He is wise in heart, and mighty in strength: who has hardened himself against him, and has prospered?
All Commentaries on Job 9:4 Go To Job 9
Gregory The Dialogist
AD 604
4. What wonder is it, if we call the Maker of the wise, ‘wise,’ Whom we know to be Wisdom itself? and what wonder is it that he describes Him to be ‘mighty,’ Whom there is none that doth not know to be this very Mightiness itself? But the holy man, by the two words set forth in praise of the Creator, conveys a meaning to us, whereby to recall us in trembling to the knowledge of ourselves. For God is called ‘wise,’ in that He exactly knows our secret hearts, and it is added that He is ‘mighty,’ in that He smites them forcibly, so known. And so He can neither be deceived by us, because He is wise, nor be escaped, because He is strong. Now, as wise, He beholds all things, Himself unseen, then, as strong, without let or hindrance, He punishes those whom He condemns. Who ordains this likewise here with mightiness of wisdom, that when the human mind exalts itself against the Creator, it should confound itself by that very self-exaltation. And hence it is added,
Who hath resisted Him, and had peace?
5. For He that creates all things marvellously, Himself regulates them, that after having been created, they should agree with themselves; and thus whereinsoever there is resistance made to the Creator, that agreement in peace is broken up, in that those things can never be well regulated, which lose the management of regulation above. For whatsoever things if subjected to God might have continued at peace, being left to themselves by their own act work their own confusion, in that they do not find in themselves that peace, which coming from above they contend against in the Creator. Thus that highest Angelical Spirit, who being in subjection to God might have stood at the height, being banished, has to bear the burthen of himself, in that he roams abroad in disquietude in his own nature. Thus the first parent of the human race, in that he went against the precept of his Creator, was thereupon exposed to the insolence of the flesh, and because he would not be subject to His Maker in obedience, being laid low beneath himself, even the peace of the body was forthwith lost to him. Thus it is well said, Who hath resisted Him, and had peace? In that by the same act, whereby the froward mind lifts itself against its Maker, it works its own confusion in itself. Now we are said to resist God, when we try to oppose His dispensations. Not that our frailty does resist His unchangeable decree, but what it has not the power to accomplish, it yet attempts. For often human weakness knows in secret the power of His dispensation, and yet aims, if it might be able, to reverse it. It sets to work to resist, but shivers itself to pieces by the very sword of its opposition. It struggles against the interior disposition of things, but, being overcome by its own efforts, is bound fast. Therefore to have peace whilst resisting can never be; for whereas confusion follows after pride, that which is foolishly done in sin is marvellously disposed to the punishment of the doer; but the holy Man, being filled with the influence of the Spirit of prophecy, while he regards in general the confounding of human pride, thereupon directs the eye of the mind to the special fate of the Jewish people, and shews by the ruin of a single people the punishment that awaits all that are lifted up.
