After it a voice roars: he thunders with the voice of his excellency; and he will not restrain them when his voice is heard.
Read Chapter 37
George Leo Haydock
AD 1849
After. Light travels faster than sound, (Haydock) though thunder and lightning are produced at the same instant. (Calmet)
Found out. Philosophers can only propose their conjectures on the cause of thunder. This sense is confirmed by the Greek, Chaldean Hebrew may be, "he delays not "(Calmet)
Protestants, "he will not stay them "(Haydock) rain commonly falling soon after thunder. As the latter is occasioned by the collision of clouds, when they come to a certain distance from the earth, the heat causes them to dissolve into showers, which augment at each crack. (Calmet)
Septuagint, "For he has done great things, which we have not understood. "This is connected with chap. xxxvi. 24. Then we read, (ver. 7.) "that man may know his own weakness. "All the intermediate verses have been supplied by Origen from Theodotion, or others. (Haydock)
“Behind him the thunder will roar.” Certainly God transforms into tears the life of him whom he filled with his illumination, and the more he reminds the illuminated soul of eternal punishments, the harder he submits it to the groans for its past wickedness; and so a person feels the pain for what he has been, because he begins by now to see the good he did not do, he hates himself for what he has been, and he loves himself for what he should have been.… “He will thunder with the voice of his greatness.” God thunders with the voice of his greatness when he suggests to us, who are now well disposed through our tears, how great he is there on high.… “And after hearing his voice, nobody will be able to investigate.” The voice of God is heard when the soul perceives the inspiration of his grace.… But not even the soul illuminated by it can investigate this voice of the Spirit, which reaches and penetrates the ear of the heart. - "Morals on the Book of Job 27.39–41"
39. For the Lord doubtless turns into sorrow the life of him whom He has filled with His illumination; and the more He suggests to the enlightened mind eternal punishments, the more cruelly does He weary it with sorrow for its past wickedness; and a man grieves at what he was, because he now begins to discern the good which he was not. He hates himself, as he remembers himself to have been. He loves himself as he discerns he ought to have been; and now loves only the bitterness of penitence; because he carefully considers in what great pleasures he has sinned through self-indulgence. It is well said then, After Him a sound will roar. Because when God enters the mind, it is doubtless plain, that the sorrow of repentance immediately follows, in order that that soul may now delight in wholesome sorrow, which used to rejoice in its iniquity with a lamentable mirth. But the more abundantly a sin is lamented, the higher is the knowledge of the truth attained. Because the conscience, before p...
