Verse 13.—'If I wait, hell is my house, and in darkness I have made my bed.' 49. Before Christ, the souls of the just were held in hell, free from torments.—For the former saints could both endure adversities, and yet, once led forth from their bodies, could not as yet be freed from the places of hell, because He had not yet come who should descend thither without guilt, that He might free from guilt those who were held there. But then did man make his bed in darkness, when, by consenting to the crafty persuader, he forsook the light of righteousness.
And because in those very places of hell the souls of the just were held without torment, so that both for original guilt they still descended thither, and yet from their own deeds they had no punishment, to have made, as it were, a bed in darkness is to have prepared a rest for oneself in hell. For it was a heavy weariness for the elect, after the loosing of the flesh, still not to behold the face of the Creator. Which weariness blessed Job not undeservedly calls darkness. But because this came from the penalty of weakness, he rightly at once subjoins that same weakness, saying: