Fathers

Job 10

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“My soul is weary of my life. I will give free course to my complaint. I will speak in the bitterness of my soul. I will tell God, ‘Do not condemn me. Show me why you contend with me. Is it good to you that you should oppress, that you should despise the work of your hands, and smile on the counsel of the wicked? Do you have eyes of flesh? Or do you see as man sees? Are your days as the days of mortals, or your years as man’s years, that you inquire after my iniquity, and search after my sin? Although you know that I am not wicked, there is no one who can deliver out of your hand. “ ‘Your hands have framed me and fashioned me altogether, yet you destroy me. Remember, I beg you, that you have fashioned me as clay. Will you bring me into dust again? Haven’t you poured me out like milk, and curdled me like cheese? You have clothed me with skin and flesh, and knit me together with bones and sinews. You have granted me life and loving kindness. Your visitation has preserved my spirit. Yet you hid these things in your heart. I know that this is with you: if I sin, then you mark me. You will not acquit me from my iniquity. If I am wicked, woe to me. If I am righteous, I still will not lift up my head, being filled with disgrace, and conscious of my affliction. If my head is held high, you hunt me like a lion. Again you show yourself powerful to me. You renew your witnesses against me, and increase your indignation on me. Changes and warfare are with me. “ ‘Why, then, have you brought me out of the womb? I wish I had given up the spirit, and no eye had seen me. I should have been as though I had not been. I should have been carried from the womb to the grave. Aren’t my days few? Stop! Leave me alone, that I may find a little comfort, before I go where I will not return from, to the land of darkness and of the shadow of death; the land dark as midnight, of the shadow of death, without any order, where the light is as midnight.’ ”

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What the Fathers say

Job 10:13

Western Saints

Gregory the Dialogist

Though Thou hide these things in Thine heart; yet I know that Thou rememberest all. HISTORICAL INTERPRETATION As if it were in plain words; 'Why do I tremble for myself, who know that Thou dost gather in one even all nations? Which nevertheless Thou 'hidest in Thine heart,' in that Thou dost not yet make it known by open revelation, but Thou That 'rememberest all,' givest me, doubtless, assurance of pardon.' But it is to be borne in mind, that in certain deeds we are both made certain of pardon, and after the commission of the sins …

Morals on the Book of Job, Book IX ↗

Thomas Aquinas

To preclude someone thinking because he had said to God, "Remember, I beseech you, that you made me like clay," that he was of the opinion that God could forget, he excuses himself concerning this language saying, "Although you hide these things in your heart, I know that you still remember everything." For God is said by analogy to hide something in his heart like a man when he does not show by effect what he has in thought or in affection. …

Commentary on Job ↗