Job’s Dialogue with Three Friends – Job 3:1 to Job 31:40, which makes up the major portion of this book, consists of a dialogue between Job and his three friends. In this dialogue, Job’s friends engage in three rounds of accusations against Job, with him offering three defenses of his righteousness. Thus, Job and his friends are able to confirm each of their views with three speeches, since the Scriptures tell us that a matter is confirmed in the mouth of two or three witnesses (2Co 13:1). The underlying theme of this lengthy dialogue is man’s attempt to explain how a person is justified before God. Job will express his intense grief (Job 3:1-26), in which his three friends will answer by finding fault with Job. He will eventually respond to this condemnation in a declaration of faith that God Himself will provide a redeemer, who shall stand on earth in the latter days (Job 19:25-27). This is generally understood as a reference to the coming of Jesus Christ to redeem mankind from their sins.

Job’s declaration of his redeemer in Job 19:23-29, which would be recorded for ever, certainly moved the heart of God. This is perhaps the most popular passage in the book of Job, and reflects the depth of Job’s suffering and plea to God for redemption. God certainly answered his prayer by recording Job’s story in the eternal Word of God and by allowing Job to meet His Redeemer in Heaven. I can imagine God being moved by this prayer of Job and moving upon earth to provide someone to record Job’s testimony, and moving in the life of a man, such as Abraham, to prepare for the Coming of Christ. Perhaps it is this prayer that moved God to call Abraham out of the East and into the Promised Land.

The order in which these three friends deliver their speeches probably reflects their age of seniority, or their position in society.

Scene 1 First Round of Speeches Job 3:1 to Job 14:22

Scene 2 Second Round of Speeches Job 15:1 to Job 21:34

Scene 3 Third Round of Speeches Job 22:1 to Job 31:40

Fuente: Everett’s Study Notes on the Holy Scriptures

Bildad Rebukes Job Again.

Since Job had asserted his innocence in such emphatic terms, Bildad believed it incumbent upon him to reprove him, chiefly in two propositions, namely, that man cannot argue with God, and that no man is pure before God. He thereby changed the issue; for the original point of the friends had been that Job’s affliction proved him guilty of some special transgression in the sight of God.

v. 1. Then answered Bildad, the Shuhite, and said, speaking for the last time,

v. 2. Dominion and fear are with Him, the awe through which God exercises His sovereign power; He maketh peace in His high places, even the heavens and all their host being subject to Him and bowing to His decrees without argument.

v. 3. Is there any number of His armies, of whatever forces of angels and of heavenly powers He chooses to carry out His will? And upon whom doth His light arise? The great light of God’s majesty surpasses all understanding of creatures, it cannot be grasped by their finite minds, 1Ti 6:16. It shuts off in advance all criticism on the part of men.

v. 4. How, then, can man be justified with God? How could any mortal hope to vindicate himself in God’s sight? Or how can he be clean that is born of a woman? It is impossible for any man to contend with the Almighty in the hope of establishing his moral purity.

v. 5. Behold even to the moon, and it shineth not, the moon itself pales beside the absolute glory of God’s light; yea, the stars are not pure in His sight, their scintillating brilliancy also fades into darkness beside God’s majesty.

v. 6. How much less man, that is a worm, mortal man being like a maggot given to corruption in God’s sight, and the son of man, which is a worm, weak and groveling in the dust before the Lord’s almighty power! So Bildad emphasized the general sinfulness of man, his statements implying the admonition that Job should now confess with proper humility. It is so much easier to reprove others than to take a proper inventory of one’s own weaknesses and sins.

Fuente: The Popular Commentary on the Bible by Kretzmann

EXPOSITION

Job 25:1-6

Far from accepting Job’s challenge, and grappling with the difficulty involved in the frequent, if not universal, prosperity of the wicked. Bildad, in his weak reply, entirely avoids the subject, and limits himself to briefly touching two old and well-worn topicsthe might of God (verses 2, 3) and the universal sinfulness of men. On neither of these two points does he throw any fresh light. He avoids, however, the reckless charges of Eliphaz (Job 22:5-9) as well as the coarse menaces of Zophar (Job 20:5-29).

Job 25:1, Job 25:2

Then answered Bildad the Shuhite, and said, Dominion and fear are with him (i.e. with God). God is the absolute Sovereign of the universe, to whom, therefore, all created beings must perforce submit themselves. He is also terrible in his might, so that for their own sakes men should submit to his decrees. Through his active sovereignty, and the fear which he inspires, he maketh peace in his high places. The meaning may be that, through these high attributes, God maintains peace among the dwellers in the supernal regions; but beyond this there is a possible allusion to a time in which peace was disturbed, and the Almighty had to “make” it, or re-establish it, (On the subject of the “war in heaven,” and the defeat and subjection of the rebels, see the comment on Job 9:13.)

Job 25:3

Is there any number of his armies? (comp. Psa 68:17, “The chariots of God are twenty thousand, even thousands of angels;” and Dan 7:10, “Thousand thousands ministered unto him, and ten thousand times ten thousand stood before him;” see also 2Ki 6:16, 2Ki 6:17; Mat 26:53; Heb 12:22; Rev 9:16). The number of the angels at any given time must be a definite one. But as there is nothing to limit the further exercise of creative power in this direction, the possible number is indefinite. And upon whom doth not his light arise? Upon what being among all the countless thousands whom he hath created, or will create, does not the brightness of his effulgence shine in such sort that they are illumined by him, and themselves shine with a mere reflected splendour?

Job 25:4

How then can man be justified with God? If God’s creatures have no brightness of their own, and, when they shine, shine only with a reflected radiance, then certainly can no man be justified by his own merits. “All have sinned, and come short of the glory of God” (Rom 3:23). Or how can he be clean that is born of a woman! (comp. Job 14:4, “Who shall bring a clean thing out of an unclean? Not one;” and the comment ad loc.).

Job 25:5

Behold even to the moon, and it shineth not. Observe, i.e; all that is purely bright in creation, “even to the moon,” the most purely bright object of all, and consider that in God’s sight, compared to his radiance, it has no brightness”it shineth not.” Or turn your attention from the moon to the stars, rivals of the moon in purity and brilliance, and reflect that the stars are not pure in his sight. A sort of dusky veil overspreads them.

Job 25:6

How much less man, that is a worm? and the son of man, which is a worm? (comp. Psa 22:6). How much less can man be pure in God’s sight? An undoubted truth, or rather, perhaps, a truism, but not to the point, for Job has never really maintained that he is without sin (see Job 7:20, Job 7:21; Job 9:2, Job 9:20, etc.). He has only maintained that his sins have not been of such a character as to account for his sufferings.

HOMILETICS

Verses 14

Bildad to Job: The greatness of God and the littleness of man: an old sermon reproduced.

I. THE GREATNESS OF GOD. To impress Job with suitable conceptions of the ineffable majesty of that Divine Being before whom he desired so confidently and, as it appeared to the speaker, so irreverently to come (Job 23:3-5), Bildad depicts God’s dominion as:

1. Absolute in its character. “Dominion is with him” (verse 2); i.e. as it is with no other. Earthly potentates derive their sovereignty from him (Pro 8:15; 1Pe 2:14). He also is the Fountain of authority for whatever principalities and powers exist in the heavenly places (Col 1:16). But dominion exists in God essentially, absolutely, permanently. The uncreated, underived, and governmental supremacy of God is exhibited in Scripture with singular lucidity and fulness (Gen 14:19; Deu 10:14; 2Ki 19:15; 1Ch 29:11; Psa 95:3; Mat 11:25; Rev 19:6).

2. Awe-inspiring in its influence. “Dominion and fear are with him” (verse 2), the term “fear” defining the effect produced upon the creaturely imagination by the sublime majesty of the unnamed Deity, Bildad’s omission of that Deity’s name being a striking illustration of the precise import of his words. Reverential awe is the proper attitude for a creature to assume in presence of God (Deu 5:29; Deu 10:12; Jos 24:14; 2Ki 17:36; Psa 2:11); who should be feared by the inhabitants of earth generally (Psa 33:8), by his redeemed ones especially (Exo 15:11; Psa 89:17), by such as would serve him acceptably (Heb 12:28), by those who would dwell with him continually (Rev 11:18), by angelic hosts (Isa 6:2) and glorified saints (Rev 15:4). This fear should be based on the majestical government of God, as Lord of heaven and earth.

3. Peaceful in its efficiency. “He maketh peace in his high places” (verse 2), i.e. “among the celestial beings immediately surrounding him” (Delitzsch); producing

(1) harmony instead of discord, quenching all symptoms of internal dissension, and, where internecine warfare may have broken out, restoring the contending combatants to a state of tranquil amity;

(2) reconciliation instead of estrangement, pointing probably to some sublime act of mediation by which the holy angels were confirmed in obedience; and

(3) subjugation instead of revolt, exhibiting his power so effectively against the rebel angels that they are completely prevented from working harm against his throne or empire, hut are kept in chains against the judgment of the great day. As God rules in heaven, so also does he reign on earth in and through Christ, who is our Peacemaker (Eph 2:14), having by his incarnation made peace (unity instead of division) between Jew and Gentile, by his cross produced at-one-ment (the reconciliation of both in one body unto God), and by his power will ultimately effect the complete subjugation of his foes (1Co 15:24 28).

4. Illimitable in its sway. “Is there any number of his armies?” (verse 3). The armies alluded to are

(1) the angels (Psa 103:21), who are represented in Scripture as an innumerable (Psa 68:17; Heb 12:22; Rev 5:11) host, arrayed in military order (Dan 4:35), whose shining legions are led on by the power of the supreme Creator (Psa 104:4; Mat 25:31), every individual member thereof being promptly obedient to that Creators will (Zec 6:5; Mat 24:21; Heb 1:14).

(2) The stars, which also are in Scripture depicted as an army (Isa 40:26), are discovered by modern science to be immensely more numerous than ever entered into the mind of Bildad to conceive. Though not intended by Bildad, God’s armies may be said also to include

(3) the creatures generally, which are all in his hand and under his control

5. Beneficent in its administration. “And upon whom cloth not his light arise?” (verse 3).

(1) The light of his material sun, whose cheering beams, created (Gen 1:16) and directed by him, diffuse themselves abroad upon the face of earth (Psa 19:6), awaking life, imparting health, producing beauty, inspiring joy, blessing all creatures animate and inanimate, rational and irrational, good and bad alike (Mat 5:45). A sunless earth would be an arctic region of perpetual ice, a dismal chamber of horrors, a prison-house of misery, a cheerless sepulchre of death. Besides being signal demonstrations of God’s creative wisdom and power, the making of light and the disposition of it in a central orb are striking tokens of his goodness.

(2) The light of his providential favour, in respect of which he is styled “the Father of lights” (Jas 1:17). The goodness of God, like the light of the sun, is freely flowing (Jas 1:5), far-extending (Psa 33:5), all-enriching (Psa 145:9), never-failing (Psa 100:5). As the Divine beneficence blesses all God’s terrestrial creatures, we may rest assured it does not forget his celestial armies of saints and angels.

(3) The light of his gracious truth, which is also set forth in Scripture under the emblem of light (Isa 2:5; Isa 9:2; Joh 12:35; 2Co 4:4), Christ, in whom that light is embodied (Joh 1:4; Joh 9:5), is characterized as the true Light (Joh 1:8, Joh 1:9), being designed for the saving illumination of the spiritually benighted, collectively and individually. The light of his gospel is destined to circle round the earth like the sun (Psa 19:4; Rom 10:18).

6. All-transcending in its splendour. “Whom doth not his light surpass?” (Delitzsch), The resplendent Ruler of the numberless legions of heaven is One whose glory, i.e. as a personal Sovereign, outshines in radiance that of each and all of those beings of light over whom he reigns. These latter have no light they derive not from him, as the moon and planets have none they receive not from the sun, and Christians none that does not come to them from Christ, round whom they revolve like attendant satellites; and so the glory which the angels or other creatures have is as no glory by reason of “the glory that excelleth.”

II. THE LITTLENESS OF MAN. With a painful lack of originality, Bildad, the master of ancient laws and popular traditions, quietly appropriates a sentiment which already Eliphaz had uttered (Job 4:17-21; Job 15:14 16), and to which even Job had assented (Job 9:2; Job 14:4), that in comparison with so transcendently glorious a Being man must for ever be immeasurably insignificant and mean.

1. Guilty. “How then can man be justified with God?” (verse 4). The argument is a fortiori: If these radiant beings constituting God’s celestial armies would never think of contending with him in order to establish the faultless purity of their characters, it is simply monstrous to suppose that a frail man, whose feebleness is the result of a depraved moral constitution, would ever succeed in securing acquittal before the bar of a holy God. The language implies

(1) that no man can be justified by worksa doctrine pervading both the Old and New Testaments (Job 9:2; Psa 143:2; Isa 57:12; Rom 3:20; Eph 2:9; Tit 3:5);

(2) that if a man is to be justified, it must be by grace (Gen 15:6; Psa 32:2; Rom 3:24; Rom 5:21; Tit 3:7), i.e. without works and by faith; while it seems also to teach

(3) that the legal standing of the angels before the throne is not of works any more than man’sa doctrine of which obscure hints are believed to be found in Scripture.

2. Impure. “How can he be clean that is born of a woman?” (verse 4). In Bildad’s estimation the moral defilement of man is

(1) involved in his origin, as being the child of womana sentiment in which Job (cf. Job 14:1, Job 14:4) and Eliphaz (Job 15:14) alike concur (cf. homiletics, ‘in loc.);

(2) proved by his station: “Behold even to the moon, and it shineth not; yea, the stars are not pure in his sight: how much less, then, man?” (verses 5, 6). Bildad, soaring at a lower altitude than Eliphaz (Job 4:18), contrasts the glory of God with the purity of his highest creatures. The incomparable brilliance of an Oriental evening sky is attested by travellers; yet the pale, clear, silver whiteness of the moon’s light, and the sparkling lustre of the starry orbs, become dimmed beside the insufferable radiance of the Divine glory (1Ti 6:16). The imperfection of the highest creatures being thus established, it follows that man, one of the lowest (physically considered), cannot be pure.

3. Feeble. “Man that is a worm, and the son of man that is a worm” (verse 6). Man is compared by Eliphaz to a dweller in a mud hut (Job 4:19), and by Job to a flower springing up from the soil (Job 14:2). He is here likened to a worm bred by putrefaction, i.e. a mean, despicable, and insignificant creature (Psa 22:6), which he is

(1) in comparison with the rest of creation (Psa 8:3, Psa 8:4; Isa 41:24), but much more

(2) in comparison with the God of creation (Isa 40:22).

Learn:

1. The claim God has on the reverential homage of his creatures.

2. The antiquity of the gospel doctrine of justification by faith.

3. The humility man should cultivate in thinking of himself.

4. The infinite condescension of him who is the Lord of all the armies of light in becoming a worm and no man.

5. The transcendent glory of Divine grace which contemplates the elevation of “man that is a worm, and the son of man that is a worm,” to a position higher than the stars or the angels; yea, to a partnership in that very dominion (Rev 3:21) which belongs to God.

HOMILIES BY E. JOHNSON

Verse 14

The majesty of God and the weakness of man.

Leaving untouched the perplexing question of the prosperity of bad men, Bildad makes the point of his attack upon Job his assertions of innocence (Job 23:10-12). His object is to insist that, the distance between man and God being infinite, man cannot enter into controversy with God, nor can he be pure in his eyes. The address of Bildad consists mainly of repetitions from the previous discourses of Eliphaz (Job 4:17, sqq.; Job 15:14, sqq.)descriptions of the majesty and sublimity of God. In reply, Job seizes the opportunity offered by his antagonist, and, after a few bitter words of self-vindication, proceeds to outvie and far surpass Bildad in his description of the greatness of God.

I. GOD‘S MAJESTY; AND APPLICATION. (Verses 2-4.)

1. Absolute power, carrying with it overwhelming awe into the minds of his subjectsa power which has quelled the earlier discord of heaven and made peace in those heightsis associated with God (verse 2). He is “Lord of hosts,” and those hosts are innumerablethe stars of heaven, the angels who inhabit and guide them (Job 15:15); and all the marvellous forces of naturewinds, lightnings, waves (Job 38:19-21; Psa 104:4), which do his bidding (verse 3).

2. He is the absolute Light, from which all others are but reflected and derived. It is his garment and his glory (Psa 104:2; Eze 1:27, Eze 1:28; 1Ti 6:16). It blesses and cheers all that lives (Mat 5:45). No living creature is exempt from its all-pervading beams. Then how can a mortal be just with God? How can man, in his feebleness, enter into court and contend with absolute Power (comp. Job 9:2)? Thus the speaker would convict Job of folly. And then comes the second member of verse 4 leading to the second great thought of the speech: “How can he be pure that is born of a woman?”

II. GOD‘S PURITY; AND APPLICATION. (Verses 5, 6.) The bright silver lustre of the moon seems pale, the stars are dimmed, when compared with the essential and eternal splendour of the Highestto say nothing of man, the maggot, the worm! The stars are but the outer adornments of the palace and abode of God; and how, then, shall man, living on this dim spot that men call earth, think to meet God on equal terms and dispute with him? If he, like moon and stars, keeps to his rank and order, he may enjoy the benefit of God; if he attempts to travel beyond it, he will be crushed by the weight of the Divine majesty (Cocceius). The view of yonder glory reminds man of his sin and corruption. The celestial lustre is the sign of celestial purity in the inhabitants of heaven; his frailty and mortality are the evidence of his sin. The time has not yet come when, life and immortality being brought to light, man is conscious of the grandeur of his inward faith and of his spiritual destiny, when he refuses to be crushed by the dazzling might and splendour of the material universe because conscious of affinity to the creative thought.J.

HOMILIES BY R. GREEN

Job 25:4

Condemnation.

If, in the course of Job’s replies to his friends, he has sought to exculpate himself from all blame, and to aver his righteousness in the sight of God, he is now answered by a brief speech of his friend, “How can man be justified in the sight of God?” True, Job holdeth fast his integrity; true, he may be free from the accusations brought against him by his friends, who are unable in any other way to explain his suffering lot; yet, although he is so far clear, he shares the deep humiliation which attaches to all, of standing before the Divine throne a condemned criminal. He is unjust. Alas! the very “stars are not pure in his sight; how much less man, that is a worm?” This condemnation and inability of man to justify himself

I. PUTS AN END TO ALL BOASTFUL SELF–CONFIDENCE BEFORE GOD. How shall the condemned and sinful even enter into controversy with the Most High? How shall the frail child of earthearth-born and earthlycontend with God. Not Job only, but every one, must be silenced in presence of this truth, which has its witness in each man’s breast.

II. IS A CAUSE FOR PENITENT HUMILIATION BEFORE GOD. Truly the place of mansinful manis the dust. How shall the unclean dare to draw nigh unto the Holy One? Human feebleness and imperfectness should be sufficient to put men as in the dust; but if sinfulness, if a sense of condemnation before God, be added to this, how much greater cause for self-abasement is there? In penitence man has ground of hope, for the Lord lifteth up the meek; but in presumed self-justification he can only meet with confusion.

III. IS A REASON FOR THE EAGER EMBRACE OF THE MERCY OF GOD IN CHRIST. Whither shall a sinner fly? Where is true safety for him? In the revelation of the mercy of God to the penitent sinner there is an assured hope. This graciousness on the part of the Most High holds out the utmost encouragement to the self-condemned to return; while the inability to justify himself is in itself the highest reason why the gracious overture of God should receive from man an eager response.

IV. IS A HIGH MOTIVE TO STRICTNESS OF LIFE. With how much carefulness and lowliness and effort ought not he to live who by his very nature is so prone to err! “The son of man, which is a worm,” ought to seek to order his course before God with the utmost lowliness and care. A pensioner upon the Divine bounty, a criminal at the Divine bar, he has no warrant for rude self-assumption, but has need to seek, in patient, humble effort, to avoid deeper condemnation.R.G.

HOMILIES BY W.F. ADENEY

Job 25:2

Peace in high places.

Bildad tries to overawe Job by presenting what is indeed a true idea of God, although, if he had known the patriarch, he would have seen that there was nothing in it that was likely to be accepted as a specific rebuke. Job had maintained his innocence, and had cried out for God to vindicate it: “Oh that I knew where I might find him!” Bildad replies that God is a great Ruler in the heavenly heights, maintaining peace among his angelic armies; how can man be justified with One so great? It is meant to be a rebuke to Job’s presumption in appealing to so awful a Judge. Yet, if Job is innocent, why should he not dare to do so? Bildad is right in saying that God is so holy that none can stand before him without being abashed by shame. The unfairness is in making this truth a ground for accusing Job, not of the general evil of fallen creatures, but of exceptional enormities of guilt,

I. GOD RULES OVER ALL.

1. He is above all. We rise through the hierarchy of being from one stage to another, and at the head of all we find God. None can equal him, none can reach up to his might and holiness. Supreme in solitary perfection, he crowns the temple of being.

2. He includes all in his sway. His exaltation does not involve his separation from his creatures. On the contrary, it gives him a wide scope; from his exalted position he surveys the whole panorama of existence, and administers the affairs of the universe.

3. He exerts active influence over all. God is not an ornamental figure-head. He not only reigns, he rules. His government is absolute; not despotic, only because it is paternal.

II. GOD‘S RULE IS A NECESSITY OF THE UNIVERSE. The worlds could not go on without it. Confusion and chaos would follow if he withdrew his hand.

1. It is needed in heaven. Even there it is God who keeps the peace. The best-tempered society needs order and government to save it from falling into confusion. Heaven would become a babel of disorder if no regulating power were supreme there. The highest intelligences and the purest spirits require a regulative influence to keep them all in harmony. However well its harps are tuned, and however perfect is its music, the celestial orchestra needs one great leader.

2. Much more is it needed on earth. If heavenly beings cannot live aright without Divine guidance and rule, much more is this the case with earthly creatures, who are weak, ignorant, and sinful. If God makes his rule felt in maintaining the perfect order of heaven, assuredly he must make it felt in rectifying the wild disorder of earth.

III. GOD‘S RULE SECURES PEACE.

1. It maintains “peace in high places.“ There is peace above, though at present there may be confusion below. The heavens are calm, though the earth is storm-tossed. The changeless blue sky is above the shifting rack of clouds. Stars keep to their spheres. Angels perform their functions. The blessed dead are at rest. If we do but look high enough we shall see peace.

2. It will bring “peace on earth.“ When heaven touches earth the peace of heaven comes down among men. If God can keep peace among the greatest beings, surely he can establish it among puny mortals. He can reconcile all enmity or crush all opposition. Christ has come from the peace of heaven to be “our Peace” (Eph 2:14).W.F.A.

Job 25:3

The innumerable armies of God.

I. THEIR VAST NUMBERS. We can see no limit to the physical universe. The starry hemisphere dazzles us with its multitudinous splendour, but the telescope greatly increases our idea of its vastness, resolving fleecy mist into galaxies of worlds, and discovering distant suns invisible to the naked eye; and photography carries the process much further, and peoples the interstellar spaces of the telescope with hosts of still more remote stars. It is not reasonable to suppose that all these worlds are destitute of life, that our little planet is the solitary home of living creatures in a terrific desert of dead worlds. But if the material world be peopled, this may be but a small part of the universe. There may be other realms of existence unseen by the eye of sense; there may be material worlds that do not contain properties that can be detected by any of our five senses, although they are perceptible to the different senses of different orders of beings; and there may be creatures of God existing in regions that are not material, spirits that do not require what we understand by bodies. The revelation of Scripture gives us glimpses of inhabitants of other worlds than ours. It is reasonable to think that the great God rules over hosts of such beings.

II. THEIR ORDERLY ARRAY. They are armies, not mobs. As the physical universe is regulated by law and maintained in order, it is most probable that the same is true of the unseen universe. All that is revealed about God’s heavenly hosts shows them to us in obedience to God’s will. It is a human figure of speech that represents them as constituting armies. Milton’s poetry, added to the visions of the Apocalypse, have impressed our imaginations with military conceptions of the angelic hosts. But we do not know what tasks may be laid upon those armies of God in subduing the evil of the universe. We may be sure that the vulgar thirst for glory, the pride of brute strength, and the cruel rage of bloodshed that characterize our hideous wars, cannot be found among the hosts of heaven. Therefore the military idea of the angels needs to be received with caution. We are directed rather to the higher warlike qualities, e.g. discipline and obedience joined to courage and strength.

III. THEIR DIVINE LIGHT. They all have their light from God. On what earthly multitudes does the sun rise every day l Yet there is light for all. But an infinitesimal proportion of the sunlight and heat is received by our world; by far the greater quantity of it is scattered through realms of space. God’s light of love reaches all his creatures. There are no remote and dark regions of the universe that lie beyond his care. As there seems to be no end to the radiation of light when this is not hindered by obstructing objects, so no limit can be discovered to the radiation of God’s love. Though the hosts of beings are innumerable, there is a share of God’s goodness for each.

“Its streams the whole creation reach,

So plenteous is the store;

Enough for all, enough for each,

Enough for evermore.”

W.F.A.

Job 25:5, Job 25:6

The awe of God’s holiness.

I. THE INCOMPARABLE HOLINESS OF GOD. This is a thought that cannot be described in human language. When conscience is aroused, some thrill of the awe of it may open our minds to its sublime meaning. We start from the conception of the absolute sinlessness of God. Not a spot of evil can be found on all he is or does. But holiness is more than negative freedom from sin. It is a real excellence, and on its positive side it expands into infinity. We do not know how far goodness may go. It is like light. No one can conceive how intense this may be; after a short time it becomes too brilliant for our eyes, and we are only blinded when we look at it; but it is conceivable that its intensity may be increased a thousandfold beyond the highest degree that we are capable of perceiving. There may be a brilliancy of light compared with which the glare of a tropical noon is as dull and gloomy as an English November. So there may be a holiness which in its positive character rises above all we can conceive or imagine of goodness into infinite regions of perfection. We can see no limit to the strength and depth of love. Human love may be strong as death. Yet compared to God’s love it is but as a feeble, flickering flame lost in the full sunlight. No one can conceive how full and rich God’s love is. All the attributes of the Divine holiness expand into infinity. Their greatness is immeasurable and inconceivable.

II. ITS OVERAWING INFLUENCE. It is as though the moon cannot shine before such a Divine light. Even that silver shield seems to be tarnished when set by the side of the brightness of God’s holiness. The stars, which are far above the filth and corruption of earth, and move in heavenly spheres, do not seem to be pure in the light of God. This impression is natural, though of Course it is thrown into the form of poetic imagery. It leads to the humiliation of all human pride. If what is brightest looks dark in comparison with the splendour of God’s holiness, what must man be in his sight? Now, it is possible to abuse these conceptions, as Bildad was doing. God does not make men out to be worse than they are. He does not blame his creatures for not being equal to himself. He does not judge them by his own perfection, but only by their capacities. There is also a foolish way of depreciating humanity. There may be much pride in the heart of a man who calls himself “a worm.” Such language is only natural and right when it is wrung out of the soul by a deep consciousness of sin, and by an overwhelming perception of God’s holiness. On the other hand, when this is the case, there is no ground for despair. The last stronghold of pride being abandoned, there is room for the mercy of God to come in. God’s holiness is just the perfection of his love. The error has been in the separation of the two attributes. In the present day a shallow conception of holiness is tempting men to think lightly of sin, for it is the awe of God’s holiness that impresses on us the feeling of our own guilt. Out of the humiliation thus produced springs our only hopethe hope of free pardon and gracious renewal. Then the holiness of God becomes our inspiration; we are called to be perfect, as our Father in heaven is perfect.W.F.A.

Fuente: The Complete Pulpit Commentary

CHAP. XXV.

Bildad observes, that the dominion of God is supreme; that his armies are innumerable; and that no man can be just, compared with God.

Before Christ 1645.

Job 25:1. Then answered Bildad The last weak effort against Job is made by Bildad. The three friends, finding themselves quite baffled in their purpose, which was, to make Job confess himself guilty of some enormous crimes, which they rashly supposed to have drawn this heavy judgment upon him; instead of ingenuously owning themselves in the wrong, which, if one may guess from the usual issue of disputes, is one of the hardest things in the world, this grave antagonist satisfies himself with an evasive answer to this purpose: namely, that no man, strictly speaking, can be justified before God; man being at best a frail and fallible creature, and God a Being of infinite purity and perfection: which is an argument that concerned Job no more than themselves, but must involve them all, without distinction, in the same class of sinners. As we here take our leave of the arguments urged by Job’s friends, we may just observe in conclusion, that nothing could be more untoward than this conduct of theirs, to bring a charge against him which they could not prove, and from which his well-known virtue and integrity of life ought to have screened him. But, though Job very plainly shews them the injustice and inhumanity of this procedure, nay, though he confutes them so far that they had nothing to reply; yet, like modern disputants, they stood out to the last, and had not the grace to own their mistake, till God himself was pleased to thunder it in their ears. Here, then, we have a lively instance of the force of prejudice and prepossession.

Fuente: Commentary on the Holy Bible by Thomas Coke

II. Bildad and Job: Chap. 2526

A.Bildad: Again setting forth the contrast between Gods exaltation and human impotence

Job 25

1. Man cannot argue with God

Job 25:2-4

1Then answered Bildad the Shuhite, and said:

2Dominion and fear are with Him,

He maketh peace in His high places.

3Is there any number of His armies?

and upon whom doth not His light arise?

4How then can man be justified with God?

or how can he be clean that is born of a woman?

2. Man is not pure before God: Job 25:5-6

5Behold even to the moon, and it shineth not;

yea, the stars are not pure in His sight.

6How much less man, that is a worm;

and the son of man, which is a worm?

B.Job: Rebuke of his opponent, accompanied by a description, far surpassing his, of the exaltation and greatness of God

Job 26

1. Sharp rebuff of Bildad: Job 26:1-4

1But Job answered, and said:

2How hast thou helped him that is without power?

how savest thou the arm that hath no strength?

3How hast thou counselled him that hath no wisdom?

and how hast thou plentifully declared the thing as it is?

4To whom hast thou uttered words?

and whose spirit came from thee?

2. Description of the incomparable sovereignty and exaltation of God, given to surpass the far less spirited effort of Bildad in this direction: Job 26:6-14

5Dead things are formed

from under the waters, and the inhabitants thereof.

6Hell is naked before Him,

and destruction hath no covering.

7He stretcheth out the north over the empty place,

and hangeth the earth upon nothing.

8He bindeth up the waters in His thick clouds;

and the cloud is not rent under them.

9He holdeth back the face of His throne,

and spreadeth His cloud upon it.

10He hath compassed the waters with bounds,

until the day and night come to an end.

11The pillars of heaven tremble,

and are astonished at His reproof.

12He divideth the sea with His power,

and by His understanding He smiteth through the proud.

13By His spirit He hath garnished the heavens;

His hand hath formed the crooked serpent.

14Lo, these are parts of His ways:

but how little a portion is heard of Him?

but the thunder of His power who can understand?

EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL

1. Jobs reply to the last assaults of Eliphaz had certainly avoided all personality, but had at the same time asserted his complete innocence in very strong, almost objectionable language (Job 23:10-12). It is more particularly to this vulnerable point that Bildad turns his attention in this, his last discourse, which limits itself to showing how unbecoming it is for manthis miserable worm of the earthto arrogate to himself any right whatever before God, or to impute to himself any justice. In substance, accordingly, he lays down only two propositions, and that without enlarging on them, to wit: (1) Man cannot argue with God, the Almighty; (2) Before God, the Holy One, man cannot be pure. In this discourse, which closes the series of attacks on Job, he describes the divine greatness and exaltation, a description which is decidedly meagre, made up only of repetitions of what Eliphaz had said in his former discourses (comp. Job 4:17 seq.; Job 15:14 seq.). No wonder that Job discovers the opportunity thus presented to him, and in his reply, first of all, addresses to the speaker a sharp, bitterly satirical rebuff, and then meets his propositions in regard to Gods greatness and holiness, not by denying them, but by surpassing them with a far more magnificent and eloquent description of the same divine attributes. [And note particularly that as Bildads illustrations of his theme are drawn from the heavenly hosts and luminaries, Job in his reply dwells principally, though not exclusively on Gods greatness as manifested in the heavens above.E.]The Strophe-scheme of both discourses is very simple, Bildads discourse containing only two strophes, the first of three, the second of two verses; Jobs discourse containing four strophes, each of three verses.

2. The last discourse of Bildad: Job 25. Man can neither argue with God, nor is he pure before Him.

First Strophe: Job 25:2-4.Dominion and fear are with Him, who maketh peace in His high places., lit. to wield dominion, to exercise sovereignty, a substantive Inf. absol. Hiph.; comp. Ewald, 156, e.[ is added in order to set forth the terrible majesty of this sovereignty.Schlott.] cannot be understood as a more precise qualification of the subject: He in His high places, He who is enthroned in the heights of heaven (Reimarus, Umbreit, Hahn). It is rather a local qualification of the action affirmed of the subject. It accordingly describes the peace founded by God as established in the heights of heaven, and so having reference to the inhabitants of heaven, and pre-supposing their former strife. Bear in mind what was said above by Job of Gods judging those in heaven (Job 21:22), and comp. Isa 24:21; also below Job 26:13.It is a weakening of the sense which is scarcely justified by the language to understand the passage as teaching Gods agency in harmonizing either the elements of the heavenly Kosmos (the perpetually recurring cycle, the wonderfully ordered paths of the stars, comp. Clemens Rom. 1 Cor. 19), or the discord of the heavenly spirits, conceived of only in the most abstract possible manner, but in truth continually averted by God, and thus as teaching the maintenance, not the making or institution, of peace (so Seb. Schmidt, J. Lange, Starke, etc.). [Ewald explains the words of the heavenly powers and spirits represented by the innumerable host of the stars, which might indeed some time be at war among themselves, but which are ever brought again by the Higher Power into order and peace. But nothing whatever is said elsewhere of such a discord as now coming to pass in the upper world. All analogies point rather to a definite fact which is assigned to the beginning of creation. Schlott.].

Job 25:3. Is there any number to His armies?, synonymous with , which is used elsewhere in this sense, are Gods hosts or armies, the stars, first of all, indeed, the heavenly armies, together with the angels which rule and inhabit them (comp. above on Job 15:15). Whether also the lower forces of nature, such as lightnings, winds, etc. (comp. Job 38:19 seq.; Psa 104:4, etc.) are intended, as Dillmann thinks is doubtful in view of the indefiniteness of the figurative form of expression. And upon whom does not His light arise?The emphatic suffix ehu in (comp. , Job 24:23) puts His light, to wit Gods own light, in contrast with the derived lower light of His hosts. The expression is scarcely to be understood of the sunlight, which indeed itself belongs to the number of these : neither can be taken = (neither here, nor Job 11:17). It is inadmissible accordingly to refer the words to the rising sun, as a sign of the fatherly beneficent solicitude of God for His earthly creatures (comp. Mat 5:45. So against Mercier, Hirz. Hahn, Schlott., etc.). We are to understand them rather of that absolutely supra-terrestrial light in which God dwells, which He wears as His garment, by which indeed He manifests His being, His heavenly doxa (Psa 104:2; Eze 1:27 seq.; 1Ti 6:16, etc.). In respect to this light Bildad asks: upon whom does it not arise? The question is not: whom does it not surpass? [over whom (i.e. which of these beings of light) does it not rise, leaving it behind, and exceeding it in brightness? Delitzsch], for would scarcely be appropriate for this thought, since the degree of light is not measured by its height (against Ewald, Heiligst., Del.)but: upon whom does it not dispense blessings and happiness? (Dillm.)

Job 25:4. How could a mortal be just with God(comp. Job 9:2): i. e. how could he appear before Him, to whose absolute power all heavenly beings are subject, arguing with Him, and making pretensions to righteousness? The second member, with which Job 4:17; Job 15:14 may be compared, stands connected with the principal thought of the discourse, which immediately follows, to the effect that no man possesses purity or moral spotlessness before God.

Second strophe: Job 25:5-6.

Job 25:5. Behold, even the moon, it shineth not brightly, and the stars are not pure in His eyes., lit. even to the moon, i.e. even as regards the moon. In the following the is the Vav of the apodosis; comp. Gesen. 145 [ 142], 2; and see above Job 23:12. = from , an alternate form, found only here, of , to be bright, to shine; comp. Job 31:26. Gekatilias attempt to render the verbto pitch a tent, is inadmissible, for that must have read , in order to yield the meaningHe pitcheth not his tent.The clausein His eyesin the second member, belongs also to the first. Comp. the parallel passages already cited in Job 4:15.Furthermore it is only the physical light, the silver-white streaming brilliancy of the stars, which is here put beside the absolute glory of Gods light (which is at once physical and ethical). Scarcely is there reference to the angels as inhabiting the stars, and to their moral purity (against Hirzel); from which however nothing can be inferred unfavorable to the theory that the stars, i.e., the heavenly globes of the starry world, are inhabited by angels.

Job 25:6. Much less then ( , as in Job 15:16) mortal man, the worm, etc. In regard to these figures of the maggot and the worm, as setting forth the insignificance, weakness, and contemptibleness of man, comp. Psa 22:7 [6]; also Isa 53:2, and similar descriptions.

3. Jobs rejoinder: Job 26. First Division (and Strophe): Job 26:2-4 : Sharp ironical rebuke of Bildad.

Job 26:2. How hast thou helped the powerless! here, like , is equivalent to an ironicalHow well! How excellent! (comp. Job 19:28). , lit. no-power is abstr. pro conc. = the powerless; so also in b = the strengthless, the feeble; and in Job 26:3 a =the unwise, ignorant. By these three parallel descriptive clauses Job means of course himself, as the object of the well-intended, but perverted attempts of the friends to teach him (not God, as Mercier, Schlottm., etc. explain) [as though Bildad had regarded God as too feeble to maintain His own cause. But against this explanation the choice of verbs, if nothing else, would be, as Delitzsch argues, decisive].

Job 26:3..and hast declared wisdom in abundance (, lit. for multitude) [an ironical hit at the poverty-stricken brevity of B.s speech. Dillm.]. , here as in Job 5:12 may be rendered by that which is to be accomplished, provided it be referred to the intellectual world, and so understood as vera et realis sapientia (J. H. Mich.). Here indeed the word is used ironically of its opposite.

Job 26:4. To whom hast thou uttered words?i. e. whom hast thou been desirous of reaching by thy words? for whom were thy elaborate speeches coined? was it, possibly, for me, who have not been touched by them in the least? So correctly the LXX.: , and the Vulg.: quem docere voluisti? The translation: with whose assistance () hast thou utttered these words? (Arnh. Hahn) [Con.] seems indeed to be favored by b, but is condemned by the construction of the verb elsewhere in our book with a double accusative (so also Job 31:37; comp. Eze 43:10), and does not agree so well with what precedes.And whose breath went forth from thee?i.e. from what kind of inspiration (inbreathing) hast thou spoken? is it the divine? Num Deo inspirante locutus es? The question involves a biting irony; for the speech of Bildad, so poor and meagre in thought, merely repeating a little of what Eliphaz had said already, might look accordingly as though it had been inspired by the latter.

4. Second Division: Job 26:5-14 : Eclipsing and surpassing the description given by Bildad of the exaltation and majesty of God by one far more glorious.

Second Strophe: Job 26:5-7. While Bildads description took its start from heaven, and it stars, Job begins by appealing to the realm of shades, together with its subterranean inhabitants as witnesses of the divine omnipotence and majesty, in order from this depth, the lowest foundation of all that is, to mount upward to the heavenly worldThe shades are made to tremble. are not giants, as the Ancient Versions render the word, but in accordance with the root (to be slack, relaxed, exhausted, comp. Ewald, 55, e), weak, powerless, namely, the marrowless and bloodless shades or forms of the underworld, the wretched inhabitants of the realm of the dead; so also in Psa 88:11 [10]; Pro 2:18; Pro 9:18, and often: Isa 26:14; Isa 26:19; comp. Job 14:9 seq. [It seems every way reasonable to associate with the idea of weakness, nervelessness, etc., here given to the word that of gigantic stature, when we remember that this same word did denote a race of earthly giants, and that the tendency of the imagination to magnify the spectral forms of the dead is so common, if not universal. So Good: The spectres of deified heroes were conceived, in the first ages of the world, to be of vast and more than mortal stature, as we learn from the following of Lucretius:

Quippe et enim jam tum divm mortalia secla
Egregias animo fades vigilante videbant;
Et magis in somnis mirando corporis actu.

This idea will certainly add to the gloomy sublimity of the description here. Let one imagine the gigantic marrowless, bloodless phantoms or shades below writhe like a woman in travail as often as the majesty of the heavenly Ruler is felt by them, as perhaps by the raging of the sea, or the quaking of the earth. Delitzsch. That even these beings, although otherwise without feeling or motion, and situated at an immeasurable distance from Gods dwelling-place are sensible of the effects of Gods activity,this is a much stronger witness to Gods greatness than aught that B. had alleged. Hirzel]. Of these shades, living far from God in the depths under the earth and under the seas (comp. b: beneath the waters and their inhabitants), it is here said: they are put in terror, they are made to tremble and quake (, Pul. from , comp. Ewald, 141 b), an expression which, like Psa 139:8; Pro 15:11, is intended to describe the energy of the divine omnipotence as illimitable and filling all things, extending even down to Sheol. Comp. also Jam 2:19, a passage otherwise related to the one before us, and perhaps suggested by it, but having a different purpose. [The rendering of E. V. needs but to be compared with the above to show how erroneous and unsatisfactory it is.E.].

Job 26:6. Naked is the underworld before Him (comp. Heb 4:13 : ), and the abyss of hell has no covering (for Him). Comp. on Pro 15:11, a passage parallel to this in matter, where (lit. destruction, annihilation) stands precisely as here as a synonym of ; also Psa 139:8, and below Job 38:17. [The definition, destruction, annihilation here given for is of course not to be understood in the metaphysical sense of the extinction of being. It is the destruction of life, as enjoyed on the face of the earth; the extinction of light, the derangement of order, the wasting away of all vital energy and beauty. Hence as describes the underworld as the insatiable receptacle of the departed, demanding and drawing men into itself, orcus rapax, gives us a glimpse yet deeper into its abysmal horrors, its destructive, wasting potencies. Hence the fearful significance with which in Rev. (Job 9:11) it is applied, as the Hebrew equivalent to the Greek Apollyon, to the angel of the bottomless pit.E.].

Job 26:7. Who stretcheth out the northern heavens over empty space.The Participles in this and the two following verses attach themselves to God, the logical subject of the ver. preceding [and are used to describe the divine activity herein specified as continuous]. Our rendering of in the sense of the northern heavens, the northern half of the heavenly vault, has decisively in its favor the verb , which is never used of the stretching out or expansion of the earth, or a part of it, but always of the out-stretching of the heavenly vault, which is conceived of as a tent; comp. Job 9:8; Isa 40:22; Isa 44:24; Zec 12:1; Psa 104:2, etc. It would be singular, moreover, if Job had first mentioned only a part of the earth, the northern, and not until afterwards had mentioned it as a whole, however true it might be that the popular notion of oriental antiquity, which represented the north of the earth as a part of it which abounded most in mountains, and was highest and heaviest, would seem to favor this view (against Hirzel, Ewald, Heiligst., Schlottmann, Dillmann). [Ewald calls attention to the corresponding Hindu notion concerning the north. Schlottmann thinks such a reference to the north as the heaviest part of the earth best suited to the connection. Dillmann argues that it could not properly be affirmed of the heavens, that they are stretched out over the ]. The reference of to the northern hemisphere of the heavens (Umbreit, Vaih., Hahn., Olsh., Del., etc.) is favored also by this considetion in addition to those already mentioned, that all the more important constellations which our book mentions (the Bear, Pleiades, etc.) belong to this northern hemisphere, and that moreover among other people of the ancient world, the pole (i. e. the north pole), and heaven, are used as synonyms; so especially among the Romans (Varro, de L. L. vii. 2, 14; Ovid, Fast. 6, 278; Horace, and other poets). The correct view was substantially given by Brentius: Synecdoche, a part for the whole; for Aquino, which is Septentrio [North] is used for the whole heaven or firmament. Hangeth the earth upon nothing: , not anything [lit. not-what] = nothing, here substantially synonymous with the empty space, (comp. Gen 1:2), hence denoting the endless empty space in which the earth (which according to Job 26:10 is conceived of as a flat disk, rather than as a ball). together with the overarching northern heavens, hangs freely. The cosmological conception of the suspension of the earth in the empty space of the universe (with which may be compared parallel representations from the classics, such as Lucretius II., 600 seq.. Ovid, Fast. II., 269 seq.) does not conflict with the mention of the pillars of the earth in Job 9:6, for the reason that the pillars are conceived of as the inner roots or bones, the skeleton as it were of the body of the earth. It is only quite indirectly that the passage before us can be used to prove the creation of the world out of nothing. We may suggest as worthy of note the descriptions, which remind us of the one before us, in the more recent oriental poets, as e. g. the Persian Ferideddin Attar (in 5. Hammer, Geschichte der schnen Redeknste Persiens, p. 141, 143):

Pillarless he spreads out the heavens
A canopy above the earth.
What bears the atmosphere? Tis nothing,
Nothing on nothing, and only nothing;
also the Arabian Audeddin Alnasaph (de religione Sonnitar., princ. Job 5:2):

Out of a breath He made the heavens; and already in the Koran, in its Sur. Job 13:2, it is said: It is Allah, who has built the heavens on high, without founding it on visible pillars. Comp. Umbreit on the ver.

Third Strophe: Job 26:8-10. Who bindeth up (or shuts in, comp. Pro 30:4, c) the waters in His clouds: which accordingly are regarded as vessels [bags, bottles, etc.] or transparent enclosures for the waters of the heavens above: without the clouds bursting under them (the waters); i. e. so that the weight of these masses of water does not cause them to pour themselves forth in torrents of rain out of their cloud-vessels, implying that this is as God expressly wills and orders it; comp. Gen 7:11; Gen 8:2. [By which nothing more or less is meant than that the physical and meteorological laws of rain are of Gods appointment. Del.].

Job 26:9 [describes the dark and thickly clouded sky that showers down the rain in the appointed rainy season. Del.] Who enshroudeth the outside of His thronelit. of the throne, for , as in 1Ki 10:19 is for , scarcely, as Hirzel thinks, by an error of transcription for . But unquestionably the throne is simply = His throne, Gods throne in heaven (comp. Isa 66:1; Mat 5:34). It is said of the face or outside () of this throne, i. e., that side of it which is turned towards this earth, that God encloses or enshrouds it by causing the clouds to come between it and the earth. , Piel from , used here of the artificial veiling, or unclosing, draping it as it were) [ signifies to take hold of, in architecture to hold together by means of beams, or to fasten together. then also as usually in Chald. and Syr. to shut (by means of cross-bars, Neh 7:3), here to shut off by surrounding with clouds. Del. Hence not exactly to hold back, E. V. but to fasten up. Merx understands the verb of bearing, holding up, and the verse to set forth the miracle that God bears up the throne on which He sits. But in that case would be superfluous. E.]. Spreading over it His cloudsthis member of the verse explaining the former. refers to , and the quadril. verb is Inf. Absol. and may thus be rendered in Latin by expendendo, in our language by the Pres. Active Participle (comp. Ew. 141, c; and Del. on the ver.) [According to others, e. g., Dillmann, Green, 189 a, the vb. is preterite. Gesenius (Lex) regards the quadriliteral as a mixed form, from and . Delitzsch argues forcibly against this, and regards it as an intensive form of , formed by prosthesis, and an Arabic change of Sin into Shin.]

Job 26:10 [passes from the waters above to the waters below]. He hath rounded off (encircled, , comp. the of the LXX.) a bound ( as in Job 14:5) for the face of the water, to the ending of the light beside the darkness: or to the extremity (the confines, the boundary line) of the light with the darkness, ad lucis usque tenebrarumque confinia (Pareau). So correctly Del. and Dill. [E. V. Con., Words., Carey, Renan., Rod. Merx], while most moderns (Rosenm., Ewald, Hirz., Schlottm., Hahn, etc.) take by itself in an adverbial sense, most perfectly, most accurately, (comp. Job 28:3), take either as a remoter accus. of (so Hirz.), or as Genit. to , standing at the head of the clause in the construct state (so Ewald). In either case, however, we get a construction which is much too harsh. As proving that is by no means necessarily used adverbially, comp. above Job 11:7. The meaning of the verse will be rightly apprehended only by referring it not to the limit in time between light and darkness, i. e. to the regular succession of day and night (Schlottm.), but to the limit in space, the line separating between the light and dark regions of the heavenly circle, which runs along the surface of the waters of the ocean, encircling the earth. That is to say this description, like that in Pro 8:27, has for its basis the conception, prevalent also among the classic nations, and down into the middle ages, that the earth is encompassed all around by water, or a sea,that upon this earth-encircling ocean is marked out the circle of the celestial hemisphere, along which the sun and stars run their course (so that a part of the water lies within this circle)that the region of the stars, of the light, lies inside of this circle, and that the region of darkness begins outside of it; comp. Voss on Virg. Georg. I., 240 seq. Dillm.

Fourth Strophe: Job 26:11-13.The pillars of heaven are made to tremble, and are astonished at His rebuke.Pillars of heaven is the name which the poet gives to the mountains towering upon high, which seem as it were to bear up the arch of heaven; comp. the ancient classic legend of Atlas, and see above on Job 9:6. In speaking of these pillars as moved to trembling (, Piel. from , ) [the signification of violent and quick motion backwards and forwards is secured to the verb by forms in the Targ., Talm. and Arabic.Del.], and as fleeing in astonishment before Gods rebuking thunder (comp. Psa 104:7; Isa 50:2; Nah 1:4), the poet describes here he phenomenon of an earthquake, or that of a tremendous thunderstorm (comp. Psalms 29.; also Rev 6:12 seq.; Job 20:11).

Job 26:12. By His power He frightens up the sea. here not intransitive as in Job 7:5; but transitive in the sense of frightening up, arousing, (comp. Isa 51:15; Jer 31:35); hardly in the sense of intimidating, or putting at rest, as some expositors [Umbreit, Dillm. [Conant, Carey, Rod.], etc.) render the verb after the LXX. (). [E. V. divideth (and so Bernard) here, and in all the passages cited: but unsupported and less suitably.]And by His understanding He smites Rahab in pieces.Comp. on Job 9:13, where already it was shown to be necessary to understand (LXX.: ) of a colossal demon-monster of legendary antiquity (not of Egypt, nor of the raging fury of the sea, to which , to shatter, to dash in pieces would not be suitable).

Job 26:13. By His breath the heavens become bright: lit. are brightness, , a substantive found only here, which, however, does not denote a permanent quality of the heavens (Rosenm.), but one that is transiently [occasionally] produced by God [by His breath He scatters the clouds, and brightens the face of heaven]; His hand hath pierced the fleeing serpent., Po. from , Isa 51:9, hence perforavit, trucidavit; not Pil. from or , so that it would express the idea of forming, creating as the Targ., Jer., Rosenm., Arnh., Vaih., Welte, Renan [E. V., Con., Noy., Ber., Rod.], explain. For here again the discourse treats not of a creative energy of God, but of one that is exercised as a part of the established order of nature, and in all probability it discusses the same theme as that to which Job 3:8 refers, to wit, the production of eclipses of the sun and moon. For the popular superstition prevalent at the time of the composition of our book conceived of this phenomenon as consisting in the attempt of a dragon-like dark monster to swallow up these luminaries, accompanied by an intervention of God, who slays or strangles this monster [so that it was customary to say, when the sun or moon was eclipsed: The Dragon, or the Flying Serpent, has wound around it; and on the other hand when it was released from the obscuration: God has killed the Dragon. Dillm.] It is to this exercise of Gods power, bringing deliverance, that the clause refers, while (the same expression also in Isa 27:1) denotes the monster referred to, which is represented as seized upon in the act of fleeing (before God), hence as a fugitive, fleeing serpent. In that parallel passage in Isaiah, the LXX. rightly translate by , while their rendering in the passage before us, , whether we regard the language or the thought, is equally inadmissible with the coluber tortuosus of the Vulg. [followed by E. V. crooked serpent], or the serpenlem vectem of the same version in Isa 27:1 (comp. the , the barring serpent, of Symmachus).

Job 26:14. A recapitulating closing verse, standing outside of the schema of strophes.Lo, these ( pointing backwards, as in Job 18:21) are the ends of His ways; or, of His way, according to the Kthibh; the same wavering between and to be seen also in Pro 8:22. The ends or borders (Delitzsch) [Conant, Words., etc.,] of Gods ways are the extreme outlines of what He is doing in governing the world, those intimations of His heavenly activity which are lowest, and nearest, and most immediately accessible to our power of apprehension.And what a faintly whispering word (it is) that we hear! , lit. and what a whisper of a word. For this combination of with a substantive in apposition, comp. Psa 30:10; Isa 40:18; and for with of the attentive hearing of anything, see above Job 21:2; also Job 37:2; Gen 27:5; Psa 92:12. Against the partitive rendering of , advocated by Schlott. and Delitzsch, may be urged the plur form , preferred by the Masoretes, as well as the probability that to express this meaning the preposition would rather have been used. [Here again, as in Job 4:12, the incorrect rendering of E. V.: How little a portion is heard of Him, mars the poetic beauty and graphic contrast of the passage. On Wordsworth remarks: We feel as it were a zephyr of Gods Presence walking in the garden of this world in the cool of the day.]But the thunder of His omnipotence (according to the Kri , his energies) who can understand?i. e. the full, unmodified manifestation of His energies, the unsmothered thunder-course of His heavenly spheres (comp. what Raphael says in the Prologue to Faust) would be unbearable by us, frail, sinful children of earth. [Job could not have uttered in nobler language his deep feeling of the degree in which the divine glory surpasses all human knowledge. There resounds in it in truth an echo of the far-off divine thunder itself, and before this the poet has the friends now become entirely dumb. Schlottm.]

DOCTRINAL, ETHICAL AND HOMILETICAL

1. That which Bildad brings forward against Job in Job 25. is so meagre, and possesses so little novelty, that it may be said, that in his discourse the opposition of the friends dies the death of exhaustion, and that the bitter irony of Jobs rejoinder to it seems fully justified. For the real problem which underlies the whole controversythe great mystery touching the frequency with which the innocent suffer, which Job had again set forth so eloquently just beforethat problem Bildad certainly does not consider. He avoids indeed those bitter personalities and odious accusations against Job with which Eliphaz had made his exit just before in a manner that was altogether unworthy, and takes his leave of the sufferer, whom he himself also had heretofore violently assailed, in a way that is relatively friendlyin a way in which the final peaceful termination of the conflict (Job 42:7-9) is remotely intimated. That which Bildad actually brings forward is a truth which does not at all touch the real point at issue, which Job himself has on former occasions expressly conceded (see Job 9:2; Job 14:4), the same truth which Eliphaz had in his first two discourses prominently emphasized, and in the renewed statement of which, at this time, Bildad closely copies even the expressions of his older associate. He only reminds Job of the universal sinfulness of the human race once again, without direct accusation, in order that Job may himself derive from it the admonition to humble himself; and this admonition Job really needs, for his speeches are in many ways contrary to that humility which is still the duty of sinful man, even in connection with the best justified consciousness of right thoughts and actions towards the holy God (Del.).

2. Of the fact that Job is still wanting in proper humility, and in a profound perception of sin, he at once proceeds to give evidence in his rejoinder in Job 26. In this he appears as decisively victorious over his opponents, who have shown themselves totally unequal to the problem to be solved, while he, by his emphatic reference to the incomprehensibleness and unsearchableness of Gods ways, had made at least an important advance towards its solution, and had shown his appreciation of the mystery as such in its entire significance. But he makes his vanquished opponents duly sensible of this superiority which he had over them, when in replying to Bildad, the last speaker of the number, he wields the weapon of sarcasm in a way that is altogether merciless, and seeks to humiliate him by a eulogy of the divine omnipotence and exaltation which is visibly intended to surpass and eclipse that which had been said by him. It is true indeed that this very description in its incomparable grandeur gives us to understand clearly enough how entirely filled and carried away Job is by its infinitely elevated theme, and how by virtue of his flight to this height of an inspired contemplation of God. every thought respecting the unrelenting, or even vindictive persecution of his opponents disappears, so that the closing reference to the unattainable height and glory of the divine nature and activity (Job 26:14) is unaccompanied by any expression whatever of triumphant pride, or bitter enjoyment of their discomfiture (comp. V. Gerlach below, Homiletic Remarks on Job 26:2 seq.). The pure and undivided enthusiasm with which he surrenders himself to the contemplation of the Divine has manifestly an ennobling, purifying, and elevating influence on his spirit. It shows that he is not far removed at length from the goal of a perfectly correct and true solution of the dark mystery which occupies him. It makes it apparent that essentially one thing is lacking to him that he may press upward through the dark scenes of his conflict to the light of pure truth and peace with God, and that isa humble submission beneath the dealings of the only wise and true God, dealings which are righteous even towards him, sincere repentance and confession of the errors and failures of which he had been guilty even during the hot conflict of suffering through which he had passed, that repenting in dust and ashes to which Gods treatment brought him at last, as one who had been afflicted by his Heavenly Father, not indeed in accordance with the ordinary standard of retribution, but nevertheless not unjustly, not without a remedial and loving purpose.

3. That which is of greatest interest in the two short sections preceding not only to the scientific, but also to the practical and homiletic expositor, are those elements of a poetic cosmology and physical theology, which in Bildads discourse are presented more briefly and more in the way of suggestion, but which in that of Job are exhibited in a more developed and comprehensive form. It is that material which at an earlier day was treated by Baur in his Systema Mundi Jobum (Hal. 1707), Scheuchzer in his Jobi Physica Sacra, etc., and which to this day is a theme of no small interest in its theological aspects as well as in those related to cosmology and the history of civilization. The fact that certain mythological representations, and in particular a few traces of astronomical myths, are scattered over this magnificent picture of creation, and that the teachings of modern science concerning the mechanism of the heavens cannot be derived from it, cannot injure the peculiarly high value of the description, nor destroy its utility for practical purposes. It is in any case a view of the universe of incontrovertible grandeur, which in all that is described in Job 26:5-13 beholds only the fringes of Gods glory as they hang over on earth (comp. Isa 6:1), only a few meagre lineaments of the entire divine manifestation, only a muffled murmur echoing from afar off as a poor substitute for the thunder of His omnipotence. And in respect to the purity and correctness of its representations in detail, this physical theology of Job ranks sufficiently high, as is shown by that which is said of hanging the earth upon nothing (Job 26:7), a description of the fact no less surprising than the following descriptions of meteorological and geological processes are poetically bold and elevated.

Particular Passages

Job 25:4 seq. Cocceius: Although in our eyes the stars may seem (to shine with some degree of purity], nevertheless even they are outside of Gods habitation, being esteemed unworthy to adorn His dwelling-place. How therefore can miserable man, who is mortal and diseased and liable to death, who is a son of Adam, who is no worthier than a worm, or a grub, who is made of earth, who crawls on the earth, who lives by the earth, who is at once foul and defiled, who in a word is as far below the stars, as the worm is below himselfhow shall he dare or be able to face God in His court, and on equal terms to argue with Him? Let him, along with the moon and the stars, keep himself in his own station, and he will enjoy Gods favors; but let him attempt to exalt himself, and he will be crushed by the weight of the divine majesty.V. Gerlach: As the hosts of heaven are types of the pure spirits of heaven, so is their brightness a type of the holiness of the inhabitants of heaven, just as immediately after (in Job 26:6) the mortality and wretchedness of man is a type of his sinfulness. In this contra-position there lies a profound truth: Holiness and shining brightness, and sin and deaths corruption correspond to each other. In his frailty and mortality man has an incessant reminder of his sin and corruption; in seeing his outward lot he should humble himself inwardly before God.

Job 26:2-4. Wohlfarth: After that Job has ironically shown to his friend the irrelevancy of his reply; he takes a nobler revenge upon him, by delivering a much worthier eulogy on Gods exalted greatness, of which notwithstanding and during his suffering he has a most vivid and penetrating conviction.V. Gerlach: Jobs frame of mind bordering on pride, which causes him altogether to misunderstand that which is glorious and exalted in Bildads last discourse, belongs to the earthly folly which clings to him, which is to be stripped away from him by the sufferings and conflicts of his inner man, and which does at last really fall away from him. The splendid description which follows, and especially its humble conclusion (Job 26:14), proves in the meanwhile that the fundamental disposition of Jobs heart was different from that which the particular expressions uttered by him in his more despondent moods would seem to indicate.

Job 26:7 seq. Brentius: The fact that God stretches out the heavens, and supports the earth, without the aid of pillars, is a great argument in proof of His power (Psa 102:26). The poets relate that Atlas supports heaven on his shoulders; but we acknowledge the true Atlas, the Lord our God, who by His word supports both heaven and earth.Wohlfarth: The look to heaven which Job here requires us to take, does not indeed reach upwards to the throne of the Eternal (Job 26:7 seq.). But although we cannot now behold Him, who dwells in His inaccessible light, we can nevertheless feel His nearness, recognize His existence, experience His influence, see His greatness and majesty, when we pray to Him as the Being who stretches out the heavens above the earth like a tent, at whose beckoning the clouds open and water the thirsty earth, who has given to the water its bounds, etc. As the work bears witness to its master, so does the universe to its Creator, Preserver, and Ruler (Psa 19:5); and no despairing one has ever beheld the eternal order which stands before him, and its mysterious, but ever beneficent movements, no sinner desiring salvation has ever tarried in the courts of this great temple of God, without being richly dowered with heavenly blessings

Job 26:14. Oecolampadius: These tokens of divine power however great will nevertheless rightly be esteemed small, as being hardly a slight whisper in comparison with the mighty thunder. There is nothing therefore so frightful, but faith will be able to endure it, when it thus exercises itself in the works of Gods power, especially with the word of promise added.Wohlfarth: We can survey only the smallest portion of Gods immeasurable realm! What is the knowledge of the greatest sages but the short-sighted vision of a worm! Our earth is a grain of sand in the All, the drop of a bucket, as the prophet says; and how little do we know of Him; how great is the sum of that which is hidden from us! (1Co 13:9 seq.).

Fuente: A Commentary on the Holy Scriptures, Critical, Doctrinal, and Homiletical by Lange

CONTENTS

This chapter is but short, yet it contains precious truths. It forms the reply of Bildad to what Job had before said. It is not at all in reproof, but only an account of God’s holiness, and the uncleanness of all created excellency in his view.

Fuente: Hawker’s Poor Man’s Commentary (Old and New Testaments)

(1) Then answered Bildad the Shuhite, and said, (2) Dominion and fear are with him, he maketh peace in his high places. (3) Is there any number of his armies? and upon whom doth not his light arise?

These verses form a short but striking description of GOD’S sovereignty. Bildad, it should seem, was grown tired of the controversy, and therefore, instead of contending any longer with Job, he contents himself in joining with Job, in following up what the man of Uz had keen dwelling upon, of the greatness and holiness of GOD, in the preceding chapter. The terms are very striking the Shuhite makes use of, to set forth the brightness and glorious excellency of GOD. The shining of his light, so universal; the vast and incalculable number of his armies, and, of consequence, the unlimited sovereignty of his government: all these are happily chosen to set forth the infinite majesty of the Almighty. How great must he be, and how glorious, who ruleth in heaven, and among the inhabitants of the earth, who sitteth (as one of the sacred writers represent him) upon the circle of the earth, and the inhabitants thereof are but as grasshoppers; Isa 40:22 . If the Reader would see a further account of this High and Lofty One, who inhabiteth eternity, whose name is Holy, he will find more to the same amount, in a stile infinitely sublime and magnificent, from the 12th verse of the same chapter onward. But I beg of him, when he hath so done, to compare with it that illustrious prophecy concerning the LORD JESUS, Dan 2:44-45 . and what a flood of light and glory will pour in upon his soul, if so be he hath been taught the truth, as it is in JESUS, that this is He whom both prophets describe; and who is at one and the same moment, in his glorious person, one with the FATHER, over all, GOD blessed forever; and one with his people, their Sovereign LORD and Redeemer. Amen.

Fuente: Hawker’s Poor Man’s Commentary (Old and New Testaments)

Justification

Job 25:4

Conversion is a human act. It is the turning of the sinner in will and in act to his God. Justification is a Divine act, or rather a series of acts. Man turns, but it is only God who justifies.

I. It is plain that when summoned to and standing before God’s judgment-seat, no sorrow, however deep and real, for the past; no promise, however reliable, for the future, will suffice us. Plainly, then, the justification of the sinner is not an act of his own. It is God that justifieth. We cannot, as innocent, claim justification; but we may, as guilty, crave pardon. He can forgive us our sins. He can acquit us for the sake of another, not our own. This is what God’s justification in the first instance means. It is pardon, it is remission of sins.

II. Then comes the difficult question: How can God’s mercy be reconciled with His justice? How can God justly pardon sinners? That was a truth hidden from the ages and generations, and revealed to us in Jesus Christ. We are justified freely by God’s grace through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus. Thus, sinful in ourselves, we are justified in Christ, as joined to Christ, as part of Christ. The justification of man is thus the Divine acquittal of man for the Son of Man’s sake. God accepts us in His Beloved Son, who for our sins deserved to be rejected.

III. But we must not stop here. God’s purpose, God’s redeeming and sanctifying work, for and in us all has this great end and aim to make us holy. Human happiness, apart from holiness, is not God’s purpose. Holiness, without happiness, is indeed, though men do not realize it, a practical impossibility. God regards us as part of the new creation. He pardons us for the sake of Him to Whom we are united. We are taught that justification, like sanctification, is a work of the Spirit of God. God’s mercy is man’s only plea. Death is sin’s wages. Eternal life is God’s gift.

F. Watson, The Christian Life Here and Hereafter, p. 15.

Job 25:5-6

The penitential tone of all Christian devotion bears witness to the conscious depth of the moral life, to the beauty of God’s holiness that makes a blot of our saintliest light (‘beholding the moon and it shineth not’). In all things, the sense of shortcoming has pervaded the consciousness of modern times.

Martineau.

Reference. XXV. 13. W. Sinclair, Words from St. Paul’s, p. 32.

Fuente: Expositor’s Dictionary of Text by Robertson

Quiet Resting-places

Job 25-27

It is a curious speech with which Bildad winds up the animated colloquy between Job and his three friends. There is a streak of failure across the face of the speech, notwithstanding its dignity. Indeed, the dignity is somewhat against the speech. Bildad is as ignorant of the reality of the case in the peroration as he was in the exordium. If this is all that can be said at the close of such an intellectual and spiritual interview, then some of the parties have grievously misunderstood the case. Taken out of its setting, read as a piece of religious rhetoric, it is good and noble; but regarded in its relations to the particular case throbbing before us with such suffering as man never bore, it seems to be impertinent in its dignity, and to aggravate the wound which the man ought to have attempted to heal. These grand religious commonplaces which Bildad utters are right, they are stately, they are necessary to the completion of the great fabric of theological and spiritual truth; but how to bring them down to the immediate pain, how to extract sympathy from them, how to make all heaven so little that it can come into a broken heart, has not entered into the imagination of this comfortless comforter.

Was there an undertone in his voice, was there anything between the lines in the curious speech with which he concluded the conference?

“How then can man be justified with God? or how can he be clean that is born of a woman?” ( Job 25:4 ).

Is there not more than theology in that inquiry? Perhaps not to the consciousness of the speaker himself. Yet we often say things which we do not put into definite words. There is a region of inference in human association, and fellowship, and education. Was the inquiry equal to saying, We have done with thee; we cannot work this miracle of curing thine obstinacy, O thou woman-born; thou art like all the rest of thy face; thou hast thy mother’s obstinacy in thee a stubbornness that nothing can melt, or straighten, or in any wise be rendered manageable: how can he be clean that is born of a woman? how can a man such as thou art, and, indeed, such as we ourselves are, be set right if once wrong in the head and in the heart? Bildad did not say all that in words; yet we may so preach even a gospel discourse as to lead men to think that we have formed but a low opinion of them, and have no expectations as to their graciousness of reply. We may be evangelical, yet critical. We may ask a question in a tone which conveys the reply. Bildad would hurl the stars at Job, and pluck the fair moon that goddess of the dead in Oriental dreaming and throw it at the suffering patriarch, that they might all wallow in a common depravity and corruption a heap of things unclean! We should be careful how we pluck the stars. Better let them hang where God put them, and shine as much as they can upon a land that is often dark. Our little hands were never meant to gather such flowers and present them even as gifts of fragrance to other people. Let us keep steadfastly within our own limits, and talk such medicable and helpful words as we can out of our own sympathetic hearts, measured and toned and adjusted by a mysterious and subtle sympathy.

Now Job becomes the sole speaker. We have now to enter upon a wonderful parable. He has lost nothing of eloquence by all this controversial talk. He speaks the better now he has shaken his comforters from him, and he will deliver a great parable-sermon, apparently miscellaneous, yet not wholly unconnected. The marvellous thing is that this man has lost everything but his mind. Is there a drearier condition on earth, when viewed in one aspect? Do we not sometimes say, Thank God, he was unconscious; he did not know what he was suffering; the medical attendant says he could not feel the pain; his poor mind, his sensibility, quite gone: that is something to be thankful for. We had a kind meaning in that comment. But here is a man whose mind is twice quickened more a mind than it ever was. He feels a shadow; a spirit cannot pass before him without some sign of masonry, without some signal which the too-quickened mind of Job would instantly understand. All gone: the grave all set in order before him: the remembered prosperity hanging like a great cloud all round about him: not a child to touch him into hopefulness of life; not a kind voice to salute him, saying, Cheer thee! the darkest hour is just before the dawn; the angels are getting ready to come to thee on their wings of light, and presently heaven’s own morning will dawn over thee in infinite whiteness and beauty. Yet his mind was left. How eloquent he was! He could set forth his sorrow in something like equivalent words. He knew every pain that was piercing him. The river of his tears hid nothing from him as to the fountains whence they sprang. Is not misery doubled by our sensitiveness as to its presence? Do we not increase our suffering by knowing just what the loss means? This is one of the mysteries of Providence, that a man should have nothing left but his sense of loss; that a man should find himself in a universe of cloud, crying, without even the friendship of an echo to keep him company. To such depths have some men been driven. Do we not thank God for their experience now and again, because it shows us how in comparison our grief is very little, our complaint is not worth utterance, our condition is blessed as compared with their sorrow-stricken hearts? On the other hand, is it not comforting that the man’s mind should have been left? There is something grand even in this agony. A man who could talk as Job talks in this elaborate parable is not poor; his riches are indeed of another kind and quality, but they are riches still. “Oh, to create within the mind is bliss!” To have that marvellous power of withdrawment from all things merely outward, or that more marvellous power of seeing things merely outward as stairways up to celestial places, is to have wealth that can never be lost, so long as we are true to ourselves and anxious to respond to the responsibilities of life with faithfulness and diligence. Thank God for your senses that are left. This is true even in the deepest spiritual experiences. A sorrowing soul says I feel as if I had committed the unpardonable sin. What is the pastor’s answer to such complaint? An instantaneous and gracious assurance to the contrary, because the very feeling that the sin may have been committed is a proof that no such sin has been done. He who has committed the unpardonable sin knows nothing about it; he is a dead man. Who feels the traveller trampling over his grave? Who says, There is a weight upon me, when he is buried seven feet deep in the earth? The very action of sensitiveness is charged with religious significance. When you are groping for God and cannot find him, know that even groping may be prayer; when you are filled with dissatisfaction with your condition, and when you have to betake yourselves even to despised interjections, as Job has had to do now and again, know that even interjection may be theology of the best kind, poetry, prayer, worship. Woe be unto him who would seek in any wise to diminish the hope of souls that feel their need of God.

In all his tumultuous but noble talk Job now and again opens a great door as if in a rock, and enters into a sanctuary perfect in its security; then he comes out again, and plunges into clouds and wintry winds; then suddenly he enters a refuge once more, and praises God in an asylum of rocks; yet he will not abide there: so in all this parable he is in a great refuge and out of it; he is resting upon a pillow made soft by the hands of God, and then he will perversely wander amongst speculations and conjectures and self-criticisms, and come home with head fallen upon his breast, and tears stopping the hymn of praise. This parable is true. Whether spoken in this particular literary form or not, there is not one untrue line in it It is the parable of the earnest soul in all ages, in all lands. It would fit the experience of men who have never heard of the Bible. It is a great human parable. When the Bible itself becomes special its speciality acquires most of its significance from the fact that the larger part of the Bible is itself commonplace that is to say, adapted not to one community or another, but to man in all his conscious want of strength and light and peace.

Job comes as it were suddenly upon an idea which sustains him.

“Hell is naked before him, and destruction hath no covering. He stretcheth out the north over the empty place, and hangeth the earth upon nothing. He bindeth up the waters in his thick clouds; and the cloud is not rent under them. He holdeth back the face of his throne, and spreadeth his cloud upon it. He hath compassed the waters with bounds, until the day and night come to an end. The pillars of heaven tremble and are astonished at his reproof. He divideth the sea with his power, and by his understanding he smiteth through the proud. By his spirit he hath garnished the heavens; his hand hath formed the crooked serpent” ( Job 26:6-13 ).

Here at all events is a sense of almightiness, sovereignty, something that can be got hold of. We must beware how we credit Job with true astronomical ideas as to the poising of the north over the empty place, and the hanging of the earth upon nothing. Let us call it Hebrew poetry. We must be careful how we seize any one point even that is exact, and make that too much of an argument, because when we come upon points that are not so applicable how can we refuse their being turned as against the biblical contention? There is no need to make this a merely astronomic discovery: but poetry does sometimes outrun science, and get the truth first of all. The expression may have to be dressed a little, modified somewhat, perhaps lowered in temperature; but even poetry is a child of God. The idea that abides is the conception of the almightiness that keeps things in their places. Who can turn the north into the south? Who can take the earth out of the emptiness which it apparently occupies, and set it upon pillars? On what would the pillars stand? How do the stars keep in their courses? Why is it they do not break away? If heaven should come down upon us we should be crushed: what keeps the great, blue, kind heaven up where it is, as if for our use and enjoyment only? Suppose we cannot tell, that does not deprive us of the consciousness that the heaven is so kept, because there stands the obvious and gracious fact. What, then, has the soul to do in relation to these natural supports, these proofs that somehow things are kept in order and are set to music? The conception coming out of this view is a conception of omnipotence. The soul is intended to reason thus: Who keeps these things in their places has power to guide my poor little life; whatever ability it was that constructed the heavens, it is not wanting in skill and energy in the matter of building up my poor life into shapeliness and utility; I will, therefore, worship here if I cannot go further; I will say, O Great Power, be thy name what it may, take me up into thy plan of order and movement; make me part of the obedient universe: art thou deaf? canst thou speak? I know not, but it does me good to cry in the dark and to tell thee, if thou canst hear, that I want to be part of the living economy over which thou dost preside. Disdain no pagan prayer. No prayer, indeed, is pagan in any sense that deserves contempt. Our first prayers have sometimes been our best; blurred with tears, choked or interrupted with penitential sobbing, they have yet told the heart’s tale in a way which could be understood by the listening Love, which we call by the name of God sometimes by the name of Father. Seize then the idea of Omnipotence; it covers all other conceptions; it is the base-line of all argument; it gives us a starting thought. Do not be particular about giving a name to it, or defining it; enter into the consciousness of the reality of such a Power, and begin there to pray at least to stumble in prayer.

Then Job utters a word which will be abiding in its significance and in its comfort

“Lo, these are parts of his ways: but how little a portion is heard of him? but the thunder of his power who can understand?” ( Job 26:14 ).

The man who said that was not left comfortless. Sometimes in our very desolateness we say things so deep and true as to prove that we are not desolate at all, if we were only wise enough to seize the comfort of the very power which sustains us. He who has a great thought has a great treasure. A noble conception is an incorruptible inheritance. Job’s idea is that we hear but a whisper. Lo: this is a feeble whispering: the universe is a subdued voice; even when it thunders it increases the whisper inappreciably as to bulk and force: all that is now possible to me, Job would say, is but the hearing of a whisper; but the whisper means that I shall hear more by-and-by; behind the whispering there is a great thundering, a thunder of power; I could not bear it now; the whisper is a gospel, the whisper is an adaptation to my aural capacity; it is enough, it is music, it is the tone of love, it is what I need in my littleness and weariness, in my initial manhood. How many controversies this would settle if it could only be accepted in its entirety! We know in part, therefore we prophesy in part; we see only very little portions of things, therefore we do not pronounce an opinion upon the whole; we hear a whisper, but it does not follow that we can understand the thunder. There is a Christian agnosticism. Why are men afraid to be Christian agnostics? Why should we hesitate to say with patriarchs and apostles, I cannot tell, I do not know; I am blind, and cannot see in that particular direction; I am waiting? What we hear now is a whisper, but a whisper that is a promise. We must let many mysteries alone. No candle can throw a light upon a landscape. We must know just what we are and where we are, and say we are of yesterday, and know nothing when we come into the presence of many a solemn mystery. Yet how much we do know! enough to live upon; enough to go into the world with as fighting men, that we may dispute with error, and as evangelistic men, that we may reveal the gospel. They have taken from us many words which they must bring back again. When Rationalism is restored amongst the stolen vessels of the Church, Agnosticism also will be brought in as one of the golden goblets that belong to the treasure of the sanctuary. We, too, are agnostics: we do not know, we cannot tell; we cannot turn the silence into speech, but we know enough to enable us to wait. Amid all this difficulty of ignorance we hear a voice saying, What thou knowest not now, thou shalt know hereafter: I have many things to say unto you, but ye cannot bear them now: if it were not so, I would have told you, as if to say, I know how much to tell, and when to tell it. Little children, trust your Lord.

Now Job gathers himself together again, and coming out in an attitude of noble gracious strength, he says

“I will teach you by the hand of God: that which is with the Almighty will I not conceal” ( Job 27:11 ).

Who is it that proposes to teach? Actually the suffering man himself. The suffering man must always become teacher. Who can teach so well? Now he begins to see a new function in life. Hitherto he has been “my lord.” He says, I was eyes to the blind, and feet was I to the lame: when I passed by the elders rose up and saluted me, and young men fled from my path: I was a prince amongst men. The talk was indeed haughty, as became a fine sheik, a gentleman of Eastern lands, overloaded with estates; but now, having passed through all this sorrow, he says, “I will teach you.” Not only so, “I will teach you by the hand of God.” Sorrow is always eloquent True suffering is always expository, as well as comforting. Have we not seen that there are many chapters of the Bible which a prosperous man cannot read? He can spell them, parse them, pronounce the individual words correctly, but he cannot read them, round them into music, speak them with the eloquence of the heart, utter them with his soul; because they can only be read by the lame and the blind, and the sorrow-laden and the poor: but oh, how they can read them! Keep away the rhetorician from the twenty-third Psalm; the fourteenth chapter of John; the Lord’s Prayer. For a man who knows nothing but words to read such passages is blasphemy. Sometimes they cannot be read aloud; they can only be read to the heart by the heart itself. So it is with preaching. Here it is that the older man has a great advantage over the young man. Not that the young man should be deprived of an opportunity of speaking in the time of zeal and prophetic hopefulness. Nothing of the kind. The young man has a work to do, but there are some texts which he must let alone for a good many years; they do not yet belong to him; when he reaches his majority then he will have his property, so to say, given to him, and he can use it in harmony with the donor’s will. The young man must be zealous, perhaps efflorescent, certainly enthusiastic, occasionally somewhat eccentric and even wild: but was not Paul himself sometimes a fool in glorying? He would have been a less apostle if he had been a more careful man. He plunged into the great work; he leaped into it, and seemed to say to the sea, O sea, thyself teach me how to swim, that I may come right again to the shore. So we need the young, ardent, fearless, enthusiastic, chivalrous; but at the same time who can teach like the man who has suffered most? He knows all the weight of agony, all the load of grief, all the loneliness of bereavement He tells you how deep was the first grave he dug. Then you begin to think that your grief was not quite so deep as his. He has lost wife, or child, or friend, or property, or health, or hope. He tells how the battle went, how cold the wind was, how tempestuous the storm, how tremendous the foe, how nearly once he was lost, and was saved as by the last and supreme miracle of God. As he talks, you begin to take heart again; from providence you reason to redemption; and thus by help of the suffering teacher the soul revives, and God’s blessing comes upon the life. Young persons should be patient with men who are talking out of the depths of their experience. It is sometimes difficult to sit and hear an older man talk about life’s battles and life’s sorrows, when to the young hearer life is a dream, a holiday, a glad recreation; the ear full of the music of chiming bells, wedding metal clashing out its nuptial music to the willing wind to be carried everywhere, a gospel of festivity and joy. We would not chill you, we would not shorten the feast by one mouthful; but the flowers that bedeck the table are plucked flowers, and when a flower is plucked it dies.

Sorrowing men, broken hearts, souls conscious of loss and desolation, the story of the patriarchs will be lost upon us if we do not apply it to ourselves as a balm, a cordial, a gospel intended for our use and privilege. Risk it all by taking the comfort. But are we worthy of the comfort? Do not attempt too much analysis. There are some things by which analysis is resisted; they say, If you thus take us to pieces you will lose the very thing we meant to convey to you. We have heard of the patience of Job, we have listened to his colloquies with his friends, and seen how they have been puzzled and bewildered; Job has now come into the parabolical period of speech: presently another voice will come across the whole scene a young voice, bell-like in tone, incisive; a young man who will take up another tone of talk altogether, and then the great whirlwind platform will be erected, and from its lofty heights there will come a tempest of questions; then will come the long eventide quiet, solemn, more hopeful than a morning dawn. Meanwhile, at this point, here is the feast of comfort. The suffering man says, We only know a part, we only hear a whisper: the great thunder has not yet broken upon us because we are not prepared for it. Let us stand in this, that God is working out a great plan, and must not be interrupted in the continuance of his labour, in the integrity of his purpose. O mighty, gracious, miracle-working Son of God, help us to wait!

Fuente: The People’s Bible by Joseph Parker

(See the Job Book Comments for Introductory content and general conclusions and observations).

VII

THE THIRD ROUND OF SPEECHES

Job 22-26.

Eliphaz’s third speech consists of three parts: Job 22:1-4 ; Job 22:5-20 ; Job 22:21-30 .

The subject of part one (Job 22:1-4 ) is: God’s dealings with men not for selfish interests, And the main points are:

1. A man who is wise may be profitable to himself, but not to God.

2. Man’s happiness cannot add to God’s happiness, because that resides in himself.

3. Man’s piety does not provoke affliction from God, for he does not fear man nor is he jealous of man. The subject of part two (Job 22:5-20 ) and the status of the case in general, are expressed thus:

Your wickedness is the cause of your suffering. For the first time Eliphaz now leaves insinuations, intimations, and generalities, and, in response to Job’s repeated challenge comes to specifications, which he cannot know to be true and cannot’ prove. This is the difficult part of all prosecutions, viz: to specify and to prove) as the Latin proverb expresses it: Hie labor, hoc opus est. The breakdown of Eliphaz on this point prepares the way for Job’s speedy triumph. Bildad dares not follow on the same line; all the wind is taken out of his sails; he relapses into vague generalities and with lame brevity repeats himself. Zophar who has the closing speech of the prosecution, is so completely whipped, that he makes no rejoinder. It is a tame windup of a great discussion, confessing advertising defeat.

The specifications of Eliphaz’s charges against Job are:

l. Thou hast taken pledges of thy brother for nought (Job 22:6 a). (For the heinousness of this offense see later legislation, viz: Exo 22:26 ; Deu 24:6 ; Deu 24:17 ; and the reference in Eze 18:16 .)

2. Thou hast stripped the naked of their clothing (Job 22:6 b).

3. Thou hast withheld water and bread from the famishing, and all this when thou hadst the earth and wast honorable in it (Job 22:7-8 ).

4. Thou hast refused the pleadings of necessitous widows and robbed helpless orphans [See Job’s final pathetic and eloquent reply in Job 31 , where he sums up the case and closes the defense], therefore snares, fear, and darkness have come upon thee like a flood of waters (Job 22:9-11 ).

5. These were presumptuous and blasphemous sins because you argued that God could not see you, denying his omniscience (Job 22:12-14 ).

6. You have imitated the antediluvians who, ungrateful for divine mercies, bade God depart and denied his power and who therefore were swallowed up by the flood becoming an object lesson to future ages and a joy to the righteous (Job 22:15-20 ). (Cf. 2Pe 2:4-15 and Jud 1:6-16 .)

The passage, Job 22:21-30 , consists of an exhortation and a promise. The items of the exhortation, and the implication of each are as follows:

1. Acquaint thyself with God (Job 22:21 ), which implies Job’s ignorance of him.

2. Accept his law and treasure it up in thy heart (Job 22:22 ), which implies Job’s enmity against God.

3. Repent and reform (Job 22:23 ), which implies wickedness in Job.

4. Cease worshiping gold and let God be the object of thy worship (Job 22:24 ), implying that he was covetous.

The items of the promise are:

1. God, not gold, shall be thy treasure and delight and his worship thy joy (Job 22:25-26 ).

2. Thy prayers will be heard and thy vows accepted (Job 22:27 ).

3. Thy purposes will be accomplished and thy way illumined (Job 22:28 ).

4. Thou shall hope for uplifting when cast down and thy humility will secure divine interposition (Job 22:29 ).

5. Thou shall even deliver guilty men through thy righteousness (Job 22:30 ). [Cf. Gen 18:25-32 ; ten righteous men would have saved Sodom; but compare Eze 14:14 ; Eze 14:20 and Jer 15:1 ; see also Job’s reply in Job 31 .] The items of Job’s reply as it applies to his particular case (Job 23:1-24:12 ) are:

1. Even yet my complaint is accounted rebellion by men though my hand represses my groaning (Job 23:2 ).

2. “Oh that I could now get the case before God himself he would deliver me forever, but I cannot find him, though he finds me” (Job 3:10 a).

3. When he has fully tried me, as gold is tested by fire, I shall be vindicated, for my life has been righteous (Job 23:10-12 ). [This is nearly up to Rom 8:28 ,]

4. But his mind, in continuing my present trouble though I am innocent, is immutable by prayers and his purpose to accomplish in me what he desires is inflexible (Job 23:13-14 ).

5. This terrifies me, because I am in the dark and unheard (Job 23:15-17 ).

6. Why are there not judgment days in time, so that those that know him may meet him? (Job 24:1 ).

7. Especially when there are wicked people who do all the things with which I am falsely charged, whom he regards not

The items of broad generalization in this reply are as follows Here Job passes from his particular case to a broad generalization of providential dealings and finds the same inexplicable problems]:

1. There are men who remove land marks, i.e., land stealers (Job 24:2 ). (Cf. Deu 19:14 ; Deu 27:17 ; and Hos 5:10 ; also Henry George vs. Land Ownership in severally and limitations of severally ownership when it becomes a monopoly), so that it shuts out the people from having a home. (See Isa 5:8 .)

2. There are those who openly rob the widow and orphan and turn the poor away so that they have to herd as wild asses and live on the gleanings from nature (Job 24:3-8 ).

3. There are those who pluck the fatherless from the mother’s breast for slaves and exact the clothing of the poor for a pledge, so that though laboring in the harvest they are hungry, and though treading the wine press they are thirsty (Job 24:9-11 ).

4. In the city men groan, the wounded cry out in vain for help and God regardeth not the folly (Job 24:12 ).

5. These are rebels against light, yet it is true that certain classes are punished: (1) the murderer; (2) the thief; (3) the adulterer (Job 24:13-17 ).

6. The grave gets all of them, though God spares the mighty for a while and if it is not so, let some one prove me a liar and my speech worth nothing (Job 24:18-25 ).

In Bildad’s reply to Job (Job 25 ) he ignores Job’s facts; repeats a platitude, How should man, impure and feeble, born of a woman, a mere worm, be clean before the Almighty in whose sight the moon and stars fade?

Job’s reply to Bildad is found in Job 26:1-4 , thus:

1. Thou hast neither helped nor saved the weak.

2. Thou hast not counseled them that have no wisdom.

3. Thou hast not even done justice to what is known.

4. To whom have you spoken, and who inspired you?

Job excels Bildad in speaking of God’s power (Job 26:5-14 ), the items of which are:

1. The dead tremble beneath the waters and the inhabitants thereof before him.

2. Hell and destruction are naked to his sight. [Cf. “Lord of the Dead,” Mat 22:32 and other like passages.]

3. The northern sky is over space and the suspended earth hangeth on nothing.

4. The clouds hold water and are not rent by it; his own throne is hidden by the cloud spread upon it.

5. A boundary is fixed to the waters and a horizon to man’s vision, even unto the confines of darkness.

6. The mountains shake and the pillars tremble, yet he quells the raging storm.

7. These are but the outskirts and whispers of his ways and we understand his whisper better than we understand his thunder.

Two things are worthy of note here, viz:

1. Job was a martyr, vicarious, he suffered for others.

2. Job’s sufferings were a forecast of the suffering Messiah as Abraham was of the suffering Father. So far, we have found:

1. That good men often suffer strange calamities while evil men often prosper.

2. That the sufferings of the righteous come from intelligence, power, and malice, and so, too, the prosperity of the wicked comes from supernatural power as well.

3. That man cannot solve the problem without a revelation, and the suffering good man needs a daysman, and an advocate.

4. That before one can comprehend God, God must become a man, or be incarnated.

5. That there must be a future, since even and exact Justice is not meted out here.

6. That there is a final judgment, at which all will be rewarded for what they do.

7. That there must be a resurrection and there must be a kinsman redeemer.

Many things were not understood at that time, such as the following:

1. That Satan’s power was only permitted, he being under the absolute control of God.

2. That suffering was often disciplinary and, as such, was compensated.

3. That therefore the children of God should glory in them, as in the New Testament light of revelation Paul understood all this and gloried in his tribulation.

4. That the wicked were allowed rope for free development and that they were spared for repentance. Peter in the New Testament gives us this light.

5. That there is a future retribution; that there are a heaven and a hell.

6. That this world is the Devil’s sphere of operation as it relates to God’s people.

QUESTIONS

1. Of what does Eliphaz’s third speech consist?

2. What the subject of part one (Job 22:1-4 ) and its main points?

3. What the subject of part two (Job 22:5-20 ) & in general, what the status of case?

4. What the specifications of Eliphaz’s charge against Job?

5. Of what does Job 22:21-30 consist?

6. What the items of the exhortation, and what the implication of each?

7. What the items of the promise?

8. What the items of Job’s reply as it applies to his particular case (Job 23:1-17 )?

9. What the items of broad generalization in this reply?

10. What was Bildad’s reply to Job (Job 25 )?

11. What Job’s reply to Bildad?

12. In what does Job excel Bildad (Job 26:5-14 ) and what the items?

13. What two things are worthy of note here?

14. So far, what have we found?

15. What was not understood at that time?

Fuente: B.H. Carroll’s An Interpretation of the English Bible

Job 25:1 Then answered Bildad the Shuhite, and said,

Ver. 1. Then answered Bildad the Shuhite, and said ] A pithy and ponderous speech he here maketh, though little to the purpose, for he quite digresseth from the question in hand concerning the wicked’s flourishing, and saints’ sufferings, he chooseth to sing the same song with his fellows, concerning the power and purity of God above all creatures. See Job 4:18 ; Job 15:15 . Some men are of that mind, that they will never be said or set down, but strive to have the last word. This was Peter’s vanity and the rest of the disciples, Mat 26:35 , which our Saviour winked at till time should confute them, as it also did soon after.

Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)

Job Chapter 25

Well now we come to Bildad (Job 25 ). And Bildad only barely gives the appearance of a speech. It is a very short one, and it has no kind of application really to Job. They are evidently obliged to give in, and Bildad, the second of them, he it is that now descants upon the glory of God. And it is all perfectly true, and very finely stated too. There is a great deal of what is very beautiful in what Bildad said, only it had no bearing on the matter at all. “Dominion and fear are with him; he maketh peace in his high places.” Yes, but what troubled Job was that he had anything but peace in his low place. There he was in this terrible humiliation and suffering, and he could not tell why it was. “Is there any number of his armies?” That is all very true; was that any comfort to Job, or any answer? “And upon whom doth not his light arise?” Well, there might be an implication that Job was all wrong because he did not enjoy the light, and it was not that Bildad did. The fact is that he was quiet; he was entirely without any trial; and he could therefore talk reasonably, and so far quietly; but he had no understanding of Job.

“How then can man be justified with God?” That is exactly what Job had said in the ninth chapter, so that he was only repeating what Job had said a great deal better than he. Job enters into it in a very full manner, and so strongly that he even puts forth the need of a daysman, i.e., a mediator, between God and man. He had far more spiritual light than any of them. “How can he be clean that is born of a woman?” That again is what Job had already taught. “Behold even to the moon, and it shineth not; yea, the stars are not pure in his sight; how much less man, that is a worm, and the son of man, which is a worm?” That was all true, but had no bearing.

Fuente: William Kelly Major Works (New Testament)

answered = concluded. See note on Job 4:1.

Bildad. See note on Job 2:11.

Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics

Chapter 25

Then answered Bildad the Shuhite, and said [concerning God], Dominion and fear are with him, he makes peace in his high places. Is there any number of his armies? and upon whom doth not his light arise? How then can man be justified with God? ( Job 25:1-4 )

Job, you’ve been trying to justify yourself before God. But how can man be justified with God?

I would like to suggest to you that man cannot be justified with God apart from the work of Jesus Christ. It’s not possible that a just God can forgive sins apart from Jesus Christ. We’ll go into that someday as we deal with the problems of the Christian life; we don’t have time tonight.

or how can he be clean that is born of a woman? The moon shines not; yea, the stars are not pure in his sight. How much less man, that is a worm? and the son of man, which is a worm? ( Job 25:4-6 )

“

Fuente: Through the Bible Commentary

Job 25:1-6

Job 25

BILDAD’S THIRD AND FINAL SPEECH:

THIS BRIEF RESPONSE IS THE LAST WORD JOB’S THREE FRIENDS HAD TO SAY

Job 25:1-6

“Then answered Bildad the Shuhite, and said,

Dominion and fear are with him;

He maketh peace in his high places.

Is there any number of his armies?

And upon whom doth not his light arise?

How then can man be just with God

Or how can he be clean that is born of a woman?

Behold, even the moon hath no brightness,

And the stars are not pure in his sight:

How much less man, that is a worm!

The son of man that is a worm!”

All that Bildad said here was as applicable to himself as it was to Job; and there does not appear to be any logical argument whatever in this speech.

“The stars are not pure in his sight” (Job 25:5). One may well wonder where he got an idea like this. When God viewed the Creation, “He beheld everything that he had made, and behold, it was very good” (Gen 1:31). This means that the stars were pure in God’s sight; thus Bildad’s word here is another example of the fact that Job’s friends had not spoken of God the things that were right (Job 42:7).

It is believed by many scholars that much of this last half of Job is obscured by the imperfect preservation of the text, The critical analysis of these middle chapters takes special notice of, “(1) The extreme brevity of Bildad’s speech, (2) the similarity of some things in Job 24 to what Bildad said, and (3) the fact that much of Job 27 seems to contradict what Job had previously said.” Any rearrangement of the text in these chapters should be delayed until scholars can agree on the way it ought to be presented.. We shall limit our comments to an exploration of the text as it stands.

Meredith G. Kline has given us what this writer considers to be a completely sufficient comment on this chapter.

“Bildad avoids Job’s challenge in the last verse of the previous chapter. Anxious, however, to say something, he repeats some of Eliphaz’ earlier remarks (Job 4:17 ff and Job 15:14 ff). This inept repetition by Bildad indicates that Job’s philosophical friends have exhausted their resources of wisdom. Bildad’s brief and feeble effort represents their expiring breath. Zophar’s subsequent failure to speak is the silence of the vanquished.”

E.M. Zerr:

Job 25:1-2. Bildad’s turn came next; his was the second in order of the speeches. It is significant that his speech was very brief and contained nothing new. The strength of Job’s position has been shown by the fact that the friends were unable to answer a single one of his arguments. Instead, their speeches became weaker and weaker, and Bildad finally was able only to make this weak speech of 6 verses. The next in line would have been Zophar, but he will not be heard any more at all. This paragraph describes the greatness of God, all of which is admitted but is not to the point.

Job 25:3. The power of God is likened to a king with many soldiers at his command.

Job 25:4. No man can be just in the sight of God and Job was foremost in teaching that truth. As to the last sentence, Job had already affirmed its answer in the noted passage of Job 14:1-4.

Job 25:5. God’s power to stop the shining of the moon does not prove any objection to the light of that body. The stars are material things and not subject to the laws of righteousness.

Job 25:6. Of course one man would be a worm if his father were one. The word is from two different originals that have practically the same meaning. The idea is that man is of such lowly origin that he will perish like a worm. In view of that no man should think to compare himself with God. To all of this Job would have given his approval but it was not on the subject.

Fuente: Old and New Testaments Restoration Commentary

The answer of Bildad is characterized by its brevity, and by the fact that he did not set himself to argue the matter with Job. It is a manifest weakening in the controversy on the side of the friends. Bildad was not prepared to discuss the general truth of what had been said, but he made it perfectly evident that he had no sympathy with the personal application which Job suggested. He contented himself with a general statement, first, of the greatness and government of God; and, second, of the consequent absurdity of man’s attempt to defend himself, or claim to be just or clean before God.

As to the first, he briefly affirmed the fact of God’s enthronement, and of His administration of all affairs. In the presence of this greatness, before which the moon lacks brightness and the stars are impure, how can man, who is but a worm, be just or dean? The force of the speech is identical with that of Eliphaz. Without argument, Bildad made it perfectly clear that, in his mind, the guilt of Job was established.

Fuente: An Exposition on the Whole Bible

How Can Man Be Just before God?

Job 25:1-6

Bildads closing speech adds little to the controversy. He suggests simply that Jobs vindications of himself do not imply that he is righteous before God, and, acting upon the philosophy of the time, Bildad prefers to consider that Job is guilty of unrealized sins rather than believe that God has permitted suffering to come to Him unmerited.

There are some unanswerable questions in this paragraph-suggestions full of helpfulness. Gods armies are numberless-ten thousand times ten thousand, and every angel is pledged to our help. His light shines everywhere, even on the saddest hearts. Not one of us can be just before Him, but we may avail ourselves of the justifying righteousness of Christ, which, as Bunyan says, is always the same, not increased by our good frames of mind or lessened by our bad ones. None of woman born are clean, but the blood of Jesus Christ cleanses from all sin. Moon and stars pale and pass away, but God hath set His heart upon His saints, and hath adopted them into His family. And when the fabric of nature shall have decayed, they shall shine as the sun in the kingdom of their Father.

Fuente: F.B. Meyer’s Through the Bible Commentary

Job 25:2

The most beautiful word that ever hung upon the mouth of man is peace, because it is sweetness to his fellow-men, and it makes sacrifice to God. Many summers and many winters of life go to ripen that fruit. And of that beautiful fruit of the lips hear what God says: “I create the fruit of the lips; Peace, peace, to him that is far off and to him that is near, saith the Lord; I will heal him.”

I. The words are meant to teach us that up in His high places God is ever devising and carrying on processes which are to produce peace for men in this lower state. In mystery, in solitude, and in largeness, before the foundations of the earth were laid, God began to make peace in His high places. He willed that great scheme whereby Christ should come in the fulness of time to make redemption for a yet unformed and yet uncreated world. The ruin of Eden was prepared for in the high places of the eternal mind; and at once, at the moment of the Fall, the promise came that peace should be restored on earth.

II. The far end of Christ’s work was to give peace on earth. When He ascended from His Cross and grave to more than His former greatness, and when from His eternal throne He began to offer up His mediatorial intercession and pour down upon His Church the Holy Spirit, then was the fabric of man’s peace complete, those words established to the very letter, “He maketh peace in His high places.”

J. Vaughan, Fifty Sermons, 1874, p. 72.

References: Job 25-S. Cox, Expositor, 1st series, vol. viii., p. 270; Ibid., Commentary on Job, p. 321.

Fuente: The Sermon Bible

CHAPTER 25 The Third Address of Bildad

1. What God is (Job 25:1-3)

2. What man is (Job 25:4-6)

Job 25:1-3. Bildads arguments are exhausted. He has reached the end of his resources and Zophar does not open his lips again. Nevertheless Bildads final word is of great force and beauty, with deep meaning. He gives a picture of what God is.

With Him dominion is reverence;

He maketh peace in His high places.

The number of His hosts who can count?

And upon whom doth not His light arise?

How pregnant with meaning these four sentences!

Job 25:4-6. And what is man, man the creature of the dust, the earthworm.

How then can man be just with God?

Or he be pure who is of woman born?

Behold for Him the moon hath no brightness,

And even the stars are not pure in His sight.

How much less man, that is but a worm!

Or any mortal man-nothing but a worm!

Fuente: Gaebelein’s Annotated Bible (Commentary)

Reciprocal: Job 18:1 – Bildad

Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge

Job 25:1. Then answered Bildad Who makes the last weak effort against Job; and being unable to deny the truth of his assertions, but at the same time unwilling to give up the argument, shelters himself behind the acknowledged attributes of God, power, justice, and purity, and the infirmities of human nature. Probably he and the rest of Jobs friends now perceived that Job and they did not differ so much as they had thought. They owned that the wicked might prosper for a while; and Job owned they would be destroyed at the last. As to the point of bringing Job to confess himself guilty of some enormous crimes, which they at first rashly supposed had drawn this heavy judgment upon him, that is completely given up, and Bildad satisfies himself with an evasive answer to what Job had observed on that head, to this purpose, namely, that no man, strictly speaking, can be justified before God; man being at best a frail and fallible creature, and God a being of infinite purity and perfection; an argument which concerned Job no more than themselves, but equally involved them all in the same class of sinners. This answer has no reference to what Job spake last, but to that which seemed most reproveable in all his discourses, his censure of Gods proceedings with him, and his desire of disputing the matter with him. Bildads sentiments are extremely good and pious, but they are but little to the purpose, since he is now reduced to advance what Job had never disputed. As we here take our leave, says Dr. Dodd, of the arguments urged by Jobs friends, we may just observe, in conclusion, that nothing could be more untoward than this conduct of theirs, to bring a charge against him which they could not prove, and from which his well- known virtue and integrity of life ought to have screened him. But, though Job very plainly shows them the injustice and inhumanity of this procedure; nay, though he confutes them so far that they had nothing to reply, yet, like modern disputants, they stood out to the last, and had not the grace to own their mistake, till God himself was pleased to thunder it in their ears. Here, then, we have a lively instance of the force of prejudice and prepossession.

Fuente: Joseph Bensons Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

Job 25:4. How can man be justified with God? Bildad asks a question which he himself could not answer; but we have the proper answer from the living oracle, Job 42:8. Take seven bullocks, and offer up sacrificesIt is God that justifieth; it is Christ that diedGod hath made him to be sin for us who knew no sin, that we might be made the righteousness of God in him.

Job 25:5. Behold even the moon, and it shineth not. The sense seems to be, If the moon and the stars are lights inferior to the sun, how much more is man inferior to the great Fountain of all intelligence and purity; and what is he but darkness itself, when compared with his Maker.

REFLECTIONS.

Bildad finding Job immoveable, makes only a short reply, that though God often spares the wicked, even to hoary age, it does not derogate from his grandeur. He reigns in heaven, he makes peace in the high places of his abode, preserving harmony in the spheres, and order among angels. Of those his armies there is no counting the number.

The inference he would draw is, if God be thus holy and glorious; and if no mortal can be pure before him, then every one whom he afflicts is impure. Thus men are apt to draw misguided inferences from partial views of providence. Why not listen to a wiser man than Bildad, Judge nothing before the time.

Fuente: Sutcliffe’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

Job 25-27. offer a difficult critical problem. The phenomena which excite attention are these: (a) Bildads speech is unusually short; (b) Jobs reply contains a section (Job 26:5-14) very like Bildads speech; (c) Zophar fails to speak; (d) ch. 27 has a title prefixed, which has no real parallel elsewhere in the middle of a speech belonging to the original poem (ch. 29 forming no real exception); (e) the greater part of ch. 27 so completely contradicts Jobs views as elsewhere expressed, that it seems very hard to believe that it can have formed part of this speech (Peake).

Here what is a very usual rearrangement will be adopted. We shall take Job 25 and Job 26:5-14 as Bildads speech, Job 26:1-4 and Job 27:2-6 as Jobs reply, and Job 27:7-23 as the missing third speech of Zophar. This seems the simplest arrangement, though it is open to objections. For this and alternative views, see Peakes Commentary.

Job 25. Opening of Bildads Third Speech.Unable to reply to the facts of experience adduced by Job, he nevertheless makes his protest against his argument. Let the facts be what they will, God is great in power and man is unclean and sinful in his sight.

In 2 the reference is to battles of the angels, perhaps rebellions against God, who vanquishes the rebellious angels, as long ago He vanquished the chaos-monster Tiamat and her brood (Job 9:13, Job 26:12-13, Isa 51:9). With Job 25:4-6 cf. the words of Eliphaz, Job 41:7-21, Job 15:14-16.

Fuente: Peake’s Commentary on the Bible

BILDAD’S REPLY THE GREATNESS OF GOD

(vv.1-3)

The brevity of Bildad’s reply is evidence that he had no answer to Job’s predicament. He confines himself rather to fundamental facts that were important for all mankind, verses 1-3 dealing briefly with God’s supremacy and power. “Dominion and fear belong to Him” (v.2). The greatness of His dominion is such as to inspire a wholesome fear in every creature. This was nothing new to Job, for he had insisted on this himself. “He makes peace in His high places.” This peace was certainly not on earth, as Job was experiencing. When Christ was born, the angels announced, “on earth peace” (Luk 2:13-14), but peace did not follow and has not followed on earth since then. Why not? Because mankind rejected the very One who is “the Prince of Peace”.

Then when the Lord was on the verge of His great sacrifice of Calvary, as He entered Jerusalem, the crowd who gathered were moved by God to say, “Blessed is the King who comes in the name of the Lord! Peace in heaven and glory in the highest!” (Luk 19:37-38). Though earth refused Him, heaven very soon received Him (after His resurrection), and anyone today who wants true peace will find it only in looking to the Prince of Peace in heaven. The day will yet come when the Lord Jesus will establish peace on earth, but not until He returns in judgment, to judge every evil thing that raises its head against the Lord of glory. Of course, Bildad did not understand in what way the Lord “makes peace in His high places,” but how good it is for us to understand it today!

“Is there any, number to His armies?” (v.3). The Lord Jesus assured His disciples that if He asked the Father, He would provide him with “more than twelve legions of angels” (Mt 25:53). Do angels have power? One angel of the Lord killed 185,000 Assyrians in one night! (2Ki 19:35).

Also, “Upon whom does His light not arise?” Just as the sun rises on all the earth (Psa 19:6), so the Lord Jesus is the true light who, coming into the world, shed His light upon everyone (Joh 1:9). Of course Bildad had no knowledge of this, and little realised that God moved him to speak in this way

THE NOTHINGNESS OF MAN

(vv.4-6)

Since God is so great, “what is man?” Can men possibly be righteous before God? Can one born of a woman be pure? Naturally there is no hope of man ever attaining such righteousness and purity, for man is a totally corrupted sinner Bildad however was not applying this humbling lesson to himself, but to Job! But we all need to learn this as regards ourselves. The New Testament supplies the answer to this serious question. Man can be righteous before God, but only by faith in the Lord Jesus who has suffered for our sins. Righteousness is not ours by nature, but is imputed to believers only because of their faith in Christ (Rom 4:20-24).

Fuente: Grant’s Commentary on the Bible

3. Bildad’s third speech ch. 25

The brevity of this speech reflects the fact that Job’s companions were running out of arguments. Job’s responses were at least silencing them, if not convincing them.

Bildad seems to have abandoned the earlier theme of the wicked person’s fate because of what Job had just pointed out. Instead, he merely emphasized the sinfulness and insignificance of all people, and God’s greatness. Perhaps he hoped Job would admit to being a sinner, since the whole human race is unclean. He felt Job was absurd in thinking that he could argue before God.

Job 25:4 restates a basic question that had come up earlier in the debate (Job 4:17; Job 9:2 b; Job 15:14). The answer did not come in this book, but it came later with subsequent good news of God’s grace. Perhaps Bildad raised it here to convince Job that neither he nor anyone else could be as guiltless as Job claimed to be. The illustrations that follow in Job 25:5-6 support his point.

Interestingly this last statement, the last of all those recorded in the book that Job’s three friends uttered, is a very depressing one. These men had come to comfort Job, but their words and worldview made that impossible.

"The best way to help discouraged and hurting people is to listen with your heart and not just with your ears. It’s not what they say but why they say it that is important. Let them know that you understand their pain by reflecting back to them in different words just what they say to you. Don’t argue or try to convince them with logical reasoning. There will be time for that later; meanwhile, patiently accept their feelings-even their bitter words against God-and build bridges, not walls." [Note: Wiersbe, pp. 35-36.]

Fuente: Expository Notes of Dr. Constable (Old and New Testaments)

XXI.

THE DOMINION AND THE BRIGHTNESS

Job 25:1-6

BILDAD SPEAKS

THE argument of the last chapter proceeded entirely on the general aspect of the question whether the evil are punished in proportion to their crimes. Job has met his friends so far as to place them in a great difficulty. They cannot assail him now as a sort of infidel. And yet what he has granted does not yield the main ground. They cannot deny his contrast between the two classes of evildoers nor refuse to admit that the strong oppressor has a different fate from the mean adulterer or thief. Bildad therefore confines himself to two general principles, that God is the supreme administrator of justice and that no man is clean. He will not now affirm that Job has been a tyrant to the poor, He dares not call him a murderer or a housebreaker. A snare has been laid for him who spoke much of snares, and seeing it he is on his guard.

Dominion and fear are with Him;

He maketh peace in His high places.

Is there any number of His armies?

And on whom doth not His light shine?

How then can man be just with God?

Or how can he of woman born be clean?

Behold, even the moon hath no brightness,

And the stars are not pure in His sight.

How much less man that is a worm,

And the son of man, the worm!

The brief ode has a certain dignity raising it above the level of Bildads previous utterances. He desires to show that Job has been too bold in his criticism of providence. God has sole dominion and claims universal adoration. Where He dwells in the lofty place of unapproachable glory His presence and rule create peace. He is the Lord of innumerable armies (the stars and their inhabitants perhaps), and His light fills the breadth of interminable space, revealing and illuminating every life. Upon this assertion of the majesty of God is based the idea of His holiness: Before so great and glorious a Being how can man be righteous? The universality of His power and the brightness of His presence stand in contrast to the narrow range of human energy and the darkness of the human mind.

Behold, says Bildad, the moon is eclipsed by a glance of the great Creator and the stars are cast into shadow by His effulgence; and how shall man whose body is of the earth earthy claim any cleanness of soul? He is like the worm; his kinship is with corruption; his place is in the dust like the creeping things of which he becomes the prey.

The representation of God in His exaltation and glory has a tone of impressive piety which redeems Bildad from any suspicion of insolence at this point. He is including himself and his friends among those whose lives appear impure in the sight of Heaven. He is showing that successfully as Job may repel the charges brought against him, there is at all events one general condemnation in which with all men he must allow himself to be involved. Is he not a feeble ignorant man whose will, being finite, must be imperfect? On the one hand is the pious exaltation of God, on the other the pious abasement of man.

It is, however, easy to see that Bildad is still bound to a creed of the superficial kind without moral depth or spiritual force. The ideas are those of a nature religion in which the one God is a supreme Baal or Master, monopolising all splendor, His purity that of the fire or the light. We are shown the Lord of the visible universe whose dwelling is in the high heavens, whose representative is the bright sun from the light of which nothing is hidden. It is easy to point to this splendid apparition and, contrasting man with the great fire force, the perennial fountain of light, to say-How dark, how puny, how imperfect is man! The brilliance of an Arabian sky through which the sun marches in unobstructed glory seems in complete contrast to the darkness of human life. Yet, is it fair, is it competent to argue thus? Is anything established as to the moral quality of man because he cannot shine like the sun or even with the lesser light of moon or stars? One may allow a hint of strong thought in the suggestion that boundless majesty and power are necessary to perfect virtue, that the Almighty alone can be entirely pure. But Bildad cannot be said to grasp this idea. If it gleams before his mind, the faint flash passes unrecognised. He has not wisdom enough to work out such a thought. And it is nature that according to his argument really condemns man. Job is bidden look up to the sun and moon and stars and know himself immeasurably less pure than they.

But the truth stands untouched that man whose body is doomed to corruption, man who labours after the right, with the heat of moral energy in his heart, moves on a far higher plane as a servant of God than any fiery orb which pours its light through boundless space. We find ignorance of man and therefore of his Maker in Bildads speech. He does not understand the dignity of the human mind in its straining after righteousness. “With limitless duration, with boundless space and number without end, Nature does at least what she can to translate into visible form the wealth of the creative formula. By the vastness of the abysses into which she penetrates in the effort, the unsuccessful effort, to house and contain the eternal thought we may measure the greatness of the Divine mind. For as soon as this mind goes out of itself and seeks to explain itself, the effort at utterance heaps universe upon universe during myriads of centuries, and still it is not expressed and the great oration must go on forever and ever.” The inanimate universe majestic, ruled by eternal law, cannot represent the moral qualities of the Divine mind, and the attempt to convict a thinking man, whose soul is bent on truth and purity, by the splendour of that light which dazzles his eye, comes to nothing. The commonplaces of pious thought fall stale and flat in a controversy like the present. Bildad does not realise wherein the right of man in the universe consists. He is trying in vain to instruct one who sees that moral desire and struggle are the conditions of human greatness, who will not be overborne by material splendours nor convicted by the accident of death.

Fuente: Expositors Bible Commentary