For God shall cast upon him, and not spare: he would scarcely flee out of his hand.
All Commentaries on Job 27:22 Go To Job 27
Gregory The Dialogist
AD 604
35. God, as often as He chastens the sinner by smiting him, for this reason’ lets loose’ the scourge, that He may ‘spare.’ But when by smiting He brings his life to an end whilst remaining in sin, He ‘lets loose’ the scourge, but never at all ‘spares.’ For the Same, Who ‘let loose’ the scourge that He might ‘spare,’ one day ‘lets it loose’ with this view that He may not spare. For in this life the Lord busies Himself so much the more that He may spare, in proportion as He scourges the more in awaiting; as He Himself saith to John by the voice of the Angel, As many as I love, I rebuke and chasten [Rev. 3, 19]; and as it is elsewhere spoken, For whom the Lord loveth, He chasteneth. [Hab. 12, 6] But reversely it is written of the scourge of condemnation, The wicked is taken in the work of his own hands [Ps. 9, 16]. Of whom the Lord saith by Jeremiah, when He sees the multitudes transgressing irreclaimably, whom He now no longer regards as sons under discipline, but as enemies under unmitigated scourging, For I have wounded thee with the wound of an enemy, with a cruel chastisement. [Jer. 30, 14] And what is said here, and not spare, is there likewise brought out in other words; Why criest thou for thine affliction? thy sorrow is incurable. [ver. 15] Whence the Elect always make this provision, that they should return to righteousness before the wrath of the Judge is inextinguishably kindled, lest being caught by the last stroke, they find life ended to them, together with sin, For the rod will then do away with the sin, when it alters the life, since whosesoever ways it does not change, his doings it does not atone for. Therefore all smiting from God is either a purifying of the present life in us, or a commencement of the punishment that follows. For with reference to those who profit by the scourge it is written, Who framest pain in the commandment [Ps. 94, 20]. For in that case when the wicked man is scourged and amended, to the commandment he would not give ear; to the pain he does. And so there is ‘pain framed in the commandment’ to him, who by pain as it were in the stead of the commandment is kept back from evil practices, But touching these persons to whom scourges are a curse, not a clearance, it is said, Thou hast stricken them, but they have not grieved; Thou hast consumed them, but they have refused to receive correction. [Jer. 5, 3] With these, their scourges commence in this life, and last on in everlasting smiting, Whence the Lord saith by Moses, For a fire is kindled in Mine anger, and shall burn unto the lowest hell [Deut. 32, 22]. For so far as regards the present smiting it is rightly said, A fire is kindled in Mine anger. But as regards the eternal damnation, it is immediately added with propriety, And shalt burn unto the lowest hell. Though by some persons that is used to be alleged, which is written, God judgeth not twice upon the same thing [Nah. 1, 9. LXX]. Which persons, howsoever, do not pay regard to this that is spoken by the Prophet of the wicked; And crush them with double confusion [Jer. 17, 18]. And that, which is written elsewhere; Jesus in saving the People out of Egypt, a second time destroyed them that believed not [Jude 5]. To which persons, however, if we yield assent, that any sin cannot be twice visited with punishment, this must be ,judged of those persons smitten for sin and dying in their sin, that their smiting begun here is completed there, that so to the unreformed there should be one and the same scourge, which begins here in time, but is consummated in eternal punishments, that to those that wholly refuse to be amended, the dealing of present scourges now should be the beginning of the torments to ensue. And so God shall let loose upon him, and not spare. It goes on;
Fleeing he shall flee out of His hand,
36. For he ‘flees out of the hand’ of the Smiter, who amends the wickedness of his behaviour; or otherwise, because in Holy Writ the hand is used to be taken for acting, he ‘flees from the hand of the smiter,’ who, whilst he marks the destruction of the wicked man, forsakes the path of wickedness.
