The Enarrations, or Expositions, on the Psalms

¹⁴ “And they said, How has God known, and is there knowledge in the Most High?”. See through what thought they pass. Behold unjust men are happy, God does not care for things human. Does He indeed know what we do? See what things are being said. We are inquiring, brethren, “How has God known,” etc. (no longer let Christians say it). For how does it appear to you that God knows not, and that there is no knowledge in the Most High? He replies, “Lo! Themselves they are sinners, and in the world they have gotten abundant riches”. Both sinners they are, and in the world they have gotten abundant riches. He confessed that he willed not to be a sinner in order that he might have riches. A carnal soul for things visible and earthly would have sold its justice. What sort of justice is that which is retained for the sake of gold, as if gold were a more precious thing than justice herself, or as if when a man denies the deposit of another man's goods, he to whom he denied them should suffer a greater loss, than he that denies them to him. The former does lose a garment, the latter fidelity. “Lo! They are themselves sinners, and in the world they have gotten abundant riches.” On this account therefore God knows not, and on this account there is no knowledge in the Most High.

15. “And I said, therefore without cause I have justified my heart”. In that I serve God, and have not these things; they serve him not, and they abound in these things: “therefore without cause I have justified my heart, and have washed among the innocent my hands.” This without cause I have done. Where is the reward of my good life? Where is the wage of my service? I live well and am in need; and the unjust man does abound. “And I have washed among the innocent my hands. And I have been scourged all the day long”. From me the scourges of God do not impart. I serve well, and I am scourged; he serves not, and is honoured. He has proposed to himself a great question. The soul is disturbed, the soul does pass over things which are to pass away unto despising things earthly and to desiring things eternal. There is a passage of the soul herself in this thought; where she does toss in a sort of tempest she will reach the harbour. And it is with her as it is with sick persons, who are less violently sick, when recovery is far off: when recovery is at hand they are in higher fever; physicians call it the “critical accession” through which they pass to health: greater fever is there, but leading to health: greater heat, but recovery is at hand. So also is this man enfevered. For these are dangerous words, brethren, offensive, and almost blasphemous, “How has God known?” This is why I say, “and almost;” He has not said, God has not known: he has not said, there is no knowledge in the Most High: but as if inquiring, hesitating, doubting. This is the same as he said a little before, “My steps were almost overthrown.” He does not affirm it, but the very doubt is dangerous. Through danger he is passing to health. Hear now the health: “Therefore in vain I have justified my heart, and have washed among the innocent my hands: and I have been scourged all the day long, and my chastening was in the morning.” Chastening is correction. He that is being chastened is being corrected. What is, “in the morning”? It is not deferred. That of the ungodly is being deferred, mine is not deferred: the former is too late or is not at all; mine is in the morning.

16. “If I said, I shall declare thus; behold, the generation of Your sons I have reprobated”: that is, I will teach thus. How will you teach? That there is no knowledge in the Most High, that God does not know? Will you propound this opinion, that without cause men live justly who do live justly; that a just man has lost his service, because God does more show favour to evil men, or else He does care for no one? Will you tell this, declare this? He does restrain himself by an authority repressing him. What authority? A man wishes some time to break out in this sentiment: but he is recalled by the Scriptures directing us always to live well, saying, that God does care for things human, that He makes a distinction between a godly man and an ungodly man. Therefore this man also wishing to put forth this sentiment, does recollect himself. And what says he? “I have reprobated the generation of Your sons.” If I shall declare thus, the generation of just men I shall reprobate. As also some copies have it, “Behold, the generation of your sons with which I have been in concert:” that is, with which consisting of Your sons I have been in concert; that is, with which I have agreed, to which I have been conformed: I have been out of time with all, if so I teach. For he does sing in concert who gives the tune together; but he that gives not the tune together does not sing in concert. Am I to say something different from that which Abraham said, from that which Isaac said, from that which Jacob said, from that which the Prophets said? For all they said that God does care for things human, am I to say that He cares not? Is there greater wisdom in me than in them? Greater understanding in me than in them? A most wholesome authority has called back his thought from ungodliness. And what follows? That he might not reprobate, he did what? “And I undertook to know”. May God be with him in order that he may know. Meanwhile, brethren, from a great fall he is being withheld, when he does not presume that he already knows, but has undertaken to know that which he knew not. For but now he was willing to appear as if knowing, and to declare that God has no care of things human. For this has come to be a most naughty and ungodly doctrine of unrighteous men. Know, brethren, that many men dispute and say that God cares not for things human, that by chances all things are ruled, or that our wills have been made subject to the stars, that each one is not dealt with according to his deserts, but by the necessity of his stars—an evil doctrine, an impious doctrine. Unto these thoughts was going that man whose feet were almost moved, and whose steps were all but overthrown, into this error he was going; but because he was not in tune with the generation of the sons of God, he undertook to know, and condemned the knowledge wherein with God's just men he agreed not. And what he says let us hear; how that he undertook to know, and was helped, and learned something, and declared it to us. “And I undertook,” he says, “to know.” “In this labour is before me.” Truly a great labour; to know in what manner both God does care for things human, and it is well with evil men, and good men labour. Great is the importance of the question; therefore, “and this labour is before me.” As it were there is standing in my face a sort of wall, but you have the voice of a Psalm, “In my God I shall pass over the wall.”