17. The Abyss of Knowledge (Commentary on Ecclesiastes,
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compared to the Lord? What we seek is hardly so small that it can be grasped by the reasoning of insignificant human nature.
Listen to the counsel of Ecclesiastes: Do not utter a word before God. For God, he says, is in heaven, and thou upon earth (Eccles. 5.1). And he shows, I think, especially by the distance that separates heaven and earth, despite their mutual affinity, how far the divine nature surpasses the compass of man's thought. For as much as the stars are beyond the grasp of the fingers, so much and many times more does that nature which is above all human minds transcend our earthly thoughts.
17. The Abyss of Knowledge (Commentary on Ecclesiastes, sermon 7, 44.724D-732D) The text which follows leads the soul to a more profound philosophy of the things of the spirit. For he teaches us here that the universe is entirely consistent with itself, that there is an indestructible harmony among all intelligible things and a kind of cooperation which exists among all beings.
The universe is not separated from that with which it is connected, but all things continue in existence governed by the power of being; and that which is truly being is the divine Goodness in itself—or call it by any other name you may find to express its indestructible nature. And yet, how can we find a name for that which the divine voice of the Apostle tells us is beyond every name (Phil. 2.9) ? The only name you could find to express that ineffable nature and power is that of the Good.
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It is this Good, beyond all good, that truly is, and by itself it has given and continues to give all things the power to come into existence and to remain in being. What is outside of it is non-existence; for what is outside of being does not exist. Now love is the antithesis of evil; and God is all goodness. Hence it follows that evil is outside of God, and that its essence must be conceived of not as something existent but rather as the absence of good. We therefore call evil that which is outside of the concept of good. And thus evil is conceived as the opposite of good as non-being is the opposite of being. Thus it is that we fall short of the good by the deliberate choice of our appetite. It is just like people who are deprived of light and are said to see the darkness, whereas they do not see the darkness but rather do not see anything.18 So too the nature of evil, which is really non existent, becomes real in those men who have fallen short of the good. And evil remains in existence so long as we remain outside of the good. But we can by a free movement of the will tear ourselves away from this attachment to the non existent and attach ourselves to real being; then it ceases to have that existence in me any longer, and never will have it again completely. For evil in itself is nothing apart from our deliberate choice. When I attach myself and cleave to what is truly being, I abide in that which always was, is now and ever shall be.
This I think is the meaning of the saying: there is a time to rend, and a time to sew (Eccles. 3.7), that is, that we should break away from all that we have been evilly attached to and cleave to that which it is good to adhere to. It is good for me, says the text, to adhere to my God, to put my hope in the Lord (Ps. 72.28). One might quote many other texts
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which offer useful counsel in this matter, as, for example:
Lift the evil from yourselves.w And this is the command which the divine Apostle also gives us when he orders the man who has been condemned for illicit wedlock to separate himself from the common body of the Church, lest the little leaven, as he tells us (i Cor. 5.6), corrupt the whole mass of the prayer of the Church. On the other hand, he tries to restore by repentance the man who has been separated by sin where he says: lest perhaps such a one he swallowed up with overmuch sorrow (2 Cor. 2.7). Thus Paul knows how to tear away the soiled portion of the Church's robe in good time, and in good time to sew it on again when it has been cleansed of all dirt by penance.
Many similar instances can be observed in the accounts of our more primitive documents as well as in the events of our own day, which are being accomplished in our churches in a providential way. We know of those from whom we have been torn away, and those to whom we still adhere: we are separated from those in heresy, and constantly attached to true piety; for the robe of the Church, as we observe, is still whole, even when it has broken off any communion with heretics.
But whether the sacred text is (according to my interpre tation) expounding a philosophy of being, or is merely teach ing some such lesson by way of counsel, the divine word does in all things aim at the practical and the useful, opportunely breaking off evil attachments and duly applying us to those things wherein attachment is desirable.
Let us now proceed with the rest of the text. Here I think it will be clear how much better the actual words of the passage fit the context when they are interpreted according
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to a deeper level of meaning. Ecclesiastes first mentions the time to keep silence, and after that he allows a time to speak
(Eccles. 3.7). When, and on what matters, is it better to keep silence? Those who are concerned with morals might say that most often silence is more becoming than speech; and similarly Paul distinguishes the proper times for speech and for silence, sometimes prescribing silence, at other times com manding speech. Let no evil speech proceed from your mouth (Eph. 4.29) is his law of silence. But if speech is good, to the edification of the faith, that it may administer grace to the hearers (Eph. 4.29), then it is the time to speak. Let women keep silence in the churches (1 Cor. 14.34), once again, gives us the time to keep silence. But if they would learn anything, let them as\ their husbands at home (1 Cor.
14.35), again shows us the proper time for speech. Lie not one to another (Col. 3.9) suggests the proper time for silence, and speak ye the truth every man with his neighbor (Eph.
4.25) is, once again, permission to speak.
Many similar quotations can be cited from the Old Testa ment. When the sinner stood against me, l was dumb, and was humbled, and kept silence (Ps. 382-3), and: I, as a deaf man, heard not: and as a dumb man not opening his mouth.
The man who cannot be moved to requite evil is dumb; and when he should use his voice, he opens his mouth in parables and utters things hidden (Ps. 77.2), he fills his mouth with praise, and makes his tongue the pen (Ps. 44.2). But since there are innumerable examples of this in Scripture, I need not go into detail where there is such agreement.
But what I did want to take up again briefly was the point that occurred to my mind earlier: that there is a connection between this doctrine of speech and silence and the meaning
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we gave to the text on rending and sewing (Eccles. 3.7). In that text it was a question of the reason tearing the soul away from its contrary, to which it was adhering, and uniting it to that true reality which is beyond all reason. This was what I said earlier. But in the present text I think that silence is mentioned first because human speech finds it impossible to express that reality which transcends all thought and every concept, which the soul that has been torn from evil con stantly seeks, and to which it yearns to be united once it has been found. And he who obstinately tries to express it in words, unconsciously offends God. For He Who is believed to transcend the universe must surely transcend speech. He who tries to circumscribe the infinite in speech no longer admits that He is transcendent by the very fact that he equates God with his speech, under the impression that the proper description of God is only such as his discourse is capable of expressing. He is unaware that the proper notion of the supreme Being is preserved precisely in our belief that God transcends knowledge. The reason for this is that all created reality must look only to that to which it is naturally akin. Indeed nothing can remain in existence if it goes out side of its own nature. Thus fire does not abide in water, nor water in fire. Earth does not abide in water, nor water on earth; air cannot exist in earth nor earth in air. But each element must remain within the confines of its own nature, and exists only so long as it does so. If it moves outside of its nature, it passes from existence.
The same is true of our sense faculties. Each faculty must remain within its natural operation, and cannot shift to that of a neighboring sense. The eye, for example, cannot operate on the data of audition; hearing cannot taste; touch cannot
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speak; and the tongue cannot function on what is visible or audible. Each sense remains within the bounds of its own faculty, within the operation prescribed by nature.
So too no created being can go out of itself by rational contemplation. Whatever it sees, it must see itself; and even if it thinks it is seeing beyond itself, it does not in fact possess a nature which can achieve this. And thus in its contempla tion of Being it tries to force itself to transcend a spatial representation, but it never achieves it. For in every possible thought, the mind is surely aware of the spatial element which it perceives in addition to the thought content; and the spatial element is, of course, created. Yet the Good that we have learned to seek and to cherish is beyond all creation, and hence beyond all comprehension. Thus how can our mind, which always operates on a dimensional image, com prehend a nature that has no dimension, especially as our minds are constantly penetrating, by analysis, into things which are more and more profound. And though the mind in its restlessness ranges through all that is knowable, it has never yet discovered a way of comprehending eternity in such wise that it might place itself outside of it, and go beyond the idea of eternity itself and that Being which is above all being. It is like someone who finds himself on a mountain ridge. Imagine a sheer, steep crag, of reddish ap pearance below, extending into eternity; on top there is this ridge which looks down over a projecting rim into a bottom less chasm. Now imagine what a person would probably experience if he put his foot on the edge of this ridge which overlooks the chasm and found no solid footing nor any thing to hold on to. This is what I think the soul experiences when it goes beyond its footing in material things, in its
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quest for that which has no dimension and which exists from all eternity. For here there is nothing it can take hold of, neither place nor time, neither measure nor anything else; it does not allow our minds to approach. And thus the soul, slipping at every point from what cannot be grasped, be comes dizzy and perplexed and returns once again to what is connatural to it, content now to know merely this about the Transcendent, that it is completely different from the nature of the things that the soul knows.
Thus it is, then, that when reason touches on those things which are beyond it, that is the time to keep silence (Eccles.
3.7); rather it keeps the wonder of that ineffable power within the secret of our conscience, fully aware that great men have spoken not of God but rather of his works, saying:
Who shall declare the powers of the Lord? (Ps. 105.2) and 7 will relate all thy wonders (Ps. 9.2), and Generation and generation shall praise thy wor\s (Ps. 144.4). This is what they discuss and this is what they have to say in their attempt to translate reality into words. But when their discourse touches on that which transcends all knowledge, it is rather silence that they prescribe in what they tell us. For they tell us that of the magnificence of the glory of His holiness there is no end™ Ah, the wonder of it! Why does the sacred text fear to approach the glory of the divine mystery, so that it has not even expressed any of those effects which are out side His nature ? It does not say that God's essence is without limit, judging it rash even to express this in a concept; rather it merely marvels at the vision of the magnificence of His glory. But once again he is unable to see the substance of this glory; he is merely in amazement at the glory of His holiness. He is far from being concerned with the exact nature of God's essence; he has not the power to show admi-