Job — Chapter 23

Respondens autem Job Nunc quoque

On Job's continued appeal for direct audience with God: "Even today my complaint is bitter; my hand is heavy on account of my groaning. Oh that I knew where I might find him, that I might come even to his seat! I would lay my cause before him, and fill my mouth with arguments." Corderius notes the logical sequence: Job, having been condemned by his friends without evidence, appeals to the court of last resort — God himself. This is not presumption but righteous confidence in divine justice. On v. 7: "There an upright man could reason with him, and I should be delivered forever from my judge" — Corderius follows Gregory (Moral. XVI.32) in reading "judge" here as both "my present judge" (God who afflicts me) and "the enemies who would condemn me" (the friends). Job trusts that if he could present his case before God directly, his innocence would be vindicated. This passage is central to the theology of prayer: prayer is the soul's appeal to the divine court, where perfect justice always prevails.

Si ad orientem iero non apparet

On the hiddenness of God and the soul's faithful perseverance: "Behold, I go forward, but he is not there, and backward, but I do not perceive him; on the left hand when he is working, I do not behold him; he turns to the right hand, but I do not see him. But he knows the way that I take; when he has tested me, I shall come out as gold." Corderius develops what later mystical theology will call the "dark night": God seems absent in all four directions; the soul searches everywhere but cannot find its Beloved. Yet the very absence is known to God ("he knows the way I take") — his hiddenness is not indifference but a form of presence. He cites Bernard (De Consid. V) and Gregory of Nyssa on the apophatic dimension of mystical experience: the soul that genuinely seeks God must pass through a period of apparent divine absence, which is itself a purification of the desire for God. The conclusion ("I shall come out as gold") — the trial is revealed as the very means of perfection.

Ipse vero scit viam meam et probavit

On God's testing as purification: "He knows the way that I take; when he has tested me, I shall come out as gold. My foot has held fast to his steps; I have kept his way and have not turned aside. I have not departed from the commandment of his lips; I have treasured the words of his mouth more than my portion of food." Corderius develops the metallurgical image (aurum per ignem): gold is purified by fire; the more intense the fire, the purer the gold that emerges. The saints emerge from the furnace of affliction purer than before. He cites Gregory (Moral. XVI.44): God tries the gold of virtue in the furnace of tribulation. On vv. 11-12: the steadfastness of Job's adherence to the divine commandments — not departing from the footsteps of God, treasuring his words more than food — is adduced as evidence of genuine righteousness. The inner life of Job, as he describes it here, is the life of a mystic: constant attention to divine will, complete orientation of all desires toward God.

Ipse enim solus est et nemo avertere

On the unchangeable divine will: "But he is unchangeable, and who can turn him back? What he desires, that he does. For he will complete what he appoints for me, and many such things are in his mind." Corderius develops the theology of divine immutability and providence: God's eternal decrees cannot be altered by creature intervention, argument, or pressure. This might seem terrifying — and it does terrify Job (v. 15-16: "Therefore I am terrified at his presence; when I consider, I am in dread of him. God has made my heart faint; the Almighty has terrified me"). But Corderius shows the other face: the same divine immutability that makes God's chastisements inexorable also makes his promises unbreakable; the same will that has decreed Job's suffering has also decreed Job's vindication and restoration. The terror of divine immutability in affliction becomes consolation when the soul grasps that the same God wills both the trial and the final triumph.