Since 27:1 begins, "Then Job continued . . .,"Job may have paused and waited for Zophar to respond. However we have no third speech by him in the text. Evidently Job proceeded to elaborate further on Bildad's "wisdom"but broadened his perspective and addressed all three friends. "You"in 27:5, 11, and 12 is plural in the Hebrew text.
Job began by affirming his innocence (27:1-6). For the first time he took an oath that his words were true. "As God lives"means that what he was saying was as certain as God's existence.
In a similar spirit Job wished that his enemies would suffer the fate of the wicked (27:7-23).109In so saying Job was claiming that he was on the side of the righteous, and all who were against him were wicked.
"Imprecatory rhetoric is difficult for Westerners to understand. But in the Semitic world it is still an honorable rhetorical device. The imprecation had a juridical function and was frequently a hyperbolic (cf. Ps. 109:6-15; 139:7-9) means of dealing with false accusations and oppression. Legally the false accusation and the very crimes committed are called down on the perpetrator's head. Since his counselors had falsely accused Job of being wicked, they deserved to be punished like the wicked."110
Again Job called upon God. His friends never did, as far as the text records.
Some writers have regarded 27:13-23 as Zophar's third speech.111Still this section is consistent with Job's argument in the immediate context (27:7-10) and previously (24:18-25).
"In the following strophe Job now begins as Zophar (ch. xx. 29) concluded. He gives back to the friends the doctrine they have fully imparted to him. They have held the lot of the evil-doer before him as a mirror, that he may behold himself in it and be astounded; he holds it before them, that they may perceive how not only his bearing under suffering, but also the form of his affliction, is of a totally different kind."112
Job asserted that the wicked would experience punishment eventually. Though he believed God was not being just with him, he could not escape the conviction that God must deal justly. It was this antinomy that made Job so uncomfortably anxious to obtain a reply from God. He agreed with his companions that God punishes the wicked. This is what normally happens in life (27:13-23). Nonetheless he disagreed that this is always true in every case.
