A Prophetic Silence

Cum autem pertransissent septem dies, factum est verbum Domini ad me, dicens.   In eo quod septem diebus moerens sedit, et post diem septimum verba dominicae jussionis accepit ut loqui debuisset, aperte indicat quia eisdem diebus moerens tacuerat. Missus autem ad praedicandum fuerat, et tamen septem diebus sedens tacebat. Quid est hoc quod nobis propheta sanctus in hoc suo silentio innuit, nisi quia ille loqui veraciter novit, qui prius bene tacere didicerit? Quasi enim quoddam nutrimentum verbi, est censura silentii. Et recte per excrescentem quoque gratiam sermonem accipit, qui ordinate ante per humilitatem tacet. Hinc enim per Salomonem dicitur: Tempus tacendi, et tempus loquendi. Non enim ait, Tempus loquendi, et tempus tacendi, sed prius tacendi praemittit tempus, et postmodum subdit loquendi, quia non loquendo tacere, sed tacendo debemus loqui discere. Si ergo propheta sanctus qui missus ad loquendum fuerat diu prius tacuit, ut postmodum recte loqueretur, pensandum nobis est quanta ei culpa sit non tacere, quem nulla cogit necessitas loqui. Sanctus Gregorius Papa I, In Ezechielem Prophetam, Liber Primus, Homilia XI Migne PL 76 907

When seven days had passed the word of the Lord came to me saying...1 In which seven days he sat mourning and after the seventh day he received the word of the Lord's command that he should speak, openly indicating that he was silent during those days of mourning. He was sent to preach yet for seven days he sat silent. And what is this that the holy Prophet teaches us in his silence but that only he knows truly how to speak who before speaking has learned to be silent? For as a sort of nourishment of the word is the span of silence. And rightly by a growth of grace he receives the word, who before on account of humility is silent. Whence it is said by Solomon: 'A time for silence, and a time for speaking.' 2 It is not said, 'A time for speaking and a time for silence,' but first comes the time of silence and after comes the time of speaking, because it is not in speaking that we learn to be silent, but by silence that we learn to speak. If therefore the holy Prophet who was sent to speak was first silent that afterward he should speak correctly, we should think how much fault there may be to the one who is not silent, whom no necessity drives him to speak.   Pope Saint Gregory the Great, on Ezekiel, Book 1, from Homily 11 1 Ez 3.16 2 Eccl 3.7