On Job et al. being said to be “blameless” in Scripture:
For also, to be "without
blame" is ascribed to the recognition and judgment of those to whom there
is a readiness to notice mildness in one's face and not to notice the
turbulence in the heart. Hence, too, Paul decrees with confidence these words:
"It behooves a bishop to be without guilt" (Tit. 1.7) and elsewhere
gives a general testimony to the Corinthians and asserts: "So that you not
lack in of our Lord, Jesus Christ, who will sustain you to the very end without
guilt." (Cor. 1.1.7 and 8) Lo, Paul reproaches in the very same letter the
very same people whom he assured by his own testimony that they are without
guilt to the very end when he writes: "Now to be sure, generally, there is
fault in you because you have lawsuits with one another." (Cor. 1.6.7)
(Thus), under the one title, and referring to the same persons, lo and behold,
(here we have): "being without guilt" and here: "fault.";
hence, he declares that those whom you would see to be called, "without
guilt", are not immediately asserted to be "without fault." For
also Lord Jesus has said: "John came without eating and without
drinking," (Luc. 7.33) and again, it is written: "His (John's) food
was locusts and wild honey." (Matt. 3.4) grace while you await the
revelation Are we to believe on the basis of one or another statement, that
either John has not eaten or that the Lord was mistaken? On the contrary, in
both statements there is truth because John had taken some food into the
substance of his flesh, and, on the other hand, the Lord had spoken truly about
John, that he had not eaten with the rest, nor what the rest had eaten; proving
that he and holy Scriptures disclose men's purposes when the knowledge of God
has often been concealed, Therefore it is compliantly accepted that whenever
the Scripture mentions "someone just and without blame", he is so
called only according to the notion of time and in the judgment of men, not in
that final judgment of God; God, to whom the conscience of the whole world is
subjected and who should be praised by every tongue.
. . .
to the Septuagint) And after much
reproaching through teaching and after much teaching through reproaching, Job
answering, said to the Lord: "Why am I judged to have been admonished and
rebuked by the Lord, hearing such things, when I am nothing?' (Iob 39. 34 sec.
LXX) Such also (was) Zacharias, a man "without blame", worthy of
being honored by men, worthy in the testimony of the Scriptures, who, as a
result of this, was already being tickled by his swollen pride and was
beginning to believe more the fame than his conscience, and (therefore) was
censured with the brand of infidelity by a reproaching angel and punished with
a temporary silence. Hence, also Paul says: "Therefore let him who thinks
that he is standing, watch out that he does not fall." (Cor. 1.10.12) And
serving, so to speak, as a model for men, he declares about himself and says:
"I chastise my body and subdue it to slavery lest perhaps I myself should
be cast away after preaching to others." (Cor. 1. 9.27) Thus, to call
someone "without guilt" and "without blame" is not evidence
of perfection, but an example of frequent (Scriptural) use. (Ruth May Gover, “The
Liber Apologeticus of Paulus Orosius: A Translation and Commentary” [MA Thesis;
Queens College of the City University of New York, May 1969], 34-45, 36)
Further Reading:
Origen
on the two meaning of "to be without sin" in Scripture
