Voices and influences
Gregory the Dialogist
The Roman prefect who became a monk, then a reluctant pope, and taught the Middle Ages how to care for souls.
Summary
This site quotes Gregory the Dialogist 628 times across 33 books, and lists 0 works.
- Lived died 604.
- Quoted here most in Job: 384 of 628.
Gregory the Dialogist
- Lived
- died 604
- Tradition
- Patristic
5 of 628 quotations
Own words
Quoted in full, because Gregory the Dialogist died in 604 and these works are out of copyright. Each citation below names its edition and its year. A citation naming a modernised text means that edition makes its own editorial changes, and that edition's terms are not in this site's record.
Kish, who is called harsh, signifies not only his elect, but also the Redeemer himself. For no one was harsher toward himself than he.
The rest of the quotation
For the prophet, indicating the severity of this harshness, says: "Truly he himself bore our infirmities, and he himself carried our sorrows" (Isa. 53:4). For to die is not to suffer for mortals, who are subject to the suffering of a condemned nature.
1 Samuel 9:3 One day the donkeys of Saul’s father Kish wandered off, and Kish said to his son Saul, “Take one of the servants and go look for the donkeys.” BSB
There follows: "But as for me, far be it from me that I should sin against the Lord by ceasing to pray for you." 15.
The rest of the quotation
He speaks these things, to whom the Lord said above concerning those to whom he speaks: "They have not rejected you, but me, that I should not reign over them." Behold, the prophet is rejected, and he speaks to those who reject him, saying: "Far be it from me that I should commit this sin against the Lord, that I should cease to pray for you."
1 Samuel 12:23 As for me, far be it from me that I should sin against the LORD by ceasing to pray for you. And I will continue to teach you the good and right way. BSB
When long afterward David sat against the battle lines of enemies, he wished from desire to drink water from the cistern of Bethlehem. His chosen soldiers, breaking through the midst of the opposing forces, brought back unharmed the water the king had desired.
The rest of the quotation
But the man instructed by scourges immediately reproached himself for having desired water at the peril of his soldiers, and pouring it out, he offered it to the Lord, as it is written there: He poured it out to the Lord.
2 Samuel 23:16 So the three mighty men broke through the Philistine camp, drew water from the well near the gate of Bethlehem, and brought it back to David. But he refused to drink it; instead, he poured it out to the LORD, BSB
Behold, His servants are not stedfast, and in His Angels He found folly: How much more in them that dwell in houses of clay, whose foundation is in the dust, which shall be consumed as by the moth?
The rest of the quotation
Though the Angelical nature, by being fixed in contemplation of the Creator, remains unchangeable in its own state, yet hereby, that it is a created being, it admits in itself the variableness of change. Now to be changed is to go from one thing into another, and to be without stability in one's self.
Job 4:18–19 If God puts no trust in His servants, and He charges His angels with error, how much more those who dwell in houses of clay, whose foundations are in the dust, who can be crushed like a moth! BSB
MORAL INTERPRETATION. But he shall save the poor from the sword of their mouth, and from the hand of the mighty. For the 'poor' is everyone that is not set up in his own eyes.
The rest of the quotation
And hence 'Truth' saith in the Gospel, Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Now a person is drawn into sin in two ways. For either he is led on by pleasure, or overcome by fear. For 'the sword of the mouth' is the mischievousness of persuasion, but 'the hand of the mighty' is the opposition of power.
Job 5:15 He saves the needy from the sword in their mouth and from the clutches of the powerful. BSB
Influence, on the record
This site quotes Gregory the Dialogist 628 times across 33 books.
This site’s own count of what it does with the voice
The life, in order
The life told as one accountfrom this site's record
Gregory was born in Rome about 540, into an old senatorial family with money and land. The Rome he grew up in was a wreck. Plague came through in waves. The Lombards were burning their way down the peninsula. A city that had once held a million people was down to a few tens of thousands, camped among ruins it could no longer repair. About 573 he became prefect of the city — the highest civil office left in Rome. Then he walked away from it. He turned the family mansion on the Caelian Hill into a monastery of St. Andrew and used the family estates in Sicily to found six more. He later said those were the happiest years of his life. He was pulled back out. For roughly six years he served as the pope's representative at the imperial court in Constantinople, learning how empires actually work. He came home to Rome, and in 590 plague killed Pope Pelagius II. The city elected Gregory. He tried to refuse. He called the office a burden and began signing his letters servus servorum Dei — servant of the servants of God. Popes still use the title. He governed like a man who expected no help. He fed Rome out of the church's own estates, kept careful accounts of grain and the poor who received it, and negotiated peace with the Lombard king Agilulf when the emperor in Constantinople would not. In 596 he sent the monk Augustine and about forty companions to convert the English. Bede preserved the story behind it: Gregory seeing fair-haired boys for sale in the Roman market and asking who they were. Angles, he was told. Not Angles but angels, he answered. He wrote the Pastoral Rule, a short and practical book on how a pastor should live and how differently he must speak to the proud man and the frightened one. It became the standard handbook for bishops for a thousand years; King Alfred had it put into English. His Moralia on Job, thirty-five books long, was the most-copied commentary of the early Middle Ages. His Dialogues — four books of stories about Italian holy men, including the only life we have of Benedict — gave him his Eastern name. In Greek churches he is Gregory the Dialogist, and the Liturgy of the Presanctified Gifts is called by his name. He was ill for most of his working life: gout, and a stomach complaint that often kept him off his feet. He wrote about it plainly in his letters. He died on 12 March 604. Sources: Bede, Ecclesiastical History of the English People; Gregory the Great, Pastoral Rule and Dialogues; Philip Schaff, History of the Christian Church, vol. IV; The Catholic Encyclopedia (1913).
628 quotations across 33 books
Where this voice is quoted
So Job opens his mouth in vain and multiplies words without knowledge.”
“Therefore doth Job open his mouth in vain, he multiplieth words without knowledge. By introducing these words, he doubtless asserts, that blessed Job both knew nothing, and had said much; and, though he introduces his own opinions loquaciously, he accuses him of the fault of…”
I get my knowledge from afar, and I will ascribe justice to my Maker.
“I will repeat my knowledge from the beginning. But because, on the mention of knowledge, his pride of heart hath displayed itself in his voice, he is plainly discovered to be a haughty person, if he does not quickly conceal himself by some disguise.”
For truly my words are free of falsehood; one perfect in knowledge is with you.
“For truly my words are without falsehood. Even righteous men, when they see that they cannot be understood by their feeble hearers, are frequently wont to praise the things they say.”
He does not keep the wicked alive, but He grants justice to the afflicted.
“But He saveth not the wicked, and giveth judgment to the poor. Holy Scripture is frequently wont to call the humble, 'poor.'”
He does not take His eyes off the righteous, but He enthrones them with kings and exalts them forever.
“He will not withdraw His eyes from the righteous, but establisheth kings on the throne for ever, and there are they exalted.”
And if men are bound with chains, caught in cords of affliction, then He tells them their deeds and how arrogantly they have transgressed.
“And if they shall be in chains, and bound with the cords of poverty, He will shew them their works, and their wickednesses, because they have been violent. The chains of bondage, are the very detention of their present pilgrimage.”
He opens their ears to correction and commands that they turn from iniquity.
“He will open also their ear, to correct them, and will speak to them that they return from iniquity. To 'open the ear from iniquity,' is to lay open the understanding of knowledge.”
If they obey and serve Him, then they end their days in prosperity and their years in happiness.
“If they shall hear and observe Him, they shall fulfil their days in good, and their years in glory; but if they shall not hear, they shall pass away by the sword, and shall be consumed with folly.”
The godless in heart harbor resentment; even when He binds them, they do not cry for help.
“Hypocrites and crafty men provoke the wrath of God. When mentioning hypocrites, he appropriately subjoins, 'and crafty.' For unless they are crafty in wit, they cannot consistently make pretence of that which they wish to appear.”
God rescues the afflicted by their affliction and opens their ears in oppression.
“He will deliver the poor from his straitness. The poor is delivered from his straitness, when any humble person is set free from this affliction of his pilgrimage.”
Indeed, He drew you from the jaws of distress to a spacious and broad place, to a table full of richness.
“He will therefore bring thee safely from a narrow opening into a broad place. Every one who forsakes the way of life, and casts himself down into the darkness of sins, plunges himself, as it were, into a well or pitfall.”
But now you are laden with the judgment due the wicked; judgment and justice have seized you.
“But thy cause hath been judged as the cause of the ungodly, thou shall receive thy cause and judgment. The cause of the good, is righteousness.”
Behold, God is exalted in His power. Who is a teacher like Him?
“Behold, God is lofty in His strength, and none is like Him among lawgivers. As if he said plainly, He, Who will appear humble in weakness, remains lofty in strength, Paul also witnessing this, who says, For though He was crucified through weakness, yet He…”
Who has appointed His way for Him, or told Him, ‘You have done wrong’?
“Who will be able to search out His ways? Or who dareth to say to Him, Thou hast wrought iniquity? As if he said; 'How can He be blamed, Whose doing cannot be searched into?”
Remember to magnify His work, which men have praised in song.
“Remember that thou knowest not His work, of Whom men have sung. In Holy Scripture sometimes Angels, and sometimes persons ['homines'] of perfect life, are called 'men.' ['viri.']”
All mankind has seen it; men behold it from afar.
“All men see Him, every one beholdeth afar off. Every man from the fact that he is created rational, ought to conclude from reason that He Who made him is God.”
Indeed, God is great—beyond our knowledge; the number of His years is unsearchable.
“Behold, God is great, surpassing our knowledge. The number of His years cannot be reckoned. He had said above, Behold, God is lofty. [ver. 22] He now says again, Behold, God is great.”
“At this my heart also pounds and leaps from its place.
“At this my heart trembled, and was moved from its place. Because, while fear strikes the mind, it estranges it from itself, the Latin translations sometimes call an ecstasy fear, as is said by the Psalmist, I said in my fear, I am cast out…”
Listen closely to the thunder of His voice and the rumbling that comes from His mouth.
“It will hear a hearing in the terror of His voice, and a sound going out of His mouth. It is the habit of Holy Scripture, that, when it informs us that any thing is heard with the hearing, it says that this hearing is…”
Then there comes a roaring sound; He thunders with His majestic voice. He does not restrain the lightning when His voice resounds.
“After Him a sound will roar. He will thunder with the voice of His greatness. And He will not be enquired into, when His Voice hath been heard.”
God thunders wondrously with His voice; He does great things we cannot comprehend.
“God will thunder marvellously with His voice. Who doeth great things and inscrutable. God thunders marvellously with His voice, because He penetrates our hearts incomprehensibly with His secret might.”
For He says to the snow, ‘Fall on the earth,’ and to the gentle rain, ‘Pour out a mighty downpour.’
“Who ordereth the snow to descend on the earth, and the rains of the winter, and the showers of His strength. Because the Psalmist says, Thou shalt wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow; [Ps.”
He seals up the hand of every man, so that all men may know His work.
“Who sealeth the hand of all men, that every one may know his works. For men scorn to think of the sins they commit. But when they hear the power of heavenly severity, they discern this burden of misdeeds which weighs them down.”
The tempest comes from its chamber, and the cold from the driving north winds.
“A tempest will come forth from the inner parts, and cold from Arcturus. When Holy Scripture mentions the inner parts, in opposition to Arcturus, it designates the quarter of the South, opposite to the parts of the North.”
Whether for punishment or for His land, He accomplishes this in His loving devotion.
“Whether in one tribe, or in His own land, or in whatsoever place of His mercy He shall order them to be found. The one tribe of Judah is certainly meant, which is mentioned in Holy Scripture plainly and repeatedly above the rest.”