Interesting Point by Gregory the Great

I started Pope St. Gregory the Great's commentary on Job this morning and noticed something most biblical scholars should take note of these days.

St. Greg is going through the authorship debates of Job and makes this comment after summing up all the different possibilities:

"But who was the writer, it is very superfluous to enquire; since at any rate the Holy Spirit is confidently believed to have been the Author. He then Himself wrote them, Who dictated the things that should be written. He did Himself write them Who both was present as the Inspirer in that Saint's work, and by the mouth of the writer has consigned to us his acts as patterns for our imitation." (http://www.lectionarycentral.com/GregoryMoralia/Preface.html)

I was also amazed at his depth of insight into the debates on who wrote Job, the fathers were much smarter than some people give them credit for. This summer, I want to pick a father and just try to read everything he wrote (perhaps St. Gregory as I've read his letters to St. Anselm in the Ven. Bede's English history already).

He had some other great quotes I found as well:

"Holy Scripture is a stream in which the elephant may swim and the lamb may wade."

"Learn the heart of God from the Word of God"

"The Bible is a letter from Almighty God to His creatures."

Which Protestants would jump on to say AHA! he was a proto-protestant...untill you read his other work on purgatory / soteriology.

A very great man though to be sure. Jaroslav Pelikan seemed to paint him as a mindless plagiarist/copyist of St. Augustine, but I'm seeing he goes deeper than that.

Gregory the Great on Job

I've started re-reading the book of Job and was looking for a patristic commentary on it and I found out that Pope St. Gregory the Great, who according to Calvin was 'the last good pope', wrote a commentary on Job. I couldn't find it on Newadvent or any other site, but I finally found it here: http://www.documentacatholicaomnia.eu/01p/0590-0604,_SS_Gregorius_I_Magnus,_Moralia_in_Job,_EN.doc and it's like 177 pages. Right now I'm about 500 pages behind on reading for school, but I'd like to try and read it alongside Job. It could be fun.

I like the introduction to it already, it's really honest about his life and reminds me a bit of St. Augustine's Confessions:

"I had long fended off the grace that would convert me, and how even after I was touched by the longing for heaven I chose to stay hidden beneath worldly garb. I had already been shown the love of eternity that should fill my desires, but the chains of long-bred habit kept me from altering my outer way of life. While my heart forced me to go on serving this world (at least to all appearances) many worldly pressures began to arise that threatened to bind me to this world not in appearance only but (what is more burdensome) in mind as well. Finally I fled all that in my anxiety and sought the cloister's harbor. I thought, in vain as it turned out, that I had finally abandoned the things of the world and come to shore naked from the shipwreck that is this life. But often a storm arises and the waves blast a carelessly moored ship away from even the safest port. Thus suddenly I found myself, under cover of Holy Orders, back on the sea of secular affairs."

It's this kind of description which reminds me of how the monastic movement started, out of a sincere devotion to God. Ultimately anyone familiar with late medieval history will realize the dream eventually turned into a nightmare and in many places monasteries were quite corrupt. In any case, this is quite a story I hope I eventually get to read.