from tanub comes tenuba, produce and abundance of fruits, says Aben-Ezra. For the reward of fruit corresponds to the labor; and just as the earth, so also the mind and tongue of the just man brings forth precious and abundant fruit with great exertion.
The Septuagint translates: the mouth of the just apostazei, that is, distills wisdom. "Distills" signifies first the value of the words of the just. For just as myrrh distills stacte, which is the most precious myrrh, so the mouth of the just distills holy utterances, especially by exhorting sinners to repentance and change of life, according to Song of Songs V, 13: "His lips are lilies distilling the finest myrrh." Second, that the words of the just are few and sparing, as a drop distills drop by drop. Third, that they are well considered and refined, as waters distilled from roses and herbs by apothecaries. Fourth, that the just man accommodates himself to the rudeness and infancy of his disciples. For just as a teacher gradually instills in children the way of reading and writing, lest if he gives them everything at once he confuse and overwhelm their memory, so the wise and just man does. For the uneducated and children are like vessels with a narrow mouth, into which one must pour liquid drop by drop; for if you pour the whole amount at once, it will overflow and be lost. Fifth, that the just man keeps many more things in his heart than he brings forth from his mouth. Hence St. Chrysostom: "From the words, as from streams, conjecture that the fountain is far greater. For what is brought forth externally flows from it, and what is inside is its surplus." And shortly after: "By the same reasoning, approved words signify that there is much more approved virtue within."
Verse 32: The Lips of the Just Consider What Is Pleasing
32. THE LIPS OF THE JUST CONSIDER WHAT IS PLEASING, AND THE MOUTH OF THE WICKED, PERVERSE THINGS. — "Consider," that is, they bring forth considerately. It is a metalepsis, like that expression: "The mouth of the just will meditate, that is, will speak with meditation, wisdom." For "consider" in Hebrew is iedeun, that is, they know; Aquila and Theodotion: they will recognize. Pagninus: the lips of the just know what is pleasing to God, and the mouth of the wicked speaks perverse things. Vatablus: the lips of the just know what is well-pleasing (the Tigurine: what is agreeable), that is, they speak knowingly and fittingly those things that please God and men.
The meaning is: The just man considers what is pleasing to God and men and speaks these things with grace, beauty, and elegance; therefore he pleases all, and all applaud him. But the mouth of the wicked speaks perverse things that displease God and men; therefore he is displeasing to all.
Hence the Septuagint, instead of iedeun (they know), reading with neighboring letters but different vowel points iariph (they distill), or rather iiddeun in the piel form (they cause to know, they instruct), translates: the lips of just men distill graces (as if gems); but the mouth of the wicked katastrephetai, which the Complutensian editors translate "is turned away"; others: "is perverted"; better the Roman edition: "perverts."
Therefore whatever words the just man speaks, so many graces, so many roses, so many pearls distill from his mouth, according to Psalm XLIV: "Grace is poured out upon your lips; therefore God has blessed you forever." In Belgium, the Religious Joscio of St. Bertin is famous, who about 500 years ago, daily greeting the Mother of God with five psalms beginning with the corresponding letters of the name MARIA, was found after death to bear five roses on his face and mouth with the inscription of the name Maria. Offering therefore the roses of psalms to the Mother of God in life, after death he deserved to be adorned by her with the same number of heavenly roses — so the archives of the monastery of St. Bertin, St. Antoninus, and others attest. Therefore every time you devoutly recite the Angelic Salutation to the Mother of God, you bring forth just as many roses from your mouth; if you repeat it to the number of the psalms, you will offer her a rosary in the manner of a psalter — a crown of roses, indeed of gems — most excellent.
Cajetan rather flatly translates and explains it thus: the lips of the just make known their will — that is, the just man explains his will in words without deceit or fraud; but the mouth of the wicked will speak confusions — that is, he wraps his plans in fraudulent words.
Better is R. Solomon: "The lips of the just know how to gain for themselves ratson, the goodwill of their Creator, and to win Him over; they also understand the method by which they may bind mortals to themselves and preserve friendship." And R. Levi: "The tongue of the just knows how to deserve ratson, the inclination of mortals toward itself, since its words turn out to be agreeable and pleasant." And the translator of the Greek Catena from the Septuagint: the lips of just men pour forth pleasing speech, but the mouth of the wicked, being perverse, arouses disgust.
The speeches of the just are so apt and elegant that they seem filled with graces, and again so firm that they cannot be undone; but the speech of the wicked produces weariness and abomination. This is what the Apostle admonishes, Ephesians IV, 29: "Let no evil speech proceed from your mouth; but if any good speech for the building up of faith, that it may give grace to the hearers." And Colossians IV, 6: "Let your speech be always in grace, seasoned with salt, that you may know how you ought to answer every one."