Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Job 11:13
If thou prepare thine heart, and stretch out thine hands toward him;
13. If thou prepare thine heart ] Thou is emphatic, and meant by the speaker to place Job in a different class from the “hollow man” described in Job 11:12. Job hardly accepted the good intention, cf. ch. Job 12:3. “To prepare the heart” may mean, to bring it into a condition of right thought and feeling towards God. The word might also mean “fix thy heart,” let it no more be driven to and fro amidst false feelings and views, Psa 10:17; Psa 51:10; Psa 57:7; Psa 78:37.
and stretch out ] In prayer, and seeking help, Exo 9:29; Isa 1:15; cf. Job 8:5.
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
13 20. Zophar turns to Job in exhortation and promise.
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
If thou prepare thine heart – Zophar now proceeds to state that if Job even yet would return to God, he might hope for acceptance. Though he had sinned, and though he was now, as he supposed, a hollow-hearted and an insincere man, yet, if he would repent, he might expect the divine favor. In this he accords with the sentiment of Eliphaz, and he concludes his speech in a manner not a little resembling his; see Job 5:17-27.
And stretch out thine hands toward him – In the attitude of supplication. To stretch out or spread forth the hands, is a phrase often used to denote the act of supplication; see 1Ti 2:8, and the notes of Wetstein on that place. Horace, 3 Carm. xxiii. 1, Coelo supinas si tuleris manus. Ovid, M. ix. 701, Ad sidera supplex Cressa manus tollens. Trist. i. 10, 21, Ipsc gubernator, tollens ad sidera palmas; compare Livy v. 21. Seneca, Ep. 41; Psa 63:4; Psa 134:2; Psa 141:2; Ezr 9:5.
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
Job 11:13-15
If thou prepare thine heart, and stretch out thine hands towards Him.
The way to happiness
I purpose to show you that happiness is within your reach, and to point out the means by which it may be infallibly attained.
1. Prepare your hearts, or rightly dispose and order your hearts especially with reference to subsequent acts and exercises. If we would be truly happy, we must seek happiness within.
1. A prepared heart is thoughtful and considerate. The careless and trifling never attain peace of mind. A prepared heart is a penitent and humble heart. Sin is the great hindrance to human happiness; and the removal of it is therefore absolutely necessary.
2. A prepared mind is a decided mind. The mind thinks with reference to decision; otherwise thinking is a vain employ, a mere mocking of intelligence. If a man decides under that preparedness which serious thoughtfulness, prayer, and the aid of God concur to supply, it will determine to make the cultivation and salvation of the soul the great end of life.
2. Stretch out the hand towards God. This denotes the act and habit of prayer. The expression stretching forth the hand is strikingly descriptive of true and prevalent prayer. It was an action over a sacrifice, and it marked mans submission to the rites which God had appointed his trust in them, and his appeal to God upon their presentation. It was an action which acknowledged God as the source of supply and help. It was the action of desire. It was an action of waiting upon God.
3. Personal reformation. If iniquity be in thine hand put it far away. Those who sin are not generally the men who pray; but some do. They pray both in public and in secret, and yet do not renounce all evil. The most perverse attempt that man has ever made, is to reconcile religion with the practice of sin. This will appear if you consider the only principles upon which such an attempt can be made. It may suppose that God loves religious services for their own sake. Or that God can be deceived by a show of outward piety, if outward morality be superadded, or that men may sin because grace abounds. Or that the end of religion is to save men from punishment. If, then, you have practised iniquity, renounce it entirely, and renounce it forever. If it be shut up secretly in thine heart, let it not remain there any longer. Conscience is privy to it, and will smite you for it in your seasons of calm reflection. If the price of iniquity is in your hand, divest yourself of the evil thing. Make restitution to the men you have injured. The righteous Lord loveth righteousness. When iniquity is put away then comes true peace. The blessing of God is given, and conscience approves of the act. The consciousness of integrity and uprightness is a source of the purest enjoyment.
4. The fourth direction relates to a godly family discipline. In ancient times the heads of families were the priests. Nor did parents cease, in a very important sense, to be the priests in their families after the establishment of the Levitical priesthood. In this respect no change has taken place under the Christian dispensation. The office of the head of the family is to instruct his household in the truths of Gods law and Gospel. Our ancestors understood this duty. Together with religious concern, there is to be the actual putting away of evil from your families. From a proper course of family discipline and order Gods blessing will not be withheld. For then shalt thou lift up thy face without spot; yea, thou shalt be steadfast and shalt not fear. Thy face shall be lifted up in holy confidence towards God; and it shall be undefiled by a spot of guilty shame towards men. (R. Watson.)
Heart and hands
Zophar tells Job of his faults, and of Gods secret knowledge of him, and winds up with the words of the text, which, while they are altogether inappropriate and undeserved in Jobs case, are in principle grandly true, in form sweetly beautiful, and may well provide us with pleasant food. If thou shalt prepare thy heart, and stretch out thine hands toward Him. That is the attitude of supplication, and doubtless has here the idea of prayer. But it has much more than that. It means that the heart and the hands are to go together, are to move in unison; that the hands must do what the heart prompts, and that as the heart is prepared to take in God, the hands are to be at the control of God. The prepared heart receives Christ as guest, and the willing hands are told off to wait upon Him all the time. The stretching of the hands here means also a habit of desire. It includes willing obedience. It is the attitude of one who is willing, waiting, and even eager to be of service. This consecration of the heart, and this dedication of the hands, will lead to the due fulfilment of the next verse, If iniquity be in thine hands, put it far away. That is to say, all the misdoings of the past are to be sorrowed over, repented of, and put away. Heart and hands are alike to be clean, and a new leaf is to be turned over in the volume of life, no more to be blotted by guilt, or inscribed with the writing of self-condemning sin. Adapt the meaning of Zophar to our day, and it comes to this, no wickedness is to be permitted to dwell under any roof we can call our own. We are to turn it out, and keep it out of our homes, let it have no place by our hearthstones, no shelter in kitchen or parlour. True religious principle will not turn and trifle, will not dally with wrong-doing. For then shalt thou lift up thy face without spot. A manly religion, a godly fidelity will enable a man to look all the world in the face. Thou shalt not fear. Only true religion can so endow a man. Perfect love casteth out fear. Thou shalt forget thy misery, and remember it as waters that pass away. The good mans life is like a river, ever flowing, through various scenery of mingled barrenness and beauty. The rough, barren, sad, sorrowful, through which it passes, will never, never be reproduced. (Good Company.)
The two-fold development of godliness
I. Godliness developed in the spiritual activity of a mans life. The activity which Zophar recommends has a threefold direction–
1. Towards his own heart. If thou prepare thine heart.
2. Towards the great God. And stretch out thine hands towards Him.
3. Towards moral evil. If iniquity be in thine hand, put it far away.
II. Godliness developed in the spiritual blessedness of a mans life. Zophar specifies several advantages attending the course he recommended.
1. Cheerfulness of aspect.
2. Steadfastness of mind.
3. Fearlessness of soul.
4. A deliverance from all suffering.
5. Uncloudedness of being. (Homilist.)
Change of heart
New mental level produces new perspective. There is a form of decision in which, in consequence of some outer experience or some inexplicable inward change, we suddenly pass from the easy and careless to the sober and strenuous mood, or possibly the other way. The whole scale of values of our motives and impulses then undergoes a change like that which a change of the observers level produces on a view. The most sobering possible agents are objects of grief and fear. When one of these affects us, all light fantastic notions lose their motive power, all solemn ones find theirs multiplied manifold. The consequence is an instant abandonment of the more trivial projects with which we had been dallying, and an instant practical acceptance of the more grim and earnest alternative which till then could not extort our minds consent. All those changes of heart, awakenings of conscience, etc., which make new men of so many of us, may be classed under this head. The character abruptly rises to another level, and deliberation comes to an immediate end. (Prof. James, Psychology.)
Fuente: Biblical Illustrator Edited by Joseph S. Exell
Verse 13. If thou prepare thine heart] Make use of the powers which God has given thee, and be determined to seek him with all thy soul.
And stretch out thine hands toward him] Making fervent prayer and supplication, putting away iniquity out of thy hand, and not permitting wickedness to dwell in thy tabernacle; then thou shalt lift up thy face without a blush, thou wilt become established, and have nothing to fear, Job 11:14-15.
There is a sentiment in Pr 16:1, very similar to that in the 13th verse, which we translate very improperly: –
leadam maarchey leb.
To man are the preparations of the heart:
umeyehovah maaneh lashon.
But from Jehovah is the answer to the tongue.
It is man’s duty to pray; it is God’s prerogative to answer. Zophar, like all the rest, is true to his principle. Job must be a wicked man, else he had not been afflicted. There must be some iniquity in his hand, and some wickedness tolerated in his family. So they all supposed.
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
O Job, thy business is not to quarrel with thy Maker, or his works, but to address thyself to him.
Prepare thine heart, to wit, to seek God, as it is expressed, 2Ch 19:3; 30:19; Psa 78:8. If thou prepare thy heart by sincere repentance for all thy hard speeches of God, and sins against him, and with a pure and upright heart seek unto him; without which thy prayers will be in vain. Or,
If thou directest, or rectifiest, thine heart, turning thy bold contentions with God into humble and sincere supplications to him.
Stretch out thine hands, i.e. pray, which is here described by its usual gesture; as Job 15:25; Psa 88:9.
Towards him, i.e. to God, as appears both from the nature of the thing, and from the context.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
13. The apodosis to the “If”is at Job 11:15. Thepreparation of the heart is to be obtained (Pr16:1) by stretching out the hands in prayer for it (Psa 10:17;1Ch 29:18).
Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
If thou prepare thine heart, and stretch out thine hands towards him. In this and the following verses Zophar proceeds to give some advice to Job; which, if taken, would issue in his future happiness, but otherwise it would be ill with him; he advises him to pray to God with an heart prepared for such service; so some render the last clause in the imperative, “stretch out thine hands w towards him”; that is, towards God; for, though not expressed, is implied, whose immensity, sovereignty, and omniscience, Zophar had been discoursing of; and, though stretching out the hands is sometimes a gesture of persons in distress and mournful circumstances, thereby signifying their grief and sorrow, and of others in great danger, in order to lay up anything for safety; and of conquered persons resigning themselves up into the hands of the conqueror; and of such who are desirous of being in friendship, alliance, and association with others; yet it is also sometimes used as for the whole of religious worship, Ps 44:20; so particularly for prayer, Ps 88:9; and this was what all Job’s friends advised him to, to humble himself before God, to pray for the forgiveness of his sins, and for the removal of his afflictions and deliverance from them; see Job 5:8; in order to which it is proper the “heart [should be] prepared”; as it is requisite it should be to every good work by the grace of God so to this: and then may it be said to be prepared for such service, when the spirit of God is given as a spirit of grace and supplication, whereby the heart is impressed with a sense of its wants, and so knows what to pray for; and arguments and fit words are put into the mind and mouth, and it knows how to pray as it should; and is enabled to approach the throne of grace with sincerity, fervency, and in the exercise of faith, being sprinkled from an evil conscience by the blood of Jesus, and resigned to the divine will, in all its petitions it is directed to make: now this is the work of God, to prepare the heart; the preparation of the heart, as well as the answer of the tongue, is from the Lord; he is prayed to for it, and it is affirmed he will do it,
Pr 16:1; but it is here represented as if it was man’s act, which is said not to suggest any power in man to do it of himself; at least this is not the evangelic sense of such phrases; for Zophar might be of a more legal spirit, and not so thoroughly acquainted with the evangelic style; but this might be said, to show the necessity of such a preparation, and to stir up to a concern for it, and to expect and look for it from and by the grace of God.
w “Expande ad eum manus tuas”, De Dieu.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
13 But if thou wilt direct thy heart,
And spread out thy hands to Him –
14 If there is evil in thy hand, put it far away,
And let not wickedness dwell in thy tents –
15 Then indeed canst thou lift up thy face without spot,
And shalt be firm without fearing.
The phrase signifies neither to raise the heart (Ewald), nor to establish it (Hirz.), but to direct it, i.e., give it the right direction (Psa 78:8) towards God, 1Sa 7:3; 2Ch 20:33; it has an independent meaning, so that there is no need to supply , nor take to be for (after the construction in 2Ch 30:19). To spread out the hands in prayer is ( ) ; is seldom used instead of the more artistic , palmas, h.e. manus supinas . The conditional antecedent clause is immediately followed, Job 11:14, by a similarly conditional parenthetical clause, which inserts the indispensable condition of acceptable prayer; the conclusion might begin with : when thou sendest forth thy heart and spreadest out thy hands to Him, if there is wickedness in thy hand, put it far away; but the antecedent requires a promise for its conclusion, and the more so since the praet. and fut. which follow , Job 11:13, have the force of futt. exact.: si disposueris et extenderis , to which the conclusion: put it far away, is not suited, which rather expresses a preliminary condition of acceptable prayer. The conclusion then begins with , then indeed, like Job 8:6; Job 13:19, comp. Job 6:3, with , now indeed; the causal signification of has in both instances passed into the confirmatory (comp. 1Sa 14:44; Psa 118:10-12; Psa 128:2, and on Gen 26:22): then verily wilt thou be able to raise thy countenance (without being forced to make any more bitter complaints, as Job 10:15.), without spot, i.e., not: without bodily infirmity, but: without spot of punishable guilt, sceleris et paenae (Rosenmller). here signifies without (Targ. ), properly: far from, as Job 21:9; 2Sa 1:22; Pro 20:3. Faultless will he then be able to look up and be firm ( from , according to Ges. 71), quasi ex aere fusus (1Ki 7:16), one whom God can no longer get the better of.
Fuente: Keil & Delitzsch Commentary on the Old Testament
13 If thou prepare thine heart, and stretch out thine hands toward him; 14 If iniquity be in thine hand, put it far away, and let not wickedness dwell in thy tabernacles. 15 For then shalt thou lift up thy face without spot; yea, thou shalt be stedfast, and shalt not fear: 16 Because thou shalt forget thy misery, and remember it as waters that pass away: 17 And thine age shall be clearer than the noonday; thou shalt shine forth, thou shalt be as the morning. 18 And thou shalt be secure, because there is hope; yea, thou shalt dig about thee, and thou shalt take thy rest in safety. 19 Also thou shalt lie down, and none shall make thee afraid; yea, many shall make suit unto thee. 20 But the eyes of the wicked shall fail, and they shall not escape, and their hope shall be as the giving up of the ghost.
Zophar, as the other two, here encourages Job to hope for better times if he would but come to a better temper.
I. He gives him good counsel (Job 11:13; Job 11:14), as Eliphaz did (ch. v. 8), and Bildad, ch. viii. 5. He would have him repent and return to God. Observe the steps of that return. 1. He must look within, and get his mind changed and the tree made good. He must prepare his heart; there the work of conversion and reformation must begin. The heart that wandered from God must be reduced–that was defiled with sin and put into disorder must be cleansed and put in order again–that was wavering and unfixed must be settled and established; so the word here signifies. The heart is then prepared to seek God when it is determined and fully resolved to make a business of it and to go through with it. 2. He must look up, and stretch out his hands towards God, that is, must stir up himself to take hold on God, must pray to him with earnestness and importunity, striving in prayer, and with expectation to receive mercy and grace from him. To give the hand to the Lord signifies to yield ourselves to him and to covenant with him, 2 Chron. xxx. 8. This Job must do, and, for the doing of it, must prepare his heart. Job had prayed, but Zophar would have him to pray in a better manner, not as an appellant, but as a petitioner and humble suppliant. 3. He must amend what was amiss in his own conversation, else his prayers would be ineffectual (v. 14): “If iniquity be in thy hand (that is, if there be any sin which thou dost yet live in the practice of) put it far away, forsake it with detestation and a holy indignation, stedfastly resolving not to return to it, nor ever to have any thing more to do with it. Eze 18:31; Hos 14:9; Isa 30:22. If any of the gains of iniquity, any goods gotten by fraud or oppression, be in thy hand, make restitution thereof” (as Zaccheus, Luke xix. 8), “and shake thy hands from holding them,” Isa. xxxiii. 15. The guilt of sin is not removed if the gain of sin be not restored. 4. He must do his utmost to reform his family too: “Let not wickedness dwell in thy tabernacles; let not thy house harbour or shelter any wicked persons, any wicked practices, or any wealth gotten by wickedness.” He suspected that Job’s great household had been ill-governed, and that, where there were many, there were many wicked, and the ruin of his family was the punishment of the wickedness of it; and therefore, if he expected God should return to him, he must reform what was amiss there, and, though wickedness might come into his tabernacles, he must not suffer it to dwell there, Ps. ci. 3, c.
II. He assures him of comfort if he took this counsel, <i>v. 15, c. If he would repent and reform, he should, without doubt, be easy and happy, and all would be well. Perhaps Zophar might insinuate that, unless God did speedily make such a change as this in his condition, he and his friends would be confirmed in their opinion of him as a hypocrite and a dissembler with God. A great truth, however, is conveyed, That, the work of righteousness will be peace, and the effect of righteousness quietness and assurance for ever, Isa. xxxii. 17. Those that sincerely turn to God may expect,
1. A holy confidence towards God: “Then shalt thou lift up thy face towards heaven without spot thou mayest come boldly to the throne of grace, and not with that terror and amazement expressed,” ch. ix. 34. If our hearts condemn us not for hypocrisy and impenitency, then have we confidence in our approaches to God and expectations from him, 1 John iii. 21. If we are looked upon in the face of the anointed, our faces, that were dejected, may be lifted up–that were polluted, being washed with the blood of Christ, may be lifted up without spot. We may draw near in full assurance of faith when we are sprinkled from an evil conscience, Heb. x. 22. Some understand this of the clearing up of his credit before men, Ps. xxxvii. 6. If we make our peace with God, we may with cheerfulness look our friends in the face.
2. A holy composedness in themselves: Thou shalt be stedfast, and shalt not fear, not be afraid of evil tidings, thy heart being fixed, Ps. cxii. 7. Job was now full of confusion (ch. x. 15), while he looked upon God as his enemy and quarrelled with him; but Zophar assures him that, if he would submit and humble himself, his mind would be composed, and he would be freed from those frightful apprehensions he had of God, which put him into such an agitation. The less we are frightened the more we are fixed, and consequently the more fit we are for our services and for our sufferings.
3. A comfortable reflection upon their past troubles (v. 16): “Thou shalt forget thy misery, as the mother forgets her travailing pains, for joy that the child is born; thou shalt be perfectly freed from the impressions it makes upon thee, and thou shalt remember it as waters that pass away, or are poured out of a vessel, which leave no taste or tincture behind them, as other liquors do. The wounds of thy present affliction shall be perfectly healed, not only without a remaining scar, but without a remaining pain.” Job had endeavoured to forget his complaint (ch. ix. 27), but found he could not; his soul had still in remembrance the wormwood and the gall: but here Zophar puts him in a way to forget it; let him by faith and prayer bring his griefs and cares to God, an leave them with him, and then he shall forget them. Where sin sits heavily affliction sits lightly. If we duly remember our sins, we shall, in comparison with them, forget our misery, much more if we obtain the comfort of a sealed pardon and a settled peace. He whose iniquity is forgiven shall not say, I am sick, but shall forget his sickness, Isa. xxxiii. 24.
4. A comfortable prospect of their future peace. This Zophar here thinks to please Job with, in answer to the many despairing expressions he had used, as if it were to no purpose for him to hope ever to see good days again in this world: “Yea, but thou mayest” (says Zophar) “and good nights too.” A blessed change he here puts him in hopes of.
(1.) That though now his light was eclipsed it should shine out again, and more brightly than ever (v. 17),– that even his setting sun should out-shine his noon-day sun, and his evening be fair and clear as the morning, in respect both of honour and pleasure.–that his light should shine out of obscurity (Isa. lviii. 10), and the thick and dark cloud, from behind which his sun should break forth, would serve as a foil to its lustre,–that it should shine even in old age, and those evil days should be good days to him. Note, Those that truly turn to God then begin to shine forth; their path is as the shining light which increases, the period of their day will be the perfection of it, and their evening to this world will be their morning to a better.
(2.) That, though now he was in a continual fear and terror, he should live in a holy rest and security, and find himself continually safe and easy (v. 18): Thou shalt be secure, because there is hope. Note, Those who have a good hope, through grace, in God, and of heaven, are certainly safe, and have reason to be secure, how difficult soever the times are through which they pass in this world. He that walks uprightly may thus walk surely, because, though there are trouble and danger, yet there is hope that all will be well at last. Hope is an anchor of the soul, Heb. vi. 19. “Thou shalt dig about thee,” that is, “Thou shalt be as safe as an army in its entrenchments.” Those that submit to God’s government shall be taken under his protection, and then they are safe both day and night. [1.] By day, when they employ themselves abroad: “Thou shalt dig in safety, thou and thy servants for thee, and not be again set upon by the plunderers, who fell upon thy servants at plough,” Job 1:14; Job 1:15. It is no part of the promised prosperity that he should live in idleness, but that he should have a calling and follow it, and, when he was about the business of it, should be under the divine protection. Thou shalt dig and be safe, not rob and be safe, revel and be safe. The way of duty is the way of safety. [2.] By night, when they repose themselves at home: Thou shalt take thy rest (and the sleep of the labouring man is sweet) in safety, notwithstanding the dangers of the darkness. The pillar of cloud by day shall be a pillar of fire by night: “Thou shalt lie down (v. 19), not forced to wander where there is no place to lay thy head on, nor forced to watch and sit up in expectation of assaults; but thou shalt go to bed at bedtime, and not only shall non hurt thee, but none shall make thee afraid nor so much as give thee an alarm.” Note, It is a great mercy to have quiet nights and undisturbed sleeps; those say so that are within the hearing of the noise of war. And the way to be quiet is to seek unto God and keep ourselves in his love. Nothing needs make those afraid who return to God as their rest and take him for their habitation.
(3.) That, though now he was slighted, yet he should be courted: “Many shall make suit to thee, and think it their interest to secure thy friendship.” Suit is made to those that are eminently wise or reputed to be so, that are very rich or in power. Zophar knew Job so well that he foresaw that, how low soever this present ebb was, if once the tide turned, it would flow as high as ever; and he would be again the darling of his country. Those that rightly make suit to God will probably see the day when others will make suit to them, as the foolish virgins to the wise, Give us of your oil.
III. Zophar concludes with a brief account of the doom of wicked people (v. 20): But the eyes of the wicked shall fail. It should seem, he suspected that Job would not take his counsel, and here tells him what would then come of it, setting death as well as life before him. See what will become of those who persist in their wickedness, and will not be reformed. 1. They shall not reach the good they flatter themselves with the hopes of in this world and in the other. Disappointments will be their doom, their shame, their endless torment. Their eyes shall fail with expecting that which will never come. When a wicked man dies his expectation perishes, Prov. xi. 7. Their hope shall be as a puff of breath (margin), vanished and gone past recall. Or their hope will perish and expire as a man does when he gives up the ghost; it will fail them when they have most need of it and when they expected the accomplishment of it; it will die away, and leave them in utter confusion. 2. They shall not avoid the evil which sometimes they frighten themselves with the apprehensions of. They shall not escape the execution of the sentence passed upon them, can neither out-brave it nor outrun it. Those that will not fly to God will find it in vain to think of flying from him.
Fuente: Matthew Henry’s Whole Bible Commentary
3. The penitent will prosper; for the wicked there is no hope. (Job. 11:13-20)
TEXT 11:1320
13 If thou set thy heart aright,
And stretch oat thy hands toward him;
14 If iniquity be in thy hand, put It far away,
And let not unrighteousness dwell in thy tents.
15 Surely then shalt thou lift up thy face without spot;
Yea, thou shalt be stedfast, and shalt not fear:
16 For thou shalt forget thy misery;
Thou shalt remember it as waters that are passed away.
17 And thy life shall be clearer than the noonday;
Though there be darkness, it shall be as the morning.
18 And thou shalt be secure, because there is hope;
Yea, thou shalt search about thee, and shalt take thy rest in safety.
19 Also thou shalt lie down, and none shall make thee afraid;
Yea, many shall make suit unto thee.
20 But the eyes of the wicked shall fail, And they shall have no way to flee;
And their hope shall be the giving up of the ghost.
COMMENT 11:1320
Job. 11:13The pronoun you is emphatic in the text and contrasts Job with the hollow man of Job. 11:12. Zophar calls Job to do four things: (1) Get his heart right with God; (2) Pray to God for forgiveness; (3) Reform his life style to conform to Gods expectations; and (4) Set his entire household in order.
Job. 11:14Put evil far away from you. Do not permit it to exist in your household.
Job. 11:15Jobs face will no longer bear the marks of the guilty. The word translated steadfastsecurecomes from a verb used for describing the pouring of molten metalJob. 28:2; Job. 37:18.
Job. 11:16Here the phrase waters that are passed away is a metaphor for oblivian; in Job. 6:15 it is a metaphor for treachery. Zophar has also promised Job restoration to his former prosperous state. Ultimately, Jobs restoration did not come as a result of following any of the advice of his friends. You is emphatic. You will certainly forget all your misery.
Job. 11:17Hope and security will be Jobs once more. Your life (heledmeans durable, vigorous) will last into advanced age. The imagery of noonday is derived fromsohorayimzenithnoon. Compare this with Jobs descriptions in Job. 10:22of the darkness of Sheol as light.
Job. 11:18Jobs security (Hebrew verb means to search or dig about), Zophar claims, will be based on his removing the guilt. When Jobs guilt is removed, restpeacewill result.
Job. 11:19God will grant Job confidence. This same phrase none will make you afraid is also found in Mic. 4:4. When Job lived in the good graces of God, he was famousJob. 29:7-10, Job. 21:5; compare with Job. 19:18 and Job. 30:1-10. When he is restored to God, his fame and respectability, social influence, will also returnIsa. 17:2 and Zep. 3:13.
Job. 11:20The highest hope of the unrighteous is death. The ultimate goal should be to give up the spirit, i.e., lit. to breathe out of the soul. This assertion is Zophars not so subtle final suggestion to Job. In response, Job lashes out at his vehement sarcastic attack in chapters 1214.
Fuente: College Press Bible Study Textbook Series
Third division, in three strophes: AN EXHORTATION TO REPENTANCE AND NEWNESS OF LIFE, Job 11:13-20.
a. Repentance toward God, and the putting away of sin, are the conditions of spiritual confidence and security, Job 11:13-15.
13. Prepare heart Zophar has just spoken (Job 11:12) of “getting a heart,” (becoming wise,) but this is not to be secured without the putting forth of effort. As if the pointed reference were not enough, the emphatic thou defines whom he meant by the cruel taunt of the preceding verse.
And stretch thine hands The stretching out of the hands toward heaven in prayer was a very ancient and appropriate mode of worship. It symbolized an earnestness of desire that would not be satisfied with folded arms or hands, but that stretched them forth toward heaven as far as possible, as if it would drag a blessing down. Or, as Witsius, (on prayer, page 93,) suggests, it may denote sincerity, the attribute being that of one who would lay open what was hid. Or it may indicate hope, which relinquishes every other object and turns to God.
Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
Zophar Admonishes Job to Repent
v. 13. If thou prepare thine heart, v. 14. if iniquity be in thine hand, put it far away, and let not wickedness dwell in thy tabernacles, v. 15. For then shalt thou lift up thy face without spot v. 16. because thou shalt forget thy misery, v. 17. and thine age shall be clearer than the noonday, v. 18. And thou shalt be secure, v. 19. Also thou shalt lie down, and none shall make thee afraid, v. 20. But the eyes of the wicked shall fail,
Fuente: The Popular Commentary on the Bible by Kretzmann
(13) If thou prepare thine heart, and stretch out thine hands toward him; (14) If iniquity be in thine hand, put it far away, and let not wickedness dwell in thy tabernacles. (15) For then shalt thou lift up thy face without spot; yea, thou shalt be stedfast, and shalt not fear: (16) Because thou shalt forget thy misery, and remember it as waters that pass away: (17) And thine age shall be clearer than the noonday; thou shalt shine forth, thou shalt be as the morning. (18) And thou shalt be secure, because there is hope; yea, thou shalt dig about thee, and thou shalt take thy rest in safety. (19) Also thou shalt lie down, and none shall make thee afraid; yea, many shall make suit unto thee. (20) But the eyes of the wicked shall fail, and they shall not escape, and their hope shall be as the giving up of the ghost.
There is much good counsel in this advice of Zophar; though less applicable to Job than he thought. Job had confessed himself a sinner; but would not allow himself to be an hypocrite: and this was the point of contention. Zophor intimates by his speech, that he thought there was some secret dreadful transaction, which he had been guilty of, known only to the LORD, and Job’s own conscience; and therefore urgeth him to make confession, and to put it away. All the rest of his discourse is founded upon the same arguments, as had been pressed upon Job before, namely, that great sins required great punishment; and that Job’s calamities were on this account. So that until a reform took place, he could expect no relief: but when that point was accomplished, GOD’S mercy would follow.
Fuente: Hawker’s Poor Man’s Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
Job 11:13 If thou prepare thine heart, and stretch out thine hands toward him;
Ver. 13. If thou prepare thine heart ] viz. To meet God, Amo 4:12 , humbly submitting to his justice, and heartily imploring his mercy. The sum of what Zophar saith in the following verses is this: If thou truly repent, thou shall prosper; as if not, thou shall perish. This he might have said more fitly to most of us, who are deeply guilty, saith Lavater, than to Job, who was nothing so sinful as we are, and yet much more penitent. But Zophar calls upon him to quarrel with his faults, and not with his friends, and to break off his sins by repentance, without which, if he should have peace, it would be but like those short interims between the Egyptian plagues.
And stretch out thine hands toward him
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
If thou prepare. This was Zophar’s false theology.
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
Job 11:13-20
Job 11:13-20
ZOPHAR PROMISES RESTORATION IF JOB WILL CONFESS AND REPENT
“If thou set thy heart aright,
And stretch out thy hands toward him;
If iniquity be in thy hand, put it away,
And let righteousness dwell in thy tents.
Surely then shalt thou lift up thy face without spot;
Yea, thou shalt be steadfast, and shalt not fear:
For thou shalt forget thy misery;
Thou shalt remember it as waters that are passed away.
And thy life shall be clearer than the noonday;
though there be darkness, it shall be as the morning.
And thou shalt be secure because there is hope;
Yea, thou shalt search about thee, and shalt take thy rest in safety.
And thou shalt lie down, and none shall make thee afraid;
Yea, many shall make suit unto thee.
But the eyes of the wicked shall fail,
And they shall have no way to flee;
and their hope shall be the giving up of the ghost.”
“If thou set thy heart aright” (Job 11:13). “The word thou in this place is emphatic, carrying the implication that, “If thou with all thy wickedness, if even thou, wilt abandon it, thou shalt be restored.”
“Though there be darkness, it shall be as the morning” (Job 11:17). “This is a remarkable antithesis to what Job had said back in Job 10:21 f. Job’s future need not be a day of darkness whose very noon is night.” It may be, if only Job will confess and repent, a brighter day than any ordinary day at noon, “Whose very night is as bright as the morning.”
What comfort could such an exhortation have been to a man who knew nothing that he could confess and whose repentance, if he had pretended any, would have been the utmost hypocrisy?
We cannot escape the conviction that Satan here played one of his trump cards in his vain effort to shake the integrity of Job. Zophar and the other friends of Job, of course, were unaware that they, in these confrontations, were primary agents of the devil himself.
E.M. Zerr:
Job 11:13-15. This paragraph is a concise and direct statement of the position of the friends of Job. He was being afflicted for his sins, and if he would repent and make proper amends he would restore himself in the sight of God.
Job 11:16. After Job would have restored himself to God’s favor by proper acknowledgment, he would feel so good that all his past misery would be forgotten.
Job 11:17-18. Zophar unconsciously uttered a prophetic statement of the final state of Job. (Job 42:12.) But that state did not come to him as a result of doing what the three friends were demanding of him.
Job 11:19. Many shall make suit unto thee. This was another unconscious prophecy and the fulfillment may be seen in Job 42:8.
Job 11:20. This was a true statement but had no bearing on Job’s case. The friends of Job made so many remarks that were unrelated to the controversy under consideration, and the real issue was thereby thrown into confusion.
Fuente: Old and New Testaments Restoration Commentary
prepare: Job 5:8, Job 8:5, Job 8:6, Job 22:21, Job 22:22, 1Sa 7:3, 2Ch 12:14, 2Ch 19:3, Psa 78:8, Luk 12:47
stretch: Psa 68:31, Psa 88:9, Psa 143:6
Reciprocal: Exo 9:29 – spread 1Ki 8:22 – General 2Ch 6:12 – spread forth 2Ch 30:19 – prepareth Ezr 7:10 – prepared Job 15:11 – the consolations Job 22:23 – return Job 36:11 – spend Psa 44:20 – stretched Psa 126:6 – that goeth Pro 3:25 – Be Isa 1:16 – Wash Lam 3:40 – search
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
Job 11:13. If thou prepare thy heart Thy business, O Job, is not to quarrel with thy Maker, or his works; but to address thyself to him by prayer and supplication, sincerely repenting of all thy hard speeches, and other sins against God, and seeking him with a pure and upright heart; without which thy prayers will be in vain.
Fuente: Joseph Bensons Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
11:13 If thou {g} prepare thine heart, and stretch out thine hands toward him;
(g) If you repent, pray to him.
Fuente: Geneva Bible Notes
Zophar’s appeal to Job 11:13-20
Three steps would bring Job back to where he should be, said Zophar: repentance (Job 11:13), prayer (Job 11:13), and reformation (Job 11:14). He also painted the fruits of conversion for Job. These benefits were a clear conscience, faithfulness, and confidence (Job 11:15); forgetfulness of his troubles (Job 11:16); joy (Job 11:17); hope and rest (Job 11:18); and peace, popularity, and leadership (Job 11:19). Like Bildad, Zophar ended his first speech with a fire-breathing warning (Job 11:20; cf. Job 8:22).
"If Zophar was rough of manner, his desire and hope for Job may be observed, for his description of the prosperity which will come if he but set his heart right is longer and more beautiful than that of either Eliphaz or Bibdad." [Note: Morgan, p. 206.]
Whereas Eliphaz’s authority was personal experience, and Bildad’s was tradition, Zophar’s seems to have been intuition (cf. Job 20:1-5). It appears that Zophar held to what he believed about divine retribution simply because it seemed right to him. He offered no other reason for adopting this view than that it was self-evident, to him at least. His speech was more emotional than any given so far.
"The child who defined ’sympathy’ as ’your pain in my heart’ knew more about giving comfort than did these three." [Note: Wiersbe, p. 19.]