My flesh is clothed with worms and clods of dust; my skin is broken, and become loathsome.
All Commentaries on Job 7:5 Go To Job 7
Gregory The Dialogist
AD 604
And yet if we take Job’s words as the voice of the holy church universal, doubtless we find it at one time sunk to the earth by the “corruption” of the flesh, at another time by “the defilement of dust.” For [the church] has many within it who, while devoted to the love of the flesh, become corrupt with the putrefaction of excess. In addition, there are some people who certainly keep from the gratification of the flesh, yet grovel with all their heart in earthly practices. So let holy church speak through the words of one of its members, let it express what it endures from either sort of person. “My flesh is clothed with corruption and the defilement of dust.” It is as if [the church] said in plain words, “There are many who are members of me in faith, yet these are not sound or pure members in practice. For they either are mastered by foul desires and run to and fro in corruption’s rottenness, or, being devoted to earthly practices, they are soiled with dust. For in those whom I have to endure, people filled with wantonness, I do plainly lament for the flesh turned corrupt. And in those from whom I suffer, those who are seeking the earth, what else is this but the defilement of dust that I bear?”
