Text -- Job 17:1-9 (NET)

17:1 My spirit is broken, my days have faded out, the grave awaits me. 17:2 Surely mockery is with me; my eyes must dwell on their hostility. 17:3 Make then my pledge with you. Who else will put up security for me? 17:4 Because you have closed their minds to understanding, therefore you will not exalt them. 17:5 If a man denounces his friends for personal gain, the eyes of his children will fail. 17:6 He has made me a byword to people, I am the one in whose face they spit. 17:7 My eyes have grown dim with grief; my whole frame is but a shadow. 17:8 Upright men are appalled at this; the innocent man is troubled with the godless. 17:9 But the righteous man holds to his way, and the one with clean hands grows stronger.

Commentary -- Word/Phrase Notes (per phrase)

Wesley: Job 17:1

He speaks of the sepulchres of his fathers, to which he must be gathered. The graves where they are laid, are ready for me also. Whatever is unready, the grave is ready for us: it is a bed soon made. And if the grave be ready for us, it concerns us, to be ready for the grave.

Wesley: Job 17:2

Do not my friends, instead of comforting, mock me? Thus he returns to what he had said, Job 16:20, and intimates the justice of his following appeal.

Wesley: Job 17:3

These words contain, an humble desire to God that he would be his surety, or appoint him a surety who should maintain his righteous cause against his opposers.

Wesley: Job 17:3

Be surety to me; whereof that was the usual gesture.

Wesley: Job 17:4

Thou hast blinded the minds of my friends: therefore I desire a more wise and able judge.

Wesley: Job 17:4

Thou wilt not give them the victory over me in this contest, but wilt make them ashamed of their confidence.

Wesley: Job 17:7

I am grown so poor and thin, that I am not to be called a man, but the shadow of a man.

Wesley: Job 17:8

At the depth and mysteriousness of God's judgments, which fall on innocent men, while the worst of men prosper.

Wesley: Job 17:8

Notwithstanding all these sufferings of good men, and the astonishment which they cause, he shall the more zealously oppose those hypocrites, who make these strange providences of God an objection to religion.

JFB: Job 17:1

Result of elephantiasis. But UMBREIT, "my strength (spirit) is spent."

JFB: Job 17:1

Life is compared to an expiring light. "The light of my day is extinguished."

JFB: Job 17:1

Plural, to heighten the force.

JFB: Job 17:2

UMBREIT, more emphatically, "had I only not to endure mockery, in the midst of their contentions I (mine eye) would remain quiet."

JFB: Job 17:2

Hebrew, "tarry all night"; a figure taken from sleep at night, to express undisturbed rest; opposed to (Job 16:20), when the eye of Job is represented as pouring out tears to God without rest.

JFB: Job 17:3

Namely, a pledge or security; that is, be my surety; do Thou attest my innocence, since my friends only mock me (Job 17:2). Both litigating parties had to lay down a sum as security before the trial.

JFB: Job 17:3

Provide a surety for me (in the trial) with Thee. A presage of the "surety" (Heb 7:22), or "one Mediator between God and man" (see on Job 16:21).

JFB: Job 17:3

"who else (save God Himself) could strike hands with me?" that is, be my security (Psa 119:122). The Hebrew strikes the hand of him for whom he goes security (Pro 6:1).

JFB: Job 17:4

The intellect of his friends.

JFB: Job 17:4

Rather imperative, "exalt them not"; allow them not to conquer [UMBREIT], (Isa 6:9-10).

JFB: Job 17:5

The Hebrew for "flattery" is "smoothness"; then it came to mean a prey divided by lot, because a smooth stone was used in casting the lots (Deu 18:8), "a portion" (Gen 14:24). Therefore translate, "He that delivers up his friend as a prey (which the conduct of my friends implies that they would do), even the eyes," &c. [NOYES] (Job 11:20). Job says this as to the sinner's children, retorting upon their reproach as to the cutting off of his (Job 5:4; Job 15:30). This accords with the Old Testament dispensation of legal retribution (Exo 20:5).

JFB: Job 17:6

God. The poet reverentially suppresses the name of God when speaking of calamities inflicted.

JFB: Job 17:6

(Deu 28:37; Psa 69:11). My awful punishment makes my name execrated everywhere, as if I must have been superlatively bad to have earned it.

JFB: Job 17:6

As David was honored (1Sa 18:6). Rather from a different Hebrew root, "I am treated to my face as an object of disgust," literally, "an object to be spit upon in the face" (Num 12:14). So Raca means (Mat 5:22) [UMBREIT].

JFB: Job 17:7

(Psa 6:7; Psa 31:9; Deu 34:7).

JFB: Job 17:7

Literally, "figures"; all the individual members being peculiar forms of the body; opposed to "shadow," which looks like a figure without solidity.

JFB: Job 17:8

At my unmerited sufferings.

JFB: Job 17:8

The upright shall feel their sense of justice wounded ("will be indignant") because of the prosperity of the wicked. By "hypocrite" or "ungodly," he perhaps glances at his false friends.

JFB: Job 17:9

The strength of religious principle is heightened by misfortune. The pious shall take fresh courage to persevere from the example of suffering Job. The image is from a warrior acquiring new courage in action (Isa 40:30-31; Phi 1:14).

Clarke: Job 17:1

My breath is corrupt - Rather, My spirit is oppressed, רוחי חבלה ruchi chubbalah : My days are extinct, and the sepulchral cells are ready for me - Parkhurst. There is probably a reference here to cemeteries, where were several niches, in Each of which a corpse was deposited. See on Job 17:16 (note). For חבלה chubbalah , corrupted or oppressed, some MSS. have חלה chalah , is made weak; and one has גבלה is worn down, consumed: this is agreeable to the Vulgate, Spiritus meus attenuebatur; "My spirit is exhausted."

Clarke: Job 17:2

Are there not mockers with me? - This has been variously translated. The Vulgate: "I have not sinned, and yet my eye dwells upon afflictions."Septuagint: "I conjure you, laboring under afflictions, what evil have I done? Yet strangers have robbed me of my substance."Mr. Good: "But are not revilers before me? Alas, mine eye penetrateth their rebukes."Calmet thinks the Hebrew might be translated thus: "If I have not been united in friendship with the wicked, why are my eyes in bitterness?"Coverdale translates both verses thus: My breth fayleth, my dayes are shortened, I am harde at deathes dore. I have disceaved no man, yet must myne eye continue in hevynesse. Mr. Heath "Were it not so, I have sarcasms enow in store; and I could spend the whole night unmoved at their aggravations."The general meaning is sufficiently plain, and the reader has got translations enough.

Clarke: Job 17:3

Lay down now - Deposit a pledge; stake your conduct against mine, and your life and soul on the issue; let the cause come before God, let him try it; and see whether any of you shall be justified by him, while I am condemned.

Clarke: Job 17:4

For thou hast hid their heart - This address is to God; and here he is represented as doing that which in the course of his providence he only permits to be done

Clarke: Job 17:4

Shalt thou not exalt them - This was exactly fulfilled: not one of Job’ s friends was exalted; on the contrary, God condemned the whole; and they were not received into the Divine favor till Job sacrificed, and made intercession for them.

Clarke: Job 17:5

He that speaketh flattery - There is a great variety of meaning given to the terms in this verse. The general sense is, The man who expects much from his friends will be disappointed: while depending on them his children’ s eyes may fail in looking for bread.

Clarke: Job 17:6

He hath made me also a by-word - My afflictions and calamities have become a subject of general conversation, so that my poverty and affliction are proverbial. As poor as Job, As afflicted as Job, are proverbs that have even reached our times and are still in use

Clarke: Job 17:6

Aforetime I was as a tabret - This is not the translation of the Hebrew ותפת לפנים אהיה vethopheth lephanim eheyeh . Instead of לפנים lephanim , I would read לפניהם liphneghem , and then the clause might be translated thus: I shall be as a furnace, or consuming fire (Topheth) before them. They shall have little reason to mock when they see the end of the Lord’ s dealings with me; my example will be a consuming fire to them, and my false friends will be confounded. Coverdale translates thus: He hath made me as it were a byworde of the comon people. I am his gestinge stocke amonge them.

Clarke: Job 17:7

Mine eye also is dim - Continual weeping impairs the sight; and indeed any affliction that debilitates the frame generally weakens the sight in the same proportion

Clarke: Job 17:7

All my members are as a shadow - Nothing is left but skin and bone. I am but the shadow of my former self.

Clarke: Job 17:8

Upright men shall be astonied - In several of these verses Job is supposed to speak prophetically of his future restoration, and of the good which religious society should derive from the history of his original affluence, consequent poverty and affliction, and final restoration to health, peace, and prosperity. The upright will receive the account with astonishment, and wonder at the dispensations of the Almighty; while hypocrites, false professors and the sour-headed, godly, shall be unmasked, and innocent men, whether in affliction or affluence, shall be known to be favourites of the Almighty.

Clarke: Job 17:9

The righteous also shall hold on his way - There shall be no doubt concerning the dispensations of the Divine providence. My case shall illustrate all seemingly intricate displays of God’ s government. None shall be stumbled at seeing a godly man under oppression, knowing that God never permits any thing of the kind but for the good of the subject, and the manifestation of his own mercy, wisdom, and love. Therefore whatever occurs to the righteous man, he will take it for granted that all is well and justly managed, and that the end will be glorious

Clarke: Job 17:9

Shall be stronger and stronger - He shall take encouragement from my case, stay himself on the Lord, and thus gain strength by every blast of adversity. This is one grand use of the book of Job. It casts much light on seemingly partial displays of Divine providence: and has ever been the great text-book of godly men in a state of persecution and affliction. This is what Job seems prophetically to declare.

TSK: Job 17:1

breath is corrupt : or, spirit is spent, Job 19:17

my days : Job 6:11, Job 42:16; Isa 57:16

the graves : Job 17:13, Job 17:14; Psa 88:3-5; Isa 38:10-14

TSK: Job 17:2

mockers : Job 12:4, Job 13:9, Job 16:20, Job 21:3; Psa 35:14-16; Mat 27:39-44

continue : Heb. lodge, Psa 25:13, Psa 91:1 *marg.

provocation : 1Sa 1:6, 1Sa 1:7

TSK: Job 17:3

put me : Job 9:33; Gen 43:9, Gen 44:32; Pro 11:15, Pro 20:16; Heb 7:22

strike : Pro 6:11, Pro 11:15 *marg. Pro 17:18, Pro 22:26

TSK: Job 17:4

2Sa 15:31, 2Sa 17:14; 2Ch 25:16; Isa 19:14; Mat 11:25, Mat 13:11; Rom 11:8; 1Co 1:20

TSK: Job 17:5

He that : Job 32:21, Job 32:22; Psa 12:2, Psa 12:3; Pro 20:19, Pro 29:5; 1Th 2:5

the eyes : Exo 20:5; Deu 28:65; 1Ki 11:12; Lam 4:17

TSK: Job 17:6

a byword : Job 30:9; 1Ki 9:7; Psa 44:14

aforetime : or, before them

as a tabret : Gen 31:27; Isa 5:12

TSK: Job 17:7

Mine eye : Job 16:16; Psa 6:7, Psa 31:9, Psa 31:10; Lam 5:17

members : or, thoughts, Job 17:11

shadow : Psa 109:23; Ecc 6:12

TSK: Job 17:8

astonied : Psa 73:12-15; Ecc 5:8; Hab 1:13; Rom 11:33

stir up : Job 34:30; Act 13:46

TSK: Job 17:9

hold on : Psa 84:7, Psa 84:11; Pro 4:18, Pro 14:16; Isa 35:8-10; 1Pe 1:5; 1Jo 2:19

clean : Gen 20:5; Psa 24:4, Psa 26:6, Psa 73:13; Isa 1:15, Isa 1:16; Mar 7:2

be stronger and stronger : Heb. add strength, Isa 40:29-31; 2Co 12:9, 2Co 12:10

Commentary -- Word/Phrase Notes (per Verse)

Barnes: Job 17:1

My breath is corrupt - Margin or "spirit is spent."The idea is, that his vital powers were nearly extinct; his breath failed; his power was weakened, and he was ready to die. This is connected with the previous chapter, and should not have been separated from it. There was no necessity of making a new chapter here, and we have one of those unfortunate breaks in the middle of a paragraph, and almost of a sentence, which are too common in the Scriptures.

The graves are ready for me - The Hebrew is plural, but why so used I know not. The Vulgate is singular - sepulchrum. The Septuagint renders it, "I pray for a tomb (singular, ταφῆς taphēs ), but I cannot obtain it."Possibly the meaning is, "I am about to be united "to the graves,"or "to tombs.""Schultens remarks that the plural form is common in Arabic poetry, as well as in poetry in general.

Barnes: Job 17:2

And doth not mine eye continue in their provocation? - Margin "lodge."This is the meaning of the Hebrew word used here - נלן tālan . It properly denotes to pass the night or to lodge in a place, as distinguished from a permanent residence. The idea here seems to be, that his eye "rested"on their provocations. It remained fixed on them. It was not a mere glance, a passing notice, but was such a view as resulted from a careful observation. It was not such a view as a traveler would obtain by passing hastily by, but it was such as one would obtain who had encamped for a time, and had an opportunity of looking around him with care, and seeing things as they were. Thus explained, there is much poetic beauty in the passage. The Vulgate, however, renders it, "I have not sinned, and mine eye remains in bitterness."The Septuagint, "I supplicate in distress - κάμνων kamnōn - yet what have I done? Strangers came, and stole my substance: who is the man?"The simple meaning is, that Job had a calm view of their wickedness, and that he could not be deceived.

Barnes: Job 17:3

Lay down now - This is evidently an address to God - a repetition of the wish which he had so often expressed, that he might be permitted to bring his cause directly before him; see Job 13:3. The whole passage here is obscure, because we are in a great measure ignorant of the ancient practices in courts of law, and of the ancient forms of trial. The general sense seems to be, that Job desires the Deity to enter into a judicial investigation, and to give him a "pledge"- or, as we should say, a "bond,"or "security"- that he would not avail himself of his almighty power, but would place him on an equality in the trial, and allow him to plead his cause on equal terms; see the notes at Job 13:20-22. The phrase "lay down now"means, lay down a pledge, or something of that kind; and may have referred to some ancient custom of giving security on going to trial, that no advantage would be taken, or that the parties would abide by the decision in the case.

Put me in a surety with thee - The word used here ( ערבני ‛ârabı̂yn ) is from ערב ‛ârab , to mix, mingle; to exchange, to barter and then to become surety for anyone - that is, to "exchange"places with him, or to stand in his place; Gen 43:9; Gen 44:32. Here the idea seems to be, that Job wished the Deity to give him some pledge or security that justice would be done, or that he would not take advantage of his power and majesty to overawe him. Or, as has been remarked, it may refer to some custom of furnishing security on a voluntary trial or arbitration, that the award of the referees would be observed. I think it most probable that this is the idea. The controversy here was to be voluntary. In a voluntary trial, or an arbitration, there is a necessity of some security by the parties that the decision shall be submitted to - a pledge to each other that they will abide by it. Such a pledge Job desired in this case. All this is language taken from courts, and should not be pressed too much, nor should Job be hastily charged with irreverence. Having once suggested the idea of a "trial"of the cause, it was natural for him to use the language which was commonly employed in reference to such trials; and these expressions are to be regarded as thrown in for the sake of "keeping,"or verisimilitude.

Who is he that will strike hands with me? - Striking hands then, as now, seems to have been one mode of confirming an agreement, or ratifying a compact. The idea here is,"Who is there that will be surety to me for thee?"that is, for the faithful observance of right and justice. There is an appearance of irreverence in this language, but it arises from carrying out the ideas pertaining to a form of trial in a court. In entering into "sureties,"it was usual to unite hands; see Pro 6:1 :

My son, if thou be surety for thy friend,

If thou hast stricken thy hand with a stranger.

So Pro 17:18 :

A man void of understanding striketh hands,

And becometh surety in the presence of his friend

Compare Pro 11:15; Pro 22:26. The same custom prevailed in the times of Homer and of Virgil. Thus, Homer (Iliad, β b . 341) says:

Ποῦ δὴ -

- δεξιαὶ ἦς ἐπέπιθμεν -

Pou de4 -

- dexiai hēs epepithmen -

And so Virgil (Aeneid 4:597) says;

- en dextra fidesque .

Barnes: Job 17:4

For thou hast hid their heart from understanding - That is, the heart of his professed friends. Job says that they were blind and perverse, and indisposed to render him justice; and he therefore pleads that he may carry his cause directly before God. He attributes their want of understanding to the agency of God in accordance with the doctrine which prevailed in early times, and which is so often expressed in the Scriptures, that God is the source of light and truth, and that when people are blinded it is in accordance with his wise purposes; see Isa 6:9-10. It is "because"they were thus blind and perverse, that he asks the privilege of carrying the cause at once up to God - and who could blame him for such a desire?

Therefore thou shalt not exalt them - By the honor of deciding a case like this, or by the reputation of wisdom. The name of sage or "wise"man was among the most valued in those times; but Job says that that would not be awarded to his friends. God would not exalt or honor people thus devoid of wisdom.

Barnes: Job 17:5

He that speaketh flattery to his friends - Noyes renders this, "He that delivers up his friend as a prey, the eyes of his children shall fail."So Wemyss, "He who delivers up his friends to plunder."Dr. Good, "He that rebuketh his friends with mildness, even the eyes of his children shall be accomplished."The Septuagint, "He announces evil for his portion; his eyes fail over his sons."The Vulgate, "He promises spoil to his companions, and the eyes of his sons fail."The word rendered "flattery"( חלק chêleq ) properly means "that which is smooth, smoothness"(from חלק châlaq to be smooth); and thence it denotes "a lot"or "portion,"because "a smooth stone"was anciently used to cast lots in dividing spoils; Deu 18:8. Here it is synonymous with plunder or spoil; and the idea is, that he who betrayeth his friends to the spoil or to the spoiler, the eyes of his children shall fail. The meaning in this connection is, that the friends of Job had acted as one would who should announce the residence of his neighbors to robbers, that they might come and plunder them. Instead of defending him, they had acted the part of a traitor. Schultens says that this verse is "a Gordian knot;"and most commentators regard it as such; but the above seems to give a clear and consistent meaning. It is evidently a proverb, and is designed to bear on the professed friends of Job, and to show that they had acted a fraudulent part toward him. In Job 17:4, he had said that God had hid their heart from understanding, and that wisdom had failed them. He "here"says that in addition to a want of wisdom, they were like a man who should betray his neighbors to robbers.

Even the eyes of his children shall fail - He shall be punished. To do this is a crime, and great calamity shall come upon him, represented by the failure of the eyes of his children. Calamity is not unfrequently expressed by the loss of the eyes; see Pro 30:17.

Barnes: Job 17:6

He hath also - That is, God has done this.

Also a by-word - A proverb ( משׁל mâshâl ); a term of reproach, ridicule, or scorn. lie has exposed me to derision.

And aforetime - Margin "before them."The margin is the correct translation of the Hebrew, פנים pânı̂ym . It means, in their presence, or in their view.

I was as a tabret - This is an unhappy translation. The true meaning is,"I am become their "abhorrence,"or am to them an object of contempt."Vulgate, "I am an exampie (" exemplum ") to them."Septuagint, "I am become a laughter ( γέλως gelōs ) to them."The Chaldee renders it, "Thou hast placed me for a proverb to the people, and I shall be Gehenna ( גיהנם gayhı̂nnôm ) to them."The Hebrew word תפת tôpheth - or "Tophet,"is the name which is often given in the Scriptures to the valley of Hinnom - the place where children were sacrificed to Moloch; see the notes at Mat 5:22. But there is no evidence or probability that the word was so used in the time of Job. It is never used in the Scriptures in the sense of a " tabret ,"that is a tabor or small drum; though the word תף toph is thus used; see the notes at Isa 5:12. The word used here is derived, probably, from the obsolete verb תיף typ - "to spit out;"and then to spit out with contempt. The verb is so used in Chaldee. "Castell."The meaning of the word probably still lives in the Arabic, The Arabic word means to spit out with contempt; and the various forms of the nouns derived from the verb are applied to anything detested, or detestable; to the parings of the nails; to an abandoned woman; to a dog, etc. See "Castell"on this word. I have no doubt that is the sense here, and that we have here a word whose true signification is to be sought in the Arabic; and that Job means to say that he was treated as the most loathsome and execrable object.

Barnes: Job 17:7

Mine eye is dim by reason of sorrow - Schultens supposes that this refers to his external appearance in general, as being worn down, exhausted, "defaced"by his many troubles; but it seems rather to mean that his eyes failed on account of weeping.

And all my members are as a shadow - " I am a mere skeleton, I am exhausted and emaciated by my sufferings."It is common to speak of persons who are emaciated by sickness or famine as mere shadows. Thus, Livy (L. 21:40) says, Effigies, imo, "umbrce hominum;"fame, frigore, illuvie, squalore enecti, contusi, debilitati inter saxa rupesque. So Aeschylus calls Oedipus - Οἰδίπου σκιαν Oidipou skian - the shadow of Oedipus.

Barnes: Job 17:8

Upright men shall be astonished at this - At the course of events in regard to me. They will be amazed that God has suffered a holy man to be plunged into such calamities, and to be treated in this manner by his friends. The fact at which he supposes they would be so much astonished was, that the good were afflicted in this manner, and that no relief was furnished.

And the innocent shall stir up himself - Shall rouse himself, or assume vigor to resist the wicked.

The hypocrite - The wicked - alluding probably to his professed friends. The idea of hypocrisy which the sentence conveys arises from the fact, that they professed to be "his"friends, and had proved to be false; and that they had professed to be the friends of God, and yet had uttered sentiments inconsistent with any right views of him. He now says, that that could not go unnoticed. The world would be aroused at so remarkable a state of things, and a just public indignation would be the result.

Barnes: Job 17:9

The righteous also shall hold on his way - The meaning of this verse is plain; but the connection is not so apparent. It seems to me that it refers to "Job himself,"and is a declaration that "he,"a righteous man, who had been so grievously calumniated, would hold on his way, and become stronger and stronger, while "they"would sink in the public esteem, and be compelled to abandon their position. It is the expression of a confident assurance that "he"would be more and more confirmed in his integrity, and would become stronger and stronger in God. Though Job intended, probably, that this should be applied to himself, yet he has expressed it in a general manner, and indeed the whole passage has a proverbial cast; and it shows that even then it was the settled belief that the righteous would persevere. As an expression of the early faith of the pious in one of the now settled doctrines of Christianity, "the perseverance of the saints,"this doctrine is invaluable. It shows that that doctrine has traveled down from the earliest ages. It was one of the elementary doctrines of religion in the earliest times. It became a proverb; and was admitted among the undisputed maxims of the wise and good, and it was such a sentiment as was just adapted to the circumstances of Job - a much tried and persecuted man. He was in all the danger of apostasy to which the pious are usually exposed; he was tempted to forsake his confidence in God; he was afflicted for reasons which he could not comprehend; he was without an earthly friend to sustain him, and he seemed to be forsaken by God himself; yet he had the fullest conviction that he would be enabled to persevere. The great principle was settled, that if there was true religion in the heart, it would abide; that if the path of righteousness had been entered, he who trod it would keep on his way.

And he that hath clean hands - The innocent; the friend of God; the man of pure life; see the notes at Job 9:30; compare Psa 24:4. "Clean hands"here, are designed to denote a pure and holy life. Among the ancients they were regarded as indicative of purity of heart. Porphyry remarks ( de antro Nympharum ) that in the "mysteries,"those who were initiated were accustomed to wash their hands with honey instead of water, as a pledge that they would preserve themselves from every impure and unholy thing; see Burder, in Rosenmuller’ s Alte u. neue Morgenland, in loc.

Shall be stronger and stronger - Margin, as in Hebrew add strength. He shall advance in the strength of his attachment to God. This is true. The man of pure and blameless life shall become more and more established in virtue; more confirmed in his principles; more convinced of the value and the truth of religion. Piety, like everything else, becomes stronger by exercise. The man who speaks truth only, becomes more and more attached to truth; the principle of benevolence is strengthened by being practiced; honesty, the more it is exhibited, becomes more the settled rule of the life; and he who prays, delights more and more in his appoaches to God. The tendency of religion in the heart is to grow stronger and stronger; and God intends that he who has once loved him, shall continue to love him forever.

Poole: Job 17:1

My breath is corrupt i.e. it stinks, as it doth in dying persons. Or, my spirit is corrupted , or spent, or lost, i.e. my vital spirits and natural powers are wasted; my soul is ready to leave the body.

My days are extinct the lamp of my life is wasted, and upon the point of going out, and that in a snuff.

The graves i.e. the grave; the plural number being put for the singular, as sepulchres , 2Ch 21:20 , cities , Jud 12:7 , asses , Zec 9:9 , are put for one of each of these.

Are ready for me open their mouths as ready to receive me. The sense and scope of this verse is the same with the former.

Poole: Job 17:2

Do not my friends, instead of comforting, mock and abuse me, as if I had made use of religion only as a cloak to my wickedness? Heb. If there be not mockers with me , understand, let God do so or so to me. It is a form of an oath, which is defectively expressed, after the manner of the Hebrews. Assuredly I am in the midst of cruel mockers, which is a sore aggravation of my affliction. Thus he returns to what he had said Job 16:20 , and intimates the necessity and justice of his following appeal, which otherwise might be thought too bold.

Mine eye either,

1. The eyes of my body. Do they not continue to provoke me to my face? Or rather,

2. The eye of my mind. Their provoking scoffs and reproaches do not only molest me in the day-time, when they are with me, but lodge with me in the night, and are continually in my thoughts, and break my sleep, and disturb me in dreams. And therefore if I be a little disordered, I may be excused.

Poole: Job 17:3

He turneth his speech either to Eliphaz, who spoke last; or rather to God, as is evident from the matter and scope of the words, and from the next verse. These words contain either,

1. A humble desire to God that he would appoint him a surety, who should undertake for his friends; that they should refer the cause in difference between them to God or to some other person, who should determine the matter in God’ s name, and according to God’ s will; or that God would be his Surety, or appoint him a surety who should maintain his righteous cause against his opposers; for so this phrase is oft used, as Psa 119:121,122 Isa 38:14 . And some expound this, as they did Job 16:21 , of Christ Jesus, who was called our Surety , Heb 7:22 ; appoint, I pray thee, my Surety (i.e. Christ, who is now) with thee, to plead my cause. Or rather,

2. An appeal from God unto God, or a kind of challenge or desire of debating his cause with God; which, though it savoureth of too much boldness and irreverence to God, yet seeing Job expresseth the same desire almost in the same manner, Job 9:33,34 , and is sharply reproved by God for contending with him, Job 40:2 , I know no inconvenience of ascribing the same thing to him here. So the sense is, Because I am not able to deal with thee immediately, considering the dread of thy majesty, my only desire is, that thou wouldst deal with me upon fair and equal terms, as if thou wert a man like myself, and appoint some man who shall in thy name and stead determine the time and place for the trial of my cause with thee. And this suits well enough with the two following verses, because his friends were without understanding, Job 17:4 , and partial, Job 17:5 ; therefore he desires to cease discoursing with them, and to debate his cause with God, who was just and impartial, and also would be favourable to him.

Strike hands with me i.e. agree and promise, or be surety to me; whereof that was the usual gesture, Pro 6:1,2 17:18 22:26 .

Poole: Job 17:4

Thou hast blinded the minds of my friends, that they can not see those truths which are most plain and evident to all men of sense and experience; therefore I desire a more wise and able judge.

Therefore shalt thou not exalt them i.e. thou wilt not give them the victory over me in this contest, but wilt give sentence for me, and discharge them, and make them ashamed of their confidence in affirming falsehoods of thee, and punish them severely for their miscarriage. It is a usual figure, whereby much more is understood than is expressed.

Poole: Job 17:5

Hereby Job chargeth them, either,

1. With flattering him with vain hopes, and promises of the return of his former prosperity, when he knew that his case was desperate. Or,

2. With flattering and befriending God, and giving a partial sentence out of respect to him; for which he reproved and condemned them before, Job 13:7-9 , where see the notes. Some render the words thus, He that uttereth or declareth his mind or thoughts (as this word signifies, Psa 139:2,17 ) with flattery , or to flatter or deceive another.

The eyes of his children shall fail he shall be severely punished, not only in his person, but even in his children, whose eyes shall fail with vain expectations of relief and deliverance out of those calamities which shall come upon them for this sin of their parents.

Poole: Job 17:6

He i.e. God, who is oft designed by this pronoun in this book.

A by-word or proverb , or common talk . My calamities are so great and prodigious, that they fill all people with discourse, and are become proverbial to express extreme miseries. Compare Num 21:27,28 De 28:37 .

And or but , or although , as this particle is oft used.

Aforetime so he aggravateth his present misery by the mention of his former prosperity. Or, to their faces , or openly . They do not only reproach me behind my back, but revile and mock me, and make a sport of my calamities, even to my face. I was as a tabret , i.e. I was the people’ s delight and darling, and matter of their praise, and entertained by them with applauses, and as it were with instruments of music. Or,

I am as a tabret i.e. matter of sport and merriment to them.

Poole: Job 17:7

By reason of sorrow through excessive weeping and decay of spirits, which cause a dimness in the sight.

All my members are as a shadow my body is so consumed, and my colour so wan and ghastly, that I look more like a ghost, or a shadow, than like a man.

Poole: Job 17:8

Wise and good men, when they shall see and consider my calamities, will not be so forward to censure and condemn me as you are, but will rather stand and wonder at the depth and mysteriousness of God’ s counsels and judgments, which fall so heavily upon innocent men, while the worst of men prosper.

And the innocent shall stir up himself against the hypocrite: but, or yet , (notwithstanding all these sufferings of good men and the astonishment which they cause,)

innocent (or religious persons shall be so far from joining their opinions, and counsels, and interests, with

hypocrites or profane men , who thence take occasion to censure the afflicted person, and to reproach, and condemn, and desert the profession and practice of godliness, that they) will stir up themselves against them in holy indignation, and will oppose their wicked courses, and will prefer afflicted piety before prosperous iniquity.

Poole: Job 17:9

Shall hold on his way i.e. shall persist in that good way into which he hath entered, and not be turned from it by any afflictions which may befall himself or any other good men, nor by any contempt or reproach cast upon them by the ungodly by reason thereof.

He that hath clean hands i.e. whose life and the course of his actions is holy and righteous; which is a sign that his heart also is pure and perfect.

Shall be stronger and stronger shall not be shaken and discouraged by the grievous afflictions of the godly, nor by the bitter censures and reproaches of hypocrites or wicked men, cast upon them for that cause; but will be continued thereby, and made more constant and resolute in cleaving to God, and his ways and people, in spite of all difficulties and miseries.

Haydock: Job 17:1

Spirit. Hebrew, "breath is corrupt," (Haydock) or spent. I cannot breathe without the greatest difficulty. (Calmet) ---

Only. Septuagint, "But I want the grave, and do not obtain it." (Haydock)

Haydock: Job 17:2

Not sinned. That is, I am not guilty of such sins as they charge me with. (Challoner) ---

Hebrew, "the wicked were not with me" in friendship at any time. Protestants, " Are there not mockers with me?" (Haydock) ---

Job was doubly afflicted, with corporal pain and calumny: yet hopeth in God. (Worthington)

Haydock: Job 17:3

Fight. I am secure under thy protection. Hebrew, "who will strike hands with me?" or stand bondsman for my debt? (Proverbs vi. 1.) Who will take my place? You accuse me of weakness and of impiety: but how would you act, if you were treated in the same manner? (Calmet)

Haydock: Job 17:4

Understanding. They will not answer for me. They are not of such a generous disposition; nor can they distinguish between the punishment of guilt and the trial of virtue. (Calmet)

Haydock: Job 17:5

He. My friend. (Calmet) ---

Hebrew, "speaketh flattery," (Haydock) or promiseth to caress me, while he neglects his own children. But the sense of the Vulgate and Chaldean seem preferable. My friends speak as if they could do any thing, and as if no trial would stagger their resolution. But they durst not be in my situation for a short time. (Calmet) ---

Like hunters, who have promised their children some prey, my friends will not, however, gain the victory over me. (Menochius)

Haydock: Job 17:6

Example. Protestants, "a tabret." (Haydock) ---

The people sing over my misfortune, Lamentations iii. 14. I am represented as a victim of God's just indignation. (Calmet) ---

Septuagint, "a laughter," or laughing-stock. (Haydock)

Haydock: Job 17:7

Indignation of God, or of myself. (Menochius) ---

Nothing. Hebrew, "as a shadow." (Calmet)

Haydock: Job 17:8

Hypocrite. If you condemn me, I shall comfort myself with the approbation of the righteous, and still maintain my station. (Haydock) ---

Men of sense and virtue will tremble at the judgments of God, and will never join the crowd of scoffers. (Calmet)

Gill: Job 17:1

My breath is corrupt,.... Through the force of his disease, which made it have an ill smell, so that it was strange and disagreeable to his wife, Job 19:17; passing through his lungs, or other parts, which were affected with some disorder, or as frequently is the case of dying persons, and so Job thought himself to be. The word ⁿ used has the signification of pain, even of the pains of a woman in travail; and so may signify, that Job drew his breath with great pain, as people troubled with an asthma do, or dying persons in the hiccups, or just fetching their last breath; or "my spirit" ^o, as it may be rendered, that is, his vital spirits which were exhausted and spent, there were scarce any left in him; or "my mind" ^p, or soul, which was overwhelmed with grief, and so disturbed, that he was not himself, but in a manner distracted with the terrors of God, and the severity of his hand upon him:

my days are extinct; here Job corrects himself; he had spoken of a few years before, but it is as if he should say now, why do I talk of a few years, when I have but a few days to live, and even those are as good as gone? meaning not only his days of prosperity, which were at an entire end, as he thought, but the days of his natural life; the lamp of life was almost burnt out, the oil was spent, the wick was just extinguished, it was like the snuff of a candle going out:

the graves are ready for me; the place of his fathers' sepulchres, the burial place of his ancestors, where many graves were; or he may have respect to various things into which the dead are put, as into so many graves; as besides their being rolled up in linen, as was the way of the eastern countries, there was the coffin, a sort of a grave, and which sometimes was made of stone; and then the place dug in the earth, more properly called the grave, and often over that a sepulchral monument was erected; so that there was grave upon grave. Job does not seem to have any respect to the usage of kings, and great personages, preparing stately monuments for themselves while living, such as the pyramids of Egypt, built by and for their kings, as is supposed; for the words "are ready" are not in the text, only supplied, though they are also by the Targum; they are very short and significant in the original text, "the graves for me", or they are mine; the grave is my property, my house, where I expect shortly to be, and there to abide and dwell until the resurrection, and which was desirable to him; "a grave to me"; that is all that I desire, or can expect; here he wished to be, as he did not doubt he quickly should be; and it is as if he should say, I am ready for that, and so Jarchi paraphrases it; and happy is the man that is ready for the grave, for death, and eternity, for the coming of his Lord, having the grace of God wrought in him, and the righteousness of his living Redeemer on him, which was Job's case; such an one shall go into the nuptial chamber at once, and be received into everlasting habitations.

Gill: Job 17:2

Are there not mockers with me?.... Meaning not irreligious persons, such as make a mock at sin, a jest of religion, a laugh at good men, sneer at the doctrines and ordinances of God, and scoff at things future, as the coming of Christ, the resurrection of the dead, and a future judgment; with whom it is very uncomfortable to be, as well as with any sort of profane men, and such there were no doubt in Job's time; but he seems to design his friends, by whom be thought himself mocked, and who were, as he imagined, scorners of him, Job 12:4; and therefore for this reason entreats his case might be heard, and his cause pleaded:

and doth not mine eye continue in their provocation? or "lodge all night" ^q; his sense is, that they were continually provoking him with their words, their scoffs and jeers, their censures and calumnies, and the weak reasons and arguments they made use of to support their charges and suspicions; these dwelt upon his mind not only in the daytime but in the night, so that he could not get a wink of sleep for them; their words were so teasing and distressing, and they acted such a cruel part to him, and stuck so close to him, and hung upon his thoughts, that he could not get clear of them in the night season; but his mind ran upon them, which kept him waking, that he could not close his eyelids for thinking of them.

Gill: Job 17:3

Lay down now,.... A pledge that thou wilt provide a surety, appoint and admit one to plead for me, and that thou wilt hear my cause, and determine it; or "put now", or "put, I pray thee" ^r, thy heart and mind to me and my case, to my petition and request, and grant it:

put me in a surety with thee; appoint, provide, and place a surety for me with thee, and let him appear to do his work and office: such an one Jesus Christ is; he is of God the Father's appointing to be the Mediator between God and men, and who himself voluntarily engaged and agreed to be the surety of the better testament; and this was known to the Old Testament saints, and to Job; and his prayer was the prayer of faith: and this work and office Christ performs; he was surety for his people from eternity, he drew nigh to God on their account, and struck hands with his Father, or covenanted and agreed with him about the salvation of his people, and the manner of it; he gave his word, his bond, to his Father for them, that he would save them; and upon that suretyship engagement of Christ all the Old Testament saints were pardoned, justified, and glorified; he promised and bound himself to pay all their debts, to satisfy for all their sins, to bring in an everlasting righteousness for them, and to bring them all safe to heaven and happiness; in order to which, he put himself in their room and stead, and laid down his life a ransom for them; upon which Job might say, and so may every believer, what follows,

who is he that will strike hands with me? that will enter the lists, litigate and dispute the point with me, or bring any charge or accusation against me, having such a surety to answer for me, such an advocate to plead my cause, such a Mediator between God and man, who has made reconciliation for sin, brought in everlasting righteousness, and satisfied law and justice, see Rom 8:33; or else the sense is, "who is he", besides him that is a surety of God's appointing and providing, "can strike bands with me?" or be a surety for me? there is no other Mediator, Saviour, or Redeemer, besides him; if he had not undertaken the cause of his people, and the redemption of them, it must have ceased for ever, no other was equal to such a work; so that here is another reason used with the Lord to provide a surety, since no other could to any purpose.

Gill: Job 17:4

For thou hast hid their heart from understanding,.... That is, the hearts of his friends, and therefore they were unfit to undertake his cause, or be sureties for him, or be judges in it. It is the same thing as to hide understanding from their hearts, which God sometimes does in a natural sense; when men like not the knowledge of him, as attainable by the light of nature, he gives them up to reprobate minds, minds void of knowledge and judgment in things natural; and sometimes, in a spiritual sense, he hides men's hearts from the knowledge of things divine and evangelical, and even this he does from the wise and prudent of this world; yea, sometimes he hides the knowledge of his providential dealings with men from his own people, as he did from Asaph, Jeremiah, Habakkuk, and others; and, as it seems, from Job's friends, who therefore mistook his case, and were very unfit and insufficient to determine it:

therefore shalt thou not exalt them; to such honour and dignity, to be umpires, arbitrators, or judges in the case of Job; this God had reserved for another, Elihu, or rather himself, who decided the controversy between Job and his friends, and declared in his favour, and that they had not spoken the thing that was right of him, as his servant Job had done, Job 42:7;

Gill: Job 17:5

He that speaketh flattery to his friends,.... As Job's friends did to him when they promised great outward prosperity, and a restoration to his former state, and to a greater affluence upon his repentance and reformation; or when they spoke deceitfully for God, pretending great regard to the honour of his justice and holiness, and therefore insisted on it that he must be a wicked man and an hypocrite, that was afflicted by him, as Job was:

even the eyes of his children shall fail; so hateful are some sins to God, and particularly deceitful tongues, and flattering lips, that he will punish them in their posterity; the eyes of their children shall fail for want of sustenance, and while they are looking in vain for salvation and deliverance out of trouble, see Exo 20:4.

Gill: Job 17:6

He hath made me also a byword of the people,.... Either Eliphaz, or God; for whatsoever befell him, whether more immediately by the hand of God, or by any instrument, the ascribes it to him, as being suffered in Providence to befall him; as when he became a byword or proverb to the people in common, to whom an example might be set by one or more of Job's friends. The name of Job is to this day a byword or proverb among men, both for his poverty and his patience; if a man is described as very poor, he is said to be as poor as Job; or if very patient under his afflictions, he is said to be as patient as Job; but as neither of these are to the disgrace of Job, something else seems rather intended here, even something to his reproach; as when a man was represented as a very wicked man, or an hypocrite, it used to be said, such an one is as wicked a creature, and as arrant an hypocrite, as Job:

and aforetime I was as a tabret; the delight of the people, who, when he appeared in the public streets, came out and went before him, singing, and dancing, and beating on tabrets, and such like musical instruments, to express their joy upon the sight of him; but now it was otherwise with him, and he whom they could not sufficiently extol and commend, now knew not well what to say bad enough of him; such a change in the sentiments and conduct of men must needs be very chagrining: or "aforetime I was as a lord", as Ben Gersom, from the use of the word in Dan 3:2; as he supposes; he was like a lord or nobleman, or as one in some high office, and now as the offscouring of all things; or it denotes what he was "before them", the people, in their sight at present, and should be: the word used is "Tophet", which Aben Ezra takes to be the name of a place, and as it seems of that place where children were offered to Moloch, and which place was in being, and such practices used by the Canaanites in the times of Job; and this place, which was also called the valley of Hinnom, being afterwards used for hell, led the Targum to paraphrase the words thus, "and hell from within shall I be"; and so Sephorno, in appearance hell to all that see me; and in general it may signify that he was, or should be, avoided, as any unclean place, very ungrateful and disagreeable, as that place was; or as anything abominable, and to be loathed and rejected, and this way go several interpreters ^s; though some think respect is had to the punishment of tympanization, in which sufferers were beaten upon in several parts of their bodies, as if men were beating upon a tabret or drum, which gave great pain and torment, see Heb 11:35; and with such like cruelty and indignity Job suggests he was or should be used; and therefore begs for a surety, for one to interpose and plead on his behalf; let the carriage of men to him be what it will, that is here referred to; compare with this Psa 69:11.

Gill: Job 17:7

Mine eye also is dim by reason of sorrow,.... Through excessive weeping, and the abundance of tears he shed, so that he had almost lost his eyesight, or however it was greatly weakened and impaired by that means, which is often the case, see Psa 6:7;

and all my members are as a shadow; his flesh was consumed off his bones, there were nothing left scarcely but skin and bone; he was a mere anatomy, and as thin as a lath, as we commonly say of a man that is quite worn away, as it were; is a walking shadow, has scarce any substance in him, but is the mere shadow of a man; the Targum interprets it of his form, splendour, and countenance, which were like a shadow; some interpret it "my thoughts" ^t, and understand it of the formations of his mind, and not of his body, which were shadows, empty, fleeting, and having no consistence in them through that sorrow that possessed him.

Gill: Job 17:8

Upright men shall be astonished at this,.... Such as were upright in heart, and in their walk conversation, sincere and honourable in their profession of religion, these would be amazed at the afflictions of Job, and the unkindness of his friends; it is hereby suggested, that it would be then, and in ages to come, a matter of surprise to truly gracious persons, when they should hear of such sore afflictions laid upon so good a man, and he told what censures, calumnies, and reproaches, were cast upon him by his friends; this would be so astonishing, that they would not know how to believe it, and still more at a loss how to account for it, that such things should be permitted in Providence, there being reason to believe the truth of them:

and the innocent shall stir up himself against the hypocrite; that is, such, who though they are not free from sin, yet live holy and harmless lives and conversations among men, so that they are not chargeable with any gross iniquity, or what is scandalous and unbecoming their character; these shall rise up with indignation against such persons as pretend to a great deal of sanctify and devotion, and yet have no charity or love to an afflicted saint, but censure and reproach him, and add affliction to his affliction. Thus Job retorts the charge of hypocrisy his friends brought against him upon them; for he seems tacitly to design them, and delivers these words as a kind of solace to himself; that though he was thus used by them at that time, yet good men in future time would have different apprehensions of him, and rise up and vindicate his name and character.

Gill: Job 17:9

The righteous also shall hold on his way,.... He that is righteous, not in appearance but really, not in a legal but in an evangelic sense; who is justified by the righteousness of Job's living Redeemer, who lives by faith on his righteousness, and in consequence of that in holiness of life and conversation; such an one being in Christ the way of righteousness and salvation, and walking in the paths of faith, holiness, and truth, and in all the tracks of religious worship, private and public, he will persevere therein, and will not on any account depart out of the right way into which he has been led and directed. This is opposed to a going back, as some do, and to a turning to the right hand or the left, as others, and to a standing still, being stumbled, offended, and discouraged; and it supposes a progress, a going forward in the way, so as not to be moved out of it by their own, or the afflictions of others, by the reproaches and persecutions of men, the temptations of Satan, the snares, riches, honours, and pleasures of the world, or through darkness, desertion, and unbelief; they may indeed have many slips and falls, and be almost, but not altogether, out of the way, and never finally or to perdition; which is owing not to their conduct and care, might and strength, but to the power of God, and the supplies of his grace, to Christ and his strength, and to the Spirit and his influence, guidance, and direction:

and he that hath clean hands shall be stronger and stronger; or "add strength" ^u; increase in it. This character is opposed to one of an immoral life and conversation, and describes one that is not guilty of any notorious crime, that does not live in any known sin, but in the general course of his life is upright and sincere, holy, harmless, and inoffensive; such a man as he is already a partaker of spiritual grace and strength, and so, as he wants more, it is given him; his spiritual strength is renewed, he goes from one degree of it to another, and even while walking in the way of God he finds an increase of it; yea, that itself is strength unto him; as his day is his strength is, to assist him in religious services, to enable him to resist his enemies, and endure afflictions, and continue in the good ways of God.

Commentary -- Verse Notes / Footnotes

NET Notes: Job 17:1

¹ tn The verb חָבַל (khaval, “to act badly”) in the Piel means “to ruin.” The Pual translation with “my spirit” as the subject means “broken” in the sense of finished (not in the sense of humbled as in Ps 51).

² tn The verb זָעַךְ (za’aq, equivalent of Aramaic דָעַק [da’aq]) means “to be extinguished.” It only occurs here in the Hebrew.

³ tn The plural “graves” could be simply an intensification, a plural of extension (see GKC 397 §124.c), or a reference to the graveyard. Coverdale had: “I am harde at deathes dore.” The Hebrew expression simply reads “graves for me.” It probably means that graves await him.

NET Notes: Job 17:2

¹ tn The noun is the abstract noun, “mockery.” It indicates that he is the object of derision. But many commentators either change the word to “mockers” (Tur-Sinai, NEB), or argue that the form in the text is a form of the participle (Gordis).

² tn E. Dhorme (Job, 243) interprets the preposition to mean “aimed at me.”

³ tn The meaning of הַמְּרוֹתָם (hammÿrotam) is unclear, and the versions offer no help. If the MT is correct, it would probably be connected to מָרָה (marah, “to be rebellious”) and the derived form something like “hostility; provocation.” But some commentators suggest it should be related to מָרֹרוֹת (marorot, “bitter things”). Others have changed both the noun and the verb to obtain something like “My eye is weary of their contentiousness” (Holscher), or mine eyes are wearied by your stream of peevish complaints” (G. R. Driver, “Problems in the Hebrew text of Job,” VTSup 3 [1955]: 78). There is no alternative suggestion that is compelling.

NET Notes: Job 17:3

¹ tn The MT has two imperatives: “Lay down, pledge me, with me.” Most commentators think that the second imperative should be a noun, and take it to say, “Lay my pledge with/beside you.” A. B. Davidson (Job, 126) suggests that the first verb means “give a pledge,” and so the two similar verbs would be emphatic: “Give a pledge, be my surety.” Other than such a change (which would involve changing the vowels) one would have to interpret similarly by seeing the imperatives as a kind of hendiadys, with the main emphasis being on the second imperative, “make a pledge.”

² sn The idiom is “to strike the hand.” Here the wording is a little different, “Who is he that will strike himself into my hand?”

NET Notes: Job 17:4

¹ tn This half-verse gives the reason for the next half-verse.

² sn The pronoun their refers to Job’s friends. They have not pledged security for him because God has hidden or sealed off their understanding.

³ tn The object “them” is supplied. This is the simplest reading of the line, taking the verb is an active Polel. Some suggest that the subject is “their hand” and the verb is to be translated “is not raised.” This would carry through the thought of the last verse, but it is not necessary to the point.

NET Notes: Job 17:5

¹ tn Heb “for a portion.” This verse is rather obscure. The words are not that difficult, but the sense of them in this context is. Some take the idea to mean “he denounces his friends for a portion,” and others have a totally different idea of “he invites his friends to share with him.” The former fits the context better, indicating that Job’s friends speak out against him for some personal gain. The second half of the verse then promises that his children will suffer loss for this attempt at gain. The line is surely proverbial. A number of other interpretations can be found in the commentaries.

NET Notes: Job 17:6

¹ tn The verb is the third person, and so God is likely the subject. The LXX has “you have made me.” So most commentators clarify the verb in some such way. However, without an expressed subject it can also be taken as a passive.

² tn The word “byword” is related to the word translated “proverb” in the Bible (מָשָׁל, mashal). Job’s case is so well known that he is synonymous with afflictions and with abuse by people.

³ tn The word תֹפֶת (tofet) is a hapax legomenon. The expression is “and a spitting in/to the face I have become,” i.e., “I have become one in whose face people spit.” Various suggestions have been made, including a link to Tophet, but they are weak. The verse as it exists in the MT is fine, and fits the context well.

NET Notes: Job 17:7

¹ tn See the usage of this verb in Gen 27:1 and Deut 34:7. Usually it is age that causes the failing eyesight, but here it is the grief.

² tn The word יְצֻרִים (yÿtsurim), here with a suffix, occurs only here in the Bible. The word is related to יָצַר (yatsar, “to form, fashion”). And so Targum Job has “my forms,” and the Vulgate “my members.” The Syriac uses “thoughts” to reflect יֵצֶר (yetser). Some have followed this to interpret, “all my thoughts have dissolved into shadows.” But the parallel with “eye” would suggest “form.” The plural “my forms, all of them” would refer to the whole body.

NET Notes: Job 17:8

¹ tn This verb שָׁמַם (shamam, “appalled”) is the one found in Isa 52:14, translated there “astonished.”

² tn The verb means “to rouse oneself to excitement.” It naturally means “to be agitated; to be stirred up.”

NET Notes: Job 17:9

¹ tn The last two words are the imperfect verb יֹסִיף (yosif) which means “he adds,” and the abstract noun “energy, strength.” This noun is not found elsewhere; its Piel verb occurs in Job 4:4 and 16:5. “he increases strength.”

Geneva Bible: Job 17:2

[Are there] not ^{( a )} mockers with me? and doth not mine eye continue in ^{( b )} their provocation?

^{( a )} Instead of comfort, being now at death's door, he had but them that mocked at him, and discouraged him.

Geneva Bible: Job 17:3

^{( c )} Lay down now, put me in a surety with thee; who [is] he [that] ^{( d )} will strike hands with me?

^{( c )} He reasons with God as a man beside himself, so that his cause might be brought to light.

^{( d )} And answers for you?

Geneva Bible: Job 17:4

For thou hast hid their heart from ^{( e )} understanding: therefore shalt thou not exalt [them].

^{( e )} That these my afflictions are your just judgments, though man does not know the reason.

Geneva Bible: Job 17:5

^{( f )} He that speaketh flattery to [his] friends, even the eyes of his children shall fail.

^{( f )} He who flatters a man, and only judges him happy in his prosperity, will not himself only but in his posterity be punished.

Geneva Bible: Job 17:6

He hath made me also a ^{( g )} byword of the people; and aforetime I was as a tabret.

^{( g )} God has made all the world speak of me, because of my afflictions.

Geneva Bible: Job 17:8

Upright [men] shall be astonied at ^{( i )} this, and the innocent shall stir up himself against the hypocrite.

^{( i )} That is, when they see the godly punished: but in the end they will come to understanding and know what will be the reward of the hypocrite.

Geneva Bible: Job 17:9

The righteous also shall hold on his ^{( k )} way, and he that hath clean hands shall be stronger and stronger.

^{( k )} That is, will not be discouraged, considering that the godly are punished as well as the wicked.

Commentary -- Verse Range Notes

TSK Synopsis: Job 17:1-16

1 Job appeals from men to God.

6 The unmerciful dealing of men with the afflicted may astonish, but not discourage the righteous.

11 His hope is not in life, but in death.

MHCC: Job 17:1-9

Job reflects upon the harsh censures his friends had passed upon him, and, looking on himself as a dying man, he appeals to God. Our time is ending. It concerns us carefully to redeem the days of time, and to spend them in getting ready for eternity. We see the good use the righteous should make of Job's afflictions from God, from enemies, and from friends. Instead of being discouraged in the service of God, by the hard usage this faithful servant of God met with, they should be made bold to proceed and persevere therein. Those who keep their eye upon heaven as their end, will keep their feet in the paths of religion as their way, whatever difficulties and discouragements they may meet with.

Matthew Henry: Job 17:1-9

Job's discourse is here somewhat broken and interrupted, and he passes suddenly from one thing to another, as is usual with men in trouble; but we may reduce what is here said to three heads: -

I. The deplorable condition which poor Job was now in, which he describes, to aggravate the great unkindness of his friends to him and to justify his own complaints. Let us see what his case was.

1. He was a dying man, Job 17:1. He had said (Job 16:22), " When a few years have come, I shall go that long journey."But here he corrects himself. "Why do I talk of years to come? Alas! I am just setting out on that journey, am now ready to be offered, and the time of my departure is at hand. My breath is already corrupt, or broken off; my spirits are spent; I am a gone man."It is good for every one of us thus to look upon ourselves as dying, and especially to think of it when we are sick. We are dying, that is, (1.) Our life is going; for the breath of life is going. It is continually going forth; it is in our nostrils (Isa 2:22), the door at which it entered (Gen 2:7); there it is upon the threshold, ready to depart. Perhaps Job's distemper obstructed his breathing, and short breath will, after a while, be no breath. Let the Anointed of the Lord be the breath of our nostrils, and let us get spiritual life breathed into us, and that breath will never be corrupted. (2.) Our time is ending: My days are extinct, are put out, as a candle which, from the first lighting, is continually wasting and burning down, and will by degrees burn out of itself, but may by a thousand accidents be extinguished. Such is life. It concerns us therefore carefully to redeem the days of time, and to spend them in getting ready for the days of eternity, which will never be extinct. (3.) We are expected in our long home: The graves are ready for me. But would not one grave serve? Yes, but he speaks of the sepulchres of his fathers, to which he must be gathered: "The graves where they are laid are ready for me also,"graves in consort, the congregation of the dead. Wherever we go there is but a step between us and the grave. Whatever is unready, that is ready; it is a bed soon made. If the graves be ready for us, it concerns us to be ready for the graves. The graves for me (so it runs), denoting not only his expectation of death, but his desire of it. "I have done with the world, and have nothing now to wish for but a grave."

2. He was a despised man (Job 17:6): " He "(that is, Eliphaz, so some, or rather God, whom he all along acknowledges to be the author of his calamities) " has made me a byword of the people, the talk of the country, a laughing-stock to many, a gazing-stock to all; and aforetime (or to men's faces, publicly) I was as a tabret, that whoever chose might play upon."They made ballads of him; his name became a proverb; it is so still, As poor as Job. " He has now made me a byword, "a reproach of men, whereas, aforetime, in my prosperity, I was as a tabret, deliciae humani generis - the darling of the human race, whom they were all pleased with. It is common for those who were honoured in their wealth to be despised in their poverty.

3. He was a man of sorrows, Job 17:7. He wept so much that he had almost lost his sight: My eye is dim by reason of sorrow, Job 16:16. The sorrow of the world thus works darkness and death. He grieved so much that he had fretted all the flesh away and become a perfect skeleton, nothing but skin and bones: " All my members are as a shadow. I have become so poor and thin that I am not to be called a man, but the shadow of a man. "

II. The ill use which his friends made of his miseries. They trampled upon him, and insulted over him, and condemned him as a hypocrite, because he was thus grievously afflicted. Hard usage! Now observe,

1. How Job describes it, and what construction he puts upon their discourses with him. He looks upon himself as basely abused by them. (1.) They abused him with their foul censures, condemning him as a bad man, justly reduced thus and exposed to contempt, Job 17:2. "They are mockers, who deride my calamities, and insult over me, because I am thus brought low. They are so with me, abusing me to my face, pretending friendship in their visit, but intending mischief. I cannot get clear of them; they are continually tearing me, and they will not be wrought upon, either by reason or pity, to let fall the prosecution."(2.) They abused him too with their fair promises, for in them they did but banter him. He reckons them (Job 17:5) among those that speak flattery to their friends. They all came to mourn with him. Eliphaz began with a commendation of him, Job 4:3. They had all promised him that he would be happy if he would take their advice. Now all this he looked upon as flattery, and as designed to vex him so much the more. All this he calls their provocation, Job 17:2. They did what they could to provoke him and then condemned him for his resentment of it; but he thinks himself excusable when his eye continued thus in their provocation: it never ceased, and he never could look off it. Note, The unkindness of those that trample upon their friends in affliction, that banter and abuse them then, is enough to try, if not to tire, the patience even of Job himself.

2. How he condemns it. (1.) It was a sign that God had hidden their heart from understanding (Job 17:4), and that in this matter they were infatuated, and their wonted wisdom had departed from them. Wisdom is a gift of God, which he grants to some and withholds from others, grants at some times and withholds at other times. Those that are void of compassion are so far void of understanding. Where there is not the tenderness of a man one may question whether there be the understanding of a man. (2.) It would be a lasting reproach and diminution to them: Therefore shalt thou not exalt them. Those are certainly kept back from honour whose hearts are hidden from understanding. When God infatuates men he will abase them. Surely those who discover so little acquaintance with the methods of Providence shall not have the honour of deciding this controversy! That is reserved for a man of better sense and better temper, such a one as Elihu afterwards appeared to be. (3.) It would entail a curse upon their families. He that thus violates the sacred laws of friendship forfeits the benefit of it, not only for himself, but for his posterity: " Even the eyes of his children shall fail, and, when they look for succour and comfort from their own and their father's friends, they shall look in vain as I have done, and be as much disappointed as I am in you."Note, Those that wrong their neighbours may thereby, in the end, wrong their own children more than they are aware of.

3. How he appeals from them to God (Job 17:3): Lay down now, put me in a surety with thee, that is, "Let me be assured that God will take the hearing and determining of the cause into his own hands, and I desire no more. Let some one engage for God to bring on this matter."Thus those whose hearts condemn them not have confidence towards God, and can with humble and believing boldness beg of him to search and try them. Some make Job here to glance at the mediation of Christ, for he speaks of a surety with God, without whom he durst not appear before God, nor try his cause at his bar; for, though his friends' accusations of him were utterly false, yet he could not justify himself before God but in a mediator. Our English annotations give this reading of the verse: " Appoint, I pray thee, my surety with thee, namely, Christ who is with thee in heaven, and has undertaken to be my surety let him plead my cause, and stand up for me; and who is he then that will strike upon my hand? "that is, "Who dares then contend with me? Who shall lay any thing to my charge if Christ be an advocate for me?"Rom 8:32, Rom 8:33. Christ is the surety of the better testament (Heb 7:22), a surety of God's appointing; and, if he undertake for us, we need not fear what can be done against us.

III. The good use which the righteous should make of Job's afflictions from God, from his enemies, and from his friends, Job 17:8, Job 17:9. Observe here,

1. How the saints are described. (1.) They are upright men, honest and sincere, and that act from a steady principle, with a single eye. This was Job's own character (Job 1:1), and probably he speaks of such upright men especially as had been his intimates and associates. (2.) They are the innocent, not perfectly so, but innocence is what they aim at and press towards. Sincerity is evangelical innocency, and those that are upright are said to be innocent from the great transgression, Psa 19:13. (3.) They are the righteous, who walk in the way of righteousness. (4.) They have clean hands, kept clean from the gross pollutions of sin, and, when spotted with infirmities, washed with innocency, Psa 26:6.

2. How they should be affected with the account of Job's troubles. Great enquiry, no doubt, would be made concerning him, and every one would speak of him and his case; and what use will good people make of it? (1.) It will amaze them: Upright men shall be astonished at this; they will wonder to hear that so good a man as Job should be so grievously afflicted in body, name, and estate, that God should lay his hand so heavily upon him, and that his friends, who ought to have comforted him, should add to his grief, that such a remarkable saint should be such a remarkable sufferer, and so useful a man laid aside in the midst of his usefulness; what shall we say to these things? Upright men, though satisfied in general that God is wise and holy in all he does, yet cannot but be astonished at such dispensations of Providence, paradoxes which will not be unfolded till the mystery of God shall be finished. (2.) It will animate them. Instead of being deterred from and discouraged in the service of God, by the hard usage which this faithful servant of God met with, they shall be so much the more emboldened to proceed and persevere in it. That which was St. Paul's care (1Th 3:3) was Job's, that no good man should be moved, either from his holiness or his comfort, by these afflictions, that none should, for the sake hereof, think the worse of the ways or work of God. And that which was St. Paul's comfort was his too, that the brethren in the Lord would wax confident by his bonds, Phi 1:14. They would hereby be animated, [1.] To oppose sin and to confront the corrupt and pernicious inferences which evil men would draw from Job's sufferings, as that God has forsaken the earth, that it is in vain to serve him, and the like: The innocent shall stir up himself against the hypocrite, will not bear to hear this (Rev 2:2), but will withstand him to his face, will stir up himself to search into the meaning of such providences and study these hard chapters, that he may read them readily, will stir up himself to maintain religion's just but injured cause against all its opposers. Note, The boldness of the attacks which profane people make upon religion should sharpen the courage and resolution of its friends and advocates. It is time to stir when proclamation is made in the gate of the camp, Who is on the Lord's side? When vice is daring it is no time for virtue, through fear, to hide itself. [2.] To persevere in religion. The righteous, instead of drawing back, or so much as starting back, at this frightful spectacle, or standing still to deliberate whether he should proceed or no (allude to 2Sa 2:23), shall with so much the more constancy and resolution hold on his way and press forward. "Though in me he foresees that bonds and afflictions abide him, yet none of these things shall move him, "Act 20:24. Those who keep their eye upon heaven as their end will keep their feet in the paths of religion as their way, whatever difficulties and discouragements they meet with in it [3.] In order thereunto to grow in grace. He will not only hold on his way notwithstanding, but will grow stronger and stronger. By the sight of other good men's trials, and the experience of his own, he will be made more vigorous and lively in his duty, more warm and affectionate, more resolute and undaunted; the worse others are the better he will be; that which dismays others emboldens him. The blustering wind makes the traveller gather his cloak the closer about him and gird it the faster. Those that are truly wise and good will be continually growing wiser and better. Proficiency in religion is a good sign of sincerity in it.

Keil-Delitzsch: Job 17:1-2

1 My breath is corrupt,

My days are extinct,

The graves are ready for me.

2 Truly mockery surrounds me,

And mine eye shall loiter over their disputings.

Hirz., Hlgst., and others, wrongly consider the division of the chapter here to be incorrect. The thought in Job 16:22 is really a concluding thought, like Job 10:20., Job 7:21. Then in Job 17:1 another strain is taken up; and as Job 16:22 is related, as a confirmation, to the request expressed in Job 16:19-21, so Job 17:1, Job 17:2 are related to that expressed in Job 17:3. The connection with the conclusion of Job 16 is none the less close: the thoughts move on somewhat crosswise ( chiastisch ). We do not translate with Ewald: "My spirit is destroyed,"because חבּל (here and Isa 10:27) signifies not, to be destroyed, but, to be corrupted, disturbed, troubled; not the spirit (after Arab. chbl , usually of disturbance of spirit), but the breath is generally meant, which is become short (Job 7:15) and offensive (Job 19:17), announcing suffocation and decay as no longer far distant. In Job 17:1 the ἅπ. γεγρ. נזעכﬖ is equivalent to נדעכו , found elsewhere. In Job 17:1 קברים is used as if the dead were called, Arab. ssâchib el -kubûr , grave-companions. He is indeed one who is dying, from whom the grave is but a step distant, and still the friends promise him long life if he will only repent! This is the mockery which is with him, i.e., surrounds him, as he affirms, Job 17:1 . A secondary verb, התל , is formed from the Hiph. התל (of which we had the non-syncopated form of the fut. in Job 13:9), the Piel of which occurs in 1Ki 18:27 of Elijah's derision of the priests of Baal, and from this is formed the pluralet . התלים (or, according to another reading, התלּים , with the same doubling of the ל as in מהתלּות , deceitful things, Isa 30:10; comp. the same thing in Job 33:7, אראלּם , their lions of God = heroes), which has the meaning foolery, - a meaning questioned by Hirz. without right, - in which the idea of deceit and mockery are united. Gecatilia and Ralbag take it as a part.: mockers; Stick., Wolfson, Hahn: deluded; but the analogy of שׁעשׁעים , תעלולים , and the like, speaks in favour of taking it as a substantive. אם־לא is affirmative (Ges. §155, 2, f ). Ewald renders it as expressive of desire: if only not (Hlgst.: dummodo ne ); but this signification (Ew. §329, b ) cannot be supported. On the other hand, it might be intended interrogatively (as Job 30:25): annon illusiones mecum (Rosenm.); but this אם־לא , corresponding to the second member of a disjunctive question, has no right connection in the preceding. We therefore prefer the affirmative meaning, and explain it like Job 22:20; Job 31:36, comp. Job 2:5. Truly what he continually hears, i.e., from the side of the friends, is only false and delusive utterances, which consequently sound to him like jesting and mockery. The suff. in Job 17:2 refers to them. המּרות (with Dag. dirimens , which renders the sound of the word more pathetic, as Job 9:18; Joe 1:17, and in the Hiph. form כנּלתך , Isa 33:1), elsewhere generally (Jos 1:18 only excepted) of rebellion against God, denotes here the contradictory, quarrelsome bearing of the friends, not the dispute in itself (comp. Arab. mry , III. to attack, VI. to contend with another), but coming forward controversially; only to this is תּלן עיני suitable. הלין must not be taken as = הלּין here; Ewald's translation, "only let not mine eye come against their irritation,"forces upon this verb, which always signifies to murmur, γογγύζειν , a meaning foreign to it, and one that does not well suit it here. The voluntative form תּלן = תּלן (here not the pausal form, as Jdg 19:20, comp. 2Sa 17:16) quite accords with the sense: mine eye shall linger on their janglings; it shall not look on anything that is cheering, but be held fast by this cheerless spectacle, which increases his bodily suffering and his inward pain. From these comforters, who are become his adversaries, Job turns in supplication to God.

Keil-Delitzsch: Job 17:3-5

3 Lay down now, be bondsman for me with Thyself;

Who else should furnish surety to me?!

4 For Thou hast closed their heart from understanding,

Therefore wilt Thou not give authority to them.

5 He who giveth his friends for spoil,

The eyes of his children shall languish.

It is unnecessary, with Reiske and Olsh., to read ערבני ( pone quaeso arrhabonem meum = pro me ) in order that שׂימה may not stand without an object; שׂימה has this meaning included in it, and the ארבני which follows shows that neither לבך (Ralbag) nor ידך (Carey) is to be supplied; accordingly שׂים here, like Arab. wḍ‛ ( wâḍ‛ ), and in the classics both τιθέναι and ponere , signifies alone the laying down of a pledge. Treated by the friends as a criminal justly undergoing punishment, he seeks his refuge in God, who has set the mark of a horrible disease upon him contrary to his desert, as though he were guilty, and implores Him to confirm the reality of his innocence in some way or other by laying down a pledge for him ( ὑποθήκη ). The further prayer is ערבני , as word of entreaty which occurs also in Hezekiah's psalm, Isa 38:14, and Psa 119:122; ערב seq. acc. signifies, as noted on the latter passage, to furnish surety for any one, and gen. to take the place of a mediator (comp. also on Heb 7:22, where ἔγγυος is a synon. of μεσίτης ). Here, however, the significant עמּך is added: furnish security for me with Thyself; elsewhere the form is ל ערב , to furnish security for (Pro 6:1), or לפני before, any one, here with עם of the person by whom the security is to be accepted. The thought already expressed in Job 16:21 receives a still stronger expression here: God is conceived of as two persons, on the one side as a judge who treats Job as one deserving of punishment, on the other side as a bondsman who pledges himself for the innocence of the sufferer before the judge, and stands as it were as surety against the future. In the question, Job 17:3 , the representation is again somewhat changed: Job appears here as the one to whom surety is given. נתקע , described by expositors as reciprocal, is rather reflexive: to give one's hand (the only instance of the med . form of כּף תּקע ) = to give surety by striking hands, dextera data sponsionem in se recipere (Hlgst.). And לידי is not to be explained after the analogy of the passive, as the usual ל of the agents: who would allow himself to be struck by my hand, i.e., who would accept the surety from me (Wolfson), which is unnatural both in representation and expression; but it is, according to Pro 6:1 (vid., Bertheau), intended of the hand of him who receives the stroke of the hand of him who gives the pledge. This is therefore the meaning of the question: who else ( הוּא מי ), if not God himself, should strike (his hand) to my hand, i.e., should furnish to me a pledge (viz., of my innocence) by joining hands? There is none but God alone who can intercede for him, as a guarantee of his innocence before himself and others. This negative answer: None but Thou alone, is established in Job 17:4. God has closed the heart of the friends against understanding, prop. concealed, i.e., He has fixed a curtain, a wall of partition, between their hearts and the right understanding of the matter; He has smitten them with blindness, therefore He will not (since they are suffering from a want of perception which He has ordained, and which is consequently known to Him) allow them to be exalted, i.e., to conquer and triumph. "The exaltation of the friends,"observes Hirzel rightly, "would be, that God should openly justify their assertion of Job's guilt."Löwenthal translates: therefore art thou not honoured; but it is not pointed תּרמם = תּתרמם , but תּרמם , whether it be that אתם is to be supplied, or that it is equivalent to תּרממם (Ew. §62, a , who, however, prefers to take is as n. Hithpa. like תּקמם in the unimproved signification: improvement, since he maintains this affords no right idea), according to the analogy of similar verb-forms (Job 31:15; Isa 64:6), by a resolving of the two similar consonants which occur together.

The hope thus expressed Job establishes (Job 17:5) by a principle from general experience, that he who offers his friends as spoil for distribution will be punished most severely for the same upon his children: he shall not escape the divine retribution which visits him, upon his own children, for the wrong done to his friends. Almost all modern expositors are agreed in this rendering of לחלק as regards Job 17:5 ; but חלק must not be translated "lot"(Ewald), which it never means; it signifies a share of spoil, as e.g., Num 31:36 (Jerome praedam ), or even with a verbal force: plundering (from חלק , 2Ch 28:21), or even in antithesis to entering into bond for a friend with all that one possesses (Stick., Schlottm.), a dividing (of one's property) = distraining, as a result of the surrender to the creditor, to which the verb הגּיד is appropriate, which would then denote denouncing before a court of justice, as Jer 20:10, not merely proclaiming openly, as Isa 3:9. We have translated "spoil,"which admits of all these modifications and excludes none; the general meaning is certainly: one deserts (instead of shielding as an intercessor) his friends and delivers them up; יגּיד with a general subj., as Job 4:2 (if any one attempts), Job 15:3; Job 27:23. With respect to the other half of the verse, Job 17:5 , the optative rendering: may they languish (Vaih.), to the adoption of which the old expositors have been misled by parallels like Psa 109:9., is to be rejected; it is contrary to the character of Job (Job 31:30). We agree with Mercerus: Nequaquam hoc per imprecationem, sed ut consequentis justissimae poenae denunciationem ab Iobo dictum putamus . For v. 5 b is also not to be taken as a circumstantial clause: even if the eyes of his children languish (Ew., Hlgst. Stick., Hahn, Schl.). It is not רעהוּ , but רעים ; and before supposing here a Synallage num . so liable to be misunderstood, one must try to get over the difficulty without it, which is here easy enough. Hence Job is made, in the intended application of the general principle, to allude to his own children, and Ewald really considers him the father of infant children, which, however, as may be seen from the prologue, is nothing but an invention unsupported by the history. Since it is בניו and not בניהם , we refer the suff. to the subj. of יגיד . The Waw of ועיני Mich. calls Waw consecutivum; it, however, rather combines things that are inseparable (certainly as cause and effect, sin and punishment). And it is יגיד , not הגיד , because the perf. would describe the fact as past, while the fut. places us in the midst of this faithless conduct. Job says God cannot possibly allow these, his three friends, the upper hand. One proclaims his friends as spoil (comp. Job 6:27), and the eyes of his children languish (comp. Job 11:20), i.e., he who so faithlessly disowns the claims of affection, is punished for it on that which he holds most dear. But this uncharitableness which he experiences is also a visitation of God. In the next strophe he refers all that he meets with from man to Him as the final cause, but not without a presage of the purpose for which it is designed.

Keil-Delitzsch: Job 17:6-9

6 And He hath made me a proverb to the world,

And I became as one in whose face they spit.

7 Then mine eye became dim with grief,

And all my members were like a shadow.

8 The upright were astonished at it,

And the innocent is stirred up over the godless;

9 Nevertheless the righteous holdeth fast on his way,

And he that hath clean hands waxeth stronger and stronger.

Without a question, the subj. of Job 17:6 is God. It is the same thing whether משׁל is taken as inf. followed by the subject in the nominative (Ges. §133, 2), or as a subst. (lxx θρύλλημα ; Aq., Symm., Theod., παραβολήν ), like שׂחוק , Job 12:4, followed by the gen. subjectivus . משׁל is the usual word for ridicule, expressed in parables of a satirical character, e.g., Joe 2:17 (according to which, if משׁל were intended as inf., משׁל־בּי עמּים might have been expected); עמּים signifies both nations and races, and tribes or people, i.e., members of this and that nation, or in gen. of mankind ( Job 12:2). We have intentionally chosen an ambiguous expression in the translation, for what Job says can be meant of a wide range of people (comp. on Job 2:11 ad fin. ), as well as of those in the immediate neighbourhood; the friends themselves represent different tribes; and a perishable gipsy-like troglodyte race, to whom Job is become a derision, is specially described further on (Job 24, 30).

Job 17:6

By תּפת (translated by Jer. exemplum , and consequently mistaken for מופת ) the older expositors are reminded of the name of the place where the sacrifices were offered to Moloch in the valley of the sons of Hinnom (whence גּיהנּם , γέεννα , hell), since they explain it by "the fire of hell,"but only from want of a right perception; the לפנים standing with it, which nowhere signifies palam , and cannot here (where אהיה , although in the signification ἐγενόμην , follows) signify a multo tempore , shows that תפת here is to be derived from תּוּף , to spit out (as נפת , gum, from נוּף ). This verb certainly cannot be supported in Hebr. and Aram. (since רקק is the commoner word), except two passages in the Talmud ( Nidda 42 a , comp. Sabbath 99 b , and Chethuboth 61 b ); but it is confirmed by the Aethiopic and Coptic and an onomatopoetic origin, as the words πτύειν, ψύειν , spuere , Germ. speien , etc., show.

(Note: תוף is related to the Sanskrit root shttı̂v , as τέγη, τρύχους, τρύζω , and the like, to στέγη, στρύχνος, στρύζω , , vid., Kuhn's Zeitschrift , Bd. iv. Abh. i. (the falling away of s before mutes).)

Cognate is the Arabic taffafa , to treat with contempt, and the interjection tuffan , fie upon thee,

(Note: Almost all modern expositors repeat the remark here, that this tuffan is similar in meaning to ῥακά , Mat 5:22, while they might learn from Lightfoot that it has nothing to do with רק , to spit, but is equivalent to ריקא , κενέ .)

e.g., in the proverb (quoted by Umbreit): ‛aini fihi watuffan ‛aleihi , my eye rests on it wishfully, and yet I feel disgust at it. Therefore לפנים (spitting upon the face) is equivalent to בפנים , Num 12:14; Deu 25:9 (to spit in the face). In consequence of this deep debasement of the object of scorn and spitting, the brightness and vision of his eye (sense of sight) are become dim (comp. Psa 6:8; Psa 31:10) מכּעשׂ (always written with שׂ , not ס , in the book of Job), from grief, and his frames, i.e., bodily frame = members (Jer. membra , Targ. incorrectly: features), are become like a shadow all of them, as fleshless and powerless as a shadow, which is only appearance without substance. His suffering, his miserable form ( זאת ), is of such a kind that the upright are astonished ( שׁמם , to become desolate, silent), and the guiltless (like himself and other innocent sufferers) become excited (here with vexation as in Psa 37:1, as in Job 31:29 with joy) over the godless (who is none the less prosperous); but the righteous holds firm (without allowing himself to be disconcerted by this anomalous condition of things, though impenetrably mysterious) on his way (the way of good to which he has pledged himself), and the pure of hands ( וּטהר־ as Pro 22:11, according to another mode of writing וּטהר־ with Chateph-Kametz under the ט and Gaja under the ו ; comp. Isa 54:9, where the form of writing וּמגּער־ umigg^o or is well authorized) increases ( יוסיף , of inward increase, as Ecc 1:18) in strength ( אמץ only here in the book of Job); i.e., far from allowing suffering to draw him from God to the side of the godless, he gathers strength thereby only still more perseveringly to pursue righteousness of life and purity of conduct, since suffering, especially in connection with such experiences as Job now has with the three friends, drives him to God and makes his communion with Him closer and firmer. These words of Job (if we may be allowed the figure) are like a rocket which shoots above the tragic darkness of the book, lighting it up suddenly, although only for a short time. The confession which breaks through in lyric form in Ps 73 here finds expression of a more brief, sententious kind. The point of Eliphaz' reproach (Job 15:4), that Job makes void the fear of God, and depreciates communion with God, is destroyed by this confession, and the assurance of Satan (Job 2:5) is confronted by a fact of experience, which, if it should also become manifest in the case of Job, puts to shame and makes void the hope of the evil spirit.

Constable: Job 15:1--21:34

C. The Second Cycle of Speeches between Job and His Three Friends chs. 15-21

In the second cycle of speeches Job's companions did not change their minds about why Job was suffering and the larger issue of the basis of the divine human relationship. They continued to hold the dogma of retribution. Their spirit did change, however, to one of greater hostility. They seem to have abandoned hope that direct appeals to Job would move him to repent because they no longer called on him to repent. Instead they stressed the fate of the wicked and indirectly urged him to repent. In their first speeches their approach was more intellectual; they challenged Job to think logically. In their second speeches their approach was more emotional; they sought to convict Job's conscience.

"In the first [cycle of speeches] Eliphaz had emphasised [sic] the moral perfection of God, Bildad his unwavering justice, and Zophar his omniscience. Job in reply had dwelt on his own unmerited sufferings and declared his willingness to meet God face to face to argue his case. Having failed to stir his conscience, the friends see in him a menace to all true religion, and in the second cycle their rebukes are sharper than in the first, though their characters are still carefully preserved."⁷²

Constable: Job 16:1--17:16

2. Job's second reply to Eliphaz chs. 16-17

This response reflects Job's increasing disinterest in the words of his accusers. He warned them and then proceeded to bewail his isolation.

Constable: Job 16:18--17:3

Job's desire for a representative in heaven 16:18-17:2

Job called on the earth not to cover his blood (v. 18) so it might cry to God for vindication (cf. Gen. 4:10). Job did not want people to forget his case when he died. He wanted someone to answer his questions and to vindicate his innocence even if he was not alive to witness it. The witness and advocate to which he referred (v. 19) seem to be some heavenly witness other than God since he called this person a man (v. 21).⁷⁷ Many commentators, however, believe Job had God in mind. Certainly the God-man, Jesus Christ, our advocate with the Father, is the person whom God provided to meet this need. However, Job did not have revelation concerning Him as far as the text indicates. Job longed for someone to plead with God for him since God was apparently ignoring his own cries. Moreover Job's companions were not pleading his case as true friends should have done (16:20; 17:2).

"With increasing clarity Job is seeing that satisfactory answers might be gained only when he has more direct dealings with God after death."⁷⁸

Constable: Job 17:3-5

Job's disclaimer of his friends 17:3-5

Evidently in legal cases of this sort each litigant would give the judge a bond (money or some personal possession) before the trial. This bond would guarantee that the litigant would be fair and honest during the trial. If one of the litigants was not, the judge would not return his bond to him at the trial's end.⁷⁹ Job called on God to lay down His pledge (as the prosecutor) with Himself (the judge; 17:3a). The guarantor (17:3b) was one who provided the bond if the person on trial could not. Job's supportive friends would normally have provided his bond, but they had turned against him. Job lay the ultimate responsibility for his friends' blindness and rejection at God's feet because God had withheld understanding from them. Consequently he believed God would not lift them up (17:4). Job may have believed part of his friends' motive in not helping him was that they could obtain a portion of his property when he died (17:5). However since verse 5 is a proverb, he may have only been reminding his friends of the serious consequences of slander.⁸⁰

Constable: Job 17:6-16

Job's despair in the face of death 17:6-16

Job proceeded to accuse God by making him a byword (proverb) to others (v. 6). Perhaps parents were pointing to him as an example of what happens to a person who lives a hypocritical life. One writer suggested that verse 6 should read, "Therefore I repudiate and repent of dust and ashes."⁸¹ This statement would express Job's intention to abandon mourning. However most interpreters have not adopted this rendering. Job did not stop mourning.

Bright flashing eyes were and still are a sign of vitality, but Job's eyes had grown dim because of his suffering (v. 7). Nonetheless Job still believed that his experiences would not discourage other godly people from opposing the wicked (v. 8b).

Again Job ended his speech with a gloomy reference to the grave and his anticipated death (vv. 13-16).

Introduction / Outline

JFB: Job (Book Introduction)

JOB A REAL PERSON.--It has been supposed by some that the book of Job is an allegory, not a real narrative, on account of the artificial character of many of its statements. Thus the sacred numbers, three and seven, often occur. He had seven thousand sheep, seven sons, both before and after his trials; his three friends sit down with him seven days and seven nights; both before and after his trials he had three daughters. So also the number and form of the speeches of the several speakers seem to be artificial. The name of Job, too, is derived from an Arabic word signifying repentance.

But Eze 14:14 (compare Eze 14:16, Eze 14:20) speaks of "Job" in conjunction with "Noah and Daniel," real persons. St. James (Jam 5:11) also refers to Job as an example of "patience," which he would not have been likely to do had Job been only a fictitious person. Also the names of persons and places are specified with a particularity not to be looked for in an allegory. As to the exact doubling of his possessions after his restoration, no doubt the round number is given for the exact number, as the latter approached near the former; this is often done in undoubtedly historical books. As to the studied number and form of the speeches, it seems likely that the arguments were substantially those which appear in the book, but that the studied and poetic form was given by Job himself, guided by the Holy Spirit. He lived one hundred and forty years after his trials, and nothing would be more natural than that he should, at his leisure, mould into a perfect form the arguments used in the momentous debate, for the instruction of the Church in all ages. Probably, too, the debate itself occupied several sittings; and the number of speeches assigned to each was arranged by preconcerted agreement, and each was allowed the interval of a day or more to prepare carefully his speech and replies; this will account for the speakers bringing forward their arguments in regular series, no one speaking out of his turn. As to the name Job--repentance (supposing the derivation correct)--it was common in old times to give a name from circumstances which occurred at an advanced period of life, and this is no argument against the reality of the person.

WHERE JOB LIVED.--"Uz," according to GESENIUS, means a light, sandy soil, and was in the north of Arabia-Deserta, between Palestine and the Euphrates, called by PTOLEMY (Geography, 19) Ausitai or Aisitai. In Gen 10:23; Gen 22:21; Gen 36:28; and 1Ch 1:17, 1Ch 1:42, it is the name of a man. In Jer 25:20; Lam 4:21; and Job 1:1, it is a country. Uz, in Gen 22:21, is said to be the son of Nahor, brother of Abraham--a different person from the one mentioned (Gen 10:23), a grandson of Shem. The probability is that the country took its name from the latter of the two; for this one was the son of Aram, from whom the Arameans take their name, and these dwelt in Mesopotamia, between the rivers Euphrates and Tigris. Compare as to the dwelling of the sons of Shem in Gen 10:30, "a mount of the East," answering to "men of the East" (Job 1:3). RAWLINSON, in his deciphering of the Assyrian inscriptions, states that "Uz is the prevailing name of the country at the mouth of the Euphrates." It is probable that Eliphaz the Temanite and the Sabeans dwelt in that quarter; and we know that the Chaldeans resided there, and not near Idumea, which some identify with Uz. The tornado from "the wilderness" (Job 1:19) agrees with the view of it being Arabia-Deserta. Job (Job 1:3) is called "the greatest of the men of the East"; but Idumea was not east, but south of Palestine: therefore in Scripture language, the phrase cannot apply to that country, but probably refers to the north of Arabia-Deserta, between Palestine, Idumea, and the Euphrates. So the Arabs still show in the Houran a place called Uz as the residence of Job.

THE AGE WHEN JOB LIVED.--EUSEBIUS fixes it two ages before Moses, that is, about the time of Isaac: eighteen hundred years before Christ, and six hundred after the Deluge. Agreeing with this are the following considerations: 1. Job's length of life is patriarchal, two hundred years. 2. He alludes only to the earliest form of idolatry, namely, the worship of the sun, moon, and heavenly hosts (called Saba, whence arises the title "Lord of Sabaoth," as opposed to Sabeanism) (Job 31:26-28). 3. The number of oxen and rams sacrificed, seven, as in the case of Balaam. God would not have sanctioned this after the giving of the Mosaic law, though He might graciously accommodate Himself to existing customs before the law. 4. The language of Job is Hebrew, interspersed occasionally with Syriac and Arabic expressions, implying a time when all the Shemitic tribes spoke one common tongue and had not branched into different dialects, Hebrew, Syriac, and Arabic. 5. He speaks of the most ancient kind of writing, namely, sculpture. Riches also are reckoned by cattle. The Hebrew word, translated "a piece of money," ought rather be rendered "a lamb." 6. There is no allusion to the exodus from Egypt and to the miracles that accompanied it; nor to the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah (PATRICK, however, thinks there is); though there is to the Flood (Job 22:17); and these events, happening in Job's vicinity, would have been striking illustrations of the argument for God's interposition in destroying the wicked and vindicating the righteous, had Job and his friends known of them. Nor is there any undoubted reference to the Jewish law, ritual, and priesthood. 7. The religion of Job is that which prevailed among the patriarchs previous to the law; sacrifices performed by the head of the family; no officiating priesthood, temple, or consecrated altar.

THE WRITER.--All the foregoing facts accord with Job himself having been the author. The style of thought, imagery, and manners, are such as we should look for in the work of an Arabian emir. There is precisely that degree of knowledge of primitive tradition (see Job 31:33, as to Adam) which was universally spread abroad in the days of Noah and Abraham, and which was subsequently embodied in the early chapters of Genesis. Job, in his speeches, shows that he was much more competent to compose the work than Elihu, to whom LIGHTFOOT attributes it. The style forbids its being attributed to Moses, to whom its composition is by some attributed, "whilst he was among the Midianites, about 1520 B.C." But the fact, that it, though not a Jewish book, appears among the Hebrew sacred writings, makes it likely that it came to the knowledge of Moses during the forty years which he passed in parts of Arabia, chiefly near Horeb; and that he, by divine guidance, introduced it as a sacred writing to the Israelites, to whom, in their affliction, the patience and restoration of Job were calculated to be a lesson of especial utility. That it is inspired appears from the fact that Paul (1Co 3:19) quotes it (Job 5:13) with the formula, "It is written." Our Savior, too Mat 24:28), plainly refers to Job 29:30. Compare also Jam 4:10 and 1Pe 5:6 with Job 22:29; Rom 11:34-35 with Job 15:8. It is probably the oldest book in the world. It stands among the Hagiographa in the threefold division of Scripture into the Law, the Prophets, and the Hagiographa ("Psalms," Luk 24:44).

DESIGN OF THE BOOK.--It is a public debate in poetic form on an important question concerning the divine government; moreover the prologue and epilogue, which are in prose, shed the interest of a living history over the debate, which would otherwise be but a contest of abstract reasonings. To each speaker of the three friends three speeches are assigned. Job having no one to stand by him is allowed to reply to each speech of each of the three. Eliphaz, as the oldest, leads the way. Zophar, at his third turn, failed to speak, thus virtually owning himself overcome (Job 27:1-23). Therefore Job continued his reply, which forms three speeches (Job 26:1-14; Job 27:1-23; Job 28:1-28; Job 29:1-31:40). Elihu (Job 32:1-37:24) is allowed four speeches. Jehovah makes three addresses (Job 38:1-41:34). Thus, throughout there is a tripartite division. The whole is divided into three parts--the prologue, poem proper, and epilogue. The poem, into three--(1) The dispute of Job and his three friends; (2) The address of Elihu; (3) The address of God. There are three series in the controversy, and in the same order. The epilogue (Job 42:1-17) also is threefold; Job's justification, reconciliation with his friends, restoration. The speakers also in their successive speeches regularly advance from less to greater vehemence. With all this artificial composition, everything seems easy and natural.

The question to be solved, as exemplified in the case of Job, is, Why are the righteous afflicted consistently with God's justice? The doctrine of retribution after death, no doubt, is the great solution of the difficulty. And to it Job plainly refers in Job 14:14, and Job 19:25. The objection to this, that the explicitness of the language on the resurrection in Job is inconsistent with the obscurity on the subject in the early books of the Old Testament, is answered by the fact that Job enjoyed the divine vision (Job 38:1; Job 42:5), and therefore, by inspiration, foretold these truths. Next, the revelations made outside of Israel being few needed to be the more explicit; thus Balaam's prophecy (Num 24:17) was clear enough to lead the wise men of the East by the star (Mat 2:2); and in the age before the written law, it was the more needful for God not to leave Himself without witness of the truth. Still Job evidently did not fully realize the significance designed by the Spirit in his own words (compare 1Pe 1:11-12). The doctrine, though existing, was not plainly revealed or at least understood. Hence he does not mainly refer to this solution. Yes, and even now, we need something in addition to this solution. David, who firmly believed in a future retribution (Psa 16:10; Psa 17:15), still felt the difficulty not entirely solved thereby (Psa. 83:1-18). The solution is not in Job's or in his three friends' speeches. It must, therefore, be in Elihu's. God will hold a final judgment, no doubt, to clear up all that seems dark in His present dealings; but He also now providentially and morally governs the world and all the events of human life. Even the comparatively righteous are not without sin which needs to be corrected. The justice and love of God administer the altogether deserved and merciful correction. Affliction to the godly is thus mercy and justice in disguise. The afflicted believer on repentance sees this. "Via crucis, via salutis" ["The way of the cross, the way of deliverance"]. Though afflicted, the godly are happier even now than the ungodly, and when affliction has attained its end, it is removed by the Lord. In the Old Testament the consolations are more temporal and outward; in the New Testament, more spiritual; but in neither to the entire exclusion of the other. "Prosperity," says BACON, "is the blessing of the Old Testament; adversity that of the New Testament, which is the mark of God's more especial favor. Yet even in the Old Testament, if you listen to David's harp, you shall hear as many hearse-like airs as carols; and the pencil of the Holy Ghost has labored more in describing the afflictions of Job than the felicities of Solomon. Prosperity is not without many fears and distastes; and adversity is not without comforts and hopes." This solution of Elihu is seconded by the addresses of God, in which it is shown God must be just (because He is God), as Elihu had shown how God can be just, and yet the righteous be afflicted. It is also acquiesced in by Job, who makes no reply. God reprimands the "three" friends, but not Elihu. Job's general course is approved; he is directed to intercede for his friends, and is restored to double his former prosperity.

POETRY.--In all countries poetry is the earliest form of composition as being best retained in the memory. In the East especially it was customary for sentiments to be preserved in a terse, proverbial, and poetic form (called maschal). Hebrew poetry is not constituted by the rhythm or meter, but in a form peculiar to itself: 1. In an alphabetical arrangement somewhat like our acrostic. For instance, Lam. 1:1-22. 2. The same verse repeated at intervals; as in Psa 42:1-11; Psa. 107:1-43. 3. Rhythm of gradation. Psalms of degrees, Psa. 120:1-134:3, in which the expression of the previous verse is resumed and carried forward in the next (Psa 121:1-8). 4. The chief characteristic of Hebrew poetry is parallelism, or the correspondence of the same ideas in the parallel clauses. The earliest instance is Enoch's prophecy (Jud 1:14), and Lamech's parody of it (Gen 4:23). Three kinds occur: (1) The synonymous parallelism, in which the second is a repetition of the first, with or without increase of force (Psa 22:27; Isa 15:1); sometimes with double parallelism (Isa 1:15). (2) The antithetic, in which the idea of the second clause is the converse of that in the first (Pro 10:1). (3) The synthetic, where there is a correspondence between different propositions, noun answering to noun, verb to verb, member to member, the sentiment, moreover, being not merely echoed, or put in contrast, but enforced by accessory ideas (Job 3:3-9). Also alternate (Isa 51:19). "Desolation and destruction, famine and sword," that is, desolation by famine, and destruction by the sword. Introverted; where the fourth answers to the first, and the third to the second (Mat 7:6). Parallelism thus often affords a key to the interpretation. For fuller information, see LOWTH (Introduction to Isaiah, and Lecture on Hebrew Poetry) and HERDER (Spirit of Hebrew Poetry, translated by Marsh). The simpler and less artificial forms of parallelism prevail in Job--a mark of its early age.

JFB: Job (Outline)

• THE HOLINESS OF JOB, HIS WEALTH, &c. (Job 1:1-5)
• SATAN, APPEARING BEFORE GOD, FALSELY ACCUSES JOB. (Job 1:6-12)
• SATAN FURTHER TEMPTS JOB. (Job 2:1-8)
• JOB REPROVES HIS WIFE. (Job 2:9-13)
• JOB CURSES THE DAY OF HIS BIRTH AND WISHES FOR DEATH. (Job 3:1-19)
• HE COMPLAINS OF LIFE BECAUSE OF HIS ANGUISH. (Job 3:20-26)
• FIRST SPEECH OF ELIPHAZ. (Job 4:1-21)
• ELIPHAZ' CONCLUSION FROM THE VISION. (Job 5:1-27)
• REPLY OF JOB TO ELIPHAZ. (Job 6:1-30)
• JOB EXCUSES HIS DESIRE FOR DEATH. (Job 7:1-21)
• THE ADDRESS OF BILDAD. (Job 8:1-22)
• REPLY OF JOB TO BILDAD. (Job 9:1-35)
• JOB'S REPLY TO BILDAD CONTINUED. (Job 10:1-22)
• FIRST SPEECH OF ZOPHAR. (Job 11:1-20) Zophar assails Job for his empty words, and indirectly, the two friends, for their weak reply. Taciturnity is highly prized among Orientals (Pro 10:8, Pro 10:19).
• JOB'S REPLY TO ZOPHAR. (Job 12:1-14:22)
• JOB'S REPLY TO ZOPHAR CONTINUED. (Job 13:1-28)
• JOB PASSES FROM HIS OWN TO THE COMMON MISERY OF MANKIND. (Job 14:1-22)
• SECOND SPEECH OF ELIPHAZ. (Job 15:1-35)
• JOB'S REPLY. (Job 16:1-22) (Job 13:4).
• JOB'S ANSWER CONTINUED. (Job 17:1-16)
• REPLY OF BILDAD. (Job 18:1-21)
• JOB'S REPLY TO BILDAD. (Job 19:1-29)
• REPLY OF ZOPHAR. (Job 20:1-29)
• JOB'S ANSWER. (Job 21:1-34)
• AS BEFORE, ELIPHAZ BEGINS. (Job 22:1-30) Eliphaz shows that man's goodness does not add to, or man's badness take from, the happiness of God; therefore it cannot be that God sends prosperity to some and calamities on others for His own advantage; the cause of the goods and ills sent must lie in the men themselves (Psa 16:2; Luk 17:10; Act 17:25; 1Ch 29:14). So Job's calamities must arise from guilt. Eliphaz, instead of meeting the facts, tries to show that it could not be so.
• JOB'S ANSWER. (Job 23:1-17)
• BILDAD'S REPLY. (Job 25:1-6) Power and terror, that is, terror-inspiring power.
• JOB'S REPLY. (Job 26:1-14)
• JOB'S SPEECH CONTINUED. (Job 28:1-28)
• SPEECH OF ELIHU. (Job 32:1-37:24) Prose (poetry begins with "I am young").
• ADDRESS TO JOB, AS (Job 32:1-22) TO THE FRIENDS. (Job 33:1-33)
• GOD'S SECOND ADDRESS. (Job 40:1-24)
• JOB'S PENITENT REPLY. (Job 42:1-6) In the first clause he owns God to be omnipotent over nature, as contrasted with his own feebleness, which God had proved (Job 40:15; Job 41:34); in the second, that God is supremely just (which, in order to be governor of the world, He must needs be) in all His dealings, as contrasted with his own vileness (Job 42:6), and incompetence to deal with the wicked as a just judge (Job 40:8-14).

TSK: Job (Book Introduction)

A large aquatic animal, perhaps the extinct dinosaur, plesiosaurus, the exact meaning is unknown. Some think this to be a crocodile but from the description in Job 41:1-41:34 this is patently absurd. It appears to be a large fire breathing animal of some sort. Just as the bomardier beetle has an explosion producing mechanism, so the great sea dragon may have an explosive producing mechanism to enable it to be a real fire breathing dragon.

TSK: Job 17 (Chapter Introduction)

Overview

Job 17:1, Job appeals from men to God; Job 17:6, The unmerciful dealing of men with the afflicted may astonish, but not discourage the righteous; Job 17:11, His hope is not in life, but in death.

Poole: Job 17 (Chapter Introduction)

CHAPTER 17

His miserable life; false friends; their punishment, Job 17:1-5 . His contempt, and sorrow, Job 17:6,7 . The righteous should be established, Job 17:8,9 ; but he was given over to death, Job 17:11-16 .

MHCC: Job (Book Introduction)

This book is so called from Job, whose prosperity, afflictions, and restoration, are here recorded. He lived soon after Abraham, or perhaps before that patriarch. Most likely it was written by Job himself, and it is the most ancient book in existence. The instructions to be learned from the patience of Job, and from his trials, are as useful now, and as much needed as ever. We live under the same Providence, we have the same chastening Father, and there is the same need for correction unto righteousness. The fortitude and patience of Job, though not small, gave way in his severe troubles; but his faith was fixed upon the coming of his Redeemer, and this gave him stedfastness and constancy, though every other dependence, particularly the pride and boast of a self-righteous spirit, was tried and consumed. Another great doctrine of the faith, particularly set forth in the book of Job, is that of Providence. It is plain, from this history, that the Lord watched over his servant Job with the affection of a wise and loving father.

MHCC: Job 17 (Chapter Introduction)

(Job 17:1-9) Job appeals from man to God.

(Job 17:10-16) His hope is not in life, but in death.

Matthew Henry: Job (Book Introduction)

An Exposition, with Practical Observations, of The Book of Job

This book of Job stands by itself, is not connected with any other, and is therefore to be considered alone. Many copies of the Hebrew Bible place it after the book of Psalms, and some after the Proverbs, which perhaps has given occasion to some learned men to imagine it to have been written by Isaiah or some of the later prophets. But, as the subject appears to have been much more ancient, so we have no reason to think but that the composition of the book was, and that therefore it is most fitly placed first in this collection of divine morals: also, being doctrinal, it is proper to precede and introduce the book of Psalms, which is devotional, and the book of Proverbs, which is practical; for how shall we worship or obey a God whom we know not? As to this book,

I. We are sure that it is given by inspiration of God, though we are not certain who was the penman of it. The Jews, though no friends to Job, because he was a stranger to the commonwealth of Israel, yet, as faithful conservators of the oracles of God committed to them, always retained this book in their sacred canon. The history is referred to by one apostle (Jam 5:11) and one passage (Job 5:13) is quoted by another apostle, with the usual form of quoting scripture, It is written, 1Co 3:19. It is the opinion of many of the ancients that this history was written by Moses himself in Midian, and delivered to his suffering brethren in Egypt, for their support and comfort under their burdens, and the encouragement of their hope that God would in due time deliver and enrich them, as he did this patient sufferer. Some conjecture that it was written originally in Arabic, and afterwards translated into Hebrew, for the use of the Jewish church, by Solomon (so Monsieur Jurieu) or some other inspired writer. It seems most probable to me that Elihu was the penman of it, at least of the discourses, because (Job 32:15, Job 32:16) he mingles the words of a historian with those of a disputant: but Moses perhaps wrote the first two chapters and the last, to give light to the discourses; for in them God is frequently called Jehovah, but not once in all the discourses, except Job 12:9. That name was but little known to the patriarchs before Moses, Exo 6:3. If Job wrote it himself, some of the Jewish writers themselves own him a prophet among the Gentiles; if Elihu, we find he had a spirit of prophecy which filled him with matter and constrained him, Job 32:18.

II. We are sure that it is, for the substance of it, a true history, and not a romance, though the dialogues are poetical. No doubt there was such a man as Job; the prophet Ezekiel names him with Noah and Daniel, Eze 14:14. The narrative we have here of his prosperity and piety, his strange afflictions and exemplary patience, the substance of his conferences with his friends, and God's discourse with him out of the whirlwind, with his return at length to a very prosperous condition, no doubt is exactly true, though the inspired penman is allowed the usual liberty of putting the matter of which Job and his friends discoursed into his own words.

III. We are sure that it is very ancient, though we cannot fix the precise time either when Job lived or when the book was written. So many, so evident, are its hoary hairs, the marks of its antiquity, that we have reason to think it of equal date with the book of Genesis itself, and that holy Job was contemporary with Isaac and Jacob; though not coheir with them of the promise of the earthly Canaan, yet a joint-expectant with them of the better country, that is, the heavenly. Probably he was of the posterity of Nahor, Abraham's brother, whose first-born was Uz (Gen 22:21), and in whose family religion was for some ages kept up, as appears, Gen 31:53, where God is called, not only the God of Abraham, but the God of Nahor. He lived before the age of man was shortened to seventy or eighty, as it was in Moses's time, before sacrifices were confined to one altar, before the general apostasy of the nations from the knowledge and worship of the true God, and while yet there was no other idolatry known than the worship of the sun and moon, and that punished by the Judges, Job 31:26-28. He lived while God was known by the name of God Almighty more than by the name of Jehovah; for he is called Shaddai - the Almighty, above thirty times in this book. He lived while divine knowledge was conveyed, not by writing, but by tradition; for to that appeals are here made, Job 8:8; Job 21:29; Job 15:18; Job 5:1. And we have therefore reason to think that he lived before Moses, because here is no mention at all of the deliverance of Israel out of Egypt, or the giving of the law. There is indeed one passage which might be made to allude to the drowning of Pharaoh (Job 26:12): He divideth the sea with his power, and by his understanding he smiteth through Rahab, which name Egypt is frequently called by in scripture, as Psa 87:4; Psa 89:10; Isa 51:9. But that may as well refer to the proud waves of the sea. We conclude therefore that we are here got back to the patriarchal age, and, besides its authority, we receive this book with veneration for its antiquity.

IV. We are sure that it is of great use to the church, and to every good Christian, though there are many passages in it dark and hard to be understood. We cannot perhaps be confident of the true meaning of every Arabic word and phrase we meet with in it. It is a book that finds a great deal of work for the critics; but enough is plain to make the whole profitable, and it was all written for our learning.

1. This noble poem presents to us, in very clear and lively characters, these five things among others: - (1.) A monument of primitive theology. The first and great principles of the light of nature, on which natural religion is founded, are here, in a warm, and long, and learned dispute, not only taken for granted on all sides and not the least doubt made of them, but by common consent plainly laid down as eternal truths, illustrated and urged as affecting commanding truths. Were ever the being of God, his glorious attributes and perfections, his unsearchable wisdom, his irresistible power, his inconceivable glory, his inflexible justice, and his incontestable sovereignty, discoursed of with more clearness, fulness, reverence, and divine eloquence, than in this book? The creation of the world, and the government of it, are here admirably described, not as matters of nice speculation, but as laying most powerful obligations upon us to fear and serve, to submit to and trust in, our Creator, owner, Lord, and ruler. Moral good and evil, virtue and vice, were never drawn more to the life (the beauty of the one and the deformity of the other) than in this book; nor the inviolable rule of God's judgment more plainly laid down, That happy are the righteous, it shall be well with them; and Woe to the wicked, it shall be ill with them. These are not questions of the schools to keep the learned world in action, nor engines of state to keep the unlearned world in awe; no, it appears by this book that they are sacred truths of undoubted certainty, and which all the wise and sober part of mankind have in every age subscribed and submitted to. (2.) It presents us with a specimen of Gentile piety. This great saint descended probably not from Abraham, but Nahor; or, if from Abraham, not from Isaac, but from one of the sons of the concubines that were sent into the east-country (Gen 25:6); or, if from Isaac, yet not from Jacob, but Esau; so that he was out of the pale of the covenant of peculiarity, no Israelite, no proselyte, and yet none like him for religion, nor such a favourite of heaven upon this earth. It was a truth therefore, before St. Peter perceived it, that in every nation he that fears God and works righteousness is accepted of him, Act 10:35. There were children of God scattered abroad (Joh 11:52) besides the incorporated children of the kingdom, Mat 8:11, Mat 8:12. (3.) It presents us with an exposition of the book of Providence, and a clear and satisfactory solution of many of the difficult and obscure passages of it. The prosperity of the wicked and the afflictions of the righteous have always been reckoned two as hard chapters as any in that book; but they are here expounded, and reconciled with the divine wisdom, purity, and goodness, by the end of these things. (4.) It presents us with a great example of patience and close adherence to God in the midst of the sorest calamities. Sir Richard Blackmore's most ingenious pen, in his excellent preface to his paraphrase on this book, makes Job a hero proper for an epic poem; for, says he, " He appears brave in distress and valiant in affliction, maintains his virtue, and with that his character, under the most exasperating provocations that the malice of hell could invent, and thereby gives a most noble example of passive fortitude, a character no way inferior to that of the active hero," etc. (5.) It presents us with an illustrious type of Christ, the particulars of which we shall endeavour to take notice of as we go along. In general, Job was a great sufferer, was emptied and humbled, but in order to his greater glory. So Christ abased himself, that we might be exalted. The learned bishop Patrick quotes St. Jerome ore than once speaking of Job as a type of Christ, who for the job that was set before him endured the cross, who was persecuted, for a time, by men and devils, and seemed forsaken of God too, but was raised to be an intercessor even for his friends and had added affliction to his misery. When the apostle speaks of the patience of Job he immediately takes notice of the end of the Lord, that is, of the Lord Jesus (as some understand it), typified by Job, Jam 5:11.

2. In this book we have, (1.) The history of Job's sufferings, and his patience under them (ch. 1, Job 2:1-13, not without a mixture of human frailty, ch. 3. (2.) A dispute between him and his friends upon them, in which, [1.] The opponents were Eliphaz, Bildad, and Zophar. [2.] The respondent was Job. [3.] The moderators were, First, Elihu, ch. 32-37. Secondly, God himself, ch. 38-41. (3.) The issue of all in Job's honour and prosperity, ch. 42. Upon the whole, we learn that many are the afflictions of the righteous, but that when the Lord delivers them out of them all the trial of their faith will be found to praise, and honour, and glory.

Matthew Henry: Job 17 (Chapter Introduction)

In this chapter, I. Job reflects upon the harsh censures which his friends had passed upon him, and looking upon himself as a dying man (Job 17:1), he appeals to God, and begs of him speedily to appear for him, and right him, because they had wronged him, and he knew not how to right himself (Job 17:2-7). But he hopes that, though it should be a surprise, it will be no stumbling-block, to good people, to see him thus abused (Job 17:8, Job 17:9). II. He reflects upon the vain hopes they had fed him with, that he should yet see good days, showing that his days were just at an end, and with his body all his hopes would be buried in the dust (Job 17:10-16). His friends becoming strange to him, which greatly grieved him, he makes death and the grave familiar to him, which yielded him some comfort.

Constable: Job (Book Introduction)

Introduction

Title

This book, like many others in the Old Testament, got its name from the central character in it rather than from its writer. While it is possible that Job may have written it, there is no concrete evidence that he did.

"Job" means "hated" or "the much persecuted." Perhaps "Job" was a nickname his friends gave him during his suffering. Job is the title of the book in the Hebrew, Greek (Septuagint), Latin (Vulgate), and English Bibles.

Date

Concerning the time the events recorded took place there have been many views ranging from the patriarchal age of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob (beginning about 2100 B.C.) to the sixth century B.C.

Internal evidence suggests that Job lived in the patriarchal period. The length of his life (either 140 or about 210 years; 42:16) is similar to that of Terah (205 years), Abraham (175 years), Isaac (180 years), and Jacob (147 years). The writer measured Job's wealth in terms of his livestock. This is how Moses evaluated the wealth of Abraham and Jacob (1:3; 42:12; cf. Gen. 12:16; 13:2; 30:43; 32:5). The Sabeans and Chaldeans (1:15, 17) were nomads during the patriarchal period but not later. Job was the priest of his family (1:5) a condition that became less common when nations in the Near East developed more organization. Names of people and places in the book were also common in the patriarchal age (e.g., Sheba, Tima, Eliphaz, Uz, Job). Genesis, the Mari documents, and the Egyptian Execration texts, all of which refer to life in the Near East at this time, also refer to these names.

"The idea that Job has an Edomite background is as old as the LXX, which equates Job with Jobab, king of Edom (Gn. 36:33)."¹

"Most recent [liberal] writers are agreed that in its original form the book was of post-exilic origin, and the secondary parts of later composition."²

Internal evidence, however, has led many careful students of the book to conclude that it was the work of one person. Perhaps someone else added a few minor touches later under divine inspiration (e.g., 42:16-17). If Job lived in the patriarchal period, as the evidence seems to suggest, what clues are there that someone did not write it then or very soon afterwards? The detailed recounting of the conversations that took place certainly suggests a composition date fairly close to that of the actual events. That has been the position of Jewish and Christian scholars until destructive criticism became popular in the last few centuries. Critics point to the fact that oral tradition was very exact in the ancient world and that people could have transmitted Job's story by mouth for generations and retained its purity. With the Holy Spirit's superintending work it could have been, but there is no evidence that this is what happened. Literacy was widespread in the ancient world at this time.³ Critics further point out that in the process of social evolution composition of a work such as this book was more typical at a date much later than the patriarchal period. Yet again there is no evidence that someone wrote it later. The simpler explanation is that someone wrote it early. Since there is no proof that someone wrote it later, most conservative scholars have continued to prefer the traditional early date of composition theory.

Writer

The book does not identify its writer. Furthermore the ancient Hebrews could not agree on who wrote it. Consequently many different scholars have made guesses as to who the writer was.

From the patriarchal period Job himself is the favored candidate, though some scholars have nominated Elihu. These men seem to be the most likely of the chief characters to have preserved the record of Job's trials. There are many examples of ancient extra-biblical writings in which the author spoke of himself in the third person, so we need not eliminate Job on that ground. The book reads as though an eyewitness of the events recorded wrote it.

Jewish tradition favored Moses as the writer. Moses recorded other events during the patriarchal period in Genesis, he was familiar with desert life, and he had enough ability to write such a book as this one.

Solomon has supporters mainly because he composed other poetic biblical literature (Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, and Song of Solomon). Moreover there are some similarities between Job and Proverbs such as the relationship between fearing God and being wise.

Other scholars have suggested later writers including Hezekiah, Isaiah, and Ezra.

Of course, the writer may have been none of these individuals. No one knows for sure who wrote Job. I tend to prefer a contemporary of Job or Job himself because of the antiquity of this view and the fact that no one has proved it unsatisfactory.

Scope

It is also difficult to determine how much time the events narrated in the book cover.

The first chapter tells about Job's life before his trial, and the last chapter reveals what happened after it until Job's death. The chapters in between deal with a relatively short period in Job's long life. How long was this period?

We have a few clues. Job referred to months when he spoke of his sufferings (7:3; 29:2). In view of Job's physical symptoms his ailments seem to have bothered him for several months at least. He may have suffered for years. However, Job said the same people who had respected him previously had come to reject and avoid him. He implied that his rejection was fairly recent.

The main part of the book contains dialogue that took place between a few individuals. There is no indication in the text that extended periods of time interrupted Job's sojourn at the city dump. It seems to have continued for a few days at the most, though the conversations may have stopped and then restarted. The writer may have telescoped the events to keep the narrative flowing smoothly. It appears that the scope of the main action at the city dump lasted no longer than a few days or possibly weeks.

Genre

Job is primarily a combination of at least three literary types: lawsuit,⁴ lament,⁵ and controversy dialogue.⁶ The larger category is wisdom literature. However there are so many different types of literature in this book that many writers despair of assigning one type as the dominant one.

"The book of Job defies all efforts to establish its literary genre. While it has been viewed as an epic,⁷ a tragedy,⁸ and a parable,⁹ upon close analysis it is none of these even though it exhibits properties belonging to each of them. As Robert Gordis observes, the author of Job has created his own literary genre.¹⁰ The book is didactic in the sense that the author seeks to teach religious truth, a task which he executes primarily by means of lyrical poetry expressive of deep emotions."¹¹

"The book of Job is an astonishing mixture of almost every kind of literature to be found in the Old Testament. Many individual pieces can be isolated and identified as proverbs, riddles, hymns, laments, curses, lyrical nature poems."¹²

"One should think of this aspect of interpretation [i.e., genre] as being like the Olympics, a grand occasion made up of a variety of sports. Though it is all sport, each game is played by its own rules and has its own expectations about how to play the game. The variety of literature is the same way. It all has a message, but it conveys that message in a variety of ways and with a variety of expectations. To try to play basketball with soccer's rules will never work, though both use a ball and require foot speed. Or think of musical instruments, they all make music, but in different ways with different sounds. One cannot play the violin like a piano or drums; nor should one expect a violin to sound like either a piano or the kettledrum! In the same way, to read the poetry of the Psalms like a historical book is to miss the emotional and pictorial impact of the message, though both genres convey reality about people's experience with God."¹³

Message

What this book is all about has been the subject of considerable debate. Many people think God gave it to us to provide His answer to the age-old problem of suffering. In particular, many believe it is in the Bible to help us understand why good people suffer. This is undoubtedly one of the purposes of the book and one that I want to develop at some length. However, I think another purpose is more foundational than this one.

Other people have focused on the great questions Job voiced in the book. During his suffering, when God allowed Satan to knock all the props that support human earthly existence out from under him, Job got down to the most basic needs that people face. He made many profound observations about life. He articulated the most fundamental needs that human beings have. He voiced the greatest philosophical questions about life. These questions are an extremely important contribution of the book and one that I plan to give some attention. Nevertheless I think God has inspired and preserved the message of the Book of Job primarily for another reason.

I believe He did so because this book proves that the basic relationship that God has established with people does not rest on retribution but on grace. This is the message statement. Let me explain it.

In our study of the Old Testament historical books I have pointed out that God blesses people for two reasons. These are His sovereign choice to bless and people's response of trust and obedience to Him.

Because we cannot control God's sovereign choice to bless some people more than others we tend to forget that. We tend to focus on what we can control to some extent, namely our securing His blessing by trusting and obeying Him. This is understandable and legitimate, but it leads to a potential problem. The problem is that we may conclude that we can control God. Since God blesses those who trust and obey Him and He curses those who do not, we may conclude that if we trust and obey God, He owes us blessing.

This conclusion assumes that the basis of God's relationship with people is retribution. If I am good, God will reward me with blessing in some form, but if I am bad, He will punish me somehow. While this is normally the way God deals with human beings it is not always His method. Consequently there must be a more fundamental principle that governs God's dealings with people. On what basis does God consistently deal with us?

Throughout the Book of Job this is the major question that God is answering. Every major character in the book--Job, Eliphaz, Bildad, Zopher, and Elihu--assumed that God governed humankind on the basis of retribution. They believed there were no exceptions to the rule that God blesses good people and punishes bad people.

Job concluded that God was unjust since he had been good but God was allowing him to suffer. Job's wife agreed with him. Eliphaz, Bildad, and Zopher believed that Job must be a bad man instead of a good man since he was suffering. Elihu felt the solution to this apparent exception to the rule was not God's injustice but Job's ignorance rather than his sin. Elihu took a more agnostic approach to the solution of Job's problem. He suspected Job was a bad man, but he wasn't as sure about that as Job's other three friends were.

The Book of Job reveals that while God usually blesses the godly and punishes the ungodly, He does not always do so. There is a more fundamental basis from which God operates. That basis is His own free choice to bless or not bless whom He will.

We might conclude then that the basis of God's dealings with mankind is His sovereignty. However, that answer goes too far back. God's sovereignty really has nothing to do with how He rules. The attribute of sovereignty only sets forth God's position as supreme ruler. How does God rule sovereignly? If it is not on the basis of retribution, on what basis is it?

Evidence in the Book of Job points to God's grace as the basis of His dealings with people. Instead of always dealing with us in retribution, God always deals with us in grace. What does this mean?

This means that instead of responding to our good actions with blessing or our bad actions with cursing God initiates favor toward us without our deserving it.

What is the evidence in the Book of Job that God always deals with people on this basis?

This comes through in God's responses to Job (chs. 38-41). In replying to Job, God essentially reminded him of how good He had been to Job. He pointed out how much wiser and stronger He was than Job. In all of this, God wanted to impress Job with His favor toward the patriarch. That Job got the point is clear from the fact that when God finished speaking Job simply rested in God (42:6). He returned to his joy in being the recipient of God's unmerited favor even though God had not answered his questions.

How does the conflict in heaven that we learn about in chapters 1 and 2 fit into this view? Satan too believed that retribution was the basis on which God deals with people (1:9-11). God proceeded to show him that he was wrong. God allowed calamities to overtake a good man. Then when Job's trouble was all over, God blessed him even though he did not trust and obey God as he should have during his trials (42:12-17).

Satan has consistently failed to appreciate God's grace. Instead of being grateful for his own blessings, he has been in rebellion to obtain more than God gave him. Moreover he has led people to do the same things (cf. Gen. 3; Matt. 4).

I would also like to comment on a fourth possible message of the book that some have suggested. Some students of Job have said that the whole purpose of the book is to show God's superiority over Satan. Not many people hold this view, but it has appealed to some. The main problem with this interpretation, from my viewpoint, is that the dialogues and monologues that constitute the bulk of the book (in chapters 3-41) contribute nothing to this theme. While they do contain references to God's greatness, they do not deal with the issue of God's superiority over Satan.

Finally let me make some observations about the great revelation of this book, namely that the basis for God's dealings with man is His grace rather than His retribution.

First, the Book of Job appears to have been one of the first books of the Bible that God gave as special revelation if not the first. If it was one of the first, its subject would have been one of the most foundational for human beings to understand as history unfolded. What more basic revelation could God have given than the message of this book? The knowledge that God initiates favor toward His creatures without their earning or deserving it is at the heart of God's plan of salvation and the doctrine of God. When you think of Job, think of grace (cf. Ps. 103:10).

Second, like Satan, we tend to disbelieve that God wants the best for us, and we doubt that He will give it to us. Consequently we try to secure what we want for ourselves. We also become ungrateful for God's grace. Ingratitude is at the root of much sin as well as much unhappiness in life. Rejoice in God's grace. Cultivate a spirit of thankfulness (1 Thess. 5:18).

Third, we tend to elevate a secondary principle of God's dealings with people (retribution) into the primary position because it enables us to feel we have some control over God. In this way we can get God to serve us rather than serving God. If I can obligate God to bless me by being good, then God owes me something. Many people, of course, believe God owes them salvation because they are good people. However, we cannot dictate to God how He should bless us. We can count on His promises to bless in certain ways when we relate to Him in certain ways. Yet if God does not bless us as we wish He would, when we do not have His promise, we can still count on the fact that He will bless us ultimately. He will do so because it is His will and He has promised to bless the righteous. His basis of dealing with us is grace.

What about the unsaved? If God wants to bless everyone, why does He send some to eternal torment? The fact that some people choose not to accept God's grace does not mean He does not reach out to them with grace. The whole Bible is a testimony to the fact that God always has and always will reach out to humankind offering unmerited favor. The basis of God's dealings with humankind is grace. His common grace extends to all (Rom. 1; Eph. 1). God does not give us what we deserve. He gives us much better than we deserve.

Constable: Job (Outline)

Outline

I. Prologue chs. 1-2

A. Job's character 1:1-5

B. Job's calamities 1:6-2:10

1. The first test 1:6-22

2. The second test 2:1-10

C. Job's comforters 2:11-13

II. The dialogue concerning the basis of the divine-human relationship 3:1-42:6

A. Job's personal lament ch. 3

1. The wish that he had not been born 3:1-10

2. The wish that he had died at birth 3:11-19

3. The wish that he could die then 3:20-26

B. The first cycle of speeches between Job and his three friends chs. 4-14

1. Eliphaz's first speech chs. 4-5

2. Job's first reply to Eliphaz chs. 6-7

3. Bildad's first speech ch. 8

4. Job's first reply to Bildad chs. 9-10

5. Zophar's first speech ch. 11

6. Job's first reply to Zophar chs. 12-14

C. The second cycle of speeches between Job and his three friends chs. 15-21

1. Eliphaz's second speech ch. 15

2. Job's second reply to Eliphaz chs. 16-17

3. Bildad's second speech ch. 18

4. Job's second reply to Bildad ch. 19

5. Zophar's second speech ch. 20

6. Job's second reply to Zophar ch. 21

D. The third cycle of speeches between Job and his three friends chs. 22-27

1. Eliphaz's third speech ch. 22

2. Job's third reply to Eliphaz chs. 23-24

3. Bildad's third speech ch. 25

4. Job's third reply to Bildad chs. 26-27

E. Job's concluding soliloquies chs. 28-31

1. Job's discourse on God's wisdom ch. 28

2. Job's defense of his innocence chs. 29-31

F. Elihu's speeches chs. 32-37

1. The introduction of Elihu 32:1-5

2. Elihu's first speech 32:6-33:33

3. Elihu's second speech ch. 34

4. Elihu's third speech ch. 35

5. Elihu's fourth speech chs. 36-37

G. The cycle of speeches between Job and God 38:1-42:6

1. God's first speech 38:1-40:2

2. Job's first reply to God 40:3-5

3. God's second speech 40:6-41:34

4. Job's second reply to God 42:1-6

III. Epilogue 42:7-17

A. Job's friends 42:7-9

B. Job's fortune 42:10-17

A structural outline of Job14
Prologue	Job's opening lament	Dialogue-dispute(3 cycles)	Interlude on Wisdom	Monologues (3 cycles)	Job's closing contribution	Epilogue
Chs. 1-2	Ch. 3	Chs. 4-14 Chs. 15-- 21 Chs. 22-- 27	Ch. 28	Chs. 29-- 31 (Job) Chs. 32-- 37 (Elihu) Chs. 38-- 41 (God)	Chs. 40:3-5; 42:1-6	Ch. 42:7-17

Constable: Job

Job

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Hengstenberg, E. W. "Interpreting the Book of Job." In Classical Evangelical Essays in Old Testament Interpretation, pp. 91-112. Edited by Walter C. Kaiser Jr. Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 1972.

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Hermission, Hans-Jurgen. "Observations on the Creation Theology in Wisdom." In Israelite Wisdom: Theological and Literary Essays in Honor of Samuel Terrien, pp. 43-57. Edited by John G. Gammie, Walter A. Brueggemann, W. Lee Humphreys, and John M. Ward. New York: Union Theological Seminary, 1978.

Hopkins, Hugh Evan. The Mystery of Suffering. Chicago: InterVarsity Press, 1959.

Kallen, Horace M. The Book of Job as a Greek Tragedy. New York: Hill and Wang, 1959.

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Copyright 2003 by Thomas L. Constable

Haydock: Job (Book Introduction)

THE BOOK OF JOB.

INTRODUCTION.

This Book takes its name from the holy man, of whom it treats; who, according to the more probable opinion, was of the race of Esau, and the same as Jobab, king of Edom, mentioned [in] Genesis xxxvi. 33. It is uncertain who was the writer of it. Some attribute it to Job himself; others to Moses, or some one of the prophets. In the Hebrew it is written in verse, from the beginning of the third chapter to the forty-second chapter. (Challoner) --- The beginning and conclusion are historical, and in prose. Some have divided this work into a kind of tragedy, the first act extending to chap. xv., the second to chap. xxii., the third to chap. xxxviii., where God appears, and the plot is unfolded. They suppose that the sentiments of the speakers are expressed, though not their own words. This may be very probable: but the opinion of those who look upon the work as a mere allegory, must be rejected with horror. The sacred writers speak of Job as of a personage who had really existed, (Calmet) and set the most noble pattern of virtue, and particularly of patience, Tobias ii. 12., Ezechiel xiv. 14., and James v. 11. Philo and Josephus pass over this history, as they do those of Tobias, Judith, &c. (Haydock) --- The time when Job lived is not clearly ascertained. Some have supposed (Calmet) that he was a contemporary with Esther; (Du Hamel; Thalmud) on which supposition, the work is here placed in its chronological order. But Job more probably live during the period when the Hebrews groaned under the Egyptian bondage, (Haydock) or sojourned in the wilderness, Numbers xiv. 9. The Syrians place the book at the head of the Scriptures. (Calmet) --- Its situation has often varied, and is of no great importance. The subject which is here treated, is of far more; as it is intended to shew that the wicked sometimes prosper, while the good are afflicted. (Haydock) --- This had seldom been witnessed before the days of Abraham: but as God had now selected his family to be witnesses and guardians of religion, a new order of things was beginning to appear. This greatly perplexed Job himself; who, therefore, confesses that he had not sufficiently understood the ways of God, till he had deigned to explain them in the parable of the two great beasts, chap. xlii. 3. We cannot condemn the sentiments expressed by Job, since God has declared that they were right, chap. xlii. 8) and reprimands Elihu, (chap. xxxviii. 2.) and the other three friends of Job, for maintaining a false opinion, though, from the history of past times, they had judge it to be true. This remark may excupate them from the stain of wilful lying, and vain declamation. (Houbigant) --- However, as they assert what was false, their words of themselves are of no authority; and they are even considered as the forerunners of heretics. (St. Gregory; St. Augustine, &c.) (Tirinus) --- Job refutes them by sound logic. (St. Jerome) --- We may discover in this book the sum of Christian morality, (Worthington) for which purpose it has been chiefly explained by St. Gregory. The style is very poetical, (Haydock) though at the same time simple, like that of Moses. (Du Hamel) --- It is interspersed with many Arabic and Chaldaic idioms; (St. Jerome) whence some have concluded, that it was written originally by Job and his friends (Haydock) in Arabic, and translated into Hebrew by Moses, for the consolation of his brethren. (Worthington) --- The Hebrew text is in many places incorrect; (Houbigant) and the Septuagint seem to have omitted several verses. (Origen) --- St. Jerome says almost eight hundred, (Calmet) each consisting of about six words. (Haydock) --- Shultens, in 1747, expressed his dissatisfaction with the labours of all preceding commentators. To explain this book may not therefore be an easy task: but we must be as short as possible. (Haydock) --- Those who desire farther information, may consult Pineda, (Worthington) whose voluminous work, in two folios, will nearly (Haydock) give all necessary information. (Calmet)

Gill: Job (Book Introduction)

INTRODUCTION TO JOB

This book, in the Hebrew copies, generally goes by this name, from Job, who is however the subject, if not the writer of it. In the Vulgate Latin version it is called "the Book of Job"; in the Syriac version, the Writing of Job; and in the Arabic, the Writing or Book of Job the Just. In some Hebrew Bibles it stands between the Book of Proverbs and the Song of Solomon; but, according to the Talmudists ^a, it should stand between the Psalms of David and the Proverbs of Solomon. Some have made a question of it, whether there ever was such a man as Job, and suppose this book not to be a real history, or to contain matters of fact, but to be written under fictitious names, and to be parabolical, and that it is designed to set forth an example of patience in suffering affliction; and some of the Jewish writers ^b affirm, that Job never was in being, and that this book is a parable, apologue, or fable; and to this Maimonides ^c himself inclines; but this opinion is justly rejected by Aben Ezra, Peritsol, and others; for that there was such a man is as certain as that there were such men as Noah and Daniel, with whom he is mentioned by the Prophet Ezekiel, Eze 14:14 and the testimony of the Apostle James is full to this purpose, who speaks of him as a person well known, and not to be doubted of; of whom, and of whose patience, the Jews he writes to had heard much, Jam 5:11 besides, the names of the countries where he and his friends lived, the account given of his family, and of his substance, both before and after his afflictions, show it to be a real history. Learned men are not agreed about the signification of his name; according to Jerom ^d, it signifies a magician, taking it to be the same with אוב, "ob": and some Jewish writers ^e place him with Balaam and Jethro, as the counsellors of Pharaoh against the Israelites, for which he was afflicted: the same ancient fathers render the word grieving and howling; others, as Spanheim ^f, derive it from יאב, to "love" or "desire", and so it signifies desire or delight, and is the same with Desiderius or Erasmus; hence Job is called by Suidas ^g τριποθητος, exceeding desirable; but Hillerus ^h, deriving it from the same root, makes it to signify just the reverse, "without desire"; or not desirable; and supposes it to be a compound of יאוב, "desire", and איב, "not"; but the generality of writers derive it from איב, "to be at enmity", and so it signifies one that is exposed to the hatred and enmity of men, or one that is a hater and enemy of wicked men; or, as Schmidtt ⁱ interprets it, a man zealous for God, and showing hatred to wickedness and wicked men on his account. Who Job was, it is not easy to say; not the same with Jobab, of the race of Esau, as some, Gen 36:33. Aristeas ^k says he was a son of Esau himself, by his wife Bessare, and was first called Jobam; nor the same with Job a son of Issachar, Gen 46:13, nor was he a descendant of Abraham by Keturah; but rather sprung from Uz, the firstborn of Nahor, brother of Abraham, Gen 22:21, who gave name to the country where Job lived, as Buz his brother did to that of which Elihu was, and as Chesed, another brother of Uz, did to the Chasdim or Chaldeans, who were both near to Job. It is also not agreed in what time Job lived; Maimonides ^l says, of their writers some place him in the times of the patriarchs, some in the times of Moses, others in the times of David, and others say that he was of the wise men of Babylon; and some add, that he was of them that came out of the captivity there, and had a school at Tiberias, as say the Talmudists ^m who give very different accounts of him: some say he was in the times of the judges; others in the times of the queen of Sheba; and others in the times of Ahasuerus; but the more general opinion is, and indeed the more probable, that he was born when the Israelites went down into Egypt, and that he was dead when they came from thence ⁿ: in short, they place him almost in all the ages from Abraham to the Babylonish captivity, and after it; and even Luther ^o was of opinion that he lived in the times of Solomon, for which there is no more reason than for the rest: it seems most probable that he lived before Moses ^p, at least before the giving of the law to him, since no mention is made of it in this book, nor any reference to it; whereas there is to things more ancient, as the general deluge, the burning of Sodom, &c. the law concerning sacrifices only to be offered by priests was not as yet given; for Job offered sacrifices as being the head of his family, and so did his three friends, Job 1:5. The length of his life best agrees with the times before Moses, for in his time the age of man was reduced to seventy years; whereas Job must live two hundred years or more, since he lived one hundred and forty after his restoration: add to this, that this book seems to have been written before any idolatry was in the world but the worship of the sun and moon, Job 31:25 and before there were any writings divinely inspired, since there is no appeal to any in the whole controversy between Job and his friends; but the appeal is made to men of years and wisdom, and to traditions of former times, Job 5:1. According to Dr. Owen ^q Job lived three hundred and fifty years after the dispersion at Babel, about A. M. 2100. It is also greatly controverted who was the writer of this book; some ascribe the writing of it to Isaiah the prophet; others to Solomon, as Luther ^r; others to one of the prophets who was an Idumaean; but most to Moses, so the Jews ^s say, that he wrote his own book, the section of Balaam, and Job. Some think that he wrote it when in Midian, for the comfort and encouragement of the Hebrews afflicted in Egypt at that time, and who might hope to be delivered out of their afflictions, as this good man was delivered out of his; and this, it is supposed, accounts for the use of many Arabic words in it; Midian being in Arabia, where Moses, having lived some years, had mixed their language with his own. Some are of opinion that he met with this book when in those parts, which he found either in the Arabic or Syriac language, and translated it into Hebrew ^t for the use of the Israelites; and others think it was written by Job's friends, and particularly by Elihu, which is concluded from Job 32:15, but it is most probable that it was written by Job himself, or at least compiled from his diary or "adversaria" kept by him, or from those of his friends, or from both, and that it was written in the language it is now in: but be it written by whom it may, there is no doubt to be made of the divine authority of it; as appears from the sublimity of the style, the subject matter of it, its agreement with other parts of the sacred writings, and particularly from a quotation of a passage out of Job 5:13 by the Apostle Paul, 1Co 3:19 see also Job 5:17, compared with Heb 12:5. The design of it is not only in general to assert and explain the doctrine of Providence, as Maimonides observes; but in particular to show, that, though good men are afflicted, yet sooner or later they are delivered out of their afflictions; and that it becomes them to bear them patiently, and not murmur at them; nor complain of God on account of them, whose ways and works are unsearchable, and who gives no account of his matters to men, but is sovereign, wise, and just, in all he does; and whatsoever is done by him issues in the good of his people, as well as in his own glory, as the event shows. This book may be considered either as an history of the life of Job, in which an account is given of him in his prosperity; of his afflictions, and how they came upon him; of a visit paid him by his friends, and of the discourses that pass between him and them, and of his restoration to greater affluence than he enjoyed before: or as a drama or dialogue consisting of divers parts, and in which various speakers are introduced, as God, Satan, Job, his wife, and friends; or as a dispute, in which Job's three friends are the opponents, himself the respondent, Elihu the moderator, and God the umpire, who settled and determined the point in question. It contains many useful things in it concerning the Divine Being, and the perfections of his nature, his wisdom, power, justice, goodness, and sovereignty; concerning the works of creation and providence; concerning original sin, and the corruption of mankind; concerning redemption by Christ, and good works to be done by men; and concerning the resurrection of the dead, and eternal life. Some think Job was a type of Christ in his afflictions and sufferings; in his patience under them, and deliverance out of them; in his exaltation to an high pitch of happiness and prosperity; and in his intercession for his friends. He is in many things worthy of imitation, though in others to be blamed, and not followed; and, on the whole, this book of his may be read with great pleasure and profit.

Gill: Job 17 (Chapter Introduction)

INTRODUCTION TO JOB 17

In this chapter Job not only enlarges upon the reason given in the preceding chapter, why he was desirous of an advocate with God, and one to plead his cause with him for him, Job 17:1; but adds other reasons taken from the usage of his friends, from the impossibility of any but a divine Person being his surety; and of anyone being provided and appointed as such but by God himself; from the insufficiency of his friends to judge of his cause, and from the condition and circumstances he was in, Job 17:2; then he takes notice of the effects his present case would have on good men, that though they might be astonished at it, they would be filled with indignation against hypocrites, and would not be moved and stumbled by his afflictions to apostatize from and desert the good ways of God, Job 17:8; after which he addresses his friends, and either calls upon them to renew the dispute with him, or repent of their notions, and join with him in his sentiments, Job 17:10; and lastly describes his state and circumstances, according to his apprehension of things, observing the shortness of his life, and the darkness of the dispensation he was under, through one thing and another, Job 17:11; that he had nothing but the grave in view, which, and its attendants, he had made very familiar with him, Job 17:13; and that he had no hope of restoration to a better condition, as to his outward circumstances, and that he, and his hopes his friends would have him entertain, and they also, would go down together to the grave, and there should lie in the dust, and rest together till the morning of the resurrection, Job 17:15.