{"author":null,"canonical_references":[],"database_sha256":"8cfbe7284c6936871d57c02dc6aa63ebbdfd4722422d539dd9f716e46e91112e","date_end":null,"date_start":null,"edition_year":null,"id":"sermonindex-ecf-4111","native_reference":{"book_number":250,"chapter_from":2,"chapter_to":2,"system":"MyBible module coordinates (mapping unverified)","verse_from":24,"verse_to":24},"public_import_allowed":false,"record_kind":"verse-keyed-module-record","review_required":["English edition and exact text","author/work attribution","dating","verse mapping and citation kind","reuse and attribution","split author quotations and deduplicate"],"review_status":"unreviewed","source_html":"<p><b>Jerome</b>: \"Is it<br/>not good for man that he eats and drinks and shows his soul satisfaction in his<br/>labour? And even that, I perceived, is<br/>from the hand of God. For who should eat<br/>and who should make haste except me? To<br/>the man who pleases Him He has given wisdom, knowledge and joy; but to the<br/>sinner He has given the urge to gather and amass - that he may hand it on to<br/>one who is pleasing to God. That, too,<br/>is vanity and a vexation of the spirit.\" After I examined all things and saw that<br/>nothing was more unjust than one man enjoying the work of another, then this<br/>work seemed to me to be the most righteous, and like a gift of God, seeing that<br/>a man may enjoy his own labour, drinking and eating, and for a time refraining<br/>from amassed wealth. And sometimes it is a gift of God, that such a mind as is<br/>bestowed upon righteous men, that they squander those things, which they have<br/>sought with great attention and vigilance. <br/>In fact on the other hand, it is the character of the anger of God,<br/>which is set against the sinner, so he amasses wealth day and night and uses if<br/>for no purpose, then he bequeaths it to those men who are righteous in the sight<br/>of God. But, he says, looking at this<br/>more closely and noticing that all things come to a common end with death, I<br/>have judged it to be the most vain of all. <br/>These readings are very close to the text though, so that I do not seem<br/>to completely miss the plain meaning of the words, and while I follow spiritual<br/>riches, disdain the poverty of history. <br/>For what is good then, or what kind of gift of God is it, either to<br/>covet his wealth and like a man in flight gather desire prematurely, or to turn<br/>someone else's work to ones own pleasures, and then to think that this is a<br/>gift of God, if we take pleasure in others' discomfort and toil? It is good though, to take our own food and<br/>drink, which we have found by divine will, from the flesh and blood of a Lamb. For who is either able to eat or when there<br/>is need to spare in the absence of God? <br/>He warned that sacred food must not be given to the dogs [Cfr Matth. 7, 6.],<br/>and he teaches how rations ought on occasion to be given to slaves [Cfr Matth. 24, 45.],<br/>and similar to another meaning, that is we ought to eat only honey that has<br/>been found, and only as much as is needed. <br/>But God gives wisdom and knowledge and happiness to the man who is good. [Cfr Prov. 25, 16.] For unless he was good and corrected his ways<br/>beforehand by his own judgement, he will not be worthy of that wisdom,<br/>knowledge and happiness, according to that which is said in another place:<br/>\"Plant for yourselves in justice, make a vintage of the fruit of life,<br/>enlighten for yourselves the light of knowledge.\" [Os. 10, 12. (as in LXX)] In fact, righteousness ought to be planted<br/>first, and the fruit of life must be reaped, only then, afterwards the light of<br/>knowledge will be able to appear. <br/>Therefore just as God gave the good man wisdom and other gifts, in the<br/>same way he has forsaken the sinner according to his own judgement, and made<br/>him amass riches and contrive false doctrines therefrom. When a saintly man who is pleasing to God<br/>sees these things, he understands them, since they are vain and composed of the<br/>conceit of the spirit. Nor should we<br/>admire what he has said: \"he gave vexation to the sinner\" and so<br/>on. For this must be seen in concordance<br/>with that meaning which I have often explained: that for this reason anxiety or<br/>vexation has been given to him, since he was a sinner, and the cause of<br/>vexation was not in God, but in himself, who had sinned previously by his own<br/>volition.<br/><i>— Commentary on Ecclesiastes</i></p>","source_html_sha256":"b4fa3920fbabb7ccc2bf56495a19c320c2cf8c27e0c18530782a4eb57d1bc309","source_module":"ECF","source_row_id":4111,"source_url":"https://www.sermonindex.net/commentary/ecf/","text_sha256":"92e3502bf32588b0cbdcea651c0fc499d727297694f2138ce2ac9763b825d12d","translator":null,"work":null}