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.79Job 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
