Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Job 1:13
And there was a day when his sons and his daughters [were] eating and drinking wine in their eldest brother’s house:
13 22. Job’s first trial; and its issue: his reverence towards God remains unshaken
Between Job 1:12-13 there is an interval, an ominous stillness like that which precedes the storm. The poet has drawn aside the curtain to us and we know what is impending. Job knows nothing. His children are about him and he thinks the Almighty is yet with him, Job 29:5. The earth smiles to him as it was wont by day; and by night the Bear, Orion and the Pleiades come forth in their silent procession, and the Dragon trails his glittering folds across the heavens overhead, and he looks with wonder into the deep chambers of the South. All is glorious with a constant glory because it is an unchanging hand that leads them forth, the hand of the Holy One from whose words he has never declined, Job 6:10, and whose candle as he deems still shines upon his head, Job 29:3. He does not know that he is being played for like a pawn. Suddenly the catastrophe overtakes him. Messenger after messenger, each taking up his tale of ruin before the other has concluded his, announce that all he had has been taken from him. Heaven and earth have combined to overwhelm him. The forces of nature and the destructive violence of men have united to strip him bare.
The description has many features of the ideal. First, the catastrophe befell on the day when Job’s children were feasting in their eldest brother’s house, Job 1:13, the day on the morning of which Job had sent for his children and sanctified them and offered sacrifices on their behalf. Job’s godliness and his calamity are brought into the closest contrast. He felt this, and as he regarded every event as wrought by the hand of God immediately, his afflictions threw his mind into the deepest perplexity regarding the ways of God. Again, while heaven and men alternate their strokes upon him, these strokes follow one another with increasing severity, and in each case only one escapes to bring the grievous tidings. The rapid touches of the Author do not suggest any struggle or rising rebelliousness in Job’s mind. He manifests the liveliest grief, but maintains his self-control. And the scene closes upon the sufferer, a solitary man, worshipping God amidst the waste where his rich possessions once had lien.
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
And there was a day – That is, on the day on which the regular turn came for the banquet to be held in the house of the older brother; compare the notes at Job 1:4.
And drinking wine – This circumstance is omitted in Job 1:4. It shows that wine was regarded as an essential part of the banquet, and it was from its use that Job apprehended the unhappy results referred to in Job 1:5.
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
Verse 13. There was a day] The first day of the week, says the Targum. It no doubt refers to one of those birthday festivals mentioned before.
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
13. winenot specified in Job1:4. The mirth inspired by the “wine” here contraststhe more sadly with the alarm which interrupted it.
Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
And there was a day,…. Which according to the Targum was the first day of the week, but this is not certain, nor material; nor can it be said whether it was the day following that, Satan had leave to do what he would with Job’s substance, nor how long this was after that; for though Satan was no doubt eager upon it, and in haste to do mischief; yet besides its requiring some time to get the Sabeans and Chaldeans to march out of their own country into Job’s, so he would contrive and fix upon the most proper time to answer his ends and purposes, which was
when his (Job’s) sons and daughters were eating, and drinking wine in their eldest brother’s house; it should rather be rendered, “in the house of their brother, the firstborn”; that is, of Job; for relates not to brethren, but to parents, as Gussetins observes b: this was either the beginning of a new turn, or rotation of their feasting with each other, which might begin with the elder brother; or this was his birthday; see Job 1:4 and this was the day Satan pitched upon to bring all the following calamities and distresses upon Job; partly that they might fall with the greater weight upon him, and more sensibly affect him, coming upon him while his family was feasting; and while he was pleasing himself with the thoughts of having brought up his children to men’s and women’s estate, and of the affluent circumstances they were in; and of the unity, harmony, and love that subsisted amongst them, of which their present feasting to gether was a proof; and partly that these afflictions might the more look like the judgments of God upon him, just as the men of the old world were eating and drinking when the flood came and destroyed them all, Lu 17:27 and for the same reasons these were all brought upon him in one day, to crush him the more; and that it might be thought the hand of God was in it, in a way of wrath and vengeance, and so irritate him to curse him to his face, which was what Satan aimed at; see
Isa 47:8.
b Ebr. Comment. p. 127.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
13-15 And it came to pass one day, when his sons and his daughters were eating and drinking wine in the house of their eldest brother, that a messenger came to Job, and said, The oxen were ploughing, and the asses feeding beside them, when the Sabeans fell upon them, and carried them away, and smote the servants with the edge of the sword; and I only am escaped alone to tell thee.
The principal clause, , in which the art. of has no more reference to anything preceding than in Job 1:6, is immediately followed by an adverbial clause, which may be expressed by participles, Lat. filiis ejus filiabusque convivantibus . The details which follow are important. Job had celebrated the usual weekly worship early in the morning with his children, and knew that they were met together in the house of his eldest son, with whom the order of mutual entertainment came round again, when the messengers of misfortune began to break in upon him: it is therefore on the very day when, by reason of the sacrifice offered, he was quite sure of Jehovah’s favour. The participial construction, the oxen were ploughing (vid., Ges. 134, 2, c), describes the condition which was disturbed by the calamity that befell them. The verb stands here because the clause is a principal one, not as Job 1:13, adverbial. , properly “at hand,” losing its radical meaning, signifies (as Jdg 11:26) “close by.” The interpretation “in their places,” after Num 2:17, is untenable, as this signification of is only supported in the sing. is construed as fem., since the name of the country is used as the name of the people. In Genesis three races of this name are mentioned: Cushite (Gen 10:7), Joktanish (Gen 10:28), and Abrahamic (Gen 25:3). Here the nomadic portion of this mixed race in North Arabia from the Persian Gulf to Idumaea is intended. Luther, for the sake of clearness, translates here, and 1Ki 10:1, Arabia. In , the waw, as is seen from the Kametz, is waw convertens, and the paragogic ah, which otherwise indicates the cohortative, is either without significance, or simply adds intensity to the verbal idea: I have saved myself with great difficulty. For this common form of the 1 fut. consec., occurring four times in the Pentateuch, vid., Ges. 49, 2. The clause is objective: in order that – so it was intended by the calamity – I might tell thee.
Fuente: Keil & Delitzsch Commentary on the Old Testament
| The Calamities Brought on Job; The Death of Job’s Children. | B. C. 1520. |
13 And there was a day when his sons and his daughters were eating and drinking wine in their eldest brother’s house: 14 And there came a messenger unto Job, and said, The oxen were plowing, and the asses feeding beside them: 15 And the Sabeans fell upon them, and took them away; yea, they have slain the servants with the edge of the sword; and I only am escaped alone to tell thee. 16 While he was yet speaking, there came also another, and said, The fire of God is fallen from heaven, and hath burned up the sheep, and the servants, and consumed them; and I only am escaped alone to tell thee. 17 While he was yet speaking, there came also another, and said, The Chaldeans made out three bands, and fell upon the camels, and have carried them away, yea, and slain the servants with the edge of the sword; and I only am escaped alone to tell thee. 18 While he was yet speaking, there came also another, and said, Thy sons and thy daughters were eating and drinking wine in their eldest brother’s house: 19 And, behold, there came a great wind from the wilderness, and smote the four corners of the house, and it fell upon the young men, and they are dead; and I only am escaped alone to tell thee.
We have here a particular account of Job’s troubles.
I. Satan brought them upon him on the very day that his children began their course of feasting, at their eldest brother’s house (v. 13), where, he having (we may suppose) the double portion, the entertainment was the richest and most plentiful. The whole family, no doubt, was in perfect repose, and all were easy and under no apprehension of the trouble, now when they revived this custom; and this time Satan chose, that the trouble, coming now, might be the more grievous. The night of my pleasure has he turned into fear, Isa. xxi. 4.
II. They all come upon him at once; while one messenger of evil tidings was speaking another came, and, before he had told his story, a third, and a fourth, followed immediately. Thus Satan, by the divine permission, ordered it, 1. That there might appear a more than ordinary displeasure of God against him in his troubles, and by that he might be exasperated against divine Providence, as if it were resolved, right or wrong, to ruin him, and not give him time to speak for himself. 2. That he might not have leisure to consider and recollect himself, and reason himself into a gracious submission, but might be overwhelmed and overpowered by a complication of calamities. If he have not room to pause a little, he will be apt to speak in haste, and then, if ever, he will curse his God. Note, The children of God are often in heaviness through manifold temptations; deep calls to deep; waves and billows come one upon the neck of another. Let one affliction therefore quicken and help us to prepare for another; for, how deep soever we have drunk of the bitter cup, as long as we are in this world we cannot be sure that we have drunk our share and that it will finally pass from us.
III. They took from him all that he had, and made a full end of his enjoyments. The detail of his losses answers to the foregoing inventory of his possessions.
1. He had 500 yoke of oxen, and 500 she-asses, and a competent number of servants to attend them; and all these he lost at once, Job 1:14; Job 1:15. The account he has of this lets him know, (1.) That it was not through any carelessness of his servants; for then his resentment might have spent itself upon them: The oxen were ploughing, not playing, and the asses not suffered to stray and so taken up as waifs, but feeding beside them, under the servant’s eye, each in their place; and those that passed by, we may suppose, blessed them, and said, God speed the plough. Note, All our prudence, care, and diligence, cannot secure us from affliction, no, not from those afflictions which are commonly owing to imprudence and negligence. Except the Lord keep the city, the watchman, though ever so wakeful, wakes but in vain. Yet it is some comfort under a trouble if it found us in the way of our duty, and not in any by-path. (2.) That is was through the wickedness of his neighbours the Sabeans, probably a sort of robbers that lived by spoil and plunder. They carried off the oxen and asses, and slew the servants that faithfully and bravely did their best to defend them, and one only escaped, not in kindness to him or his master, but that Job might have the certain intelligence of it by an eye-witness before he heard it by a flying report, which would have brought it upon him gradually. We have no reason to suspect that either Job or his servants had given any provocation to the Sabeans to make this inroad, but Satan put it into their hearts to do it, to do it now, and so gained a double point, for he made both Job to suffer and them to sin. Note, When Satan has God’s permission to do mischief he will not want mischievous men to be his instruments in doing it, for he is a spirit that works in the children of disobedience.
2. He had 7000 sheep, and shepherds that kept them; and all those he lost at the same time by lightning, v. 16. Job was perhaps, in his own mind, ready to reproach the Sabeans, and fly out against them for their injustice and cruelty, when the next news immediately directs him to look upwards: The fire of God has fallen from heaven. As thunder is his voice, so lightning is his fire: but this was such an extraordinary lightning, and levelled so directly against Job, that all his sheep and shepherds were not only killed, but consumed by it at once, and one shepherd only was left alive to carry the news to poor Job. The devil, aiming to make him curse God and renounce his religion, managed this part of the trial very artfully, in order thereto. (1.) His sheep, with which especially he used to honour God in sacrifice, were all taken from him, as if God were angry at his offerings and would punish him in those very things which he had employed in his service. Having misrepresented Job to God as a false servant, in pursuance of his old design to set Heaven and earth at variance, he here misrepresented God to Jacob as a hard Master, who would not protect those flocks out of which he had so many burnt-offerings. This would tempt Job to say, It is in vain to serve God. (2.) The messenger called the lightning the fire of God (and innocently enough), but perhaps Satan thereby designed to strike into his mind this thought, that God had turned to be his enemy and fought against him, which was much more grievous to him than all the insults of the Sabeans. He owned (ch. xxxi. 23) that destruction from God was a terror to him. How terrible then were the tidings of this destruction, which came immediately from the hand of God! Had the fire from heaven consumed the sheep upon the altar, he might have construed it into a token of God’s favour; but, the fire consuming them in the pasture, he could not but look upon it as a token of God’s displeasure. There have not been the like since Sodom was burned.
3. He had 3000 camels, and servants tending them; and he lost them all at the same time by the Chaldeans, who came in three bands, and drove them away, and slew the servants, v. 17. If the fire of God, which fell upon Job’s honest servants, who were in the way of their duty, had fallen upon the Sabean and Chaldean robbers who were doing mischief, God’s judgments therein would have been like the great mountains, evident and conspicuous; but when the way of the wicked prospers, and they carry off their booty, while just and good men are suddenly cut off, God’s righteousness is like the great deep, the bottom of which we cannot find, Ps. xxxvi. 6.
4. His dearest and most valuable possessions were his ten children; and, to conclude the tragedy, news if brought him, at the same time, that they were killed and buried in the ruins of the house in which they were feasting, and all the servants that waited on them, except one that came express with the tidings of it, Job 1:18; Job 1:19. This was the greatest of Job’s losses, and which could not but go nearest him; and therefore the devil reserved it for the last, that, if the other provocations failed, this might make him curse God. Our children are pieces of ourselves; it is very hard to part with them, and touches a good man in as tender a part as any. But to part with them all at once, and for them to be all cut off in a moment, who had been so many years his cares and hopes, went to the quick indeed. (1.) They all died together, and not one of them was left alive. David, though a wise and good man, was very much discomposed by the death of one son. How hard then did it bear upon poor Job who lost them all, and, in one moment, was written childless! (2.) They died suddenly. Had they been taken away by some lingering disease, he would have had notice to expect their death, and prepare for the breach; but this came upon him without giving him any warning. (3.) They died when they were feasting and making merry. Had they died suddenly when they were praying, he might the better have borne it. He would have hoped that death had found them in a good frame if their blood had been mingled with their feast, where he himself used to be jealous of them that they had sinned, and cursed God in their hearts–to have that day come upon them unawares, like a thief in the night, when perhaps their heads were overcharged with surfeiting and drunkenness–this could not but add much to his grief, considering what a tender concern he always had for his children’s souls, and that they were now out of the reach of the sacrifices he used to offer according to the number of them all. See how all things come alike to all. Job’s children were constantly prayed for by their father, and lived in love one with another, and yet came to this untimely end. (4.) They died by a wind of the devil’s raising, who is the prince of the power of the air (Eph. ii. 2), but it was looked upon to be an immediate hand of God, and a token of his wrath. So Bildad construed it (ch. viii. 4): Thy children have sinned against him, and he has cast them away in their transgression. (5.) They were taken away when he had most need of them to comfort him under all his other losses. Such miserable comforters are all creatures. In God only we have a present help at all times.
Fuente: Matthew Henry’s Whole Bible Commentary
Tested In Satan’s Net By God’s Permissive Will
Verses 13-22:
In Affliction Job Praised God
Verse 13 relates a day in which the seven sons and three daughters of Job were eating and drinking wine in the eldest brother’s house; No wine drinking was mentioned in their former festival, v. 4. It appears that sin and indifference to its enticements had come to the household of Job, while away from his Home, to bring a sad alarm, Pro 27:1; Ecc 9:12; Luk 12:19.
Verses 14, 15 state that in the midst of that festival, in the older son’s house, a messenger came to Job reporting that as the oxen were plowing and the asses feeding nearby the Sabeans (Arabs) fell upon them and killed the plowman and herdsmen servants, carrying away the oxen and asses as plunder. The servant added, “1 only am escaped alone (forlorn) to tell thee;” The Sabeans were Arabs, in a general sense, Gen 10:7; Psa 72:15; Eze 23:42; Isa 13:20; Jer 3:2; Joe 3:8. One in each instance escaped to tell Job, v. 16, 17, 19.
Verse 16 adds that while the first servant was reporting to Job of the Sabean attack there came another and reported that the fire of God or a great fire from heaven, perhaps lightning, had struck and killed (burnt up) the entire flock of sheep and killed all the shepherds, except the one bringing the report. Satan, “prince of the power of the air,” had been permitted to destroy these with lightning fire, See also Exo 9:23; Num 16:35; Numbers 1 Kg 18:38; 1Kg 1:10, 12, 14. Satan was and is permitted to have destructive power over these agents of lightning and fire.
Verse 17 further recounts that while the second messenger servant of ill report to Job was speaking a third came bringing news that three bands of Chaldean warriors and looters had fallen upon the camels, slain their drivers with the sword and carried the camels away, with no servant unslain, except this one bringing the death report. These Chaldeans had swept in from the north from the Carducian mountains, Hab 1:6-8. The three bands of warriors were perhaps set one each against the three herds of 1,000 camels each, v. 3. These Chaldeans from the northern section from Uz are believed to be descended from Chesed, a nephew of Abraham, Gen 22:22.
Verses 18, 19 conclude that as the third messenger was reporting a fourth rushed in with the news that as Job’s 7 sons and three daughters were eating and drinking wine in their eldest brother’s house, v. 4, 13, a great wind storm or tornado from the wilderness south of Job’s house, came furiously out of the desert and totally destroyed the house where the festival was being held. It fell on the young men (young people) including daughters, Rth 2:21; See also Isa 21:1; Hos 13:15. Only this servant was left alive to bring the news to Job, Heb 13:5; 1Co 10:13.
Verse 20 relates four responses from job to this tragic loss: 1) He arose, as in the presence of the majesty, 2) He rent his mantle, a symbol of deep grief, Gen 37:34; Gen 37:3) He shaved his head, a second symbol of great grief, Jer 41:5; Mic 1:16; Micah , 4) He worshipped, humbled himself before the Lord, in resignation to His wisdom, Luk 18:14.
Verse 21 witnesses the testimony of unreserved trust that Job expressed in God in this hour of temporary tragic loss and grief. First, he affirmed that he came into the world naked, helpless, empty handed; and second, he certified that he would depart from this life the same way, even as every man shall. One who recognizes such is wise, 1Ti 5:7; Ecc 5:15; Ecc 12:7; Psa 139:15. He added that the Lord “gave,” doled out to him all that he had possessed, and the Lord had taken it away, for a Divine purpose, to which he was resigned, Jas 1:17; 2Sa 12:16; 2Ch 7:3; 1Pe 5:6. See also 2Sa 16:12; 1Ch 22:12; Pro 2:6; Ecc 5:19; Dan 2:21. Job thus acknowledged the sovereignty of God over all, Mat 20:15; Eph 5:20.
Verse 22 concludes that in all this experience Job did not charge God with folly, Rom 8:28; Pro 3:3-5. He simply did not act wickedly in charging God with doing wrong; When man sins it is himself and his fellowman he injures, not God, Pro 8:36; Gal 6:7-8. No degree of worldly success or prosperity insulates one against sudden reverses.
Fuente: Garner-Howes Baptist Commentary
FOURTH PART OF INTRODUCTION.INFLICTION OF THE TRIAL
I. Occasion of the trial (Job. 1:13).
There was a day. Satan watches for the time best suited for his designs. The occasion chosen that the trial might fall the more grievous (Isa. 21:4). Diabolical wisdom in doing mischief. Satans terrible malignity.His sons and his daughters were eating, and drinking wine. The childrens hilarity to be an aggravation of the fathers calamity. The more unexpected and unprepared for, the heavier the stroke. Satan likes to make his stroke tell. Turns mirth into mourning. Jobs children to die when most likely to be sinning (Job. 1:5). Satans object to destroy both body and soul at one stroke. Satan as well as Job knew the dangers incident to wine. Gods judgments often come when men are most secure (Luk. 12:19-20; 1Th. 5:2). Good to rejoice as though we rejoiced not (1Co. 7:30). The Saviours caution (Luk. 21:3-4). Changes in circumstances to be prepared for (Pro. 27:1). A day may have a fair beginning and a foul ending. In the greatest calm provide for a storm [Queen Elizabeth],In their elder brothers house. Hence no ordinary feast. The celebration of the eldest sons birthday chosen with characteristic malignity.
II. The trial itself in its four particulars
1. Attack of the Sabeans on the oxen and asses (Job. 1:14-15). There came a messenger,spared in Satans malice to carry the news. A cruel messenger to be sent to Job, as if a rebellions man (Pro. 17:11).The oxen. Satan begins with the cattle. The trial must rise in a climax.Were ploughing,[1] preparing for the next years crop, thus also to be lost.Asses feeding beside them, so arranged that both might share the same fate. The picture of security and repose heightens by contrast the calamity of the attack.Sabeans. A warlike marauding people in the north parts of Arabia Deserta. Those in South Arabia, or Arabia Felix, merchants, not marauders (Job. 6:19; 1Ki. 10:1). Bedoween incursions able to reduce a rich man to poverty in a few days. Satan at no loss for instruments to do his work. Possesses a mysterious power to influence mens minds to evil. The ungodly already prepared for that influence. Satans temptations suited to mens natural inclinations. Bad men often used by God for the trial and chastening of his children.Fell on them,rushed on them with a view to spoil. An unprovoked attack. Exceptions to the general rule in Pro. 16:7.Slain the servants. Preparation for death to be taken into daily duties. Blessed to be ready when the Master calls. Sudden death then sudden glory.I only am escaped, by Gods special Providence and Satans malice. Some escape from danger as brands plucked out of the burning (Amo. 4:11).
[1] Oriental ploughing, as in the south of Europe, done by oxen. Plough of wood, consisting of a share, two handles, and a pole or beam. Drawn by two oxen yoked together, and guided by a ploughman using a goad.
2. Destruction of the sheep by lightning (Job. 1:16). While he was yet speaking. Fiendish rapidity of Satans work. Aims at stunning and overwhelming the sufferer. Trials often like rapidly succeeding billows. Deep calleth unto deep (Psa. 62:7). Troubles seldom single. Welcome misfortune, if you come alone [Basque Proverb].Fire of God.Marg., a great fire, (like Psa. 104:16). Hot thunderbolts (Psa. 78:48). Rapid lightnings, apparently sent by God though really by Satan. A cut in the words put into the mouth of the shepherds. Act of an angry God. The object to represent God as cruel and unjust, and so bring Job to curse Him. A limited mysterious power given to Satan over the elements of nature (Eph. 2:2).From heaven. From the upper regions of the air, but apparently from God. The air or lower heavens the place of Satans special presence and operations (Luk. 10:8; Eph. 2:2; Eph. 6:12).Sheep. The greatest part of Jobs wealth (Job. 1:3.) Most frequently used in sacrifice. Smitten, though sanctified by frequent offerings. Gods ways often dark and mysterious.
3. Capture of the camels (Job. 1:17). Chaldans, Heb. Chasdim. The name related to that of Chesed, Abrahams nephew (Gen. 22:22). Two such peoples mentioned in Genesis:
(1) The old Semitic Chaldans of the mountains, in the north of Assyria and Mesopotamia (Gen. 10:22; Gen. 11:28; Gen. 11:31); Abraham himself of these (Gen. 11:28).
(2) The later Chaldans of Mesopotamia, descended from Nahor, Abrahams brother (Gen. 22:22). Called by Jeremiah an ancient nation (Jer. 5:15). A fierce and warlike people (Heb. 1:6; Heb. 1:11). First subdued by the Assyrians. In time overcame their masters, and formed the Chaldan or Babylonian Empire under Nabopolassar, a viceroy in Babylon, about 600 B.C. Their empire overthrown by Cyrus, who took Babylon, 583 B.C. In Jobs time a body of hardy monntaineers. Always strong enough to make such a raid. More fierce and powerful than the Sabeans. Strokes increase in severity. Satan inflames his instruments with his own. murderous passions.Three bands. To attack in various directions and let nothing escape. (So Gen. 14:15). Three bands under so many captains, Satan really commander-in-chief.Fell upon the camels. Marg. rushed. Made a raid upon them, as 1Sa. 23:27; 1Sa. 30:14. Arabs sometimes make a raid twenty or thirty days march from their tents.Carried them away. Three thousand camels no slight loss. Satan goes the full length of his cord. More grevious to be stripped of riches than to be always poor.
4. Loss of all his children (Job. 1:18-19). While he was yet speaking. Satan never at rest till he has done all the mischief he is permitted. Good to be always ready for another and a worse encounter. Seneca says, Csar sometimes put up his sword, but never put it off.Thy sons. The trial reaches its climax. His sons the object of his greatest solicitude. The subjects of so many prayers might have been expected to be spared, or at least some of them. The mystery increases.Were eating and drinking. When Job feared most they might be sinning (Job. 1:5). Possible to be taken from the festive board to the Judgment-seat. Festivity unsafe without God and His blessing in it. Well to be prepared to pass from earthly joys to heavenly ones.Behold. Marks the greatness of the calamity. Seven sons and three daughters,the whole of Jobs children,all arrived at maturity,all prosperous and happy,cut off at one stroke,suddenly and unexpectedly,amid the hilarity of a feast!A great wind. A tornado, cyclone, or whirlwind. Common in the East. Mysterious power of Satan to excite the atmosphere into a storm. Prince of the power of the air. Wind in Gods hand, but now for His own purpose, partially and for a time, transferred to Satans (Pro. 30:4).From the wilderness. Whence the fiercest winds came (Jer. 4:11; Jer. 13:24). From the south part of the great North Arabian Desert (Isa. 21:1; Hos. 13:15).Smote the four corners of the house. At once or successively; coming with force and steady aim as under Satans direction. All the appearance of the work of an angry God.And it fell. The object for which Satan raised the storm. Such catastrophes not uncommon in the East. Houses of comparatively frail construction (Mat. 7:27). Well-known violence of tornadoes. One in England, in 1811, tore up plantations and levelled houses with the ground, carried large trees, torn up by the roots, to the distance of twenty or thirty yards; lifted cows from one field to another; and carried haystacks to a considerable distance. Camels sometimes lifted off their legs by Eastern whirlwinds. God able to make our plagues wonderful (Deu. 28:59).Upon the young men. Mentioned as more likely to overwhelm the father; sisters included.And they are dead. Crashing tidings for a fathers ears. All dead,dead all at once,dead prematurely,dead by a sudden, unusual, and miserable death,dead as if by the hand of God Himself, as Bildad regarded them,dead at the time that Job had most need of their comfort under his other calamities. Job reduced, in one short day, from being one of the happiest of fathers to a state of childlessness and misery. Our heaviest trials often through our sweetest comforts. The sharpest thorns on the same tree with the loveliest flowers. The beauty of all earthly blessings quickly blasted (Isa. 60:6; Isa. 60:8). Too much not to be expected from God, nor too little from the creature.
Fuente: The Preacher’s Complete Homiletical Commentary Edited by Joseph S. Exell
4. The first trialloss of possessions and loved ones (Job. 1:13-19)
TEXT 1:1319
(13) And it fell on a day when his sons and his daughters were eating and drinking wine in their eldest brothers house, (14) that there came a messenger unto Job, and said, The oxen were plowing, and the asses feeding beside them; (IS) and the Sabeans fell upon them, and took them away: yea, they have slam the servants with the edge of the sword; and I only am escaped alone to tell thee. (16) While he was yet speaking, there came also another, and said, The fire of God is fallen from heaven, and hath burned up the sheep and the servants, and consumed them; and I only am escaped alone to tell thee. (17) While he was yet speaking, there came also another, and said, The Chaldeans made three bands, and fell upon the camels, and have taken them away, yea, and slam the servants with the edge of the sword; and I only am escaped alone to tell thee. (18) While he was yet speaking, there came also another, and said, Thy sons and thy daughters were eating and drinking wine in their eldest brothers house; (19) and, behold, there came a great wind from the wilderness, and smote the four corners of the house, and it fell upon the young men, and they are dead; and I only am escaped alone to tell thee.
COMMENT 1:1319
Job. 1:13With telling efficiency Satan proceeds to carry out the permitted testing. Swift disasters strike at the household of Job. In rapid succession the entire life style of Yahwehs servant has been violently removed. Violence[35] is basic to Satans method in every age. The formula now there was a day suggests a lapse of time between the scene in heaven and the initiation of the trial. This suggests that the family disasters are not involved in either his or his familys misconduct. The unexpectedness of each event leaves no time interval for Job to rationalize any explanation of the ensuing crises. How will Job respond to misfortune? How will he analyze his new conditionin view of his explicit trust in Yahweh?
[35] As violence is a fundamental sign of contemporary social, economic, and political disorder, how must Christians respond? See Jacques Ellul, Violence, NY: Seabury, E. T., 1969; also his Hope in Time of Abandonment, NY: Seabury, E. T., 1973, and G. Sorels classic Reflections on Violence. This theme is a fundamental issue and must be faced if we are to encounter the contemporary world id Christs name.
Job. 1:14Life is progressing as usual; then the disorganizing phenomena occur. How will Job cope with his new situations? We are told that men must always either cope or adjust to the factors about us. Is this the only option for contemporary believers in Jobs vindicator? (See Tofflers Future Shock and discuss.)
The messenger emphasizes the calm before the raid. Just the right conditions for surprise. The oxen were ploughing describes that the plans for the fall work were being fulfilled. The season for ploughing is winter and everything is perfectly normal; then disaster strikes. Job will have passed from wealth to destitution in four moments.
Job. 1:15The Sabeans fell upon them. But who are the Sabeans?[36] (Hebrew sebaGen. 10:7; 1Ch. 1:9; Gen. 25:3; 1 Kings 10; Isa. 40:6; Jer. 6:20; Job. 6:19; and Joe. 3:8) The specific identification is contingent upon the location of Uz. There are Sabeans related to distant South Arabians. These people are located ca. 1000 miles south of Jerusalem from which the Queen of Sheba came to visit Solomon (1Ki. 10:1-10). The distance seems highly improbable for a raid to Jobs homeland. The Sabeans meant here are perhaps those from the region now known as Yemen (see W. Phillips, Qataban and Sheba, NY, 1955). In Job. 6:19, Sheba is parallel to Tema. In Isa. 21:13 and Jer. 25:23 Tema is in the geographical area of Dedan. This would imply a North Arabian identification.
[36] The specific identification is quite complex and unnecessary for our purposes, but see R. L. Bowen, Archaeological Discoveries in South Arabia, 1958, pp. 21586; and G. W. van Beek, South Arabian History and Archeology, in the Bible and the Ancient Near East (in honor of W. F. Albright, NY, 1961). There are three groups.
The lone surviving witness to the disaster bears the sad tidingsI alone escaped the sword. This feature is found a number of times in the Old Testament (egs., 1Ki. 18:22; Gen. 44:20; Josiah Job. 13:12; 2Sa. 13:32; and Eze. 9:8.) The Hebrew is very vivid in its description of death by the sword. Literally the text says and the servants (boys) were killed by the mouth of the sword (Hebrew idiom expressing the fact that the sword ate its victims).[37]
[37] For the archaeological data on these ancient swords see T. J. Meek, Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research, 122, 1951, pp. 3133. Note further use of imagery in Revelation 1-16; Rev. 2:16; Rev. 19:15 where sword proceeds from the mouth of the Messiah.
Job. 1:16Even while he was still speaking disaster intensified. The first calamity came from the hands of man; the second from nature. The Hebrew grammar indicates the simultaneity of the two disasters. The fire of God is probably lightning. In the great Elijah encounter in 1Ki. 18:38, the lightning is called the fire of Yahweh to emphasize that the source was not Baal, the Canaanite weather god. The fire was so devastating that it literally ate all before it (see Job. 15:34; Job. 20:26; Job. 22:20; and Num. 16:35; Num. 26:10).
Job. 1:17First the Sabeans fell on them; then the Chaldeans. The mention of the Chaldeans here suggests an early origin for Job, i.e., from a marauding tribe. From the ninth century B.C., when they first appear in the Assyrian records of Ashurnasirpal II (884859) to the period when they provided the rulers of the neo-Babylonian empire of Nebuchadrezzar the Old Testament is aware of the presence of the Chaldeans. They finally gained control of Babylon in the late eighth century B.C. before Nabopolassar, in 626 B.C., founding the Neo-Babylonian Empire. The description of the Chaldeans here in Job is from a much earlier period than the neo-Babylonian era. The idiom translated formed three bands literally means put three heads, i.e., they made a three-pronged attack. This strategy is mentioned in Jdg. 7:16; Jdg. 7:20; Jdg. 9:34; Jdg. 9:43-45; and 1Sa. 11:11; 1Sa. 13:17.
Job. 1:18-19Now disaster will strike deep into the very heart of Jobs household. Before, property was the object of destruction, now persons. The scene now reverts to that sketched in Job. 1:13. All the children are gathered in the house for the final hour of doom. Only a whirlwind could have struck the four corners of the house. The first and third calamities were brought about by human agency, and the second and fourth were the results of natures violence. Satan has power over both men and nature. He has the greatest power in the universe, second only to our creator-redeemer God. The word translated young men is the same one rendered as servants in the previous accounts.
Fuente: College Press Bible Study Textbook Series
FOUR MESSENGERS OF MISFORTUNE, Job 1:13-19.
“It is not accidental,” says Hengstenberg, “that there are just four catastrophes divided into two pairs, and corresponding to the fourfold particularization of the righteousness of Job. In them may be seen a sort of irony of destiny touching his and all human righteousness.” The Germans have also remarked upon the peculiarity that the first and third of the calamities are ascribed to human, the second and fourth to celestial agencies. Evans. The Germans call calamities hiobs-posten “Job’s posts,” or messengers a proverbial expression similar to our own “Job’s comforters.”
Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
13. There was a day Literally, Now it was the day; the day of festivity, which in the rotation happened to be at the house of the firstborn. On this account it was probably the most marked of all the feasts of the year. It was a feast, too, in which the drinking of wine is specified, to set forth its sumptuousness and hilarity. These two circumstances heighten the precipice down which the family is so soon to be plunged. In the mention of wine-drinking we have, in part, the reason for Job’s anxiety over these festive occasions, and perhaps also the secret of his standing aloof.
Wine-drinking and its drunken effects, even upon women, are portrayed on the monuments of Egypt. The winepresses and offerings of wine to the gods, pictured in the tombs, establish the making of wine as far back as the fourth dynasty, (about 2450 B.C.) This is supposed to be the remotest period from which the manners of the people were thus perpetuated. The culture of the vine was, without doubt, of a vastly greater antiquity, (Gen 9:20,) as is seen in the exceptional fact that substantially the same word is used for wine among almost all eastern and western nations. The basis of the word is found, according to Pott and Kuhn, in the Indo-European language, the former making it from we, to weave, the latter from wan, to love. Gesenius and Furst, on the other hand, hold that it is of Semitic extraction, and cognate to , either from a root signifying “burning,” or another, “to tread out grapes.” The oneness of the word in the Indo-European and Semitic languages may be illustrated by comparing the Greek , originally foinos, the Latin vinum, the Welsh g-win, with the Hebrew yayin, the Arabic wain, (a bunch of grapes,) Ethiopic wain, (wine.)
Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
Scene 3 : Job’s Calamities in land of Uz Job 1:13-22 gives scene three of the prologue to the book of Job in which Satan is allowed to destroy all of Job’s children and wealth. Note how many people died during this ordeal while Job was being tested and proven righteous by God (Job 1:15-17; Job 1:19 during all four catastrophes).
Examples of Modern-Day Calamities Against God’s Children – In the mid-1980’s stormy winds came thru Panama City, Florida. A friend of mine named Jack Emerson had just purchased a new car, which was parked in his driveway. The strong wind blew a telephone pole on top of the car and damaged it. Earlier that night, the Lord had quickened Jack to get up and pray. He had failed to do so. The next morning, he went out to find his car with a telephone pole laying on top. In frustration, he asked the Lord why the pole fell on his car, and not next door, onto the property of his very, lost and sinful neighbor. The Lord quickly spoke to him these words, “A king does not war against a city that he has already conquered.” The incident was then understood.
In March of 1995, Calvary Cathedral Int’l of Fort Worth, Texas launched a 24-hour a day prayer ministry. Two days before the ministry began, a terrible hailstorm came thru that area of town. The hail was as large as a softball. It destroyed cars in the parking lot of the church. It knocked out stained glass windows, and caused much damage through the area. Then, two days later, on a Sunday morning, the prayer ministers went up the tower to the prayer room, but the lock would not work on the door. The door had to be broken down. For the next five years, this church continued in 24-hour prayer, without ceasing. Then, on 28 March 2000, a tornado hit that part of town and the church building. The walls of the tower were blown off while prayer ministers were in the room in prayer. They hid under a bench as the wall beside them was blown off. No one was killed. The devil has tried his best to stop this prayer ministry, just as in this passage of Scripture.
Job 1:16 While he was yet speaking, there came also another, and said, The fire of God is fallen from heaven, and hath burned up the sheep, and the servants, and consumed them; and I only am escaped alone to tell thee.
Job 1:16
1Ki 18:38, “Then the fire of the LORD fell , and consumed the burnt sacrifice, and the wood, and the stones, and the dust, and licked up the water that was in the trench.”
2Ki 1:10, “And Elijah answered and said to the captain of fifty, If I be a man of God, then let fire come down from heaven, and consume thee and thy fifty. And there came down fire from heaven , and consumed him and his fifty.”
Job 1:21-22 Comments – Job saw God’s hand in every thing that happened to him.
Job 1:21 And said, Naked came I out of my mother’s womb, and naked shall I return thither: the LORD gave, and the LORD hath taken away; blessed be the name of the LORD.
Job 1:21
Although Satan worked this destruction against God’s servant Job, God said that Satan had moved Him against Job (Job 2:3). So, this statement is correct in that God used Satan as an instrument to bring this destruction and loss in Job’s life.
Job 2:3, “And the LORD said unto Satan, Hast thou considered my servant Job, that there is none like him in the earth, a perfect and an upright man, one that feareth God, and escheweth evil? and still he holdeth fast his integrity, although thou movedst me against him, to destroy him without cause .”
Job 1:22 In all this Job sinned not, nor charged God foolishly.
Job’s Great Affliction
v. 13. And there was a day when his sons and his daughters were eating and drinking wine in their eldest brother’s house, v. 14. and there came a messenger unto Job and said, The oxen were plowing and the asses feeding beside them, v. 15. and the Sabeans, v. 16. While he was yet speaking, v. 17. While he was yet speaking, there came also another and said, The Chaldeans, v. 18. While he was yet speaking, there came also another, v. 19. and, behold, there came a great wind from the wilderness, v. 20. Then Job, v. 21. and said, Naked came I out of my mother’s womb, and naked shall I return thither, v. 22. In all this Job sinned not, (13) And there was a day when his sons and his daughters were eating and drinking wine in their eldest brother’s house: (14) And there came a messenger unto Job, and said, The oxen were plowing, and the asses feeding beside them: (15) And the Sabeans fell upon them, and took them away; yea, they have slain the servants with the edge of the sword; and I only am escaped alone to tell thee. (16) While he was yet speaking, there came also another, and said, The fire of God is fallen from heaven, and hath burned up the sheep, and the servants, and consumed them; and I only am escaped alone to tell thee. (17) While he was yet speaking, there came also another, and said, The Chaldeans made out three bands, and fell upon the camels, and have carried them away, yea, and slain the servants with the edge of the sword; and I only am escaped alone to tell thee. (18) While he was yet speaking, there came also another, and said, Thy sons and thy daughters were eating and drinking wine in their eldest brother’s house: (19) And, behold, there came a great wind from the wilderness, and smote the four corners of the house, and it fell upon the young men, and they are dead; and I only am escaped alone to tell thee.
Here begin the trials and temptations of Jobadiah And observe how by a climax from smaller to greater, they arise, step by step, to a finished point of the most distressing circumstances. First, the slaughter of his servants, next the loss of his cattle, then the capture of his substance, and the death of his people; and, lastly, the total destruction of his family, in the death of all his children. Here we behold the poor man bowed down under the pressure of the affliction. And to aggravate all, Satan tempting him to horrid rebellion against God. Reader! do not fail to discover the hand of God upholding his servant under all these trials; for, otherwise, it would have been totally impossible for the vessel of flesh and blood to have rid the storm. Mark it down, I beseech you, as a truth perfectly unquestionable, that according to the nature and degree of the strength imparted, the faith of God’s tried ones will be great or small. Let the trial be ever so great, ever so heavy, yet, if the eternal God be our refuge, and underneath are the everlasting arms, the believer is made more than conqueror, through his grace supporting us. But if the arm of God’s power be withdrawn, the strongest believer falls with the removal. How precious Jesus is seen in his unequalled conflicts, with the powers of darkness! Luk 22:39-53 .
Job 1:13 And there was a day when his sons and his daughters [were] eating and drinking wine in their eldest brother’s house:
Ver. 13. And there was a day ] A dismal day it proved to Job, “a day of trouble and distress, a day of wasteness and desolation, a day of darkness and gloominess, a day of clouds and thick darkness,” as Zep 1:15 . That subtle serpent set upon mischief, purposely picketh out such a time to do it as wherein such a sad and sudden change was least of all looked for; and then lays on amain (as if he were wood) with the hail shot, hell shot of sharpest afflictions. He knows well, that as mercies and deliverances, the more unexpected they are the more welcome, as Abraham’s receiving his son Isaac after a sort from the dead; Israel’s eduction out of Egypt, when they were forsaken by their hopes; Jonah’s being drawn out of the belly of hell (as he phraseth it, Jon 2:2 ); so crosses, the more suddenly they befall men the more they amate them; and finding weak minds secure, they make them miserable, leave them desperate.
When his sons and his daughters were eating and drinking wine there was a day = the fit, or usual day. When Job was seventy. See notes on p. 666.
wine. Hebrew. yayin. App-27.
Job 1:13-19
Job 1:13-19
RECORD OF THE CALAMITIES THAT BEFELL JOB IN ONE DAY
“And it fell on a day when his sons and his daughters were eating and drinking wine in their eldest brother’s house, that there came a messenger unto Job, and said, The oxen were plowing, and the asses feeding beside them; and the Sabeans fell upon them, and took them away; yea, they have slain thy servants with the edge of the sword; and I only am escaped alone to tell thee. While he was yet speaking, there came also another, and said, The fire of God is fallen from heaven, and hath burned up the sheep and the servants, and consumed them; and I only am escaped to tell thee. While he was yet speaking, there came also another, and said, The Chaldeans made three bands, and fell upon the camels, and have taken them away, yea, and slain the servants with the edge of the sword; and I only am escaped alone to tell thee. While he was yet speaking, there came also another, and said, Thy sons and thy daughters were eating and drinking wine in their eldest brother’s house; and behold there came a great wind from the wilderness, and smote the four corners of the house, and it fell upon the young men, and they are dead; and I only am escaped to tell thee.”
The malignant nature of Satan appears vividly in this passage; and it is fully harmonious with all that is written elsewhere in the Holy Scriptures concerning the evil one. (1) His deception of Eve was designed to accomplish her utter destruction, and to drown all of her posterity for ages to come in oceans of blood and tears. (2) Look what happened to the herd of swine (Mat 8:32). (3) Look what happened to Judas Iscariot. Joh 13:27 states that, “After the sop, Satan entered into Judas”; and before the night ended Judas was dead by his own hand. This passage in Job probably was given unto God’s people as an accurate portrayal of the deadly purpose of Satan in his activities among the sons of Adam.
THE DISASTERS THAT FELL UPON JOB
A dramatic summary of these is as follows:
* The Sabeans have fallen upon your oxen and asses, killed your servants, and carried away the herds.
* A stroke of lightning has killed all your sheep and the servants that guarded them.
* The Chaldeans have raided your camels, taken them, and murdered your servants.
* A tornado has struck the house where your children were feasting and killed them all.
“What power there is in this passage! If Shakespeare had dramatized it, what a play he would have had.” This outdoes the old proverb that, “When it rains, it pours.”
E.M. Zerr:
Job 1:13. There was nothing unusual in this gathering at the home of Job’s oldest son. Job 1:4 states that it was a practice for them to gather in turns for that purpose. For some reason not revealed to us, the devil chose such an occasion for carrying out the program of destruction against the family and property of Job.
Job 1:14-15. The destruction was accomplished in parts and through various agencies. The first calamity was the theft of the beasts of service and the death of the servants who had been working them, all except the one who escaped to bear the news to Job. The Sabeans were a people related to the Arabians. They were a wild-like clan and given to making raids into the territory of others. This great misfortune was reported to Job by the messenger who had escaped.
Job 1:16. The fire of God meant only that it was a supernatural fire. The messenger would not understand the situation and attributed it to God. The sheep and the servants caring for them were destroyed by fire, all except the one who was let escape to carry the news to Job.
Job 1:17. Made out three bands means they divided them into three groups among their forces. That was good strategy and was done by others in times of urgency or distress. (Gen 32:6-8; 2Sa 10:9-11.) The Chaldeans were a strong race of people residing in the Mesopotamian lands. They stole the camels of Job and slew the men caring for them, all except one allowed to escape to be the bearer of the news.
Job 1:18-19. The story of Job’s misfortunes starts with the feast at his oldest son’s house. It is remarkable that all of the events about the animals and servants occurred while that feast was going on. They must have taken place in rapid succession, for according to V. 4 the feasts were of one day’s duration. The whole setup is interesting and shows a plan so arranged as to grow with tension as it neared the climax. By selecting a time when the sons and daughters ere feasting, their attention would w not be drawn to the destruction of the property so as to rush to the defense. Furthermore, by starting on the animals and their caretakers, the less valuable of Job’s property would be lost first. Of course, the loss of even such assets would ordinarily be calculated to arouse the owner’s anxiety. Then, just after the tension had been drawn almost to the breaking point, here came the final blow, the destruction of his children. He certainly cannot stand such a heavy stroke. Surely, Satan will be the winner in such a contest.
Stripped of Every Possession
Job 1:13-22
There are dark days in our lives, when messenger follows on the heel of messenger, and we sit down amid the ruins of our happiness. All that made life gay and beautiful has withered and we are treading a dreary waste; our soul is almost dead within us and our feet are blistered.
Then our friends come and lay the blame on the Chaldeans and lightning, the Sabeans and the hurricane. They pity us as unfortunate and miserable. But we say to ourselves, looking beyond the secondary causes to the Cause beyond them all, The Lord gave, and the Lord hath taken away. Sometimes we can get no farther than this, but how happy we are when we can go on to say, Blessed be the name of the Lord. The true soul is reckless of what happens to himself, so long as the glory of the Lords name remains unsullied and enhanced. Let us, above all, never charge God with foolishness by impeaching His love or the rectitude of His decisions.
when: Job 1:4, Pro 27:1, Ecc 9:12, Luk 12:19, Luk 12:20, Luk 17:27-29, Luk 21:34
Reciprocal: Job 1:18 – Thy sons Job 9:23 – If the Job 15:21 – in prosperity Job 16:11 – to the ungodly Job 19:10 – destroyed Mat 8:32 – the whole
Job 1:13-19. Jobs Misfortune.The activity of the Satan is depicted, though he himself remains invisible. Between Job 1:12 and Job 1:13 there is an interval, an ominous silence like that which precedes the storm. The poet has drawn aside the curtain to us, and we know what is impending. Job knows nothing . . . he does not know that he is being played for like a pawn. Suddenly the catastrophe overtakes him. Messenger after messenger, each taking up his tale of ruin before the other has concluded his, announces that all has been taken from him (Davidson). The ideal character of the narrative should be observed. The catastrophe takes place on the day when the feast was in the eldest brothers house, i.e. the very day on which Job had just purified his children by sacrifice. Heaven and men alternate their strokes, which follow with ever-increasing severity. In each case one alone escapes to tell the tale.
IV.
THE SHADOW OF GODS HAND
Job 1:13-22
COMING now to the sudden and terrible changes which are to prove the faithfulness of the servant of God, we must not fail to observe that in the development of the drama the trial of Job personally is the sole consideration. No account is taken of the character of those who, being connected with his fortunes and happiness, are now to be swept away that he may suffer. To trace their history and vindicate Divine righteousness in reference to each of them is not within the scope of the poem. A typical man is taken as hero, and we may say the discussion covers the fate of all who suffer, although attention is fixed on him alone.
The writer is dealing with a story of patriarchal life, and himself is touched with the Semitic way of thinking. A certain disregard of the subordinate human characters must not be reckoned strange. His thoughts, far-reaching as they are, run in a channel very different from ours. The world of his book is that of family and clan ideas. The author saw more than any man of his time; but he could not see all that engages modern speculation. Besides, the glory of God is the dominant idea of the poem; not mens right to joy, or peace, or even life; but Gods right to be wholly Himself and greatly true. In the light of this high thought we must be content to have the story of one soul traced with such fulness as might be compassed, the others left practically untouched. If the sufferings of the man whom God approves can be explained in harmony with the glory of Divine justice, then the sudden calamities that fall upon his servants and children will also be explained. For, although death is in a sense an ultimate thing, and loss and affliction, however great, do not mean so much as death; yet, on the other hand, to die is the common lot, and the quick stroke appears merciful in comparison with Jobs dreadful experiences. Those who are killed by lightning or by the sword do but swiftly and without protracted pain fall into the hands of God. We need not conclude that the writer means us to regard the sons and daughters of Job and his servants as mere chattels, like the camels and sheep, although the people of the desert would have so regarded them. But the main question presses; the range of the discussion must be limited; and the tradition which forms the basis of the poem is followed by the author whenever it supplies the elements of his inquiry.
We have entirely refused the supposition that the Almighty forgot His righteousness and grace in putting the wealth and happiness of Job into the hands of Satan. The trials we now see falling one after the other are not sent because the Adversary has suggested them, but because it is right and wise, for the glory of God and for the perfecting of faith, that Job should suffer them. What is Gods doing is not in this case nor in any case evil. He cannot wrong His servant that glory may come to Himself.
And just here arises a problem which enters into all religious thought, the wrong solution of which depraves many a philosophy, while the right understanding of it sheds a flood of light on our life in this world. A thousand tongues, Christian, non-Christian, and neo-Christian, affirm that life is for enjoyment. What gives enjoyment is declared to be good, what gives most enjoyment is reckoned best, and all that makes for pain and suffering is held to be evil. It is allowed that pain endured now may bring pleasure hereafter, and that for the sake of future gain a little discomfort may be chosen. But it is evil nevertheless. One doing his best for men would be expected to give them happiness at once and, throughout life, as much of it as possible. If he inflicted pain in order to enhance pleasure by and by, he would have to do so within the strictest limits. Whatever reduces the strength of the body, the capacity of the body for enjoyment and the delight of the mind accompanying the bodys vigour, is declared bad, and to do anything which has this effect is to do evil or wrong. Such is the ethic of the philosophy finally and powerfully stated by Mr. Spencer. It has penetrated as widely as he could wish; it underlies volumes of Christian sermons and semi-Christian schemes. If it be true, then the Almighty of the Book of Job, bringing affliction, sorrow, and pain upon His servant, is a cruel enemy of man, to be hated, not revered. This matter needs to be considered at some length.
The notion that pain is evil, that he who suffers is placed at moral disadvantage, appears very plainly in the old belief that those conditions and surroundings of our life which minister to enjoyment are the proofs of the goodness of God on which reliance must be placed so far as nature and providence testify of Him. Pain and sorrow, it was held, need to be accounted for by human sin or otherwise; but we know that God is good because there is enjoyment in the life He gives. Paley, for example, says that the proof of the Divine goodness rests upon contrivances everywhere to be seen for the purpose of giving us pleasure. He tells us that, when God created the human species, “either He wished them happiness, or He wished them misery, or He was indifferent and unconcerned about either”; and he goes on to prove that it must be our happiness He desired, for, otherwise, wishing our misery, “He might have made everything we tasted, bitter; everything we saw, loathsome; everything we touched, a sting; every smell, a stench; and every sound, a discord”: while, if He had been indifferent about our happiness we must impute all enjoyment we have “to our good fortune,” that is, to bare chance, an impossible supposition. Paleys further survey of life leads to the conclusion that God has it as His chief aim to make His creatures happy and, in the circumstances, does the best He can for them, better far than they are commonly disposed to think. The agreement of this position with that of Spencer lies in the presupposition that goodness can be proved only by arrangements for giving pleasure. If God is good for this reason, what follows when He appoints pain, especially pain that brings no enjoyment in the long run? Either He is not altogether “good” or He is not all-powerful.
The author of the Book of Job does not enter into the problem of pain and affliction with the same deliberate attempt to exhaust the subject as Paley has made; but he has the problem before him. And in considering the trial of Job as an example of the suffering and sorrow of man in this world of change, we find a strong ray of light thrown upon the darkness. The picture is a Rembrandt; and where the radiance falls all is sharp and bright. But the shadows are deep; and we must seek, if possible, to make out what lies in those shadows. We shall not understand the Book of Job, nor form a just opinion of the authors inspiration, nor shall we understand the Bible as a whole, unless we reach a point of view clear of the mistakes that stultify the reasoning of Paley and plunge the mind of Spencer, who refuses to be called a materialist, into the utter darkness of materialism.
Now, as to enjoyment, we have the capacity for it, and it flows to us from many external objects as well as from the operation of our own minds and the putting forth of energy. It is in the scheme of things ordained by God that His creatures shall enjoy. On the other hand, trouble, sorrow, loss, bodily and mental pain, are also in the scheme of things. They are provided for in numberless ways-in the play of natural forces causing injuries, dangers from which we cannot escape; in the limitations of our power; in the antagonisms and disappointments of existence; in disease and death. They are provided for by the very laws that bring pleasure, made inevitable under the same Divine ordinance. Some say it detracts from the goodness of God to admit that as He appoints means of enjoyment so He also provides for pain and sorrow and makes these inseparable from life. And this opinion runs into the extreme dogmatic assertion that “good,” by which we are to understand happiness,
“Shall fall At last far off, at last to all.”
Many hold this to be necessary to the vindication of Gods goodness. But the source of the whole confusion lies here, that we prejudge the question by calling pain evil. The light-giving truth for modern perplexity is that pain and loss are not evil, are in no sense evil.
Because we desire happiness and dislike pain, we must not conclude that pain is bad and that, when any one suffers, it is because he or another has done wrong. There is the mistake that vitiates theological thought, making men run to the extreme either of denying God altogether because there is suffering in the world, or of framing a rosewater eschatology. Pain is one thing, moral evil is quite another thing. He who suffers is not necessarily a wrong doer; and when, through the laws of nature, God inflicts pain, there is no evil nor anything approaching wrong. In Scripture, indeed, pain and evil are apparently identified. “Shall we receive good at the hands of God, and shall we not receive evil? Is there evil in the city, and the Lord hath not done it? Thus saith the Lord, Behold I will bring upon Judah, and upon all the inhabitants of Jerusalem, all the evil that I have pronounced against them.” In these and many other passages the very thing seems to be meant which has just been denied, for evil and suffering appear to be made identical. But human language is not a perfect instrument of thought, any more than thought is a perfect channel of truth. One word has to do duty in different senses. Moral evil, wrongness, on the one hand; bodily pain, the misery of loss and defeat, on the other hand-both are represented by one Hebrew word [displeased]. In the following passages, where moral evil is clearly meant, it occurs just as in those previously quoted: “Wash you, make you clean, cease to do evil, learn to do well”; “The face of the Lord is against them that do evil.” The different meanings which one Hebrew word may bear are not generally confused in translation. In this case, however, the confusion has entered into the most modern language. From a highly esteemed thinker the following sentence may be quoted by way of example: “The other religions did not feel evil like Israel; it did not stand in such complete antagonism to their idea of the Supreme, the Creator and Sovereign of man, nor in such absolute contradiction to their notion of what ought to be; and so they either reconciled themselves as best they could to the evil that was necessary, or invented means by which men could escape from it by escaping from existence.” The singular misapprehension of Divine providence which underlies a statement like this can only be got rid of by recognising that enjoyment and suffering are not the good and evil of life, that both of them stand quite apart from what is intrinsically good and bad in a moral sense, and that they are simply means to an end in the providence of God.
It is not difficult, of course, to see how the idea of pain and the idea of moral evil have been linked together. It is by the thought that suffering is punishment for evil done; and that the suffering is therefore itself evil. Pain was simply penalty inflicted by an offended heavenly power. The evil of a mans doings came back to him, made itself felt in his suffering. This was the explanation of all that was unpleasant, disastrous, and vexing in the lot of man. He would enjoy always, it was conceived, if wrong doing or failure in duty to the higher powers did not kindle divine anger against him. True, the wrongdoing might not be his own. The son might suffer for the parents fault. Iniquity might be remembered to childrens children and fall terribly on those who had not themselves transgressed. The fates pursued the descendants of an impious man. But wrong done somewhere, rebellion of some one against a divinity, was always the antecedent of pain and sorrow and disaster: And as the other religions thought, so, in this matter, did that of Israel. To the Hebrew the deep conviction of this, as Dr. Fairbairn has said, made poverty and disease peculiarly abhorrent. In Psa 89:1-52, the prosperity of David is depicted, and Jehovah speaks of the covenant that must be kept: “If his children forsake my law, and walk not in my judgments; then will I visit their transgression with the rod, and their iniquity with stripes.” The trouble has fallen, and out of the depth of it, attributing to past sin all defeat and disaster from which the people suffer – the breaking down of the hedges, curtailment of the vigour of youth, overthrow in war-the Psalmist cries, “How long, O Lord, wilt Thou hide Thyself forever? How long shall Thy wrath burn like fire? O remember how short my time is: for what vanity hast Thou created all the children of men?” There is here no thought that anything painful or afflictive could manifest the fatherhood of God; it must proceed from His anger and force the mind back upon the memory of sin, some transgression that has caused the Almighty to suspend His kindness for a time.
Here it was the author of Job found the thought of his people. With this he had to harmonise the other beliefs-peculiarly theirs-that the lovingkindness of the Lord is over all His works, that God who is supremely good cannot inflict moral injury on any of His covenanted servants. And the difficulty he felt survives. The questions are still urged: Is not pain bound up with wrong doing? Is not suffering the mark of Gods displeasure? Are they not evil, therefore? And, on the other hand, Is not enjoyment appointed to him who does right? Does not the whole scheme of Divine providence, as the Bible sets it forth, including the prospect it opens into the eternal future, associate happiness with well doing and pain with evil doing? We desire enjoyment, and cannot help desiring it. We dislike pain, disease, and all that limits our capacity for pleasure. Is it not in accordance with this that Christ appears as the Giver of light and peace and joy to the race of men?
These questions look difficult enough. Let us attempt to answer them.
Pleasure and pain, happiness and suffering, are elements of creaturely experience appointed by God. The right use of them makes life, the wrong use of them mars it, They are ordained, all of them in equal degree, to a good end; for all that God does is done in perfect love as well as in perfect justice. It is no more wonderful that a good man should suffer than that a bad man should suffer: for the good man, the man who believes in God and therefore in goodness, making a right use of suffering, will gain by it in the true sense; he will reach a deeper and nobler life. It is no more wonderful that a bad man, one who disbelieves in God and therefore in goodness, should be happy than that a good man should be happy, the happiness being Gods appointed means for both to reach a higher life. The main element of this higher life is vigour, but not of the body. The Divine purpose is spiritual evolution. That gratification of the sensuous side of our nature for which physical health and a well-knit organism are indispensable-paramount in the pleasure philosophy-is not neglected, but is made subordinate in the Divine culture of life. The grace of God aims at the life of the spirit-power to love, to follow righteousness, to dare for justice sake, to seek and grasp the true, to sympathise with men and bear with them, to bless them that curse, to suffer and be strong. To promote this vitality all God appoints is fitted-pain as well as pleasure, adversity as well as prosperity, sorrow as well as joy, defeat as well as success. We wonder that suffering is so often the result of imprudence. On the ordinary theory the fact is inexplicable, for imprudence has no dark colour of ethical faultiness. He who by an error of judgment plunges himself and his family into what appears irretrievable disaster, may, by all reckoning, be almost blameless in character. If suffering is held to be penal, no reference to the general sin of humanity will account for the result. But the reason is plain. The suffering is disciplinary. The nobler life at which Divine providence aims must be sagacious no less than pure, guided by sound reason no less than right feeling.
And if it is asked how from this point of view we are to find the punishment of sin, the answer is that happiness as well as suffering is punishment to him whose sin and the unbelief that accompanies it pervert his view of truth, and blind him to the spiritual life and the will of God. The pleasures of a wrong doer who persistently denies obligation to Divine authority and refuses obedience to the Divine law are no gain, but loss. They dissipate and attenuate his life. His sensuous or sensual enjoyment, his delight in selfish triumph and gratified ambition are real, give at the time quite as much happiness as the good man has in his obedience and virtue, perhaps a great deal more. But they are penal and retributive nevertheless; and the conviction that they are so becomes clear to the man whenever the light of truth is flashed upon his spiritual state. We read Dantes pictures of the Inferno, and shudder at the dreadful scenes with which he has filled the descending circles of woe. He has omitted one that would have been the most striking of all, -unless indeed an approach to it is to be found in the episode of Paolo and Francesca, -the picture of souls self-doomed to seek happiness and to enjoy, on whose life the keen light of eternity shines, revealing the gradual wasting away of existence, the certain degeneration to which they are condemned.
On the other hand, the pains and disasters which fall to the lot of evil men, intended for their correction, if in perversity or in blindness they are misunderstood, again become punishment; for they, too, dissipate and attenuate life. The real good of existence slips away while the mind is intent on the mere pain or vexation and how it is to be got rid of. In Job we find a purpose to reconcile affliction with the just government of God. The troubles into which the believing man is brought urge him to think more deeply than he has ever thought, become the means of that intellectual and moral education which lies in discovery of the will and character of God. They also bring him by this way into deeper humility, a fine tenderness of spiritual nature, a most needful kinship with his fellows. See then the use of suffering. The impenitent, unbelieving man has no such gains. He is absorbed in the distressing experience, and that absorption narrows and debases the activity of the soul. The treatment of this matter here is necessarily brief. It is hoped, however, that the principle has been made clear.
Does it require any adaptation or under-reading of the language of Scripture to prove the harmony of its teaching with the view just given of happiness and suffering as related to punishment? Throughout the greater part of the Old Testament the doctrine of suffering is that old doctrine which the author of Job found perplexing. Not infrequently in the New Testament there is a certain formal return to it; for even under the light of revelation the meaning of Divine providence is learnt slowly. But the emphasis rests on life rather than happiness, and on death rather than suffering, in the gospels; and the whole teaching of Christ pointed to the truth. This world and our discipline here, the trials of men, the doctrine of the cross, the fellowship of the sufferings of Christ, are not fitted to introduce us into a state of existence in which mere enjoyment, the gratification of personal tastes and desires, shall be the main experience. They are fitted to educate the spiritual nature for life, fulness of life. Immortality becomes credible when it is seen as progress in vigour, progress towards that profound compassion, that fidelity, that unquenchable devotion to the glory of God the Father which marked the life of the Divine Son in this world.
Observe, it is not denied that joy is and will be desired, that suffering and pain are and will remain experiences from which human nature must recoil. The desire and the aversion are wrought into our constitution; and just because we feel them our whole mortal discipline has its value. In the experience of them lies the condition of progress. On the one hand pain urges, on the other joy attracts. It is in the line of desire for joy of a finer and higher kind that civilisation realises itself, and even religion lays hold of us and lures us on. But the conditions of progress are not to be mistaken for the end of it. Joy assumes sorrow as a possibility. Pleasure can only exist as alternative to the experience of pain. And the life that expands and reaches finer power and exaltation in the course of this struggle is the main thing. The struggle ceases to be acute in the higher ranges of life; it becomes massive, sustained, and is carried on in the perfect peace of the soul. Therefore the future state of the redeemed is a state of blessedness. But the blessedness accompanying the life is not the glory. The glory of the perfected is life itself. The heaven of the redeemed appears a region of existence in which the exaltation, enlargement, and deepening of life shall constantly and consciously go on. Conversely the hell of evildoers will not be simply the pain, the suffering, the defeat to which they have doomed themselves, but the constant attenuation of their life, the miserable wasting of which they shall be aware, though they find some pitiful pleasure, as Milton imagined his evil angels finding theirs, in futile schemes of revenge against the Highest.
Pain is not in itself an evil. But our nature recoils from suffering and seeks life in brightness and power, beyond the keen pangs of mortal existence. The creation hopes that itself “shall be delivered from the bondage of corruption.” The finer life is, the more sensible it must be of association with a body doomed to decay, the more sensible also of that gross human injustice and wrong which dare to pervert Gods ordinance of pain and His sacrament of death, usurping His holy prerogative for the most unholy ends. And so we are brought to the Cross of Christ. When He “bore our sins in His own body on the tree,” when He “suffered for sins once, the Righteous for the unrighteous,” the sacrifice was real, awful, immeasurably profound. Yet, could death be in any sense degrading or debasing to Him? Could evil touch His soul? Over its most insolent assumption of the right to injure and destroy He stood, spiritually victorious in the presence of His enemies, and rose, untouched in soul, when His body was broken on the cross. His sacrifice was great because He bore the sins of men and died as Gods atonement. His sublime devotion to the Father whose holy law was trampled under foot, His horror and endurance of human iniquity which culminated in His death, made the experience profoundly terrible. Thus the spiritual dignity and power He gained provided new life for the world.
It is now possible to understand the trials of Job. So far as the sufferer is concerned, they are no less beneficent than His joys; for they provide that necessary element of probation by which life of a deeper and stronger kind is to be reached, the opportunity of becoming, as a man and a servant of the Almighty, what he had never been, what otherwise he could not become. The purpose of God is entirely good; but it will remain with the sufferer himself to enter by the fiery way into full spiritual vigour. He will have the protection and grace of the Divine Spirit in his time of sore bewilderment and anguish. Yet his own faith must be vindicated while the shadow of Gods hand rests upon his life.
And now the forces of nature and the wild tribes of the desert gather about the happy settlement of the man of Uz. With dramatic suddenness and cumulative terror stroke after stroke descends. Job is seen before the door of his dwelling. The morning broke calm and cloudless, the bright sunshine of Arabia filling with brilliant colour the far horizon. The day has been peaceful, gracious, another of Gods gifts. Perhaps, in the early hours, the father, as priest of his family, offered the burnt offerings of atonement lest his sons should have renounced God in their hearts; and now, in the evening, he is sitting calm and glad, hearing the appeals of those who need his help and dispensing alms with a generous hand. But one comes in haste, breathless with running, scarcely able to tell his tale. Out in the fields the oxen were ploughing and the asses feeding. Suddenly a great band of Sabeans fell upon them, swept them away, slew the servants with the edge of the sword: this man alone has escaped with his life. Rapidly has he spoken; and before he has done another appears, a shepherd from the more distant pastures, to announce a second calamity. “The fire of God is fallen from heaven, and hath burned up the sheep, and the servants, and consumed them; and I only am escaped to tell thee.” They scarcely dare to look on the face of Job, and he has no time to speak, for here is a third messenger, a camel driver, swarthy and naked to the loins, crying wildly as he runs. The Chaldaeans made three bands-fell upon the camels-swept them away-the servants are slain-I only am left. Nor is this the last. A fourth, with every mark of horror in his face, comes slowly and brings the most terrible message of all. The sons and daughters of Job were feasting in their eldest brothers house; there came a great wind from the wilderness and smote the four corners of the house, and it fell. The young men and women are all dead. One only has escaped, he who tells the dreadful tale.
A certain idealism appears in the causes of the different calamities and their simultaneous, or almost simultaneous, occurrence. Nothing, indeed, is assumed which is not possible in the north of Arabia. A raid from the south, of Sabeans, the lawless part of a nation otherwise engaged in traffic; an organised attack by Chaldaeans from the east, again the lawless fringe of the population of the Euphrates valley, those who, inhabiting the margin of the desert, had taken to desert ways; then, of natural causes, the lightning or the fearful hot wind which coming suddenly stifles and kills, and the whirlwind, possible enough after a thunderstorm or simoom, -all of these belong to the region in which Job lived. But the grouping of the disasters and the invariable escape of one only from each belong to the dramatic setting, and are intended to have a cumulative effect. A sense of the mysterious is produced, of supernatural power, discharging bolt after bolt in some inscrutable mood of antagonism. Job is a mark for the arrows of the Unseen. And when the last messenger has spoken, we turn in dismay and pity to look on the rich man made poor, the proud and happy father made childless, the fearer of God on whom the enemy seems to have wrought his will.
In the stately Oriental way, as a man who bows to fate or the irresistible will of the Most High, Job seeks to realise his sudden and awful deprivations. We watch him with silent awe as first he rends his mantle, the acknowledged sign of mourning and of the disorganisation of life, then shaves his head, renouncing in his grief even the natural ornament of the hair, that the sense of loss and resignation may be indicated. This done, in deep humiliation he bows and falls prone on the earth and worships, the fit words falling in a kind of solemn chant from his lips: “Naked came I forth from my mothers womb, and naked I return thereto. Jehovah gave, and Jehovah hath taken away. Let Jehovahs name be blessed.” The silence of grief and of death has fallen about him. No more shall be heard the bustle of the homestead to which, when the evening shadows were about to fall, a constant stream of servants and laden oxen used to come, where the noise of cattle and asses and the shouts of camel drivers made the music of prosperity. His wife and the few who remain, with bowed heads, dumb and aimless, stand around. Swiftly the sun goes down, and darkness falls upon the desolate dwelling.
Losses like these are apt to leave men distracted. When everything is swept away, with the riches those who were to inherit them, when a man is left, as Job says, naked, bereft of all that labour had won and the bounty of God had given, expressions of despair do not surprise us, nor even wild accusations of the Most High. But the faith of this sufferer does not yield. He is resigned, submissive. The strong trust that has grown in the course of a religious life withstands the shock, and carries the soul through the crisis. Neither did Job accuse God nor did he sin, though his grief was great. So far he is master of his soul, unbroken though desolated. The first great round of trial has left the man a believer still.
Fuente: Everett’s Study Notes on the Holy Scriptures
Fuente: The Popular Commentary on the Bible by Kretzmann
Fuente: Hawker’s Poor Man’s Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
Fuente: Old and New Testaments Restoration Commentary
Fuente: F.B. Meyer’s Through the Bible Commentary
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
Fuente: Peake’s Commentary on the Bible
Fuente: Expositors Bible Commentary