# comment

text:
<p>21:3- see on <em><a href='B:500 1:14'>Joh 1:14</a></em>.</p><p><em>And I heard a great voice out of the throne, saying: Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and He shall dwell with them, and they shall be His people; and God Himself shall be with them</em>- This is stating the same wondrous truth three times. God shall indeed live with us on earth. Heaven shall come to earth. This is all an allusion to <em><a href='B:330 37:26-27'>Eze 37:26-27</a></em>, concerning the time of Christ's return. If God lives with us at Christ's return, how will He be shielded from the 'mortal' population? This problem disappears if the 1000 years is seen as a description of the Kingdom itself. Seeing God’s face was what motivated Job, and John seems to allude to it as the final consolation in 1 John 4.</p><p>"The tabernacle of God", being God’s people;&nbsp;He being our God; God living and walking with us, is all evidently alluding to <em><a href='B:30 26:11-12'>Lev 26:11-12</a></em> and <em><a href='B:20 29:45-46'>Exo 29:45-46</a></em> concerning the ultimate blessings of the covenant after Israel's final repentance. The shadowy fulfilment they have had in the past through God’s manifestation in an Angel doesn't mean that these promises can and must only be fulfilled by some form of God manifestation:&nbsp;Surely <em><a href='B:730 21:3'>Rev 21:3</a></em> is saying that at the second coming the principle of God manifestation will change in that God will personally be with His people. Because we have so far lived under the paradigm of God manifestation, let's not think that it's not possible for God to personally be with us:&nbsp;Let's really try to be broad-minded enough to take this on board:&nbsp;</p><p>The other references to "God himself" are to Yahweh personally, rather than to Christ:&nbsp; <em><a href='B:290 45:18'>Isa 45:18</a></em>; <em><a href='B:500 5:37'>Joh 5:37</a></em>; <em><a href='B:500 16:27'>Joh 16:27</a></em>; <em><a href='B:540 5:18-19'>2Co 5:18-19</a></em>; <em><a href='B:560 1:5'>Eph 1:5</a></em>:&nbsp; Indeed, those N:T. references seem to point a difference between "God himself" and Christ:&nbsp;So isn't it lack of spiritual vision- perhaps even of faith - that makes us wriggle against the idea of God Himself, in person, living with us?&nbsp;The idea of God Himself dwelling with men in the tabernacle (temple) of the new city of Jerusalem is a clear reference to <em><a href='B:330 48:35'>Eze 48:35</a></em>, which says that the name of Jerusalem in the Millennium will be "Yahweh is there". These ideas doubtless also have reference to Yahweh's promise to David to build an eternal house for Yahweh's Name:&nbsp;This verse seems to teach that God Himself, in person, will descend to earth with Christ:&nbsp;This might sound altogether too incredible:&nbsp; But think about the idea:&nbsp;The King Himself (= God) comes to see the guests at the wedding of His Son (= Jesus; <em><a href='B:470 22:11'>Mat 22:11</a></em>). "God himself" here either means God Himself or God manifest in Christ:&nbsp;"God himself shall be with them" seems to me an odd way of describing Christ's second coming. God will "be their God”. I would just about be willing to concede that this might apply to God manifest in Christ - but for one significant fact:&nbsp;this <em><a href='B:730 21:3'>Rev 21:3</a></em> is packed with O:T. allusions which explicitly refer to God the Father:&nbsp;&nbsp;</p><p><em>And be their God-&nbsp;</em>God promised Abraham that through Christ, His seed, blessing would come on people from all nations, with the result that God would be the God of Abraham's multitudinous seed: "To be a God unto... your seed... I will be their God" (<em><a href='B:10 17:7-8'>Gen 17:7-8</a></em>):&nbsp;The seed is Christ, and the "God" is Yahweh:&nbsp;Let's not confuse them:&nbsp;Now in <em><a href='B:730 21:3'>Rev 21:3</a></em> this fundamental promise is alluded to; God Himself will be our God then; we will see Him and have a personal relationship with Him:&nbsp;This would mean that this idea of personally being with God is a fundamental part of the Gospel preached to Abraham:&nbsp;</p>


text:
<p>21:4- see on <em><a href='B:470 25:37-40'>Mat 25:37-40</a></em>; <em><a href='B:730 20:14'>Rev 20:14</a></em>.</p><p><em>And He shall wipe away every tear from their eyes-&nbsp;</em>The same word is used in <em><a href='B:510 3:19'>Act 3:19</a></em> concerning sin being blotted out at Christ's return. The tears are for our sins (sorrow likewise is connected with sin in Isaiah 53). Will we have an emotional breakdown straight after the judgment? The accepted will feel so certain of this that they will almost argue with the Lord Jesus at the day of judgment that he hasn't made the right decision concerning them (<em><a href='B:470 25:37-40'>Mat 25:37-40</a></em>). It's only a highly convicted man who would dare do that. Thus the Father will have to comfort the faithful in the aftermath of the judgment, wiping away the tears which will&nbsp;<em>then</em>&nbsp;(see context) be in our eyes, and give us special help to realize that our sinful past has now finally been overcome. We will be like the labourers in the parable who walk away from judgment clutching their penny, thinking "I really shouldn't have thIsa. I didn’t work for a day, and this is a day's pay". Therefore if we honestly, genuinely feel that we won't be in the Kingdom, well, this is how in some ways the faithful will all feel.</p><p>The tears that will be wiped from our eyes are those associated with "the former things" of this life, and also the emotion associated with our acceptance. But it can't be that it means we will never have the emotion of sadness ever again. For God is made sad, grieved at His heart, even now. And we are to share&nbsp;<em>His</em>&nbsp;nature. Consider for a moment the&nbsp;<em>emotion</em>&nbsp;which we will feel after being granted Divine nature. Malachi says we will be like stalled animals, who are fed, fattened, kept in small dark pens to be killed… who then suddenly break out into the daylight, and go prancing away through the meadows. This will be our leap of joy and taste of true freedom. Yet the Father will have to comfort the faithful in the aftermath of the judgment, wiping away the tears which will&nbsp;<em>then</em>&nbsp;(see context) be in our eyes, and give us special help to realize that our sinful past has now finally been overcome. God's comfort to the oppressed is that He will wipe away their tears (Rev. 7:17; 21:4). Revelation speaks particularly to those being persecuted. And "wipe away" is the word used in the LXX for the wiping away of evil people and systems from the face of this earth (Gen. 7:4,23; Ex. 17:14; Dt. 9:14). But it is also used of the wiping away of our sins (Ps. 51:3; Is.43:25). The two ideas go together. The final comfort will be that truly we have been forgiven for our own serious sins; and also, in the same comfort, there is the assurance that the evil of sinful men has also been permanently taken away. </p><p><em>And death shall be no more</em>- The end of death is portrayed in Revelation 20 as death being thrown into the lake of fire, which is also the second death. The second death is for those rejected at the judgment at Christ's return. Their punishment with death is therefore the end of death; there will be no more death after that because the curse of death upon Adam's race will be ended. There is no possibility therefore for a 'mortal population' after these things. If there is to be no more crying or pain after the Lord's return, we are scarcely to imagine that there will be exactly these things at some supposed 'second judgment' and 'second condemnation' 1,000 years later.</p><p><em><a href='B:530 15:54-55'>1Co 15:54-55</a></em> likewise speak of the end of death: "But when this corruptible shall have put on incorruption and this mortal shall have put on immortality, then shall come to fulfilment the saying that is written: Death is swallowed up in victory. O death, where is your victory? O death, where is your sting?". The quotation is from <em><a href='B:290 25:8'>Isa 25:8</a></em>, which concerns events at Christ's return- not at the end of the 1,000 years. The end of death will therefore come at the resurrection- when Christ returns. And that is what is being taught here in Revelation 20, 21.</p><p><em>Neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain, any more-</em>&nbsp;The Greek for "pain" specifically refers to labour pains. This is all the language of the curse on Adam and Eve in Genesis 3. It fits into a theme of paradise being restored. But labour pains are also used with regard to the experience of the believers during the tribulation. As ever in Revelation, there is especial relevance to the believers who are persecuted and die during the final tribulation in the earth / land promised to Abraham. It is they who have experienced death, sorrow and labour pains.</p><p><em>The first things are passed away</em>- The parallel is with the passing away of the first heaven and earth (:1). The 'heaven and earth' is therefore a figure for "the former things":&nbsp;<em>Former things</em>... &nbsp;Defined in <em><a href='B:290 48:3-5'>Isa 48:3-5</a></em> as God’s prediction "from the beginning" that Israel would sin and be judged by Him with exile. When we read that the "former things" will no longer be remembered, and that both God and man will "remember not the former things" (<em><a href='B:290 43:18'>Isa 43:18</a></em>), perhaps the same reference is in view. <em><a href='B:730 21:4'>Rev 21:4</a></em> predicts that in the Kingdom age, there will be no more tears because "the former things are passed away", literally, 'they are behind'. That may appear obvious, a needless statement of a truism- that past things are past. But the suggestion is that then we will totally realize that our sins are behind us, as God has cast them behind His back. The connection between tears, sorrow and "former things" is a powerful psychological insight into the human condition- sorrow, tears, depression etc. are all connected with our awareness (however subconscious) of human sin, both our own and of others. When we finally grasp that all sin is indeed behind us, then there is the basis for a life without tears. And that is at least theoretically possible even now, if only we will see our sins and perceive them as God does- as past. But we must of course deal with the sins of others in that same way. God’s emphasis in Isaiah is that He has "declared" the former things from the start. All our sins in one sense were known to God from the beginning, and He knew how to deal with them.</p><p>God (this is important) made Joseph forget all his "toil", his mental sufferings (<em><a href='B:10 41:51'>Gen 41:51</a></em>). This was a miracle; no amount of steel-willed suppression of his past could have made Joseph paper over all the pain. But God did a psychological miracle upon him. Has God done the same to Christ now in His glory, as He will to us one day soon (<em><a href='B:730 21:4'>Rev 21:4</a></em>)? Yet the Lord will be factually aware of His sacrifice and the associated pain. God presumably did not obliterate Joseph's memory cells, but He made him "forget" the pain. This is surely what God has done to Christ, and what He will do to us: take away the pain on a psychological level whilst still leaving a factual awareness. Is it too much to suggest that even now, God is ready and willing to do something like this?</p>


text:
<p>21:5&nbsp;<em>And he that sits on the throne said: Behold I make all things new. And he said: Write For these words are faithful and true-&nbsp;</em>All things will be made new at the Lord’s coming, and yet those in whom the new creation is worked out already have all things made new in their spiritual experience (<em><a href='B:540 5:17-18'>2Co 5:17-18</a></em>):&nbsp;</p><p>The utter literality of all this was emphasized to John, when he was told:&nbsp;"Write For these words are true and faithful". The almost fantastical description of God Himself wiping away all the tears that are in (Gk:) the eyes of men... this really is true and faithful:&nbsp;It could be that the wonder of the idea of meeting God in person... boggled John's mind to the point he wondered whether he really was intended to write this down, doubting whether all this could be really true. And he exactly represents our feelings.</p>


text:
<p>21:6&nbsp;<em>And he said to me: They have come to pass. I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. I will freely give to him who is thirsty from the spring of the water of life</em>- We, now, take the water of life (<em><a href='B:730 22:17'>Rev 22:17</a></em>; <em><a href='B:500 4:14'>Joh 4:14</a></em>; <em><a href='B:470 10:8'>Mat 10:8</a></em>). The picture surely is that at this time, we receive literal immortality. It speaks of the Lord's return and not the end of some point 1,000 years afterwards. It is at this time, when we receive immortality, drinking the water of life, that death itself ends. So there will be no 'mortal population' after that. And yet as John's gospel stresses, we can right now drink of that water of life; we can receive the gift of the spirit, of the Lord's mind and thinking, of His life; so that we can begin to live now the kind of life which we shall eternally live. And the Greek tenses could imply that throughout eternity we are continually given, in an ongoing sense, to drink of this water of life. It is life as He has it, and not just the one-time gift of immortality.</p><p>The "freely" giving of the water of life recalls the river Pison in the garden of Eden, which means 'freely flowing'. There are allusions galore to Eden through the final visions of Revelation- for Eden shall be restored and the curse lifted.</p>


text:
<p>21:7&nbsp;<em>He that overcomes shall inherit these things</em>- The letters to the churches begin Revelation by repeatedly promising that "he that overcomes" will be recompensed at Christ's return- no suggestion is made that the recompense will be 1,000 years after His return (<em><a href='B:730 2:7'>Rev 2:7</a></em>; <em><a href='B:730 2:11'>Rev 2:11</a></em>; <em><a href='B:730 2:17'>Rev 2:17</a></em>; <em><a href='B:730 2:26'>Rev 2:26</a></em>; <em><a href='B:730 3:5'>Rev 3:5</a></em>; <em><a href='B:730 3:12'>Rev 3:12</a></em>; <em><a href='B:730 3:21'>Rev 3:21</a></em>). The Greek word translated "overcomes" occurs nowhere else. The reference here is therefore to the time of Christ's return; and it is at this time that death will be ended (:4), i:e. cast into the lake of fire. If death itself is destroyed at the Lord's return, there cannot be any mortal population during a supposed 1000 year reign which commences at His return.</p><p><em>And I will be his God and he shall be my son</em>- An application of the promise to David about Messiah to each one of us who is in Christ. The wonder of our eternal living will be that we shall relate to the Father as the Lord Jesus did. The prospect offered to us is very much in terms of&nbsp;<em>relationship</em>&nbsp;with the Father and Son, without being disturbed by personal sin and the possibility of sinning; rather than a presentation of a literal picture of a physical, materially optimal existence. Galatians 4 teaches that we are more than adopted sons; we become the actual begotten sons of God through the work of the Spirit. And when the Lord returns, this shall finally come to full realisation.  </p>


text:
<p>21:8&nbsp;<em>But for the fearful and unbelieving and abominable and murderers and fornicators and sorcerers and idolaters and all liars, their share shall be in the lake that burns with fire and sulphur; which is the second death</em>- The language of murder, fornication, lying, sorcery and idolatry has all been used in Revelation of the beast / Babylon system and their various associated acts such as the false prophet. It is they who shall be destroyed in the second death; implying that they shall be raised to judgment even if they died during the tribulation. I have suggested in chapter 20 that the descriptions of resurrection, judgment by those who they killed, and destruction in the second death all refer specifically to this category.</p><p>These people are those of <em><a href='B:730 20:15'>Rev 20:15</a></em>, those of <em><a href='B:730 22:15'>Rev 22:15</a></em> who are placed (geographically?) outside the encampment of the people of God in Jerusalem, perhaps to be literally burnt in Gehenna outside the city.</p><p>But just as apparently 'petty' sins by secular judgment are juxtaposed alongside apparently 'major' ones in Paul's writings, so here, the "fearful and unbelieving" are categorized alongside the abusive members of the beast system. Those who won't believe the good news of salvation in Jesus are in the same category as those society would characterize as serious sinners, the abusive members of the beast system. But before God, they all have the same final end. Note that the disciples, whose names are on the foundations of the new Jerusalem, were once both fearful and unbelieving (<em><a href='B:480 4:40'>Mar 4:40</a></em>). Indeed they are described as "unbelieving" several times (<em><a href='B:470 17:17'>Mat 17:17</a></em>; <em><a href='B:500 20:27'>Joh 20:27</a></em>; <em><a href='B:630 1:15'>Tit 1:15</a></em>). The point is that those who were once like those outside the city are in fact the foundations of the city.</p><p>And yet the language used here is also used about the behaviour of some within the church. The same words are used about believers in <em><a href='B:530 5:9'>1Co 5:9</a></em>; <em><a href='B:530 5:11'>1Co 5:11</a></em>; <em><a href='B:650 12:16'>Heb 12:16</a></em>; <em><a href='B:650 13:4'>Heb 13:4</a></em>. It means that in essence this is how God sees some in the ecclesias. I wonder how many of them will have literally done those things. Surely it is more reasonable to suppose that this is how their other deeds and attitudes were counted in God’s sight. Or does it show that far more people than we expect will be classed as responsible to judgment? And it's noteworthy that those who won't believe are in the same category as these more 'awful' sinners. For we are either saved or rejected, there is no third road nor category:&nbsp;</p>


text:
<p>21:9&nbsp;<em>And there came one of the seven angels who had the seven bowls, who were laden with the seven last plagues; and he spoke with me, saying: Come here, I will show you the bride-&nbsp;</em>We are introduced to the idea of seven last plagues, and thus an expectation is set up that we shall now see some awful catastrophes poured out on earth. Instead, we have a vision of the bride and her Kingdom glory. I suggest this is purposeful; we are being shown that the Lord's focus is upon the salvation of His people. The punishment of the wicked is incidental to that, and not something He at all revels in. Perhaps the idea is that the final attack against Jerusalem is made whilst the Lord and His bride are within it. And His focus is upon enjoying the beauty of His bride rather than the necessary destruction of the invaders through those seven last plagues. Maybe the seven last plagues, like the seven thunders, are potentially prepared but do not actually happen; see on <em><a href='B:730 10:4'>Rev 10:4</a></em>.</p>


text:
<p>21:10&nbsp;<em>And he carried me away in the Spirit to a mountain great and high</em>- The 'height' of the mountain likely refers more to its glory than its literal altitude. Zion and / or the mount of Olives was the great and high mountain in the Jewish thought in which Revelation is presented. And Acts 1 and Zechariah 14 envisage the Lord Jesus returning to that mountain. The exact chronology of events need not concern us; not only will the meaning / experience of time likely be changed, but the chronology must to some extent be open, because the repentance of various groups will be possible. The final outworking of events will take that into account.</p><p><em>And showed me the holy city Jerusalem coming down out of heaven from God</em>- Literal Jerusalem as the capital of Babylon will be destroyed; a new Jerusalem will literally come down to replace it. But this is not a pile of new stones, but more essentially the glorified believers, who as explained on <em><a href='B:590 4:14'>1Th 4:14</a></em> come as it were with the Lord Jesus at this stage.</p>


text:
<p>21:11&nbsp;<em>Having the glory of God. Her light was like a stone most precious, as it were a jasper stone, clear as crystal</em>- Jasper appears in various colours, representative of the varying individual beauties of the believers, refracting the Lord's light in unique and beautiful to Him ways. The Hebrew idea of 'jasper' is 'polishing', and it is that process which is underway in our lives at this moment.</p>


text:
<p>21:12&nbsp;<em>She had a wall great and high, having twelve gates; and at the gates were twelve angels, and the names of the twelve tribes of the children of Israel written thereon-&nbsp;</em>The 12 gates of the Heavenly Jerusalem are identified with 12 Angels, whereon are written the names of the 12 tribes of Israel. This suggests that the tribes of Israel are reflective of the situation in Heaven, where there are Angels representing each tribe. This identity between heavenly Angels and the believers they represent on earth is a common theme in Revelation. This connection between Angels and Israel is commonly found in the Old Testament. <em><a href='B:340 8:24'>Dan 8:24</a></em> speaks of Israel as “the people of the saints” (RVmg:), although v. 13 speaks of “the saint” (RV “holy one”) as an Angel. <em><a href='B:90 17:45'>1Sa 17:45</a></em> parallels the Angelic hosts, and the hosts of Israel’s armies; they were to follow where the host of God went, just as David’s army had to follow the sound of the cherubim “marching” over the mulberry bushes (<em><a href='B:130 14:15'>1Ch 14:15</a></em>). And whilst we follow where we are led, we are identified with our Angels to the extent that what is done to us is done to them. To defy the armies of Israel was thus to defy the armies of Heaven (<em><a href='B:90 17:45'>1Sa 17:45</a></em>). Thus the four faces of the Angel cherubim were reflected in the four standards of the camp of Israel; the people were intended to “keep in step with the Spirit”, following where they went, as they had done in the wilderness years. They were to walk “each one straight before him” (<em><a href='B:290 57:2'>Isa 57:2</a></em> RVmg:), as each of the cherubim went straight ahead (<em><a href='B:330 1:12'>Eze 1:12</a></em>). And we too are to follow where our Angel potentially enables us to go. The Angel went in to Jericho to take the city; and the Israelites went “straight” ahead, following the Angel, and thus took the city (<em><a href='B:60 5:13-14'>Jos 5:13-14</a></em>; <em><a href='B:60 6:20'>Jos 6:20</a></em>).</p>


text:
<p>21:13&nbsp;<em>On the east were three gates, on the north three gates, on the south three gates and on the west three gates</em>- What is the significance of this order? It is not a circular view, i:e. not clockwise nor anticlockwise. Perhaps it is in conscious difference to the order of the gates of the city as given in <em><a href='B:330 48:31-34'>Eze 48:31-34</a></em>, which goes north- east- south- west, i:e. in a clockwise direction, starting from where the hands of the clock would naturally begin, i:e. at the north. The many differences highlighted with the Ezekiel temple visions seem in order to make the point that contrary to Jewish expectation, that temple would not be literally built at the Lord's return. The new Jerusalem will be altogether beyond such literalism.</p><p>The square nature of the city (:16) is perhaps to demonstrate that the Kingdom of God is open to all peoples from all quarters; and the unbelieving nations who were not destroyed along with Babylon will now equally be able to enter God’s Kingdom.</p>


text:
<p>21:14&nbsp;<em>The wall of the city had twelve foundations, and on them the twelve names of the twelve apostles of the Lamb</em>- Those men were so weak in their lifetimes, but out of such weakness were made strong. John must have been shocked to see his own name there. We can assume that the device to replace Judas with Matthias in <em><a href='B:510 1:26'>Act 1:26</a></em> was therefore eternally accepted. The tragedy is that the name of Judas could have been there, but it was removed, just as names can be deleted from the book of life.</p>


text:
<p>21:15&nbsp;<em>And he that spoke with me had for a measure a golden reed to measure the city and the gates of it, and the wall of it</em>- The allusion is clearly to the measurements of the new temple given in Ezekiel 40-48. But the details and dimensions are so different, and those emphasized differences see on :13 climax in the statement that there is "no temple" in the new Jerusalem (:22). It all seems designed to underscore the point that the temple of Ezekiel's prophecy is&nbsp;<em>not&nbsp;</em>going to be built at the Lord's return. It was a potential, conditional prophecy of what could have been at the restoration from Babylon, which the Jews failed to actualize.</p><p>It's worth reflecting on the significance of how the same words for "reed" and "measure" are used in <em><a href='B:730 11:1'>Rev 11:1</a></em>, where John is bidden measure the temple with a reed. But there is no record of him doing so. Now, an Angel does make the measurements, not just with a "reed" but with a "golden reed", the gold maybe speaking of faith brought to completion. Perhaps John represented the lack of faith and obedience which precluded the Lord's Kingdom coming in the first century. Likewise it was a lack of faith which precluded the building of the temple which Ezekiel had seen measured out with a reed. Hence the difference in reeds- the one in <em><a href='B:730 21:15'>Rev 21:15</a></em> is a&nbsp;<em>golden&nbsp;</em>reed, speaking of faith.</p>


text:
<p>21:16&nbsp;<em>And the city is laid out as a square, its length is as great as its breadth, and he measured the city with the reed, twelve thousand stadia</em>- This is clearly not to be taken literally. And so one wonders why the insistence on reading 'one thousand years' as a literal measurement in this very same section of Revelation.</p><p><em>The length and the breadth and the height of it are equal</em>- As were the dimensions of the most Holy, and of Babylon, which was rebuilt briefly on the site of Jerusalem. The perfect congruence of the design reflects how in this life, each of the component parts is being brought into perfect symmetry with the others. This would be one explanation for the inter-personal friction which so many have experienced as a result of their Christian walk. In the bigger picture, this was all necessary to make us fit together so perfectly in eternity.</p><p>The square nature of the city (twice emphasized) is perhaps to demonstrate that the Kingdom of God is open to all peoples from all quarters; and the unbelieving nations who were not destroyed along with Babylon will now equally be able to enter God’s Kingdom. The temple was not a cube, but the Most Holy Place was (1 Kings 6:20). The idea may be that the new Jerusalem is not just a temple, but the entire city is the Most Holy Place, with God Himself present there with us. For the personal presence of God in the new Jerusalem is a repeated theme. The implication of Zech. 14:20,21 could be that the holiness of the temple and the Most Holy is going to be extended to the whole city of Jerusalem, confirming the impression here that the new Jerusalem is in fact a temple: "In that day there will be on the bells of the horses, HOLY TO YAHWEH; and the pots in Yahweh’s house will be like the bowls before the altar. Yes, every pot in Jerusalem and in Judah will be holy to Yahweh".</p>


text:
<p>21:17&nbsp;<em>And he measured the wall of it, one hundred and forty four cubits</em>- Again, numbers are not to be taken literally. The idea is clearly of 12 x 12, the foundations of Jacob's twelve sons mixed with those of the twelve apostles, maybe speaking of the perfect fusion of Jew and Gentile. We may well wonder why the new Jerusalem has a wall; for a wall is a symbol of protection, and implies some are within, and others without. The wall is 144 cubits high, but the city itself is 12,000 stadia high (:16). The wall and the city are not therefore identical. The wall is given quite some attention here. If sin and evil are no more, the idea of protecting from external threats seems inappropriate. I therefore would focus more on the sense of security. We shall be eternally secure. No more niggling doubts as to our salvation. No more fear of sin, but eternally secure within God's love.</p><p><em>The measurement of a man, which is also an angel's measurement</em>- The parallel between men and Angels would suggest that now the believers have become as Angels (<em><a href='B:490 20:35-36'>Luk 20:35-36</a></em>). This would suggest a reference to the time of the Lord's return, when there will be this change from humanity to immortality and Angelic nature. John has seen Angels representing believers in the heavenly throne room, and now they are united. The wall is "great and high" (:12) but 144 cubits is not a huge height for a city wall- only 216 feet / 65 meters. The walls of Babylon were almost double that, and in the context, Babylon is set up as the antithesis of the new Jerusalem. And the wall seems very low compared to the height of the city itself, which is "twelve thousand stadia", about 340 miles (:16). The point may be that what is small by man's measurement is great by God's; and that is perhaps the idea behind the enigmatic comment that a man's measurement is also an Angel's measurement in this city. Babylon was famed for its walls, but they are nothing compared to the walls of the new Jeruslaem. Because the walls of God may appear to man far smaller, but are "great and high" by God's standard. </p>


text:
<p>21:18&nbsp;<em>And the building of the wall was of jasper</em>- Why a wall? It can hardly be for protection. Perhaps there will eternally be a sense of separation between light and darkness, saved and unsaved, which we do well to be aware of now too.</p><p><em>And the city was pure gold, like pure glass</em>- See on :21&nbsp;<em>pure gold</em>. Glass was not totally transparent in John's day, but he saw glass as if it were transparent, and had the impression this was in fact transparent gold (:21). Yet gold by its nature cannot be transparent. In these paradoxes we have reflected the wonder of the whole thing. The city of God, the Kingdom of God, is transparent- it is&nbsp;<em>open</em>. The gold, the wonderful reality which by its nature is closed and dense, is also amazingly open and transparent. For a theme of these visions is that the unbelieving world those not destroyed during the last judgments are invited to come in to the Kingdom, to the community of believers, the Jerusalem which is above which has now been revealed on earth. The gates are open day and night, the wall is there- but transparent; the city itself is the ultimate image of openness. The bride and the Lord Jesus are urging the nations to come into it. No longer do the 12 tribes of Israel define membership- the symbolism of 12 x 12 gives the impression of an innumerably greater openness. The spirit of that openness is to be seen in us today.</p>


text:
<p>21:19&nbsp;<em>The foundations of the wall of the city were adorned with all manner of precious stones</em>- The allusion is to the temple in Jerusalem, whose precious stones had made John and the other disciples so awestruck (<em><a href='B:480 13:1'>Mar 13:1</a></em>). That was all to be replaced by a spiritual temple. Instead of the names of donors and other leading lights within Judaism engraved on the precious stones, now the names of the humble disciples are to be written. As the bride was adorned (:2), so the same figure is used here. The adornment is surely of good works and spiritual fruits, by which we adorn the teaching of the Gospel (<em><a href='B:630 2:10'>Tit 2:10</a></em>; <em><a href='B:670 3:5'>1Pe 3:5</a></em>).</p><p><em>The first foundation was jasper. The second, sapphire. The third, chalcedony. The fourth, emerald</em>- See on :20.</p>


text:
<p>21:20&nbsp;<em>The fifth, sardonyx. The sixth, sardius. The seventh, chrysolite. The eighth, beryl. The ninth, topaz. The tenth, chrysoprase. The eleventh, jacinth. The twelfth, amethyst</em>- The stones echo the spirit of the High Priest's breastplate. Within the city, therefore, is the heart of the High Priest. The thinking, spirit and heartbeat of Jesus is the all-consuming characteristic of the community within those walls, as it should be of us today.</p>


text:
<p>21:21- see on <em><a href='B:470 7:6'>Mat 7:6</a></em>.</p><p><em>And the twelve gates were twelve pearls. Each of the separate gates was of one pearl</em>- The gates are open constantly (:25), and even if shut, the glory passing through the pearl would have given the effect of the pearl being transparent. This fits with the otherwise strange image of transparent gold (see on :18). The gates are open; but why are there gates, therefore, and why are they effectively transparent? It is in order to teach something to the nations who witness Christ's return. They must recognize that there is indeed a wall and gate to be passed through, but it is effectively open and transparent to them, such is the Lord's will that they should enter in.</p><p><em>And the street of the city was pure gold, as if it were transparent glass-&nbsp;</em>Gold cannot by nature be transparent. John is struggling in words to convey what he saw and the impressions which arose. As with the language of demons, we have an example here of how the Bible uses human language and at times records things from the limited perspective of observers on earth.</p>


text:
<p>21:22&nbsp;<em>And I saw no temple therein. For the Lord God the Almighty, and the Lamb, are the temple of it</em>- This seems almost purposefully intended to teach that the temple outlined in Ezekiel 40-48 will not be built at the Lord's return. See on :13. The dimensions of the city, measured by a reed as was used in Ezekiel's vision, are specifically different from those in Ezekiel's temple vision. I suggest Ezekiel 40-48 was command rather than prediction; it was what could have been if the returned exiles had built it. Revelation was given in the first century, at the time when Jerusalem and its temple were destroyed. This was no small tragedy for Jews and Judaism. Revelation's message is that Jerusalem and the temple are not necessary in the new order of things; there will be a new Jerusalem, comprised of the believers; and no need in any case for a temple.</p><p>In John's Gospel, the Lord states that He is the temple / tabernacle which was to be taken down in His death and rebuilt in His resurrection. Our abiding in Him is therefore abiding within the temple; for He has prepared for us an abiding place in that spiritual house through His death (<em><a href='B:500 14:1-2'>Joh 14:1-2</a></em>). As discussed on :2, this replacement of the temple by the Lord Jesus had huge significance for the primary audience of Revelation. For the destruction of AD70 was going to shake the world and faith of most Jews, including Jewish Christians. But those who correctly perceived the message of Revelation would not have been at all fazed.</p>


text:
<p>21:23&nbsp;<em>And the city has no need of the sun, neither of the moon, to shine upon it</em>- The sun and moon were created partly in order to give a sense of time and seasons, not least the Jewish feasts. Grasping God’s view of time means that we will see the Kingdom as immortality, not everlasting life. The eternity of our future existence is not the big theme of the Bible; it is "God manifestation, not human salvation", in the words of John Thomas. The process of eternity, the life and Kingdom of God, is already going on now; the tree of life&nbsp;<em>is</em>&nbsp;now (not 'will be'; Greek tenses are precise) in the midst of the paradise of God, at least from God’s perspective (<em><a href='B:730 2:7'>Rev 2:7</a></em>). We will have no need of the sun, for the light of God’s glory will replace our concept of time (<em><a href='B:730 21:23'>Rev 21:23</a></em>). Indeed, "the time of the end" can be read as "the end of time" (<em><a href='B:340 12:4'>Dan 12:4</a></em>; <em><a href='B:340 12:9'>Dan 12:9</a></em>). There will be "time (Gk:&nbsp;<em>chronos</em>, the idea of time) no longer" (<em><a href='B:730 10:6'>Rev 10:6</a></em>). The image of Daniel 2 is destroyed together by the Lord's return; each metal in some sense exists at his coming. Rather than meaning that each of those empires must have an end time revival, this may be teaching that the whole concept of human history and time will be ground to powder by the advent of the Kingdom. One day, when we are then with the Lord, will be like a thousand years (<em><a href='B:680 3:8'>2Pe 3:8</a></em>)- there will be no comparison between our present view of time and what will then be. The ploughman shall overtake the reaper (<em><a href='B:370 9:13'>Amo 9:13</a></em>)- which may refer to the collapsing of time, rather than just being a figure of fecundity. Before people pray, they will be heard (<em><a href='B:290 65:24'>Isa 65:24</a></em> - although this is our present prayer experience too, <em><a href='B:470 6:8'>Mat 6:8</a></em>). Our focus should therefore be more on the&nbsp;<em>quality</em>&nbsp;and&nbsp;<em>nature</em>&nbsp;of the Kingdom life, rather than the mere eternity of it.</p><p><em>For the glory of God did light it, and the lamp of it is the Lamb</em>- This seems to imply their physical presence. There was no 'candlestick' Gk:- no temple and temple furniture was necessary. This was radical reasoning for the first century Jewish audience, dominated as they were by the temple cult.</p>


text:
<p>21:24&nbsp;<em>And the nations shall walk by the light of it, and the kings of the earth bring their glory into it</em>- Revelation 20 has described a period of time when the dragon is chained. It could be that during this period, a chance is given to the nations outside of the earth / land promised to Abraham, which is the focus of&nbsp;Revelation and Bible prophecy. And they respond by realizing that indeed their wealth and glory is nothing (:26), and come up to Jerusalem in repentance of their materialism, where they are invited to the Lord's table. See on <em><a href='B:730 19:18'>Rev 19:18</a></em>. The previous kings of the earth / land had supported Babylon / the beast and were now no more. But they will be replaced by leaders who bring their glory to the Lamb rather than to Babylon.  The glory they bring in to the new city is surely not physical gifts; but giving glory to God through repentance and commitment to Him. </p><p>God dwells in light (<em><a href='B:610 6:16'>1Ti 6:16</a></em>), and this new city will have light from God, through Christ (<em><a href='B:730 21:11'>Rev 21:11</a></em>; <em><a href='B:730 21:23'>Rev 21:23</a></em>;&nbsp; <em><a href='B:730 22:5'>Rev 22:5</a></em>)- because Yahweh Himself will be there:&nbsp;Perhaps some of the intensity of that light will spread out to the surrounding world, so that the nations call Jerusalem the place where Yahweh is (<em><a href='B:330 48:35'>Eze 48:35</a></em>).</p>


text:
<p>21:25&nbsp;<em>The gates of it shall in no way be shut by day (for there shall be no night there)</em>- Representing the tribes of Israel (:12). They will be continually open to Gentiles entering in and joining with them. There would be no more Jewish exclusivity of the type which troubled the believing community at the time Revelation was given. There will finally be nothing and nobody untouched by the light of the Lord Jesus. And yet John's gospel presents the Lord as the total light of our lives now; in this sense we can live the eternal life now. But again we enquire why there would be gates in an eternal city, in a situation where ultimately there are none left 'outside'. The next verses could suggest that this is because in some way, there will always be an openness for others to enter. We can only speculate who those 'others' might be. But perhaps the gates remain as an eternal reminder that those within the city had at one point entered it. This is the huge significance of baptism, and of entering through the narrow gate in this life, as well as into Divine nature at the Lord's return. </p>


text:
<p>21:26&nbsp;<em>And they shall bring the glory and the honour of the nations into it</em>- The idea of entering the city (:27) which represents the Kingdom of God is found in the Lord's teaching of the camel passing through the needle gate in order for a rich man to enter the Kingdom. There is the same message here- the wealth and glory of the world must be sacrificed in order to enter in. See on :24.</p>


text:
<p>21:27&nbsp;<em>There shall in no way enter into it anything unclean, or he that makes an abomination and a lie, but only they that are written in the Lamb's book of life</em>- As noted earlier, there is an intended contrast between the descriptions of the city in Revelation 21, 22 seem to contradict those given in Ezekiel 40-48 :</p><table><tr><td></p><p>Revelation</td><td>Ezekiel</td><td></td></tr><tr><td><em><a href='B:730 21:27'>Rev 21:27</a></em> Only those in the book&nbsp;of life can enter</td><td><em><a href='B:330 45:6'>Eze 45:6</a></em> the city is for natural Israel (<em><a href='B:450 8:5'>Zec 8:5</a></em> - children play in the streets). <em><a href='B:330 44:11'>Eze 44:11</a></em>; <em><a href='B:330 46:9'>Eze 46:9</a></em> ordinary mortals enter it.</td><td></td></tr><tr><td><em><a href='B:730 21:25'>Rev 21:25</a></em> City gates never shut</td><td><em><a href='B:330 44:1'>Eze 44:1</a></em>&nbsp;Gates shut at times</td><td></td></tr><tr><td><em><a href='B:730 22:5'>Rev 22:5</a></em>; <em><a href='B:730 21:23'>Rev 21:23</a></em> Glory of God is the light, eclipsing sun and&nbsp;moon</td><td><em><a href='B:330 45:17'>Eze 45:17</a></em>; <em><a href='B:330 46:1'>Eze 46:1</a></em>; <em><a href='B:330 46:3'>Eze 46:3</a></em> Moon shines in the city</td><td></td></tr><tr><td><em><a href='B:730 22:14'>Rev 22:14</a></em> those who enter the city&nbsp;&nbsp; eat the tree of life</td><td>mortal priests inside&nbsp;the city</td><td></td></tr><tr><td><em><a href='B:730 21:22'>Rev 21:22</a></em> no temple in the city</td><td>a temple in the city</td><td></td></tr><tr><td>The true temple has already&nbsp;been sprinkled by Christ's blood:&nbsp;</td><td><em><a href='B:330 45:20'>Eze 45:20</a></em> This temple needs regular cleansing ("so shall ye&nbsp;reconcile the house")&nbsp;by sprinkling of blood.</td><td></td></tr></table><p>These are just some of the many disparities, yet both cities are said to be built on a great mountain. The language bids us look back to Ezekiel's temple- and realize that it is&nbsp;<em>not</em>&nbsp;going to be built at the Lord's return. Such literalism will be far out of place once the Kingdom is established in all its glory.</p>


text:
<p>22:1- see on <em><a href='B:500 1:14'>Joh 1:14</a></em>.</p><p><em>And he showed me a river of water of life, bright as crystal, proceeding out of the throne of God and of the Lamb</em>- The throne of God and Jesus will be in Jerusalem. The river of life proceeds from there. Whilst I fail to see a doctrine of a Millennial reign taught in Revelation, it's clear that after Babylon is destroyed and Christ and the saints are enthroned in Jerusalem, there is a period of time during which the surviving mortals have the opportunity to identify themselves with the Kingdom and be immortalized. The water of life thus flows out to them, and they are urged to drink freely of it, thereby finding immortality. Likewise the tree of eternal life offers its fruits to them in :2; all they have to do is take it. And both the Lord Jesus and us His bride urge the peoples to come into the city of God, through the gates into the city of eternal life (:17). It may be that in order to eat of the tree of life they must first "wash their robes", undergoing a kind of baptism experience (:14). There may be some literal element of fulfilment of the prophecy that a fountain will be opened in Jerusalem where sin can be cleansed (<em><a href='B:450 13:1'>Zec 13:1</a></em>). 
The New Jerusalem described here is clearly presented as the capital city of the true Christian. This was another counter cultural stab at the cult of empire, whereby Rome was to be seen as the eternal mother city. To go to Rome was seen as the ultimate pilgrimage, with Caesar's palace perceived and imaged as the most 'holy' place on earth. All this is subverted by presenting the New Jerusalem, replete with the actual throne of God Almighty, as the ultimate city of identity. So Christians who lived within the Roman empire were not to see Rome as their capital, nor for that matter "Jerusalem that now is"; but rather the heavenly Jerusalem "which is above". 
The new Jerusalem comes down from Heaven, clothed as a bride. The city is therefore people. Just as "Babylon" is people, so is the new "Jerusalem". The wall is 144 cubits high, combining the 12 apostles with the 12 tribes of Israel. The wall too is representative of people. This needs to be understood, lest we fall into some kind of excessive literalism regarding the physical city called Jerusalem. Indeed, Paul's connects "the Jerusalem that now is" with bondage and condemnation, rather than salvation. The "Jerusalem that is above" is free, and for freedom has Christ set us free. We are that city. Revelation is full of pictures of the triumphant, victorious believers "in Heaven", and then pictures of  them "on earth" under persecution and suffering. There is no conscious survival of death. The believers "in Heaven" are not alive. But they are assured of salvation, and so the God who is outside of time sees them as they shall eternally be. But on the ground, they are suffering. The new Jerusalem 'coming down' therefore means that the salvation now assured for us, and the nature of which is currently being worked out in Heaven, will then be turned into reality on earth. Right now, our reward is being prepared; the nature of eternity, our part in the 'new city', reflects our own chosen path, our works, the nuances of our personal relationship with the Lord Jesus which we are now developing. In this sense it is a reward prepared for us, and we will be given according to our works (Rev. 22:12), although salvation itself is by grace and not works. What the Lord is now working with us to prepare will then be transferred, from heaven to earth. This all may be represented by a physical entity appearing in Jerusalem from heaven, to replace the abomination built there by the antiChrist. Although contra that is the bald statement in Rev. 21:22 "And I saw no temple therein. For the Lord God the Almighty, and the Lamb, are the temple of it". This was clearly aimed at the way the primary Jewish audience of Revelation were being sucked back in to the temple cult of Judaism. But any such future physical entity is of small moment compared to the far greater spiritual reality which that would represent. 
He who overcomes will be made a pillar in that new temple / city: "He that overcomes, I will make him a pillar in the temple of my God; and he shall leave there no more, and I will write upon him the name of my God, and the name of the city of my God, the new Jerusalem, which comes down out of heaven from my God; and my own new name" (Rev. 3:12). Clearly the temple and the city are parallel. It is a city which is a temple. And we are now that temple. The apostles are now the foundation stones of that city just as we are pillars within it. But there is a present dimension to all this. We can be pillars now within it (Gal. 2:9); and we are now the temple of God. The temple [which is the city] is now being built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets: "You are fellow-citizens [as if living in a city state] with the saints and of the household of God, being built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the chief corner stone. In whom the whole building, being fitted together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord. In whom you also are being built up together for a dwelling place of God in the Spirit" (Eph. 2:19-22). Heb. 12:22,23 is clear: "But you have come to association with mount Zion and to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to innumerable hosts of angels, to the general assembly and church of the firstborns, who are enrolled in heaven". This is what Revelation calls the "new Jerusalem". We are now like Abraham, walking in search of the city whose builder and maker is God (Heb. 11:10). Hebrews specifically mentions these things in view of the impending destruction of the city and temple in AD70. The point is, that at the Lord's return, what we are now in prospect will be revealed and manifest in ultimate terms, visibly and actually upon this earth.   
</p>


text:
<p>22:2- see on <em><a href='B:520 5:12'>Rom 5:12</a></em>.</p><p><em>In the midst of the street thereof. And on both sides of the river was the tree of life, bearing twelve fruits, yielding its fruit every month; and the leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations</em>- The righteous man is right now like "a tree planted by the rivers of water, that brings forth his fruit in season; his leaf also shall not wither; and whatever he does (in this work of preaching?) shall prosper" (<em><a href='B:230 1:3'>Psa 1:3</a></em>). These words are quoted in <em><a href='B:730 22:2'>Rev 22:2</a></em> concerning our holding out of life to the mortal population at the Lord's return. The conclusion? If we witness now we are living the Kingdom life now, and therefore we will be perpetuated in that time.</p><p>Revelation 21, 22 seem to describe a "wood of trees of life" (<em><a href='B:730 22:2'>Rev 22:2</a></em> - A:V. 'tree' must be wrong because the 'tree' is on either side of the river), watered by the river of life proceeding from the mountain of "the throne of God and of the Lamb". There was a mountain in Eden, seeing there were four "headstreams" there, and it seems fitting to suggest that God’s throne was on this same mountain before the fall. So whilst the picture is of Eden restored, there are differences- there will be a whole forest of trees of life, and no liar will be within the restored paradise, i:e. there will be no serpent, no possibility of sinning. Which means paradise indeed.</p><p>"The healing of the nations" suggests a process of time after the Lord's return during which the nations are healed, perhaps physically from the effects of the judgments, and spiritually. The situation here is part of the description of the new Jerusalem. But already in this life, the tree of life "is" in God's paradise: "To him that overcomes, I will permit him to eat from the tree of life, which is in the Paradise of God" (Rev. 2:7). Just as the new Jerusalem in one sense exists. But these things will be made physically manifest upon earth when the new Jerusalem is as it were transferred to earth at the Lord's return. </p>


text:
<p>22:3- see on <em><a href='B:730 21:27'>Rev 21:27</a></em>.</p><p><em>And there shall be no curse any more, and the throne of God and of the Lamb shall be therein, and his servants shall serve him-&nbsp;</em>One option is "No more cursed one", alluding to the serpent. No more possibility of temptation and sin; and that would indeed be attractive to all who are spiritually minded and frustrated at their own propensity to failure. The final chapters of Revelation so often parallel God and “the lamb" (e.g. <em><a href='B:730 22:3'>Rev 22:3</a></em>). The Father was so deeply united with the Son in His time of sacrificial offering. See on <em><a href='B:500 19:19'>Joh 19:19</a></em>. The descriptions of the new city of Jerusalem in the prophets and Revelation can be better understood once it is appreciated that Eden will literally be restored in that area. <em><a href='B:450 14:8-11'>Zec 14:8-11</a></em> lays the basis for the descriptions of the city in Revelation, and includes the main elements of Eden- "living waters" ('Hiddekel') going out from&nbsp;a "Lifted up" mountain in Jerusalem, with "no more curse" there, v:11 (the phrase "no more utter destruction" is translated like this when it is quoted in <em><a href='B:730 22:3'>Rev 22:3</a></em>). The removal of the curse of itself suggests that this world is not going to be destroyed; but the curse will be removed, reverting things to how they were before the sin in Eden. This is also the implication of "I am making all things new" in Rev. 21:5. The old is not destroyed totally, but made new. The word for "new" is not neos, meaning new in time or quality, but kainos, which means newness in nature or quality. The new heavens and earth are clearly based on the idea of the creation of heavens and earth in Genesis 1. But there too, we have pre-existing matter being re-ordered, and something beautiful emerging from chaos. And this is how things shall we at the Lord's return; and this is our personal hope. "We shall be changed", but not totally destroyed into some kind of nirvana / non-existence. Salvation is personal, and so we can see continuities between our present existence and how we shall eternally be. In this we see the paramount importance of personality; for who we are now is who we shall eternally be. "The spirit shall be saved". The new Jerusalem is likewise us now, "in heaven" in God's plan and purpose, which must 'come down' and be more materially and tangibly manifest upon earth. This fits with the repeated teaching that the Kingdom of God will be a restoration of the Kingdom of God as it was historically. The Lord Jesus will "restore again the Kingdom to Israel". The first heaven and earth "passes away", but that is parallel with "the former things are passed away" (Rev. 21:1,4). Likewise "no more sea" (Rev. 21:1) is hardly literal; it refers to the environment out of which the evil beasts arise (Dan. 7:3; Rev. 13:1,6,7). Nowhere does the Bible teach the literal destruction of the earth. </p>


text:
<p>22:4&nbsp;<em>They shall see his face, and his name shall be on their foreheads-&nbsp;</em>The reference seems to be to God Himself. This is in the context of the allusions to the situation in Eden being restored. The result of sin was that Adam and Eve went away from the face of God whereas they had previously seen it (Gen. 3:9-11). It is all about relationship with God without barrier.  Throughout Revelation 21, 22 there is a distinction made between God and "the Lamb". This further suggests that the references to "God himself" are&nbsp;<em>not</em>&nbsp;to God manifestation in the Lamb, but to Yahweh Himself:&nbsp;"They shall see his face; and his name shall be in their foreheads" indicates that "His face" and "His name" refer to the same being:&nbsp;The Name which will be in our foreheads will be that of Yahweh, the Father, not Christ (<em><a href='B:730 3:12'>Rev 3:12</a></em>; <em><a href='B:730 14:1'>Rev 14:1</a></em>):&nbsp;Therefore it is&nbsp;<em>His</em>&nbsp;face which we will see:&nbsp;Of course there is&nbsp;<em>some</em>&nbsp;reference here to 'seeing' in the sense of understanding, which is how we see the Father now:&nbsp;&nbsp; But then our fuller mental comprehension of the Father will be reflected in our physical vision of Him:&nbsp; <em><a href='B:290 25:6-9'>Isa 25:6-9</a></em> speaks of how God’s people will enjoy a feast in Jerusalem at the Lord's return, the veil will be withdrawn from their eyes, all tears will be wiped away, and then "It shall be said in that day, Lo, this is our God... this is Yahweh". There is a&nbsp;parallel between physically seeing God and having the veil of our present incomprehension removed. The fuller understanding which we will then have will be reflected in our literal seeing of God.</p><p>The seeing of God’s face is parallel with having His Name or personality in our heads, in the centre of our minds. This is what will make the physical seeing of His face appropriate. The Name of God in the forehead contrasts with the name in the forehead of Babylon. Here we find continued the idea that the city of Babylon is the antithesis of the new Jerusalem. But neither are literal cities; they are women, one a prostitute and the other a bride; they represent the world and the church. There is no third group, and the two systems can never assimilate into each other. They are radically opposed. And this is the situation between the believer and whatever form of 'Babylon' surrounds them. The harlot Babylon has jewels, as does the new Jerusalem. The unclean things and abominations within Babylon (Rev. 17:3,4) are the very things which are outside the new Jerusalem (Rev. 21:6). The new Jerusalem has names belonging to it, which are in the book of life (Rev. 21:27); the names associated with Babylon are not in the book of life (Rev. 17:8). Again we see that these cities refer to people and not to geographical locations. </p>


text:
<p>22:5&nbsp;<em>There shall be night no more, so they do not need the light of a lamp, nor the light of the sun; for the Lord God shall give them light</em>- The candle, symbol of God’s word (<em><a href='B:230 119:105'>Psa 119:105</a></em>) will no longer be needed by the faithful, because "the Lord God shall give them light". Our personal, direct contact with God will replace the ministry of the Bible and indeed all God’s manifestations and communications as we now have experienced them. Personally seeing God’s face means that we need no other form of illumination. But the parallel in Rev. 21:23 says that "the city has no need of the sun, neither of the moon, to shine upon it. For the glory of God did light it, and the lamp of it is the Lamb". "The city" is the "they" who are God's servants (:3). The light God will give is the light of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ, the Lamb. But we now see that same glory, albeit through a glass darkly (2 Cor. 4:6); just as we are in a sense the city now. 
The allusion is to the prophecies that Zion's light shall be everlasting and shall eclipse the need for sun and moon (Is. 30:23-26; 60:1,2,19,20). But that everlasting light shall shine "day and night", according to Is. 60:20. So we are not to think that the literal heavens shall be destroyed. But the message we get is that the spiritual shall far eclipse the physical, although the physical shall remain. All pictures of the Kingdom of God which focus heavily upon the physical [ideal climate etc.] are simply missing the Biblical emphasis- which is upon relationship with God, and His glory. 
And they shall reign for ever and ever- This continues the allusions to Eden and the restoration of the situation there. Man will again see God's face (:4), as he did there. But the intention was that Adam in Eden would reign over all creation (Gen. 1:26). This intention is now going to be realized- for ever. </p>


text:
<p>22:6- see on <em><a href='B:300 23:18'>Jer 23:18</a></em>; <em><a href='B:300 23:22'>Jer 23:22</a></em>.</p><p><em>And he said to me: These words are faithful and true</em>- It seems the Angel sensed John's struggle to accept the reality of it all. See on <em><a href='B:730 21:5'>Rev 21:5</a></em>&nbsp;<em>Write</em></p><p><em>And the Lord, the God of the spirits of the prophets, has sent His angel to show His servants what must soon take place</em>- Perhaps this continues the theme noted in :5; that now we shall be face to face with God, there is no need for any more manifestation of Him to us through things like His word. His Spirit was in the prophets, but now the God whose Spirit that was- is with us face to face.</p><p><em>His servants</em>- We are given the same simple title in :3. We will eternally serve Him, and so we have begun the eternal life now, in so far as we serve Him now. The present experience of the eternal life is a major theme in John's writings.</p>


text:
<p>22:7&nbsp;<em>And behold, I come quickly</em>- These words would be appropriate to the Lord Jesus, so we assume that He spoke them; or that the Angel so intensely represented the Lord that he could appropriately say them. The Lord's quick or soon coming could refer to the suddenness of His coming, implying the need for constant readiness for it on our part. Or the idea may indeed be that He is coming "soon", in that all believers are to live as if the second coming is imminent. And the Lord could have come "soon" after John's time, had Israel repented. The Olivet prophecy and many New Testament references certainly support that possibility. But because of the unreadiness of the bride, the lack of repentance in Israel and lack of spiritual fruit in the church, that coming has been delayed to our days.</p><p><em>Blessed is he that keeps the words of the prophecy of this book</em>- The book is hardly a list of commandments, and this particular section of Revelation is a description of the awesome destiny awaiting God’s people by grace. So the reference is not really to 'keeping' in the sense of keeping commandments; nor can 'keep' be twisted to mean 'keep the right interpretation of…'. Perhaps the idea is that blessed is he who believes these wonderful things and keeps the reality of them far further than merely seeing the vision, being visually awed, and then slipping back into the humdrum of the mediocre religious life.</p>


text:
<p>22:8&nbsp;<em>And I John am he that heard and saw these things. And when I heard and saw, I fell down to worship before the feet of the angel that showed me these things</em>- The "these things" don't therefore refer to the entire vision, but to what John saw prior to falling before the Angel. Presumably the reference is to the amazing vision of eternity in 22:1-5. Faced with these eternal realities, our natural response should be to fall down and worship.</p>


text:
<p>22:9&nbsp;<em>And he said to me: You must not do that I am a fellow-servant with you, and with your brothers the prophets, and with those that keep the words of this book. Worship God<br/></em>- This shows that the Angel was a prophet. This title does not only mean one who foretells future events, but in Biblical usage refers more to one who ministers the word of God under inspiration; the Angel was therefore responsible for inspiring the Bible like the prophets (Old and New Testament ones) were. Note too how the Lord describes the Angels as “servants” (<em><a href='B:470 22:13'>Mat 22:13</a></em>), using the common description of the prophets as Jehovah’s servants- as if He saw a close connection between Angels and prophets. See on <em><a href='B:540 3:6'>2Co 3:6</a></em>.</p>


text:
<p>22:10&nbsp;<em>Do not seal up the words of the prophecy of this book. For the time is at hand</em>- The implication would be that the interpretation of Revelation would be sealed until the time for fulfilment was at hand. Daniel was told the same about his prophecies (<em><a href='B:340 12:9'>Dan 12:9</a></em>). This fits with much other Bible teaching, to the effect that prophecy will be understood at the very end of time, just before its final fulfilment in the Lord's return. The flagship verse concerning the opening of our eyes to latter day prophecy must be <em><a href='B:340 12:4'>Dan 12:4</a></em>; <em><a href='B:340 12:10'>Dan 12:10</a></em>: "Shut up the words, and seal the book, even to the time of the end: many shall run to and fro (an idiom often used concerning response to God’s word: <em><a href='B:230 119:32'>Psa 119:32</a></em>; <em><a href='B:230 119:60'>Psa 119:60</a></em>; <em><a href='B:230 147:15'>Psa 147:15</a></em>; <em><a href='B:370 8:11-12'>Amo 8:11-12</a></em>; <em><a href='B:420 2:2'>Hab 2:2</a></em>; <em><a href='B:600 3:1'>2Th 3:1</a></em> Gk:), and knowledge (of Daniel's prophecies) shall be increased... many shall be purified, and made white, and tried (in the tribulation); but the wicked shall do wickedly: and none of the wicked shall understand; but the wise shall understand". This is all in the context of the Angel rejecting Daniel's plea for insight into his own prophecies. All he was told was that they would be fulfilled in the far distant future, but he was comforted with the thought that the faithful at that time would understand. That the fulfilment of all the latter day prophecies will be understood fully in the very last days is implied in <em><a href='B:300 23:20'>Jer 23:20</a></em>: "In the latter days you shall understand it perfectly". The "it" refers to "the intents of God’s heart" revealed in His prophetic word. It is no accident that the Apocalypse ends with&nbsp;words which clearly allude to the closing words of Daniel. John falls at the Angel's feet, as Daniel did. The Angel then says: "Seal not the sayings of the prophecy of&nbsp;<em>this</em>&nbsp;book (unlike Daniel's, which was sealed): for the time is at hand. He that is unjust, let him be unjust still: and he which is filthy, let him be filthy still (cp. "the wicked shall do wickedly")". The implication is that the book is sealed for those who are a long way from the time of fulfilment; hence John must not seal the prophecy&nbsp;<em>because</em>&nbsp;its fulfilment is near. Thus <em><a href='B:340 12:4'>Dan 12:4</a></em> LXX reads: "Seal the book until the time of its accomplishment"-&nbsp;<em>then</em>&nbsp;it will be unsealed and the meaning become apparent. The primary application of Revelation is to the events of AD70; the implication is that the righteous understood the pattern of events then because of this book. There is a repeated stress throughout the NT epistles on the need to understand and get true knowledge (<em><a href='B:670 3:7'>1Pe 3:7</a></em>; <em><a href='B:680 1:2-6'>2Pe 1:2-6</a></em>; <em><a href='B:680 1:8'>2Pe 1:8</a></em>; <em><a href='B:680 1:16'>2Pe 1:16</a></em>; <em><a href='B:680 2:20'>2Pe 2:20</a></em>; <em><a href='B:680 3:18'>2Pe 3:18</a></em>), perhaps with special reference to Scripture like the Olivet prophecy and Revelation; likewise <em><a href='B:610 3:1'>1Ti 3:1</a></em>; <em><a href='B:610 3:16'>1Ti 3:16</a></em>; <em><a href='B:610 4:1-2'>1Ti 4:1-2</a></em> encourage Bible study in the 'last days' leading up to AD70. The need for understanding and study at that time is reflected in our last days. Paul told the Thessalonians (in the context of AD70) that he didn’t need to tell them about the times and seasons because they already understood the prophecies so well- but they needed rather to make sure that their lifestyle was appropriate to their understanding (<em><a href='B:590 5:1-5'>1Th 5:1-5</a></em>). The situation in AD70 is a type of the true "last days". Therefore the understanding of Revelation will not be sealed just before its second and major fulfilment in the second coming of Christ. In the same way as Daniel's prophecies will be opened to us in the&nbsp;last days, so must the book of Revelation, because the understanding of Revelation is so bound up with the meaning of Daniel. "None of the wicked shall understand; but the wise shall understand" suggests that this true understanding of prophecy motivates the faithful remnant in holding on to a righteous lifestyle. Time and again Israel are condemned because their lack of&nbsp;<em>understanding</em>&nbsp;of the prophecies led them into sinful behaviour (<em><a href='B:50 32:29'>Deu 32:29</a></em>; <em><a href='B:230 94:8'>Psa 94:8</a></em>; <em><a href='B:290 44:18'>Isa 44:18</a></em>).</p><p>As to the time being "at hand", see on :7.</p>


text:
<p>22:11&nbsp;<em>He that is unrighteous, let him continue to do unrighteousness, and he that is filthy, let him remain filthy, and he that is righteous, let him continue to do righteousness, and he that is holy, let him remain holy</em>- This verse appears to be stating the obvious and axiomatic, but probably the idea is that God will confirm people in the way they wish to go. Seeing the reference is to the time of the very end (:10), the idea may also be that once the Lord comes, we cannot change our ways. Now is the time to do that. We will as it were be frozen as we are.</p>


text:
<p>22:12- see on <em><a href='B:470 26:70'>Mat 26:70</a></em>.</p><p><em>Behold, I come suddenly</em>- See on :7.</p><p>The suddenness / quickness of judgment is a major Biblical theme. The suddenness of how the wicked had shot words like arrows at David (Ps. 64:4) is matched with how "suddenly" they will be struck by God's arrow in judgment. Judgment will be "sudden" (Ps. 64:7); and that may be part of the idea behind Rev. 22:12 "I come quickly / suddenly". Judgment will be a sudden surprise for the wicked, but something long and slowly awaited by the righteous. The Lord's coming will be as "thief in the night" for the wicked, "at an hour you do not expect", in that it will be unexpected, catching them off guard (Lk. 17:26-30; Mt. 24:42-44; 1 Thess. 5:2,3 "While people are saying, 'Peace and security,' destruction will come upon them suddenly"). The sudden nature of Divine judgment is a major Biblical theme. We think of the sudden deaths of Ananias and Sapphira; Miriam's immediate leprosy after her complaint; and the sudden nature of the coming of the flood and judgment upon Sodom. It was sudden in the sense that the judged people were hit by it as a surprise. Hence calamity or judgment from God comes suddenly (Prov. 3:25; 6:15; 24:22; Ecc. 9:12). "It shall be at an instant, suddenly" (Is. 29:5), like a bowing wall "whose breaking comes suddenly at an instant" (Is. 30:13). God's historical judgments have likewise come "suddenly" on those who experienced them, even though God's people expected them. We think of Babylon "suddenly" being destroyed (Is. 47:11; Jer. 51:8; Hab. 2:7), just as Babylon "suddenly" destroyed Judah (Jer. 4:20; 6:26; 15:8; 18:22). The suddenness was in the experience of the judged people; the righteous were aware of the judgment coming and saw it coming. </p><p><em>And my reward is with me</em>- The reward has been prepared for us in Heaven (<em><a href='B:470 5:12'>Mat 5:12</a></em>). In this sense the new Jerusalem descends from Heaven- to us.</p><p><em>To repay everyone for what he has done-&nbsp;</em>Gk. 'according as his works shall be'. It will be in our last days that Israel's blindness starts to be cured, thanks to a Word-based revival, led by the Elijah ministry. Solomon's prayer stated that when Israel properly repented, God would then "render unto every man according unto all his ways" (<em><a href='B:140 6:30'>2Ch 6:30</a></em>). Our Lord here definitely applied these words to the work of His second coming. His allusion to Solomon's prayer should be proof enough that the time of His full apocalypse is related to the time of Israel's repentance. The "everyone" in view is not only the believers; the phrase 'according to works' is found in <em><a href='B:730 18:6'>Rev 18:6</a></em> about the judgments upon Babylon according as their works have been. We noted on <em><a href='B:730 20:13'>Rev 20:13</a></em> that the judgment according to works may specifically be a reference to the judgment of those who persecuted the believers during the tribulation. For the believers are not judged according to their works in that salvation is not on the basis of works, although it is also true that our works will have eternal consequence.</p>


text:
<p>22:13&nbsp;<em>I am the Alpha and the Omega, the first and the last, the beginning and the end</em>- The Lord Jesus is appropriating to Himself the titles of His Father, as used in <em><a href='B:290 41:4'>Isa 41:4</a></em>; <em><a href='B:290 44:6'>Isa 44:6</a></em>; <em><a href='B:290 48:12'>Isa 48:12</a></em>. Those statements that God is "the first and with the last" are all in the context of assuring a doubting Judah that really, God has saved them. We sense from the encouragement to John to really record all this, and the repeated reminders that these words are true and faithful, that the Lord's people will struggle to grasp the wonderful truth of all this. Right through the process, from our foreknowledge at the beginning to the "last things" of our final salvation- He will have been in the process.</p>


text:
<p>22:14- see on <em><a href='B:480 10:25'>Mar 10:25</a></em>.</p><p><em>Blessed are they that wash their robes, that they may have the right to eat of the tree of life and may enter in through the gates into the city</em>- The reference may be to baptism, and belief in the efficacy of that washing. On this basis we will have the “right” to the tree of life (<em><a href='B:730 22:14'>Rev 22:14</a></em>); yet our salvation is by pure grace alone. We are "meet" to be partakers of the inheritance, we walk worthy of the Lord Jesus unto all pleasing of him (<em><a href='B:580 1:10-12'>Col 1:10-12</a></em>), the labourers receive the penny of salvation, that which is their right&nbsp;(<em><a href='B:470 20:14'>Mat 20:14</a></em>). We are either seen as absolutely perfect, or totally wicked, due to God’s imputation of righteousness or evil to us (<em><a href='B:230 37:37'>Psa 37:37</a></em>). There is no third way.</p><p>This parallels the city and Eden by equating having "right to the tree of life" with entering "in through the gates into the city". <em><a href='B:730 22:3'>Rev 22:3</a></em> tells us that the throne of God will be in "it" - i:e. the wood of life (not the river- see context), as in Eden God’s throne was in the garden, which garden was presumably a wood of trees and little else ("of every tree of the garden..." -other plants are not mentioned), in the same way as the new Eden is composed solely of trees of life. The invitation "of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat" is mirrored in "take the water&nbsp;(lit. take from the stream) of life freely" - the stream being that of Eden. <em><a href='B:730 21:27'>Rev 21:27</a></em>&nbsp;stresses&nbsp;that no serpent -"whatever works abomination or makes a lie"- will enter the new Eden as it did before. The midst of the new Garden will be the throne of Christ, who in every way will then be the tree of life and knowledge. This will be paradise restored, but without the possibility of sinning. Paradise indeed.</p>


text:
<p>22:15&nbsp;<em>Outside it</em>- We all worry as to whether we shall be left outside the Kingdom. This description of those outside is helpful in this regard. All are urged to enter, the gates are open constantly, the Spirit and bride both urging entrance, the water of eternal life can be drunk freely, a whole forest of trees of life offer their eternal fruit to all regularly, the wall around the city is transparent. Only those who don't want to be there will not be.</p><p><em>Are the dogs</em>- One subtext of these visions is the criticism of Judaism and legalism. "Dogs" are elsewhere used to represent those who teach circumcision and who return to the Jewish law (<em><a href='B:570 3:2'>Phi 3:2</a></em>; <em><a href='B:680 2:22'>2Pe 2:22</a></em>).</p><p><em>And the sorcerers</em>- Literally, poisoners. All these categories of the condemned have one thing in common- they entice others into sin and damage others, after the pattern of the serpent in Eden. The message is that paradise will be restored but with the major difference that there will no more be tempters and enticers to sin:&nbsp;<em>Pharmakeus</em>&nbsp;could perhaps dynamically be translated as 'drug pushers'. But the reference is to how the system of the beast and Babylon is guilty of all these things, spreading her sorceries, fornication, idolatry and lies to all the peoples in the earth / land during the tribulation.</p><p><em>Idolaters</em>- Those who worship images, and Revelation has much to say about those who worship the image of the latter day beast.</p><p><em>Lovers and practisers of falsehood-&nbsp;&nbsp;</em>Those who love and create lies. Given all the allusions to paradise restored, this must refer to the serpent in Eden.</p>


text:
<p>22:16&nbsp;<em>I Jesus have sent my angel to testify to you these things for the churches. I am the root and the offspring of David, the bright morning star</em>- This statement of the obvious seems to be another example of how the utter reality of these things is being emphasized. This is not fantasy or wild dreaming, there is an eternal truth to this message of the Kingdom. And the message is to be shared with "the churches", initially the seven representative churches of chapters 1-3.</p><p>The Lord is both the offspring of Jesse and David, and also "the root of Jesse" (<em><a href='B:290 11:1'>Isa 11:1</a></em>; <em><a href='B:290 11:10'>Isa 11:10</a></em>). This is another way of saying that He is the alpha and omega of all things. All this wonderful plan was planned for us from the beginning and shall come to fulfilment. Barnes helpfully comments: "Not the root in the sense that David sprang from him, as a tree does from a root, but in the sense that he was the “root-shoot” of David, or that he himself sprang from him, as a sprout starts up from a decayed and fallen tree - as of the oak, the willow, the chestnut, etc. The meaning then is, not that he was the ancestor of David, or that David sprang from him, but that he was the offspring of David, according to the promise in the Scripture, that the Messiah should be descended from him. No argument, then, can be derived from this passage in proof of the pre-existence, or the divinity of Christ".</p>


text:
<p>22:17&nbsp;<em>And the Spirit and the bride say: Come And he that hears, let him say: Come</em>- The whole spirit of the Lord Jesus is to invite others to come and share His salvation. He that hears will say to others "Come". This refers to the redeemed community and the Lord Jesus urging the survivors of Babylon's judgments to come within the city of salvation. Those who 'hear', i:e. believe, will invite others to 'come', in the spirit of <em><a href='B:450 8:21'>Zec 8:21</a></em>. There is a wonderful theme in these last visions of urging others to accept the great salvation presented. The water of life can be freely drunk, the gates of the city are open constantly, and the Spirit "the Lord the Spirit", the Lord Jesus and us the bride urge others to enter. In the immediate context of this chapter, the reference would be to the mortal nations who survive Armageddon who are urged to enter the Kingdom which has been established in Jerusalem.</p><p><em>And he that is thirsty, let him come. Let him that desires take the water of life freely</em>- The 'free' nature of the gift of eternal life fits into the general impression given in these visions that the community of salvation is so utterly and easily open to all, and the only qualification is that we 'desire' to be there; that we are those who 'thirst' for the water of eternal life. This goes back to the Lord's opening teaching in the Sermon on the Mount; that salvation is freely available quite simply for those who really want it. Our desire to 'be there' should therefore be the passion of our heart, our defining emotion and wish. And we shall be satisfied.</p>


text:
<p>22:18&nbsp;<em>I testify to every man that hears the words of the prophecy of this book, that if anyone shall add to them, God shall add to him the plagues which are written in this book</em>- The reference is not to the whole Bible, it is specifically to the words of the prophecy of the Apocalypse. The only other time the Greek text talks about 'adding things' is in <em><a href='B:510 15:28'>Act 15:28</a></em> where we read of the tendency to add things to salvation by faith alone. I have suggested that the language of the New Jerusalem and the open temple is all to be understood in the first century context in which it was given. For the admission of non-Jews to a largely Jewish Christian community was a live issue. The picture presented here is of an eternal salvation where literal Jerusalem and its temple are surpassed by the reality of the Kingdom, and the 12 tribes of Israel are no longer to be understood literally. So I suggest with that background, the idea here is that the great salvation just presented is available to all, freely. And anyone who adds conditions to that shall be excluded from it; and likewise any who detract from the vision by not believing it. For the fearful and unbelieving are listed in Revelation alongside the whores and sorcerers who shall remain outside the new Jerusalem.</p><p>Yet the plagues written in the book have specific reference to latter judgments upon the Jews and upon the supporters of the beast in the earth / land promised to Abraham during the three and a half year final tribulation. Islam adds to the prophecies through claiming that the Koran and Hadith were given after the time of Revelation; and first century Judaism added to God’s book by elevating their laws and traditions to effectively the same status as the words of God un the Bible.</p>


text:
<p>22:19&nbsp;<em>And if anyone shall take away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God shall take away his part from the tree of life and out of the holy city, which are written of in this book</em>- That disobeying the law of God is effectively adding to it was clearly brought home to Israel: "What thing soever I command you, observe to do it: thou shalt not add thereto, nor diminish from it" (<em><a href='B:50 12:32'>Deu 12:32</a></em>). The command to Joshua to "observe to do according to all the law... turn not from it to the right hand or to the left" (<em><a href='B:60 1:7'>Jos 1:7</a></em>) is probably reiterating the command not to add ("to the right") or subtract ("to the left") from the law. <em><a href='B:730 22:18-19'>Rev 22:18-19</a></em> is based on these passages.</p><p>Only those once written in the book of life can have their names taken out of it. The idea of taking away therefore refers to believers who fall away. In the last days especially, as the tribulation unfolds, it will be tempting for believers to downgrade the book of Revelation, and not to accept the plain teaching about the need for separation from the beast, even if it nets death and persecution. There will be a particular temptation then to "take away" from this book:&nbsp;</p>


text:
<p>22:20&nbsp;<em>He who testifies these things says: Yes. I come quickly. Amen</em>- See on :7. This could mean that the return of the Lord was all set up and possible in the first century, but was delayed due to human failure to meet the required conditions. It could equally mean that He will come suddenly, unexpectedly for many; and the key characteristic of the faithful is that we should be ready for His coming. Acceptance of His 'imminent' return is a feature of Christian life; we are to live expecting the end to come very soon. 
The idea of delayed fulfilment of that which was expected imminently is, however, part of God's entire revelation. On one hand, the delays are because of human failure to meet required preconditions, e.g. the spread of the Gospel to all the world before the end comes, the fruit of repentance on the fig tree of Israel, spiritual fruit in the body of Christ, etc. And yet we have to note that throughout Revelation, we have visions of the "end"; as if that end is approached but not quite reached. Because then we go on to read of further events which must happen. There are gaps between the openings of the sixth and seventh seals, and again between the blowing of the sixth and seventh trumpets. The impression given to someone listening to the book being read would have been of 'strange delay'. We may take relief when we hear that there is to be "delay no longer" (Rev. 10:3-6); but then we go on to read of a three and a half year period of witness amidst persecution (Rev. 11:3). So promise of the end, followed by delay, and then another cycle of the same... appears to be part of God's style. It may well reflect human failures to meet preconditions. But it may also simply be His style in history, in order to bring things to an even greater climax when the Lord finally does return. 
Revelation comforts believers that their sufferings at the hands of systems of evil are only for "a short time" or "a little while" (Rev. 6:11; 12:12; 17:10) is from Heaven's perspective. For those 'on the ground' suffering persecution and death during that "short time", this would give perspective. But it would only be comforting if they accepted Heaven's perspective, as taught in Revelation. Believing in the ultimate return of Jesus and the eternity of God's Kingdom on earth... this enables us to locate our own sufferings, even if they last a lifetime, within the broader perspective of eternity. The comfort that suffering is only 'for a moment' only finds meaning if we accept the reality of the eternity ahead. In this sense, the Lord's return is "soon".</p><p><em>Come Lord Jesus</em>- There is little point in praying for His coming if it is set for a date set in stone that cannot be altered. The calendar date of His coming is therefore not set; because it depends upon our prayers.</p>


text:
<p>22:21&nbsp;<em>The grace of the Lord Jesus be with the saints. Amen</em>- Given the awesome eternal future prepared, it is appropriate we are reminded that this is all by absolute grace. Yet "grace" often carries with it the idea of the gift of the Spirit, and this is a major theme in John's writings. He wishes all readers to accept that gift, the presence and power of the Lord Jesus with us; which is the essence of life now just as it shall be of the life eternal. &nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> There was a man in the land of Uz-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Later scripture assumes that Job was a real historical person (<a href='B:330 14:14'>Eze 14:14</a>; <a href='B:660 5:11'>Jas 5:11</a>), although the entire book is poetry, and clearly isn't to be taken as real time recording of words spoken. It is a drama, concluding with a thunderstorm approaching and the revelation of God Himself. "The whole is divided into&nbsp;three&nbsp;parts—the prologue, poem proper, and epilogue. The&nbsp;poem,&nbsp;into three— (1) The dispute of Job and his three friends; (2) The address of Elihu; (3) The address of God. There are&nbsp;three series in the controversy, and in the same order. The epilogue also is threefold; Job's justification, reconciliation with his friends, restoration".</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>As will be noted further on this chapter, it would seem he lived in patriarchal times. This would explain why there is no reference to the exodus from Egypt, which is to be found in nearly all subsequent scripture apart from Job. Uz appears to be the relative of Abraham of <a href='B:10 22:21'>Gen 22:21</a>. But much of scripture was rewritten under inspiration at the time of the restoration and also in Hezekiah's time. This explains why ancient Hebrew terms are used along with later Hebrew, with copious connections to the restoration prophecies of later Isaiah. And as noted on :7, there is allusion to Persian concepts too- appropriate if the book was reapplied to the Jews in Persia. Judah and Israel in captivity were struggling with the questions raised in the drama of Job; Job and his children become representative of God’s people. His children suffered because of their sins. Job as the righteous remnant also suffered, but was restored. This speaks of the restoration from exile possible for Judah and Israel. They for the most part refused it. But the key was for the faithful remnant to appreciate that they too had sinned, as Job did, even though they were pleasing to God. All was under God’s control; the book deconstructs the popular views of evil, a satan being, and suffering being a direct consequence of personal sin. This was required for the exiles. We note that Job is not presented as a Jew, but one of the surrounding peoples related to Abraham. The hero is not strongly Jewish and is presented without genealogy; and that was a lesson for the exiles too, for the prophetic intention was that Jews and Gentiles would repent and form a multiethnic people of God in the restored Kingdom. The name of Yahweh is likewise not mentioned until Yahweh is revealed at the very end of the book. They had effectively forgotten His Name in exile, in real spiritual terms; but through their sufferings and repentance, His Name would be revealed to them at the end.</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>Whose name was Job-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> He appears to be the "Jobab" of 1 Chronicles 5, indeed the LXX states he is this person. "Job" may come from an Arabic word meaning 'repentance'; and that really is the appeal of the book, for the repentance of God’s people, especially the exiles, so that God’s saving purpose might be brought forward. The problem of suffering is secondary to this theme of the book.</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>That man was blameless-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> God’s opinion of Job was that he was "blameless". But as the drama progresses, Bildad argues that if Job were in fact "blameless" then God would not cast him away (<a href='B:220 8:20'>Job 8:20</a> s:w:). Job absorbs this reasoning, and confesses that he is not "blameless" (<a href='B:220 9:20-21'>Job 9:20-21</a> s:w:), and yet he is driven to the conclusion that the "blameless" and sinner are "destroyed together" by God (<a href='B:220 9:22'>Job 9:22</a> s:w:). It's quite possible that in depression and periods of suffering, we can come to have a lower view of ourselves than that which God has of us; just as at other times we can have a higher view of ourselves spiritually than we ought to. There is true guilt, the guilt which we should take, and false guilt. And Job seems to have picked up the false guilt thrown upon him by Bildad. We too need to learn this difference between false and true guilt.</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>And upright-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> God’s opinion of Job was that he was "upright". But as the drama progresses, the friends argue that if Job were in fact "upright" then God would not be afflicting him (<a href='B:220 4:7'>Job 4:7</a>; <a href='B:220 8:6'>Job 8:6</a> s:w:). Job absorbs this reasoning, and confesses that he is not "upright" and therefore cannot find God (<a href='B:220 23:7-8'>Job 23:7-8</a> s:w:). As discussed above, he absorbs false guilt and becomes influenced by the guilt placed upon him by his religion and "friends" amongst the "sons of God".</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>And one who feared God-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> A true son of Abraham and Joseph (s:w. <a href='B:10 22:12'>Gen 22:12</a>; <a href='B:10 42:18'>Gen 42:18</a>). It seems Job lived in the patriarchal age. The phrase is also used about the righteous remnant amongst the captives in Babylon / Persia, for whom this book was apparently rewritten to comfort them (<a href='B:290 50:10'>Isa 50:10</a>).</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>And turned away from the evil-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Job begins the book by being described as a man who shunned [the Hebrew word is also translated “to be without” and “to reject”] ra, “evil”. Michel understands ra here to refer to ‘the evil one’, the Canaanite god of evil, whom Job disbelieved and rejected (W:L. Michel, Job in the Light of Northwest Semitic (Rome: Bible Institute Press, 1987) Vol. 1 p. 29). One of the many themes in Job is the deconstruction of the 'satan' myths of the time, many of which are alive and well today. See on <a href='B:220 3:8'>Job 3:8</a>. Job was aware that he had indeed "turned away from evil" and feared God; it was those things, rather than the traditional wisdom of the friends, which he came to see was the true "understanding" (<a href='B:220 28:28'>Job 28:28</a> s:w:). The phrase is also used about the righteous remnant amongst the captives in Babylon / Persia, for whom this book was apparently rewritten to comfort them (<a href='B:290 59:15'>Isa 59:15</a>). See on <a href='B:230 34:14'>Psa 34:14</a>.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> There were born to him seven sons and three daughters-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Having ten children may invite us to connect Job with the ten tribe kingdom of Israel; their sufferings in captivity, along with those of Judah, elicited the kinds of questions discussed in the book of Job.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> His possessions also were seven thousand sheep, three thousand camels, five hundred yoke of oxen, five hundred female donkeys and a very great household-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>The lack of reference to horses would indicate that Job lived in patriarchal times, before horses were introduced to the Middle East from Asia. The huge number of camels suggests he lived near the desert, which corroborates with the reference to marauding Arab bands (:15) and a desert wind coming upon the tents (:19). This kind of internal harmony within the Biblical record is to me the greatest evidence of its veracity.</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>So that this man was the greatest of all the children of the east-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>Job was the “greatest of all the men of the east” (<a href='B:220 1:3'>Job 1:3</a>), the Hebrew implying the eldest, the most senior. The friends were older than Job, and take pleasure in reminding him of the wisdom of the ‘elders’. He had risen above his place, got too great too quick, and therefore they were intent on proving to him that actually he was not so great, he had sinned, and they by their supposed wisdom and understanding were really greater than him. And they bent their theology, their guesswork as to his possible sins, to that subconscious end- of justifying themselves and pulling Job down beneath them by their interpretations of his misfortunes. What this indicates is that during their period of ‘friendship’ previously, they had nursed unconscious feelings of jealousy against him. The lesson for us is to re-examine our friendships, our loyalties, to see if they carry the same feature; a desire to ‘be in with’ the popular and the successful, to catch some reflected glory. The conversion of Job led him to understand the fickleness of his friends, and to pray for them in it.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> His sons went and held a feast in the house of each one on his birthday; and they sent and called for their three sisters to eat and to drink with them-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Seven times a year they had these feasts "on their day" (Heb:), i:e. their birthday (<a href='B:220 3:1'>Job 3:1</a>). They each had their own houses, admittedly on the edge of the desert (:19) and were not tent dwellers.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> It was so, when the days of their feasting had come to an end, that Job sent and sanctified them-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Perhaps the idea is that he sent for them and sanctified them.</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>And rose up early in the morning-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> The characteristic of Abraham; Job is presented as Abraham's seed.</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>And offered burnt offerings according to the number of them all-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> There were 10 children, and he offered seven times / year (:4), meaning he offered 70 sacrifices / year for them all. He is presented as carefully and generously obedient to Divine principles of sacrifice, although all those sacrifices didn’t save his children from a judgment which (we can infer) they deserved. We see developing the picture of God’s people being judged by their neighbours for their sins, despite their receipt of great blessing from God and the existence of a righteous remnant amongst them, represented by Job. For Judah went into captivity because of their feasting (<a href='B:290 5:12'>Isa 5:12</a> s:w:).</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>For Job said, It may be that my sons have sinned, and renounced God in their hearts-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> The same phrase used by his wife when she urged Job to renounce God (<a href='B:220 2:9'>Job 2:9</a>). It would seem that the family had indeed done this. The sons or children (s:w:) of Israel did indeed sin and therefore went into exile (s:w. <a href='B:290 1:4'>Isa 1:4</a>).</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>Job did so continually-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> "Continually" is Heb. 'all the days', i:e. the birthdays of the sons (:4 cp. <a href='B:220 3:1'>Job 3:1</a>). There is good reason, linguistically and theologically, to think that the events of Job occurred early in spiritual history (compare the mentions of "Jobab" and some of the friends in 1 Chronicles 5). There are also many links with the early chapters of Genesis. We should therefore see Satan's description of himself as being in the context of <a href='B:10 4:12-14'>Gen 4:12-14</a>, where Cain is made a wanderer in the earth because of his bitter jealousy against his righteous brother. So the satan may have been another believer who was in some sense 'out of fellowship', represented by an Angel before the court of heaven, who still came to the gatherings of the believers to express his envy of Job. The reference to the sons of God coming together in worship before a priest or altar comes straight after the record of Job's children holding rather riotous birthday parties (1:4). "All the days", each day they did this, Job offered sacrifice for them; but then "there was a day" when the sons of God came to keep a feast to Yahweh. It seems that we are led to connect the keeping of days. It could be that the sons of God were in fact Job's children. They came together to party and kill their fatted calves, and then they came together to kill their sacrifices; like Corinth, they mixed the table of the Lord with the table of their own pleasure.</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>LXX adds "offered sacrifices for them, according to their number, and one calf for a sin-offering for their souls", as if they really had sinned.</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>Sanctified them- Job prayed God would forgive his children in case they sinned. The friends mocked this in <a href='B:220 5:4'>Job 5:4</a>; <a href='B:220 8:4'>Job 8:4</a>; <a href='B:220 17:5'>Job 17:5</a>; <a href='B:220 20:10'>Job 20:10</a>, saying that the children of the foolish die for their own sins, whereas, by implication, Job had figured that his prayers and sacrifices could gain them forgiveness. Yet in the end, Yahweh stated that Job had understood Him and His principles right, whereas the friends hadn’t.</p>


text:
<p> Now it happened on the day when the sons of God-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> “Sons of God” can refer to God’s people (<a href='B:520 8:14'>Rom 8:14</a>; <a href='B:540 6:17-18'>2Co 6:17-18</a>; <a href='B:690 3:7'>1Jn 3:7</a>). Angels do not bring false accusations against believers “before the Lord” (<a href='B:680 2:11'>2Pe 2:11</a>) It cannot be conclusively proved that Satan was a son of God - he “came among them”:&nbsp; The “sons of God”- the believers at that time- presented themselves before a priest or angel, perhaps at a religious feast. Someone there, maybe one of the worshippers, reflected that it was not surprising that Job was such a strong believer, seeing that God had so richly blessed him. God gave that person the power to afflict Job, to demonstrate that Job’s love of God was not proportionate to the blessings God had given him. Maybe the Satan was composed of Job’s three “friends” - they are rebuked at the end of the book (notice that “satan” is not rebuked by name). They were these "sons of God" who heard the reasoning of the satan, and they take over from the satan after he disappears from the story at the end of Job 2. The satan morphs into the friends. Their discussions with Job indicate that they had their doubts as to his integrity and suspected that his faith was now weak because God had taken away the blessings from him - “But now it is come upon thee, and thou faintest: it toucheth thee, and thou art troubled…who ever perished (which it looked as though Job was going to), being innocent?” Eliphaz pointed out (<a href='B:220 4:5'>Job 4:5</a>; <a href='B:220 4:7'>Job 4:7</a>).</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>Came to present themselves before Yahweh-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> "Before Yahweh" doesn't mean 'in Heaven'; the phrase is often used bout appearing before Yahweh's representatives such as priests or Angels. The angel which led Israel through the wilderness was called “the Lord” because it carried God’s name (<a href='B:20 23:20-21'>Exo 23:20-21</a>), but it was not God himself in person (<a href='B:20 33:20'>Exo 33:20</a> cp. :12). Similarly, priests represent God (<a href='B:140 19:6'>2Ch 19:6</a>) and to come before them was to come “before the Lord” (<a href='B:50 19:17'>Deu 19:17</a>). Cain “went out from the presence of the Lord” (<a href='B:10 4:16'>Gen 4:16</a>) - not out of heaven but probably away from the presence of the angel - cherubim. Jesus was presented as a baby “before the Lord” (<a href='B:490 2:22'>Luk 2:22</a>)- i:e. before the priest. How can Satan be in heaven and also on the earth in Job’s time when, according to popular belief, he was thrown out at the time of Adam, or in 1914, according to the “Watchtower”? There cannot be sin or rebellion against God in heaven (<a href='B:230 5:4-5'>Psa 5:4-5</a>; <a href='B:420 1:13'>Hab 1:13</a>; <a href='B:470 6:10'>Mat 6:10</a>; <a href='B:230 103:19-21'>Psa 103:19-21</a>).</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>That Satan also came among them-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Even if the “satan” (adversary) to Job was an angel, there is no reason to think it was sinful. An angel asked Abraham to offer Isaac to find out exactly how obedient Abraham would be, hence he said, “Now I know that thou fearest God, seeing thou hast not withheld thy son, thine only son from me” (<a href='B:10 22:12'>Gen 22:12</a>). Similarly the angel which guided Israel out of Egypt, “led thee these forty years in the wilderness to humble thee, and to prove thee, to know what was in thine heart, whether thou wouldest keep His commandments, or no” (<a href='B:50 8:2'>Deu 8:2</a>). God himself knows all things, but the angels bring problems into the lives of their charges in order to see how they will respond. It may be possible to understand Job’s satan like this. Remember that an evidently righteous angel was called a “satan” in <a href='B:40 22:22'>Num 22:22</a>. Much has been made of the fact that in Job 1 and in <a href='B:450 3:1-2'>Zec 3:1-2</a> we read of ha satan, the adversary. In Hebrew as in English, the definite article is significant. If I refer to myself as a personal, specific individual / being, I say "Duncan". To speak of "the Duncan" would be a description of a function, more than a reference to my personal name. Sitting at a restaurant table, you might call out: "Waiter!", intending a specific individual. You'd only speak of "the waiter" when describing his function- e.g. "The waiter served me badly". Hebrew and English operate in the same way here. So when we read in Job 1 and Zechariah 3 of the &nbsp;satan, ha satan, we're not reading of 'A specific person whose personal proper name is 'Satan''. Rather we're reading of a person who functioned as a satan or adversary. Dianne Bergant makes the point: "The word 'satan' appears with an article indicating that here the word is a title or description and not a proper name" (Dianne Bergant, Job, Ecclesiastes (Wilmington: Michael Glazier, 1982) p. 27). In other words, 'the satan' isn't the personal name of a personal being called Satan. It's a description of the function of a character, as an adversary. Note that the man Haman is called ho diabolos in <a href='B:190 7:4'>Est 7:4</a> LXX. The Russian literary analyst Vladimir Propp has shown that all stories, folklore etc. of that time contained characters with a set function- there was the hero, the companion, the friends / bystanders, and the adversary (Vladimir Propp, Theory And History Of Folklore, ed. Anatoly Liberman (Minneapolis: University Of Minnesota Press, 1984); Morphology Of The Folktale (Austin: University Of Texas Press, 1968). ). Whilst I accept that Job was a historical character, the way the book is written in such structured Hebrew poetry shows for sure that the events were 'written up' in story / ballad form. And so when the initial readership encountered "the adversary", ha satan, they wouldn't have thought of him as a cosmic being of evil. The presence of someone functioning as "the adversary" would've been quite normal to them. If we follow through the argument of the book, the logical answer of Job to the friends' allegations would have been "I'm suffering because Satan has it in for me! He's doing this, not God!". For the friends were reasoning that God was bringing such affliction into Job's life because Job was a sinner. The fact Job doesn't make this obvious retort indicates to me that "the Satan" wasn't understood by either Job nor the friends as a personal supernatural being of evil.</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>It must be noted that the satan never occurs again, under that name. The real adversary of Job was his " friends" ; and in God’s final judgment, it is they who are condemned, not 'satan'. It is therefore reasonable to see a connection between the satan and the 'friends' of Job; they too walked to and fro in the earth in order to come to him, as it seems satan did at the beginning. And we pause here for another lesson. The great satan / adversary of Job turned out to be those he thought were his friends in the ecclesia. And so it has been, time and again, in our experience: our sorest trials often come from the words of our brethren. Without underestimating the physical affliction of Job, his real adversary was his brethren. Rather than bemoaning his physical affliction, he commented how his friends had become his satans (<a href='B:220 19:19'>Job 19:19</a>) And so with the Lord Jesus, whom Job so accurately typified. Again, without minimizing the material agony of His flesh, the essential piercing was from His rejection at the hands of those He died for. For other reasons to connect the satan with the friends, see on <a href='B:220 6:19'>Job 6:19</a>; <a href='B:220 8:6'>Job 8:6</a>; <a href='B:220 12:6'>Job 12:6</a>; <a href='B:220 19:28'>Job 19:28</a>.</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>But the "Sons of God" of <a href='B:220 1:6'>Job 1:6</a> are interpreted as Angels in <a href='B:220 38:7'>Job 38:7</a>. There is nothing in itself wrong with an Angel being called a satan- we have examples of this in <a href='B:40 22:22'>Num 22:22</a> and <a href='B:130 21:1'>1Ch 21:1</a>. We know that Angels can't sin: and yet they are limited in knowledge (e.g. <a href='B:470 24:36'>Mat 24:36</a>). An Angel commented that now he knew that Abraham feared God, after he had seen his willingness to offer Isaac (<a href='B:10 22:12'>Gen 22:12</a>); Israel's guardian Angel lead them through the wilderness in order to learn about Israel's spirituality (<a href='B:50 8:2-3'>Deu 8:2-3</a>). God Himself, of course, already knew the hearts of men. The sons of God coming before Yahweh suggests a scene in the court of Heaven, similar to that of <a href='B:140 18:19-21'>2Ch 18:19-21</a>, where the Angels appear before Yahweh to discuss the case of Ahab, and then one Angel is empowered by God to carry out his suggestion:&nbsp; Those Angels represented God’s people on earth; this is why the interpretation of the Satan can equally apply to both the people of God at the time, gathering before a priest; and to their representative Angels gathered before the throne of God in the court of Heaven. Satan going out from the presence of Yahweh, empowered by Him to afflict Job, would correspond with other references to Angels 'going out' from God’s presence to execute what had been agreed in the heavenly assembly (<a href='B:230 37:36'>Psa 37:36</a>; <a href='B:230 81:5'>Psa 81:5</a>; <a href='B:450 2:3'>Zec 2:3</a>; <a href='B:450 5:5'>Zec 5:5</a>; <a href='B:490 22:22'>Luk 22:22</a>; <a href='B:650 1:14'>Heb 1:14</a>).</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>In the same way as the earthly tabernacle was a pattern of the Heavenly system (<a href='B:650 9:24'>Heb 9:24</a>), so it would appear that each of us has an Angelic representative in Heaven, appearing before the presence of God’s glory in what we are invited to see as the court of Heaven. Angels can also represent a whole group – e.g., an ecclesia (<a href='B:730 1:20'>Rev 1:20</a>). So closely identified with their charges are these Angels, that they themselves are rebuked (e.g. <a href='B:730 2:5'>Rev 2:5</a>) – not that they sinned, of course, but because they represented those ecclesias in the Heavenly court.</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>Satan describes himself as going to and fro in the earth, and walking up and down in it (1:7)- using exactly the language of <a href='B:450 1:11'>Zec 1:11</a> concerning the Angels. The way that the satan smote Job with a skin disease (<a href='B:220 2:7'>Job 2:7</a>) would suggest that he was not only a mere man; accepting an Angel-satan solves this problem. No unaided man could have brought a skin disease upon Job. If the satan refers to a righteous Angel, it is likewise easier to understand why all the problems which the satan brought are described as God bringing them (especially as Job may have conceived of God in terms of an Angel). It is also understandable why there is no rebuke of the satan at the end. For other connections between the satan and Angels, see on <a href='B:220 1:14'>Job 1:14</a>; <a href='B:220 1:16'>Job 1:16</a>; <a href='B:220 1:19'>Job 1:19</a>; <a href='B:220 4:5'>Job 4:5</a>; <a href='B:220 5:7'>Job 5:7</a>; <a href='B:220 6:9-10'>Job 6:9-10</a>; <a href='B:220 14:3'>Job 14:3</a>; <a href='B:220 16:9'>Job 16:9</a>; <a href='B:220 19:8'>Job 19:8</a>.</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>It has been correctly observed that we don’t read of ‘Satan’ after the prologue to Job. Instead we read only of God bringing the afflictions into Job’s life. But the friends, and Job himself, struggle to explain those afflictions in terms of the current ideas in the surrounding world. This may not be immediately evident, because the Hebrew of Job is notoriously hard to translate. But closer attention to the text reveals that there is repeated mention of the various beings and forces of evil which were thought to be in competition with God. It seems that the story of Job originated very early in Biblical history, in the times of the patriarchs. And yet the book has many connections with the latter half of Isaiah – just take a glance down the marginal cross references in Job, and see how often the later chapters of Isaiah are referenced. My suggestion is that the book was rewritten and edited [under Divine inspiration] during the captivity in Babylon, as a message especially relevant for the Jewish exiles as they struggled with the temptation to accept Babylonian mythological explanations of evil. This would explain the allusions to both early Canaanite and later Babylonian views of the ‘Satan’ figure. And we recall from <a href='B:290 45:5-7'>Isa 45:5-7</a> how Israel’s God was at pains to remind the exiles of His omnipotence, that He is the only God and source of power in creation, and that both good and disaster, light and darkness, are ultimately His creation; and the surrounding Gentile myths about these things were totally wrong. This is in fact the theme of the book of Job. Susan Garrett points out how Babylonian views of a dualistic cosmos, with God creating good and the ‘Satan’ figure creating evil, began to influence Jewish thought. She shares my view that the purpose of the book of Job was to counter this: “The story of Job checked an escalation in the power and authority that were ascribed to the Satan–figure, by the repeated and unambiguous assertions in Job 1-2 that Satan had obtained the authority to test Job from none other than God” (Susan Garrett, The Temptations of Jesus in Mark’s Gospel (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1998) p. 49).</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>The references to ‘Satan’–like beings and related myths in the book of Job is in order to ultimately deconstruct them as false, and to re-iterate the utter omnipotence of Yahweh as the only source of power, the only God. And this of course we would expect from an Old Testament, God–inspired book. It’s been suggested by literary critics that the prologue which mentions Satan (1 and 2) and epilogue (<a href='B:220 42:7-17'>Job 42:7-17</a>) were likely written before the poetic discourses – they appear to be “an Israelite revision of an older Canaanite or Edomite epic poem expressing their views on the age–old problem of evil” (Douglas Wingeier, What About the Devil? A Study of Satan in the Bible and Christian Tradition (Nashville: Abingdon, 2006) p. 15. More documentation of this is to be found in The Interpreter’s Bible, ed. George Buttrick, (Nashville: Abingdon, 1954) Vol. 3 pp. 878,879). Thus those ideas are alluded to and deconstructed – God is presented as all powerful, and the ‘Satan’ beliefs as untrue.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Yahweh said to Satan, Where have you come from? Then Satan answered Yahweh and said, From going back and forth in the earth, and from walking up and down in it-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> There is no implication that he was doing anything sinful. <a href='B:450 1:11'>Zec 1:11</a> implies that this is a Hebraism for observing. The references to 'wandering about on the face of the earth' have great similarities with the language used to describe the Persian empire's spies, called "The King's Eye"- a kind of agent of the King who wandered around picking up information and reporting back to him. But of course, "The King's Eye" was on the King's side and not working against him! (More documentation of this in Rivkah Kluger, The Satan Of The Old Testament (Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 1967). This view is confirmed in other research by Harry Torczyner, The Book Of Job (Jerusalem: Kiryat-Sefer, 1981) pp. 38-45. Note that Torczyner also interprets the Satan as being in God’s service, and not in opposition to Him: "The figure and role of the Satan derives from the Persian secret service... We now understand that there are in God’s service, as in that of any earthly king, secret roving officials, who go and come and report to him on the doings of his subjects"). Satan's walking / running "to and fro in the earth / land" and reporting back to God about an individual is thus very much taken from the Persian idea of the King's "evil eye", "the eye of the King", a kind of agent provocateur, a secret police-type agent, travelling around the Kingdom and reporting back to the King about suspect individuals. It also has an evident connection with the Zechariah passages which speaks of the Angels in the time of the exile and restoration from Persia "running to and fro in the earth" on God’s behalf (<a href='B:450 1:10-11'>Zec 1:10-11</a>; <a href='B:450 4:10'>Zec 4:10</a>). The implication of course was that God and His Angels, and not the Persian King and his agents, were the ones really in control of the land. It's maybe significant that the Septuagint translates "going to and fro" in <a href='B:220 1:7'>Job 1:7</a> with the word peripatei- and we find the same word in <a href='B:670 5:8'>1Pe 5:8</a> about the adversary of the early Christians 'going about' seeking them- a reference to the agents of the Roman and Jewish systems. I have elsewhere demonstrated that much of the Hebrew Bible was rewritten [under Divine inspiration] in Babylon, to bring out relevant issues for the Jewish exiles in Babylon. This includes the book of Job. It can be understood as an allegory- Job, the suffering servant of the Lord, becomes a type of Israel, the suffering servant of Isaiah's later prophecies. There are many links between Isaiah's prophecies and Job- a glance down the margin of most reference Bibles will indicate that. Just as the returning exiles faced 'satans' in the form of local Arabic opposition, so did Job. The <a href='B:450 3:1-2'>Zec 3:1-2</a> passage uses the word 'satan' to describe this opposition to the returned exiles. Note that both Zechariah 3 and Job 1 use the idea of a Heavenly court. As God put a fence around Job (<a href='B:220 1:10'>Job 1:10</a>), so He was a "wall of fire" to the returning exiles (<a href='B:450 2:5'>Zec 2:5</a>). And his final triumph and restoration, by God’s grace, was intended as a prototype for Judah in captivity. J:B. Russell mentions a Babylonian document consisting of a dialogue between a sufferer and his friend (J:B. Russell, The Devil (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1977) p. 87). Perhaps the re-writing of the book of Job during Judah's captivity in Babylon was intended as a counter to this, explaining Yahweh's perspective on suffering.</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>Eliphaz reminds Job that the wicked of Noah's time were destroyed by a flood, implying that the sudden calamities of Job's life were like the flood, thus equating him with the world at Noah's time. Jude, Daniel, Peter and the Lord Jesus all interpret that world as representing apostate Jewry in the first century, destroyed by the " flood" of AD70. It is therefore interesting that <a href='B:670 5:8-9'>1Pe 5:8-9</a>, concerning the Jewish devil walking around seeking to draw away Christians, is quoting the Septuagint of <a href='B:220 1:7'>Job 1:7</a>, suggesting Job's satan is also to be linked with the Jewish satan:&nbsp;Job's satan was perhaps not simply a sceptical worshipper who had these questions and was represented by an Angel in the court of heaven; but also an Angel wanting for himself to find out more about Job, not understanding how a man with all the blessings Job had could sincerely worship God. God therefore gave this Angel the power needed to try Job to see whether this was the case. The idea of an Angel being called a satan (adversary) is familiar to us in <a href='B:40 22:22'>Num 22:22</a> where the Angel stood in the way of Balaam for an adversary. The fact the Angel brought the trials would explain why all through the book the trials are credited to God. Satan coming "from going back and forth in the earth" (<a href='B:220 1:7'>Job 1:7</a>) would connect with the descriptions of the Angels being God’s eyes going to and fro in the earth (<a href='B:450 1:11'>Zec 1:11</a>). <a href='B:220 1:16'>Job 1:16</a> describing God sending a flame of fire to minister one of the trials is understood in the Angel context when one recalls that He "makes His ministers a flaming fire" (<a href='B:230 104:4'>Psa 104:4</a>). The series of "messengers" who come to Job announcing the trials (<a href='B:220 1:14'>Job 1:14</a>) may possibly also be Angels, or Angels controlling human messengers on earth. Job associates his trials with God’s eyes being upon him (e. g. <a href='B:220 7:8'>Job 7:8</a>) and we have seen that the eyes of God seems to be a synonym for the Angels.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Yahweh said to Satan, Have you considered my servant, Job? For there is none like him in the land, a blameless and an upright man, one who fears God, and turns away from evil-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Notice that Satan had to get power from God (<a href='B:220 2:3-6'>Job 2:3-6</a>); he had none in his own right, indeed, God brought Job to Satan’s notice (1:8). Job comments about God being the source of his sufferings: “If it be not he, who then is it?” (<a href='B:220 9:24'>Job 9:24</a> RV). Job didn’t believe anyone apart from God was responsible.</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>God knew what the satan Angel's response would be to His question. Thus God guides an Angel to think about a believer- or person- in order to further that Angel's spiritual education. This is still necessary, despite them having "had their senses exercised to discern both good and evil" previously. The knowledge of good and evil which the Angels have is exactly the same as we have- "the man is become as one of us,&nbsp; to know good and evil" the Angels lamented in Eden (<a href='B:10 3:22'>Gen 3:22</a>). Despite our experience of life, we appreciate pitiably little how God works through evil. Some can scarcely comprehend it, especially if they have no knowledge of the Truth. Yet by nature they have some dull concept of it- and it is this dim concept which the Angels possessed in Eden, which was shared with us by Adam's eating of the tree of knowledge of good and evil. Thus we can understand why the Angels need to be educated like this.</p><p>The tragedy was that those taken into captivity weren't reformed by their sufferings, and now their children likewise refused to "take it to heart" and repent (<a href='B:290 42:25'>Isa 42:25</a> s:w:). Here we have another connection between Isaiah and Job, the book which appears to have been rewritten for the exiles with Job as representative of both the exiles and the righteous servant. "Have you considered My servant..." (<a href='B:220 1:8'>Job 1:8</a>) is the same phrase in <a href='B:290 42:25'>Isa 42:25</a> "take it to heart". The book of Job was therefore written as a way of appealing for the repentance of the exiles and for them to contextualize their own sufferings.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Then Satan answered Yahweh and said, Does Job fear God for nothing?-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> The returned exiles refused to serve God for nothing (s:w. <a href='B:460 1:10'>Mal 1:10</a>). But the final investigation of the book of Job revealed that Job was prepared to serve God for nothing, just because He was God and he was His servant; and not because he expected any reward or material advantage. Job is therefore set up to the exiles as the embodiment and personification of who they should have become. But they refused to respond. The sufferings which came upon Judah were to reveal whether they would serve God for nothing; and <a href='B:460 1:10'>Mal 1:10</a> makes it clear they didn’t.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Haven’t You made a hedge around him and around his family, and around all that he has on every side? You have blessed the work of his hands, and his substance is increased in the land-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> LXX "blessed the works of his hands, and multiplied his cattle upon the land?"- an allusion to the promises of blessing and multiplication of Abraham's seed, of whom Job was presented as being representative. In <a href='B:220 10:11-12'>Job 10:11-12</a> Job complains "Thou hast clothed me with skin and flesh, and hast fenced me with bones and sinews. Thou hast granted me life and favour, and Thy visitation hath preserved My spirit". "Fenced" is the same word as "hedge" when satan complains that God has made a hedge about Job (<a href='B:220 1:10'>Job 1:10</a>). Job appears to be aware of the conversation between the satan and the Lord. It therefore makes sense to understand that the gathering of the sons of God and 'satan' was a gathering of the people of God, including the friends and Job, and the conversation was heard by all. Job is therefore saying that actually the only hedge or fence he has is his own physical body. Job seems to be saying 'You say&nbsp; I'm hedged about with blessings. But now the only hedge I've got is this sick body. The only help you give me now is to give me my spirit to keep me alive, only so you can torment me more'. Understandable, if faulty, reasoning in Job's situation.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> But put forth Your hand now and touch all that he has, and he will renounce You to Your face-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> See on <a href='B:220 30:24'>Job 30:24</a>. The same phrase for putting forth the hand is used of how God put forth His hand against Judah and sent them into exile (<a href='B:330 10:7'>Eze 10:7</a>; <a href='B:330 14:13'>Eze 14:13</a>). The 'touching' of Job uses the word used of the 'touching' of Judah by their invaders and abusers (<a href='B:290 8:8'>Isa 8:8</a>; <a href='B:300 4:10'>Jer 4:10</a>; <a href='B:300 12:14'>Jer 12:14</a>; <a href='B:330 7:12'>Eze 7:12</a>). And it is used of how the suffering servant of <a href='B:290 53:4'>Isa 53:4</a> was considered "stricken" or 'touched' by God after the pattern of Job. That suffering servant represented the faithful remnant at the restoration, and then when they ultimately failed to be as intended, it was all more fully reapplied to the Lord Jesus. Several times the friends refer to how Job has been touched by God; the parallels between the Satan and the friends will be noted throughout the book. The Satan clearly influenced the friends to think likewise, and they effectively become the Satan. And it is therefore they and not 'Satan' who are rebuked at the end of the book.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Yahweh said to Satan, Behold, all that he has is in your power. Only on himself don’t put forth your hand. So Satan went forth from the presence of Yahweh-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> See on <a href='B:290 37:36'>Isa 37:36</a>, where an Angel likewise goes forth from Yahweh. I have suggested above that the Satan refers to both one or some amongst the "sons of God", perhaps the friends; and also to the Angel who represented them in the heavenly throne room. For there is no indication that anything Satan did was sinful; Angels don't sin. Satan never actually says or does anything wrong; he simply makes the observation that there may well be a relationship between Job's service of God and the material blessing which God has given him. He is them empowered by God to bring calamities into Job's life. Time and again is it stressed, really stressed, that God brought the problems upon Job, not satan independently (<a href='B:220 1:12'>Job 1:12</a>; <a href='B:220 1:16'>Job 1:16</a>; <a href='B:220 2:3'>Job 2:3</a>; <a href='B:220 2:10'>Job 2:10</a>; <a href='B:220 6:4'>Job 6:4</a>; <a href='B:220 8:4'>Job 8:4</a>; <a href='B:220 19:21'>Job 19:21</a>).</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>The going forth from the presence of Yahweh continues the allusion to the court of Heaven, which is implied by the sons of God, the Angels representing their charges on earth, coming before God. The ‘Satan’ figure is not in itself evil, but could refer to an Angel [a ‘good’ one, as I submit there are no ‘sinful’ Angels], or an Angel representative of a fellow worshipper on earth. The debates in Heaven between the Angels, the will of God as articulated there, is then reflected and carried out on earth – rather like how in Daniel 1-6 we have events on earth described in historical terms, and then we are given an insight into what’s been going on in Heaven in Daniel 7-12. Yet the court / legal language continues throughout the book – e.g. Job is “perfect”, i:e. legally blameless. Job appeals for ‘witnesses’ (<a href='B:220 9:33-35'>Job 9:33-35</a>; <a href='B:220 16:18-22'>Job 16:18-22</a>; <a href='B:220 19:20-27'>Job 19:20-27</a>), an advocate in Heaven (<a href='B:220 9:33'>Job 9:33</a>), denies his guilt and demands a legal list of his sins (<a href='B:220 13:19'>Job 13:19</a>), he wishes for God to come to trial (<a href='B:220 9:3'>Job 9:3</a>), and thus Job is described as a man who has taken out a ‘case’ with God (<a href='B:220 23:4'>Job 23:4</a>; <a href='B:220 40:2'>Job 40:2</a>). Job 29-31 is effectively Job’s declaration of legal innocence and an appeal to God to hear his case more sympathetically (<a href='B:220 31:35'>Job 31:35</a>). And of course God pronounces a final legal verdict at the very end (<a href='B:220 42:7'>Job 42:7</a>), in response to Job’s earlier plea: “Sleeplessly I wait for His reply” (<a href='B:220 16:22'>Job 16:22</a>). It’s as if the whole experience of Job was [at least partly] in order to test out the Canaanite theories of ‘Satan’, suffering and evil in the court of Heaven; and also the various theories which arose to explain Judah's captivity in Babylon. The friends represent the traditional views of evil, and often make reference to the myths of their day about ‘Satan’ figures. They speak as if they are the final court – Eliphaz speaks of how the judges and elders of their day, the “holy ones”, had concluded Job was guilty, and that they, the friends, were right: “To which of the holy ones will you appeal [legal language]?... we have [legally] examined this, and it [Job’s guilt] is true” (<a href='B:220 5:1'>Job 5:1</a>; <a href='B:220 5:27'>Job 5:27</a>). This is of great comfort to those who feel misjudged by man – above them in Heaven the ultimate Heavenly court is considering our case, and that is all that matters. Job perhaps perceived this, even though the vision of the court of Heaven in chapters 1 and 2 was presumably unknown to him as he endured his sufferings; for in response to the friends’ wrong judgment of him, he comments that “God covers the faces of the judges of the earth” (<a href='B:220 9:24'>Job 9:24</a>). The final summing up speeches from both God and Job simply emphasize the omnipotence of God; how ultimately He has been the adversary to Job, and there is no room in the cosmos of His creation for any other power, especially any of the various personal ‘Satan’ figures believed in by the worlds of both Canaan and Babylon. The heavenly court of “sons of God” is paralleled with all the stars in <a href='B:220 38:7'>Job 38:7</a>. Bear in mind that the stars were understood as pagan deities. The whole pagan understanding of the cosmos is being deconstructed. The stars are paralleled with the Angelic sons of God who are all totally under God’s control; they are His Heavenly court.</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>The legal language of the book of Job has far reaching implications. We have noted the many connections between Job and the latter part of Isaiah, where again there is the impression of ‘God in the dock’, a cosmic trial of truth. The gods of the nations are invited to present their best cases, to demonstrate their reality against the claims of Yahweh, Israel’s God, to be the only true God. In this trial, the suffering servant is the witness used by God. And this in turn is the basis for the same lawsuit motif in the Gospel of John, where the witness is the Lord Jesus as the suffering servant, and by extension all those in Him (3). Indeed there appear to be seven witnesses in John: John the Baptist (<a href='B:500 1:7'>Joh 1:7</a>), Jesus Himself (<a href='B:500 3:11'>Joh 3:11</a>), the Samaritan woman (<a href='B:500 4:39'>Joh 4:39</a>), God Himself (<a href='B:500 5:32'>Joh 5:32</a>), the miracles (<a href='B:500 5:36'>Joh 5:36</a>), the Old Testament (<a href='B:500 5:39'>Joh 5:39</a>) and the crowd (<a href='B:500 12:17'>Joh 12:17</a>). John presents the cross as the decisive verdict, linking back to a similar verdict pronounced in Isaiah, which in turn has as its basis the final verdict of Yahweh in support of Job against the beliefs of the friends in the various ‘Satan’ gods of Canaan and Babylonia.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> It fell on a day when his sons and his daughters were eating and drinking wine in their eldest brother’s house-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Usually Job went and offered sin offerings for his children after these parties. But the disaster came exactly whilst they were partying. This would invite us to see this as judgment upon them, looking ahead to the judgment of the children ["sons"] of Israel.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> that there came a messenger to Job and said, The oxen were ploughing and the donkeys feeding beside them-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> A malak came with news of the calamities brought by the satan (Angel). It would be understandable if that malak should have been translated 'Angel' seeing there is so much other Angelic language in this area. See on <a href='B:220 1:6-7'>Job 1:6-7</a>. We see again a connection to the work of a Satan Angel.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> and the Sabeans attacked and took them away. Yes, they have killed the servants with the edge of the sword-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> The Sabeans are literally 'those of Sheba'. The same word is used by Job when he reflects upon the disaster at the hands of "the troops of Tema... the companies of Sheba" (see on <a href='B:220 6:19'>Job 6:19</a>). It seems therefore that there were people from Tema involved. And Eliphaz was from Teman (<a href='B:220 2:11'>Job 2:11</a>). Again we have a hint that these Sabeans and associated Temanites were somehow involved with the Temanite "friend" of Job, Eliphaz. The friends were in some form the Satan. In the restoration context, all the people of Sheba would repent and come to Zion (<a href='B:290 60:6'>Isa 60:6</a> s:w:). The former enemies of God’s people were to repent and join them.</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>And I alone have escaped to tell you-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> It has been suggested that the prologue to Job is in fact a literary device to place theological problems before us, e.g. of the relationship between service of God and receipt of blessing, and sin and suffering. But we must remember that later Scripture takes the experiences of Job as literal, and Job himself as a real historical person. However, it is not impossible that the account of the conversation between God and the satan was not a literal occurrence, but simply a way of setting up the problems which the historical narrative then addresses. It's worth meditating on this one. The three different messengers come and tell Job of the various disasters and conclude with the same rubric "and I alone have escaped to tell you". This is surely a theatrical presentation rather than a literal transcription of actual speech which historically occurred; my friend Steve Cook has suggested, quoting Jewish sources, that Job may well be the very earliest extant theatrical drama script of ancient literature. Job being drama would explain why the book is written as poetry. This approach also assists us in understanding how Job was told by a messenger that his sons had all died, and then at the end of the book he appears to be given his sons back again. If the messenger wasn't telling the truth, but was just part of the plot, the mechanism to present the theological problem, then this is understandable. The use of "the satan" would therefore not be referring to any cosmic being, but rather to a role. It has been observed: “In biblical sources the Hebrew term the satan describes an adversarial role. It is not the name of a particular character” (Elaine Pagels, The Origin of Satan (New York: Random House, 1996) p. 39). And again: "[ha-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>satan] is not the personal name Satan but a role specification meaning “the accuser/adversary/doubter”" (N:C. Habel, The Book of Job (London: S:C:M:, 1985) p:89). The 'satan' or adversary was not therefore necessarily sinful: “As he first appears in the Hebrew Bible, Satan is not necessarily evil, much less opposed to God. On the contrary, he appears in the book of Numbers and in Job as one of God’s obedient servants" (Pagels, op cit. p. 39). He is “subject to God’s control and was used by God to accomplish his purposes... [there is] a pronounced emphasis on his subordination” to God (S:H:T. Page, “Satan: God’s Servant” Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society; Sept. 2007 Vol. 50 No. 3 p. 449).</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>The Sabeans of 1:15 were probably the descendants of Sheba, Abraham's grandson (<a href='B:10 25:1-3'>Gen 25:1-3</a>). For his children to grow into a separate tribe, the events of Job must have happened some generations before the Law was given.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> While he was still speaking, there also came another and said, The fire of God has fallen from the sky-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> As noted on :13,19, this is the language of judgment. Job's children were indeed guilty of serious sin, and all Job's animal sacrifices couldn't save them from that judgment. At the end of the book, the friends are also liable to Divine judgment, but are saved not by sacrifice or ritual but by prayer. This all looks forward to the failure of Mosaic ritual to save; whereas a righteous mediator, the Lord Jesus, is the One who can save. See on :20.</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>And has burned up the sheep and the servants, and consumed them, and I alone have escaped to tell you-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> "The servants" is "shepherds" in LXX and GNB. Destruction of the sheep and shepherds is language elsewhere used about the suffering of Israel at the hands of the Babylonians. Job's sons were killed by wind and fire- both of which are associated with Angelic manifestation (:16,19). See on <a href='B:220 1:6-7'>Job 1:6-7</a>. It was the "servants" who were 'smitten with the edge of the sword' at the Babylon invasion (s:w. <a href='B:300 21:7'>Jer 21:7</a>). Again we see how the book of Job discusses the very issues which were facing the exiles in Babylon as they reflected upon these same tragedies.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> While he was still speaking, there came also another and said, The Chaldeans made three bands, and swept down on the camels, and have taken them away, yes, and killed the servants with the edge of the sword; and I alone have escaped to tell you-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> "The Chaldeans" confirms that Job is being set up as representative of the exiles in Chaldea who had lost their families to the Babylonian / Chaldean invaders. See on :16; <a href='B:220 19:9'>Job 19:9</a>.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> While he was still speaking, there came also another and said, Your sons and your daughters were eating and drinking wine in their eldest brother’s house-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Again as noted on :13, the disaster came exactly whilst they were partying. This would invite us to see this as judgment upon them, looking ahead to the judgment of the children ["sons"] of Israel.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> and behold, there came a great wind from the wilderness, and struck the four corners of the house, and it fell on the young men, and they are dead. I alone have escaped to tell you-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> "Struck" is the same word as "touch" in :11. This was the hand of God 'touching' Job as Satan had requested. A wind which struck four corners of a house at the same time was a whirlwind, associated with Divine judgment and theophany.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Then Job arose, and tore his robe, and shaved his head, and fell down on the ground and worshiped-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> His robe, as the head of the family, was likely of religious significance; a kind of priestly robe. And he realizes now that all such ritual has failed to save- as noted on :16. The shaved Job again becomes a picture of the shaved Judah after the Babylonian invasion (<a href='B:300 7:29'>Jer 7:29</a> s:w:), and of the suffering servant who was "sheared", s:w. "shaved" (<a href='B:290 53:7'>Isa 53:7</a>). The response to this shaving was to "worship" and not charge God wrongly, a lesson not learnt by the exiles, who wrongly charged God over it all (as Ezekiel 18 makes clear).</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> He said, Naked I came out of my mother’s womb, and naked shall I return there. Yahweh gave, and Yahweh has taken away. Blessed be the name of Yahweh-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> The 'taking away' is the term used of Judah's taking away into captivity (<a href='B:300 20:5'>Jer 20:5</a>). God gave Judah a king in His anger, and took him away at the time of Zedekiah and the captivity (<a href='B:350 13:11'>Hos 13:11</a> s:w:). The raft of questions and mental struggles elicited by all this are those which the drama of Job will now discuss and debate. We note that Job immediately sees 'God in all this'. It wasn't that Yahweh gave, and Satan took away. God took away as well as gave. Without his family and wealth, Job feels naked- as if he is now ready to go into the grave. But it was with that now naked man that God would work, and He does likewise with men today.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> In all this, Job did not sin-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Job's reaction at this point was wonderful. He didn’t sin in this respect; but he is later led to understand that he has indeed sinned and he accepts the call to repentance of <a href='B:220 33:27'>Job 33:27</a>. But the appeal for Job to repent and his final acceptance of it could also lead us to interpret this as meaning that Job did not consider he had sinned, when in fact he had. He would then become again representative of Judah; "Behold I will plead with you, because you say, I have not sinned" (<a href='B:300 2:35'>Jer 2:35</a>).</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>Nor charge God with wrongdoing- This is legal language, as if Job did not put God in the dock and accuse Him wrongly. The idea of Israel as it were taking a court case against God recurs in the prophets. Job was their example and they largely failed to follow it.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Again it happened on the day when the sons of God came to present themselves before Yahweh, that Satan came also among them to present himself before Yahweh-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> "Before Yahweh" doesn't at all have to mean this happened in Heaven itself. The phrase is used of how men come before Yahweh here on earth. Note how Job addresses the friends in <a href='B:220 13:7'>Job 13:7</a> LXX "Do ye not speak before the Lord...". This is another hint that the friends were represented by the Satan figure of the prologue, who likewise appeared "before the Lord". Satan came amongst them, but influenced them to accept his viewpoint; or even spoke for them, until they became effectively the Satan. See on <a href='B:220 13:21'>Job 13:21</a>.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Yahweh said to Satan, Where have you come from? Satan answered Yahweh and said, From going back and forth in the land, and from walking up and down in it-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> See the extensive discussion on <a href='B:220 1:7'>Job 1:7</a>.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Yahweh said to Satan, Have you considered My servant Job?-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Later Job complains to God "what is man, that Thou dost magnify him? and that Thou shouldest set Thy heart upon him? (lit. 'consider him')" (<a href='B:220 7:17'>Job 7:17</a>). Thus Job sees God- whom he probably conceived of as an Angel- as considering him, whilst we are told earlier that satan / the adversary was told to do this. A human satan considering Job would not in itself have brought the trials, for no one human could have done all the things done to Job; and Job would not have complained so bitterly about a human being considering him.</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>For there is none like him in the land, a blameless and an upright man, one who fears God and turns away from evil-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> See on <a href='B:220 1:8'>Job 1:8</a>. The connection with Isaiah is to <a href='B:290 59:15'>Isa 59:15</a> "Yes, truth is lacking; and he who departs from evil makes himself a prey". "He who departs from evil" is the term used about Job (s:w. <a href='B:220 1:8'>Job 1:8</a>; <a href='B:220 2:3'>Job 2:3</a>); and he too became a "prey" to evil. Job represents not only the exiles, but the righteous remnant amongst them who departed from evil but suffered all the same.</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>He still maintains his integrity-</p><p> Job uses this word about himself in <a href='B:220 27:6'>Job 27:6</a>. Again we have the impression that he had been present at these discussions between the Satan and God; and the view of the Satan was in fact the view now of the friends, who effectively acted as the Satan figure who had influenced their thinking. His argument against the friends, that he did maintain his integrity still, was effectively arguing back against this position of the Satan. "Hold fast" or "maintain" is the appeal of the prophets to the exiles (s:w. <a href='B:290 27:5'>Isa 27:5</a>; <a href='B:290 35:3'>Isa 35:3</a>; <a href='B:290 56:4'>Isa 56:4</a>). But sadly there were none who really followed Job's example at that time. None maintained or took hold of Yahweh's righteousness (<a href='B:290 64:7'>Isa 64:7</a> s:w:).</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>Although you incited Me against him, to ruin him-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> This is not really a rebuke; for the Satan is carefully portrayed as not actually sinning. Because God did in fact "ruin him". This 'inciting' of God reveals the sensitivity of God to human desires to understand and their wish that He would act. This is exactly what happens in our wrestlings in prayer with God. If God agrees, He "performs the counsel (advice) of His messenger" (Angels; <a href='B:290 44:26'>Isa 44:26</a>). That is in a restoration context- to encourage the early readership of Job to understand that God can be moved to respond:&nbsp; The Hebrew for "incite" means to prick or stimulate, s:w. "persuade"- God can be moved or provoked to action, He is sensitive to our struggles with 'the problem of evil' and His actions upon earth, just as much as human beings can provoke Him to anger.</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>Without cause-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Job repeats this in <a href='B:220 9:17'>Job 9:17</a>. Again we have the impression that he had been present at these discussions between the Satan and God; and the view of the Satan was in fact the view now of the friends, who effectively acted as the Satan figure who had influenced their thinking. And the point is established- that suffering can come on individuals "without cause". Yet the friends spend their speeches guessing at what the cause was in Job's case. In the restoration context, the suffering servant likewise suffered "without cause" (s:w. <a href='B:290 52:3'>Isa 52:3</a>; <a href='B:290 52:5'>Isa 52:5</a>). That figure was clearly based upon Job, and speaks of the righteous remnant at the restoration, and finally of the Lord Jesus who was their embodiment. Jeremiah laments that he too had suffered at that time "without cause" (<a href='B:310 3:52'>Lam 3:52</a> s:w:); failing to perceive the lessons of the book of Job, just as we can whenever we complain that we suffer "without cause". The reality of course was that the judgments upon Judah had not been "without cause" (<a href='B:330 14:23'>Eze 14:23</a> s:w:). And Job finally comes to realize that although he is right before God by grace, he too is a sinner and there was "cause" in his sufferings.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Satan answered Yahweh and said, Skin for skin-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> The idea may be that Job was willing to accept the loss of the skin of his children, as it were in exchange for his own skin being saved. But 'Skin for skin' is a human expression- maybe based on trading one animal skin for another. It is appropriate to a human being on earth; and yet as explained on <a href='B:220 1:6'>Job 1:6</a>, the human Satan had a representative Angel in Heaven who also used this phrase in reporting the man's thinking before God. This reflects the degree to which God is aware of our language and perceptions.</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>Yes, all that a man has he will give for his life-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> This is the basis of the Lord's words "what shall a man give in exchange for his soul / life?" (<a href='B:470 16:26'>Mat 16:26</a>), even if he possesses the whole world, as the mega wealthy Job appeared to. We note that He quotes the words of the Satan with approval; again confirming the impression that the 'Satan' figure is not essentially sinful. Just as the serpent in Eden was an animal making observations, however wrongly; and sin entered the world not by the serpent but through Adam (<a href='B:520 5:12'>Rom 5:12</a>). The serpent was part of a "very good" creation and was a-moral.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> But put forth Your hand now-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Satan asks God: "Put forth Your hand". The hand of God is an Angelic phrase. God agrees- "he is in your hand" (:6). Thus Satan's hand is God’s hand, which in practice was articulated through an Angel. Job seems to emphasize the place of God’s hand in bringing his trials- <a href='B:220 2:5-6'>Job 2:5-6</a>; <a href='B:220 2:10'>Job 2:10</a>; <a href='B:220 6:9'>Job 6:9</a>; <a href='B:220 10:7'>Job 10:7</a>; <a href='B:220 13:21'>Job 13:21</a>; <a href='B:220 19:21'>Job 19:21</a>; <a href='B:220 27:11'>Job 27:11</a> AVmg; 28:9. Job in <a href='B:220 12:9'>Job 12:9</a> feels that in the same way as God’s hand had created the natural creation- and the Angels did this- so that same Angelic hand was upon him for evil. "By His Spirit (God makes His Angels spirits) He hath garnished the Heavens; His hand hath formed the crooked serpent" (<a href='B:220 26:13'>Job 26:13</a>). Thus Job associates God’s Spirit with His hand, which is Satan's hand. It seems far more fitting that this hand and spirit should be Angelic rather than human. For no one human being could bring these sufferings upon Job. The human Satan, the fellow worshipper, was reflected in an Angel in the court of Heaven. Again, it was Angelic work that formed the Heavens. Job recognized that his trials came from the hand of God, but knew that His hand would not kill him- "with Thy strong hand Thou opposest Thyself against me... howbeit He will not stretch out His hand to (bring me to) the grave" (<a href='B:220 30:21'>Job 30:21</a>; <a href='B:220 30:24'>Job 30:24</a> AV). This was exactly the brief given to satan- to try Job, but "preserve his life". The hand of God creating evil (<a href='B:220 2:10-11'>Job 2:10-11</a>) must surely refer to God’s "Angels of evil" (<a href='B:230 78:49'>Psa 78:49</a>) rather than to man- in the restoration context, the people and Cyrus had to be taught that no one except God (including human satans!) created evil (<a href='B:290 45:5-7'>Isa 45:5-7</a>).</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>And touch his bone and his flesh, and he will renounce You to Your face-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> In <a href='B:220 2:4-6'>Job 2:4-6</a> we have the ‘Satan’ commenting that Job’s flesh and skin need to be harmed; but in <a href='B:220 19:26'>Job 19:26</a> we have Job stating his faith that even though God destroys his flesh and skin, yet God shall ultimately save him. See on <a href='B:220 16:14'>Job 16:14</a>.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Yahweh said to Satan, Behold, he is in your hand. Only spare his life-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> See on :5. In the restoration context, this was to be understood as the promise that no matter how God’s people suffered, Israel would be preserved.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> So Satan went forth from the presence of Yahweh, and struck Job with painful sores from the sole of his foot to his head-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Isaiah's description of Israel as "from the sole of the foot even unto the head there is no soundness... but wounds, and bruises and putrifying sores" (<a href='B:290 1:6'>Isa 1:6</a>) is couched in this picture of Job. As if Job represents apostate Israel, although personally innocent; in the spirit of the Lord Jesus. These types of wounds made them ritually unclean. In Isaiah’s first context, the suffering servant was King Hezekiah. Yet all Israel were to see themselves as ‘in’ him, as spiritual Israel are to see themselves as in Christ. “He was oppressed”, as Israel at that time were being “oppressed” by Assyria. As they were covered in wounds and spiritual sickness (<a href='B:290 1:5-6'>Isa 1:5-6</a>), so the suffering servant bore their diseases and rose again in salvation victory. Significantly, Isaiah 40-53 speak of the one servant, whereas Isaiah 54-66 speak of the “servants” who fulfill in principle the work of the singular servant. The suffering servant, based upon Job, was a people embodied in the future Lord Jesus.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> He took for himself a potsherd to scrape himself with-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> The word for "potsherd", a piece of broken earthenware, is used repeatedly about Judah in exile (<a href='B:290 30:14'>Isa 30:14</a>; <a href='B:290 45:9'>Isa 45:9</a>; <a href='B:300 19:1'>Jer 19:1</a>; <a href='B:310 4:2'>Lam 4:2</a>; <a href='B:330 23:34'>Eze 23:34</a>). Job is presented as their representative.</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>And he sat among the ashes-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Another similarity with Abraham, whose seed Job is presented as being (<a href='B:10 18:27'>Gen 18:27</a>). The epilogue and prologue to Job are evidently related. Job begins sitting in dust and ashes and ends repenting in dust and ashes (<a href='B:220 2:8'>Job 2:8</a>; <a href='B:220 42:6'>Job 42:6</a>). The silence of the friends at the opening of the book is matched by the silence after God has finally spoken (<a href='B:220 40:4'>Job 40:4</a>). Job intercedes for his children (<a href='B:220 1:5'>Job 1:5</a>) and ends up interceding for his friends. Job begins with the description of being the Lord’s servant; and the book concludes on the same note (<a href='B:220 42:7-8'>Job 42:7-8</a>). The question of course is: ‘So what’s the equivalent of the ‘Satan’ figure in the epilogue?’. The omission is intended and obvious. Ultimately the answer is the essence of the whole book: the ‘Satan’, the adversary, is none other than God Himself, in His love.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Then his wife said to him-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Jewish thinking came to be influenced by Babylonian ideas of a dualistic cosmos, split between God and some 'Satan' figure. The book of Job is a corrective to this, in that it teaches that evil comes from God, and any Satan figure is under His total control. Yet a mere skim reading of the prologue to Job has led some to the very opposite conclusion. Significantly, the apostate Jewish writing The Testament Of Job completely twists the intent of the Biblical record, and adds into it the common misconceptions concerning Satan- e.g. it claims of Job's wife: "Satan followed her along the road, walking stealthily, and leading her astray... [Job warns her] 'Do you not see Satan standing behind you and unsettling your reasoning?'" (23:11; 26:6). These classical images of 'Satan' have to be added in to the Biblical record- because they are simply not there in the Biblical text. These ideas of women being easily influenced by a cosmic Satan figure are thereby deconstructed here; Job's wife is presented just as a real woman, making observations which many secular people would make.</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>Do you still maintain your integrity? Renounce God, and die-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> "Renounce" or "curse" is a word with two meanings; it can also be translated 'bless'. So she may also have been quipping that blessing God, as Job has done so far in the narrative, all the same leads to death.</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>The LXX at this point adds a lot more detail, which is very much the language of Lamentations concerning the Jews after the Babylonian destruction of Jerusalem: "And when much time had passed, his wife said to him, How long wilt thou hold out, saying, Behold, I wait yet a little while, expecting the hope of my deliverance? for, behold, thy memorial is abolished from the earth, even thy sons and daughters, the pangs and pains of my womb which I bore in vain with sorrows; and thou thyself sittest down to spend the nights in the open air among the corruption of worms, and I am a wanderer and a servant from place to place and house to house, waiting for the setting of the sun, that I may rest from my labours and my pangs which now beset me: but say some word against the Lord, and die".</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> But he said to her, You speak as one of the foolish women would speak-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> "The foolish" is the term used by the restoration prophets for the unfaithful in Israel; and her perspective is therefore set up as the wrong model which they were following (<a href='B:300 17:11'>Jer 17:11</a>; <a href='B:330 13:3'>Eze 13:3</a>):&nbsp;What? Shall we receive good at the hand of God, and shall we not receive evil? In all this Job didn’t sin with his lips-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> The hand of God creating evil (<a href='B:220 2:10-11'>Job 2:10-11</a>) must surely refer to God’s "Angels of evil" (<a href='B:230 78:49'>Psa 78:49</a>) rather than to man- Cyrus had to be taught that no one except God (including human satans!) created evil (<a href='B:290 45:5-7'>Isa 45:5-7</a>). See on <a href='B:220 1:6'>Job 1:6</a>; <a href='B:220 26:13'>Job 26:13</a>; <a href='B:220 30:21'>Job 30:21</a>. The major theme of the book of Job is that God brought the problems into Job’s life and that eventually they made him a more righteous person (<a href='B:220 2:10'>Job 2:10</a>; <a href='B:220 16:11'>Job 16:11</a>; <a href='B:220 19:21'>Job 19:21</a>; <a href='B:220 23:16'>Job 23:16</a>; <a href='B:220 42:11'>Job 42:11</a>). Notice that Job did not believe that only good things came from God; he nowhere complains about Satan bringing the problems. Job realized that his sufferings had made him come to know God in practice rather than just in theory - “I have heard of Thee by the hearing of the ear: but now mine eye seeth Thee” (<a href='B:220 42:5'>Job 42:5</a>). Seeing that problems make us more righteous people if we respond correctly to them (<a href='B:650 12:5-11'>Heb 12:5-11</a>), why would a sinful, wicked being, who wants to turn us away from God, bring these things into our lives, when actually they only make us more righteous and closer to God?I have pointed out that Job all through rejects the ideas promoted by the friends, the view of traditional wisdom (especially emphasized by Bildad, <a href='B:220 8:8-10'>Job 8:8-10</a>), that various supernatural ‘Satan’ monsters and figures were responsible for his experiences. Job began by saying that we receive both good and evil from God’s hand (<a href='B:220 2:10'>Job 2:10</a> cp. <a href='B:290 45:5-7'>Isa 45:5-7</a>). And he ends saying the same – that the Lord brought the trouble upon him (<a href='B:220 42:11'>Job 42:11</a>). He repeatedly sees God as the source of all his affliction. Hence God can say that Job has spoken about Him that which is right (<a href='B:220 42:8'>Job 42:8</a>). But Job came to realize the massive practical extent of what he had previously known in theory, what he had “by the hearing of the ear”. Now his eye saw / perceived that truly no plan of God can be thwarted, by any of the various ‘Satan’ monsters imagined by men (<a href='B:220 42:2'>Job 42:2</a>). We too may say that we believe in the omnipotence of God; but such a belief requires us to throw out all beliefs in supernatural Satan figures. And that’s not a merely intellectual exercise; to see the tragedies and cruelties of our lives as being ultimately from God and under His control is something which shakes us to the core. See on <a href='B:220 41:1'>Job 41:1</a>.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Now when Job’s three friends heard of all this evil that had come on him, they each came from his own place-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> I have suggested earlier that the friends were influenced by the Satan figure and effectively became the Satan to Job. They "came" to him just as the evil "came" to him.</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>Eliphaz the Temanite, Bildad the Shuhite, and Zophar the Naamathite-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> These people are traceable in the records of the patriarchs, again suggesting an early date for the historical Job. Eliphaz and Tema are associated with the Idumeans, the people of Esau (<a href='B:10 36:4'>Gen 36:4</a>); Shuah was one of Abraham's children by Keturah.</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>And they made an appointment together-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> They were the "sons of God" who came together on set occasions "before Yahweh" (<a href='B:220 1:6'>Job 1:6</a>); so it seems that such meetings were not uncommon for them, and perhaps they came together as it were for an extraordinary meeting, or perhaps the dialogues presented occurred at their next regular meeting.</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>To come to sympathize with him and to comfort him-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> See on <a href='B:220 19:12-14'>Job 19:12-14</a>; <a href='B:220 2:11'>Job 2:11</a> the friends came "to mourn with him and to comfort him" , although Job said he turned to them for comfort in vain (<a href='B:220 16:2'>Job 16:2</a>). The Hebrew here in 2:11 is identical to that in <a href='B:230 69:20'>Psa 69:20</a>, describing Christ looking in vain for comforters:&nbsp;Job was the prototype of Isaiah's suffering servant and thereby a type of the Lord Jesus. "Comfort" is the word Job finally uses when he says he 'repents' (<a href='B:220 42:6'>Job 42:6</a>). Perhaps their aim from the start was to lead him to the repentance they wrongly imagined he must make for the sins which they mistakenly thought lay behind his sufferings.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> When they lifted up their eyes from a distance and didn’t recognize him-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> The friends "knew him not" as the Jews also did not recognize the suffering servant because of the great physical torment (<a href='B:290 52:14'>Isa 52:14</a>; <a href='B:290 53:3'>Isa 53:3</a>). Like those who crucified Christ "they sat down" watching him; "and sitting down they watched him there".</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>They raised their voices and wept; and they each tore his robe, and sprinkled dust on their heads toward the sky-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> The descriptions of the elders of Zion sitting on the ground in mourning for Jerusalem in <a href='B:310 2:10'>Lam 2:10</a> recalls the friends mourning for Job- thus associating both them and Job with a condemned Israel.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> So they sat down with him on the ground seven days and seven nights, and none spoke a word to him, for they saw that his grief was very great- This great grief was intended to represent "the day of grief and of desperate sorrow" that was to come upon a condemned Judah (s:w. <a href='B:290 17:11'>Isa 17:11</a>; <a href='B:300 15:18'>Jer 15:18</a>).</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> After this Job opened his mouth, and cursed the day of his birth-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Job although righteous was representative of a condemned Israel, whose "days" were likewise "cursed" (s:w. <a href='B:290 65:20'>Isa 65:20</a>). This is the essence of the representative nature of the work of the Lord Jesus, the suffering servant who description took Job as its prototype. He was ultimately innocent and yet representative of a cursed people, and like Job, through His intercession for sinners He could bring salvation for them.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Job responded-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> The idea of 'response' is yet another indication that Job was present at the dialogue between God and the Satan.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Let the day perish in which I was born, the night in which it was said, ‘There is a boy conceived’-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Heb. 'the night which said…'. He personifies darkness as a being, and sees himself as having been born out of that darkness. A great theme of the book of Job is that God brings light out of darkness, and is in control of the darkness; see on :4.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Let that day be darkness. Don’t let God from above seek for it, neither let the light shine on it-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Job sees a chasmic difference between light and darkness; but the end of the book reveals the truth specifically taught to the exiles in <a href='B:290 45:5-7'>Isa 45:5-7</a>, that both light and darkness were from God.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Let darkness and the shadow of death claim it for their own. Let a cloud dwell on it. Let all that makes black the day terrify it-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> An allusion to the blackness caused by the desert sandstorms called "khamsin", which appeared to turn day into thick darkness. God noted that allusion, and appears at the end of the book in such a whirlwind, to reveal the light of His grace.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> As for that night, let thick darkness seize on it. Let it not rejoice among the days of the year. Let it not counted in the number of the months-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> The "thick darkness" continues the allusion to the "khamsin" whirlwind sandstorm (see on :5), which brings a palpably "thick darkness".</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Behold, let that night be barren. Let no joyful voice come therein-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> More than wishing that his existence and birth would be somehow cancelled, the desire that his day of birth be "barren" would suggest "let no one be born in it". The restoration prophecies repeatedly use the word for "joyful voice" to speak of the joy which would again come from the restoration of Zion (<a href='B:290 61:7'>Isa 61:7</a>; <a href='B:290 65:14'>Isa 65:14</a>; <a href='B:300 31:7'>Jer 31:7</a> and often). The blackness of despair which Job experienced was that of the exiles, and yet it could all be turned around, as happened for Job.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Let them curse it who curse the day, who are ready to rouse up Leviathan-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Job says that the friends who came to mourn with him were “ready to raise up Leviathan” – or, as it can also be translated with allusion to the friends, “to raise up their mourning” (see A:V:). They thought that Leviathan, the ‘Satan’ figure they believed was real, could be blamed. But Job continually sees God as the ultimate source of what had happened to him, and understood the whole matter in terms of ‘how can a man be just with God’ rather than ‘how can a man get Satan off his back?’. A key passage is <a href='B:220 9:24'>Job 9:24</a>: “If it be not he, who then is it?” (R:V:); or as the G:N:B. puts it: “If God didn’t do it, who did?”. After all the theories of ‘Who’s responsible for all this evil in Job’s life?’, Job concludes that the source simply has to be God – and not anyone else. See on <a href='B:220 1:1'>Job 1:1</a>; <a href='B:220 9:24'>Job 9:24</a>.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Let the stars of its twilight be dark. Let it look for light, but have none, neither let it see the eyelids of the morning-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> The stars of the morning rejoiced for joy at Israel's creation (<a href='B:220 38:7'>Job 38:7</a> s:w. :7). Job wishes this to all be somehow annulled. But God’s joy in creating His people would be finally justified in His restoration of them, as happened with Job.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> because it didn’t shut up the doors of my mother’s womb, nor did it hide trouble from my eyes-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> "Trouble" is the word used of Joseph's "trouble" (<a href='B:10 41:51'>Gen 41:51</a>). Job was failing to see that his trouble had marvellously passed away and he was totally restored. God would save Israel from their "trouble" if they repented (<a href='B:50 26:7'>Deu 26:7</a> s:w:). "Trouble" is the word used in <a href='B:290 53:11'>Isa 53:11</a> of the suffering servant's "travail of... soul". Again, Job was the prototype for the suffering servant.</p>


text:
<p> Why didn’t I die from the womb? Why didn’t I give up the spirit when my mother bore me?-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> This whole depressive lament is more or less repeated by Jeremiah when in depression (<a href='B:300 20:17-18'>Jer 20:17-18</a>). We can learn from that how we should turn to Biblical precedent and example even in the darkest times of depression. But further, we see how Job's experiences are again understood as the prototype for those of the righteous remnant at the time of Judah's sufferings at the hands of the Babylonians.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Why did the knees receive me? Or why the breast, that I should nurse?-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Job in the nadir of depression wishes that his mother had not placed him as her newborn child on her knees, nor offered her breast to him.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> For now should I have lain down and been quiet. I should have slept, then I would have been at rest-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> If Job had died as a newborn, he felt he would have "slept". He clearly understood death as unconsciousness, which shows that even in those early days, there was a clear understanding of death amongst the believers. For almost everyone else had ideas of an immortal soul consciously surviving death. But his whole argument is that death is unconsciousness.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> with kings and counsellors of the earth, who built up waste places for themselves-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> This is rather similar to the description of Babylon's king coming to the grave with "all the kings of the nations" in Isaiah 14. The depressed Jews in exile likewise saw their destiny beyond the grave as being identical with that of their Babylonian oppressors.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> or with princes who had gold, who filled their houses with silver-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Their houses could refer to their burial tombs.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> or as a hidden untimely birth I had not been, as infants who never saw light-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> The description of Miriam in <a href='B:40 12:12'>Num 12:12</a> LXX is quoting from <a href='B:220 3:16'>Job 3:16</a> LXX; as if both Job and Miriam represented apostate Israel.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> There the wicked cease from troubling. There the weary are at rest-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> <a href='B:290 57:20'>Isa 57:20</a> identifies Job's troubled and 'not at rest' experience with that of the suffering, apostate Jews of the exile: "The wicked are like the troubled sea, when it cannot rest, whose waters cast up mire and dirt".</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> There the prisoners are at ease together. They don’t hear the voice of the taskmaster-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Job in his depression feels as Israel suffering in Egypt (<a href='B:20 3:7'>Exo 3:7</a>; <a href='B:20 5:6'>Exo 5:6</a>; <a href='B:20 5:13'>Exo 5:13</a>), considering that death was the only way out of the misery of hearing the "voice of the taskmaster". But he fails to see that out of that misery they were redeemed and restored to their land. This is alluded to when attention is drawn to how God’s creations "hear not the voice, the shouts and curses of the driver" (<a href='B:220 39:7'>Job 39:7</a>). God’s people didn’t have to "hear" the voice of the taskmaster; there was a way of redemption offered.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> The small and the great are there. The servant is free from his master-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Job was a master, but he now felt as a servant who wished to be free. Whose servant was he? Surely God’s. Job even yearned to be free of God, a feeling he later expresses. But he never attempts to cut the ties totally; for he knows that by the nature of things, he can't. And he is later to be taught that those ties that bind were nothing less than God’s love and saving grace.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Why is light given-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Job recognizes that the light is a gift from God, and will be brought to realize throughout the book, and especially in the speeches of God and Elihu at the end, that the darkness likewise is a gift from Him. And this was the truth which the exiles had to learn (<a href='B:290 45:5-7'>Isa 45:5-7</a> is addressed to them).</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>To him who is in misery, life to the bitter in soul-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Hezekiah, a potential fulfilment of the suffering servant who was based upon Job, was likewise given life when he was "bitter in soul" (<a href='B:290 38:15'>Isa 38:15</a>; <a href='B:290 38:17'>Isa 38:17</a>).</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> who long for death, but it doesn’t come; and dig for it more than for hidden treasures-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Job's desire for death was not fulfilled. And this stood for all time as a lesson of how the ties that bind in life, the sense of being hedged up and tied down in an unbearable position, are in fact the ties and cords of Divine love.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> who rejoice exceedingly, and are glad, when they can find the grave?-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> This was in Job's imagination. For nobody surely commits suicide with joy, and a final fear of death is part of the human condition.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Why is light given-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> See on :20.</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>To a man whose way is hidden-</p>&nbsp;<p style='margin-left:1:415em'>see on <a href='B:220 10:11-12'>Job 10:11-12</a>; <a href='B:290 40:27'>Isa 40:27</a>. "Hidden" is "obscured" / "darkened", "placed under a cloud". Finally the cloud of the whirlwind appears at the end of the book and Job finally realizes that out of that comes the light of God’s glory.</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>Whom God has hedged in?-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Job is feeling confined, imprisoned, blocked in. But this was what happened to Judah in their judgment (<a href='B:350 2:6'>Hos 2:6</a>); Job although righteous was the representative of Judah.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> For my sighing comes before I eat. My groanings are poured out like water-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> But Job's "sighing" came to an end when he was restored. The same word is used of how the sighing of the captives in exile (<a href='B:310 1:4'>Lam 1:4</a>; <a href='B:310 1:11'>Lam 1:11</a>; <a href='B:310 1:21-22'>Lam 1:21-22</a>) would likewise end when they were restored (<a href='B:290 35:10'>Isa 35:10</a>; <a href='B:290 51:11'>Isa 51:11</a>).</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> For the thing which I fear comes upon me, that of which I was afraid has happened to me-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Job's sufferings were a type of those of the Lord Jesus; and as for Job, so for the Lord, the sufferings of the cross were the thing which He had greatly feared all his life. Perhaps the thing which the Lord greatly feared, according to the Psalms, was feeling forsaken by God. And true enough to the Job type, this came upon Him.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> I was not at ease, neither was I quiet, neither had I rest; but trouble came- There are some very evident ways in which Job spiritually grew. Here he originally says that his life previous to his afflictions had not been a life of ease; but as a result of his suffering, he realized that actually it had been "at ease" (<a href='B:220 16:12'>Job 16:12</a>).</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Then Eliphaz the Temanite answered-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Eliphaz appears to have been the eldest. The friends speak according to age, with Elihu as the youngest coming last. The idea was clearly that the longer you lived, the more wisdom you attained; but this is deconstructed throughout the book.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> If someone ventures to talk with you, will you be grieved? But who can withhold himself from speaking?-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Both Job and the friends, including Elihu, so often argue that they cannot but speak. Eliphaz is here saying that whether or not Job agrees that Elihu can talk, he can't withhold himself from speaking; indeed, he argues that nobody could stop themselves from talking. And yet all are brought to silence by God’s display of majesty and answers at the end. The drama sets us all up to quip 'If only you had all remained silent as you were at the beginning, when you all sat with Job in silence!'. We can control our tongue; but all concerned seemed to think that this was just impossible, and it was part of being human to talk when provoked. But self-control is possible.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Behold, you have instructed many, you have strengthened the weak hands-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Another telling point of contact with Isaiah is found here in 4:3-5. Job had "strengthened the weak hands... and... the feeble knees. But now it (the weakness and feeble knees) is come upon thee, and thou faintest". This is picked up in <a href='B:290 35:3-4'>Isa 35:3-4</a>: "Strengthen ye the weak hands, and confirm the feeble knees. Say to them that are of a fearful (Heb. 'hasty'- both are relevant to Job) heart, Be strong... behold, your God will come". Thus Job is representative of the weak-hearted Jews in exile, and his final deliverance thus points forward to both their restoration and the final coming of the Lord to reestablish God’s Kingdom on earth.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Your words have supported him who was falling, you have strengthened the feeble knees-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> See on :4. The idea is that now Job himself had weak hands and feeble knees (:3,5), which needed strengthening. This makes him exactly correspond with the situation of the exiles in <a href='B:290 35:3-4'>Isa 35:3-4</a>; the good news of the gospel of restoration was to be experienced by him.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> But now it has come to you, and you faint. It touches you, and you are troubled-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> "Touch" is the word used by the satan in <a href='B:220 1:11'>Job 1:11</a>; <a href='B:220 2:5'>Job 2:5</a>, where satan argues that if Job is 'touched', he will renounce God. This is more evidence that the satan was the friends, on one level. When he fades from the narrative, the friends appear as it were in his place. It may be that Job's satan Angel was the Angel representing the three friends (satans) of Job. Because of His close identification with them, the satan Angel spoke their&nbsp; thoughts as if they were his own- compare Eliphaz's thoughts here with Satan's words of <a href='B:220 1:9-10'>Job 1:9-10</a>. For the connection between the satan and an Angel, see on <a href='B:220 1:6'>Job 1:6</a>.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Isn’t your piety your confidence?-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> The Hebrew can mean both "confidence" and "folly" (s:w. <a href='B:230 85:8'>Psa 85:8</a>). The friends were convinced Job was a fake because he was suffering.</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>Isn’t the integrity of your ways your hope?-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Eliphaz seems to be restating Job's convictions, that his upright ways were what his "hope" was predicated upon. But Job through his sufferings comes to "hope" only for death (<a href='B:220 6:8'>Job 6:8</a> s:w:), and feels he now has no "hope" (<a href='B:220 7:6'>Job 7:6</a>; <a href='B:220 14:19'>Job 14:19</a>; <a href='B:220 17:15'>Job 17:15</a>; <a href='B:220 19:10'>Job 19:10</a>). Bildad presses the same point as Eliphaz, suggesting that Job had only the "hope" of the hypocrite, and this "hope" would perish (<a href='B:220 8:13'>Job 8:13</a>; <a href='B:220 27:8'>Job 27:8</a>). Job had integrity, and on that basis he thought he had "hope". He suffered, and he lost that "hope", because he assumed that his sufferings meant that he was not in fact righteous. And yet he often reflects that he is righteous and is suffering unjustly. And so he is led to the realization that the "hope" of the righteous is by God’s grace and not because of the "integrity of [Job's] ways". Judah in captivity likewise lost their "hope" (<a href='B:330 19:5'>Eze 19:5</a>; <a href='B:330 37:11'>Eze 37:11</a>). But the message of the restoration prophets was that "there is hope in your end" (<a href='B:300 31:17'>Jer 31:17</a>); they were prisoners or exiles in "hope" (<a href='B:450 9:12'>Zec 9:12</a>).</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Remember now, whoever perished, being innocent? Or where were the upright cut off?-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> God’s opinion of Job was that he was "upright" (<a href='B:220 1:1'>Job 1:1</a> s:w:). But as the drama progresses, the friends argue that if Job were in fact "upright" then God would not be afflicting him (<a href='B:220 4:7'>Job 4:7</a>; <a href='B:220 8:6'>Job 8:6</a> s:w:). Job absorbs this reasoning, and confesses that he is not "upright" and therefore cannot find God (<a href='B:220 23:7-8'>Job 23:7-8</a> s:w:). He absorbs false guilt and becomes influenced by the guilt placed upon him by his religion and "friends" amongst the "sons of God". It's quite possible that in depression and periods of suffering, we can come to have a lower view of ourselves than that which God has of us; just as at other times we can have a higher view of ourselves spiritually than we ought to. There is true guilt, the guilt which we should take, and false guilt. And Job seems to have picked up the false guilt thrown upon him by Bildad. We too need to learn this difference between false and true guilt.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> According to what I have seen, those who plough iniquity and sow trouble, reap the same-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Although the friends are finally rebuked for not speaking rightly about God, Paul quotes these words in <a href='B:550 6:8'>Gal 6:8</a>. This shows that the spirit in the New Testament can at times quote words which may be out of context, and reapply them in a new context. The accusation that Job was reaping the result of his sowing of sin was wrong; but the principle is quoted with approval, that those who sow to the flesh will reap judgment. Eliphaz overlooked the fact that the final reaping was at the last day, and not in this life. Job was driven towards understanding and faith in a "last day" judgment setting things right; for he knew that he was not reaping judgment for some specific sin. He had been righteous- and yet was not reaping the results of it. So he has to conclude that the time of reaping cannot be in this life. And he progressively longs for the coming of that day. Eliphaz may also have in view the fact that it was whilst Job was literally ploughing that the judgment came (<a href='B:220 1:14'>Job 1:14</a>). See on :9.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> By the breath of God they perish. By the blast of His anger are they consumed-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> An allusion to the wind or spirit / breath of God coming from the wilderness and destroying Job's children. See on :8. This is all the language of the destruction of Judah by her enemies (<a href='B:290 30:33'>Isa 30:33</a>). Indeed Job's children had sinned, as had the sons [s:w:] / children of Israel. But this didn’t mean that Job had personally sinned in such a way as to elicit this judgment. Job is to be understood as representing Judah in captivity. The fact their sons has been destroyed by the invaders was not in fact evidence that all of them had sinned. There was no guilt by association.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> The roaring of the lion and the voice of the fierce lion, the teeth of the young lions, are broken-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> This and :11 pictures a family of lions perishing. Perhaps Job is the old lion, his wife the lioness, and the cubs are his sons.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> The old lion perishes for lack of prey. The cubs of the lioness are scattered abroad-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> See on :11. Ezekiel 19 likes Judah at the time of Babylon's invasion as being like a family of lions which died out. Again we see how the book of Job was reapplied to the situation with Judah at the time of their exile and restoration.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Now a thing was secretly brought to me; my ear received a whisper of it-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> This is typical of the sources of truth many turn to today. A person claims they had a secret revelation, unconfirmed by anyone else, unheard by anyone else, and incapable of any peer review. The contents of the claims are also unverifiable. But that is accepted as 'truth' by many. The book of Job concludes with God appealing to that which is before the eyes of every man- His power in creation, His way in history, the logical implications of the fact the righteous suffer and the wicked prosper, which lead to the conclusion that there must be a day of judgment to come, and that God must finally be revealed openly.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> In thoughts from the visions of the night, when deep sleep falls on men-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> As noted on :12, Eliphaz claims nobody else heard this message, all other men were asleep, and he implies that he must be believed. Simply on the basis of his say so. And so many are eager to do that, rather than lift their own eyes and hearts to the skies and seek God for what and how He is and has revealed Himself.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> fear came on me, and trembling, which made all my bones shake-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> This language of fear and shaking bones is that used in <a href='B:230 53:5'>Psa 53:5</a> about the condemned; but Eliphaz presents this as reason to accept him as telling the truth!</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Then a spirit passed before my face. The hair of my flesh stood up-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> It's unclear whether Eliphaz is making this up (for how can a man living before mirrors were invented, in the darkness, knows what his hair looked like)- or whether it actually happened. But we will note on :18,21 that what he says is not completely true.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> It stood still, but I couldn’t discern its appearance. A form was before my eyes. Silence; then I heard a voice saying-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Or, a still voice, recalling the voice heard by Elijah. Eliphaz admits he couldn't discern the form and appearance of whatever revealed truth to him. Yahweh's form appeared to Moses (s:w. <a href='B:40 12:8'>Num 12:8</a>) and indeed to all concerned in the book of Job, in His final theophany in the storm and whirlwind. That was to be the source of truth- and not the vaguely remembered, jumbled claims of a man like Eliphaz which couldn't be corroborated by his audience. The vision contrasts directly with <a href='B:50 4:12'>Deu 4:12</a>, where Israel did not see any "form" but only heard a voice, the Divine word, which they were to respond to. But Eliphaz claims he saw the "form" right before his eyes. The form seemed to be more significant to him than the content, the voice of the words.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> ‘Shall mortal man be more just than God? Shall a man be more pure than his Maker?-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Job did justify himself more than God (<a href='B:220 32:2'>Job 32:2</a>) and this effectively was to be read as making himself more righteous than God. Here we have the essence of the problem in the book of Job- not suffering per se, but how can man be just or right with God. The answer is given at length in Romans 1-8 - by faith in God’s imputation of righteousness to us, by grace. This is how man can be "pure" before God, by His forgiveness and imputation of righteousness (s:w. <a href='B:230 51:2'>Psa 51:2</a>; <a href='B:230 51:7'>Psa 51:7</a>). This question as to how to be pure before God was that asked by David, after his sin for which there was no sacrifice. And the answer was the same- to confess sin, and throw ourselves upon the grace which brings imputed righteousness to us. Job was not perfect, as he himself comes to admit; and yet he was counted righteous by God, both at the start and the end of the book. But any attempt to make ourselves righteous without this Divinely provided mechanism- is effectively to raise ourselves up above God. And that is the problem and failure of all works-based religions. The offer of being cleansed (s:w. "pure") by their maker was what the exiles were offered in the new covenant (s:w. <a href='B:300 33:8'>Jer 33:8</a>; <a href='B:330 36:25'>Eze 36:25</a>; <a href='B:330 36:33'>Eze 36:33</a>; <a href='B:330 37:23'>Eze 37:23</a>; <a href='B:460 3:3'>Mal 3:3</a>).</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Behold, He puts no trust in His servants. He charges His angels with folly-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> It can be argued that the book of Job is a dialogue concerning evil and suffering, with three popular views being represented by the three friends. These views are examined and corrected by the personal history of Job, as well as by the epilogue and prologue to the book. Eliphaz seems to be representative of the idea that Job is being hit by supernaturally controlled evil- Eliphaz speaks of a force of darkness (<a href='B:220 22:10-11'>Job 22:10-11</a>) and sinful or faulty Angels living in an unclean Heaven (<a href='B:220 4:18'>Job 4:18</a>; <a href='B:220 15:15'>Job 15:15</a>). Yet the answer to all this is that the Satan figure is under God’s control, all Job's misfortunes come from God and His Angels- one of whom may have been called 'the adversary' ('Satan')- are in fact all perfectly obedient to Him and not disobedient. And finally, Eliphaz and the friends are rebuked for their various wrong understandings, with God declaring Himself supreme and ultimate sovereign. Likewise Bildad's view of Angels in <a href='B:220 25:5'>Job 25:5</a> "The stars are not pure in God’s eyes" is corrected by God in <a href='B:220 38:7'>Job 38:7</a>, when He says that "the morning stars sang together and all the Sons of God shouted for joy".</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> How much more those who dwell in houses of clay, whose foundation is in the dust, who are crushed before the moth!-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Eliphaz seems to be saying that there is no way that man can ever be right with God; because, as noted on :17, he was still ignorant of the wonderful truth of imputed righteousness and justification by grace through faith. He has a very low view of human nature. Although we are indeed dust and crushed by moths as our bodies decompose, all that we posit about human nature is true of the Lord Jesus- who fully shared our nature, and yet was holy and undefiled. The Bible in fact has a far higher view of the possibilities inherent within human nature than many do today, represented as they are by the false reasoning of Eliphaz.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Between morning and evening they are destroyed. They perish forever without any regarding it-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Again, Eliphaz is wrong to assume that all men "perish forever". Job correctly reasons himself towards a belief in the resurrection of the body at the last day (<a href='B:220 19:25-27'>Job 19:25-27</a>). And God does indeed "regard" the death of His precious ones (<a href='B:230 116:15'>Psa 116:15</a>).</p>


text:
<p> Isn’t their tent cord plucked up within them? They die, and that without wisdom’- LXX "For he blows upon them, and they are withered"- the language of Isaiah concerning the perishing of the glory of Judah at the hands of the Babylonians. These words are true for the unbelievers, but are not universally true; indeed Peter appears to allude to this verse by saying that once his tent has been taken down, yet he still has the hope of eternal life at the resurrection of the body at the last day (<a href='B:680 1:13-14'>2Pe 1:13-14</a>).</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Call now; is there any who will answer you? To which of the holy ones will you appeal?-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Eliphaz appears to believe that there are Angels or holy ones around God, but Job cannot get sympathy from any of them. This indicates that the idea of a 'court of heaven', with Angels watching events upon earth, was appreciated by these people. See on <a href='B:220 1:6'>Job 1:6</a>.</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>At that moment, there was indeed nobody who would answer Job nor hear his appeal. Job's desire for these things, for real spiritual friendship and an advocate in Heaven, grew so intense that he comes to visualize an ideal friend, who would not only appreciate his every grief, but who would offer more than commiseration. He came to long for one who would reconcile him with the righteousness of God. Naturally, he would have had in mind Abraham's promised seed. His mind was therefore being prepared to desire the coming of Messiah; in prospect, he was developing a personal understanding and appreciation of the Lord Jesus. In all this, Job is our glorious example. There can be very few who have not experienced the terror of complete spiritual isolation, longing for understanding and true appreciation, but finding none within the ecclesia whom they can turn to. As we look back from our traumas to the glorious reality of Christ's existence, so Job looked forward to it.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> For resentment kills the foolish man, and jealousy kills the simple-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> "Resentment" is AV "fury"; and the Hebrew translated "jealousy" is also translated "zeal". The idea could be that it is God’s fury and jealousy which slays the fool, as happened in the judgment of Judah and her enemies (s:w. <a href='B:290 42:13'>Isa 42:13</a>; <a href='B:290 59:17'>Isa 59:17</a>; <a href='B:330 5:13'>Eze 5:13</a>; <a href='B:330 16:38'>Eze 16:38</a>). Eliphaz sees the "fire of God" which struck Job's family as a sign that they were spiritually foolish. And he continues his allusions to Job's family in :3 and :4.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> I have seen the foolish taking root, but suddenly I cursed his habitation-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> "The foolish" refers obliquely to Job, spreading out as a tree in his prosperity, and then having his "habitation" cursed. It was God through the Satan figure who apparently cursed or judged Job's habitation; but here Eliphaz says that he personally had done so. This continues to strengthen the hints that the friends were connected with the Satan and their forces may have been those which attacked his family.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> His children are far from safety. They are crushed in the gate. Neither is there any to deliver them-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Job prayed God would forgive his children in case they sinned. The friends mocked this in <a href='B:220 5:4'>Job 5:4</a>; <a href='B:220 8:4'>Job 8:4</a>; <a href='B:220 17:5'>Job 17:5</a>; <a href='B:220 20:10'>Job 20:10</a>, saying that the children of the foolish die for their own sins, whereas, by implication, Job had figured that his prayers and sacrifices could gain them forgiveness. Yet in the end, Yahweh stated that Job had understood Him and His principles right, whereas the friends hadn’t. "Safety" is literally 'salvation', and Eliphaz taunts Job that those who truly seek God (:8) will indeed be saved (s:w. :11). There was none to "deliver" Job, so far as Eliphaz could see by his naked eye; but he was sure that such "deliverance" would be given to those who sought God (:19 s:w:). The exiles sought such 'salvation' or "deliverance" (s:w. <a href='B:160 9:28'>Neh 9:28</a>), but there was "not any to deliver them" (<a href='B:290 42:22'>Isa 42:22</a> s:w:). Job represents them; but as the story unfolds, we see that if they like Job were to resign their own righteousness, confess their sins and throw themselves upon God’s grace- amazing restoration would come from the result of the "Chaldeans" who had devastated them as they had Job. The exiles too would be "delivered" (<a href='B:300 20:13'>Jer 20:13</a>; <a href='B:330 34:12'>Eze 34:12</a> s:w:).</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> whose harvest the hungry eats up, and take it even out of the thorns. They snare gapes for their substance-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Here again Eliphaz wanders in his logic, assuming that Job's children had not shared their harvest with the hungry, nor allowed the poor to live by picking up stray grapes from their vineyards (as later required by the law of Moses). He assumes these sins must have happened, and likes to imagine that the invaders of Job's lands were disgruntled, hungry people. And many similar false suppositions are made by people today as they grapple with the problem of evil and personal suffering.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> For affliction doesn’t come forth from the dust, neither does trouble spring out of the ground-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> The idea is that affliction doesn't come about as part of natural process, like plants spring out of the dust / ground. "Dust", humanity, isn't naturally born to the kind of affliction Job had experienced- according to Eliphaz. Whereas the Genesis record appears to teach the opposite; that we live in a fallen world where indeed affliction does arise as part of natural process. Eliphaz struggled to accept this, as many do today, assuming that all suffering must be the direct result of personal sin. That is simply not true to observable fact and basic human experience.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> but man is born to trouble, as the arrows of the sons of Resheph fly upward-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Significantly, it is the friends who make allusion to the ‘Satan’ figures and gods as if they are real, whereas Job in his responses always denies their reality and sees God as the direct source of His sufferings. Bildad speaks of how Job’s troubles are to be associated with “the king of terrors” (<a href='B:220 18:14'>Job 18:14</a>); Eliphaz blames them upon the “sons of Resheph” (<a href='B:220 5:7'>Job 5:7</a>); but Job’s response is that the source of the evil in his life is ultimately from God and not any such being. Eliphaz there speaks of how man’s trouble comes “as the sons of Resheph fly upwards”. Resheph was known as “the lord of the arrow” and the Ugaritic tablets associate him with archery (William J. Fulco, The Canaanite God Resep (New Haven, CT: American Oriental Society, 1976)). We would therefore be justified in reading in an ellipsis here: man’s trouble comes “as the [arrows of] the sons of Resheph fly upwards”. Job’s response is that “The arrows of the Almighty are in me” (<a href='B:220 6:4'>Job 6:4</a>), and he lament that God is an archer using him as his target for practice (<a href='B:220 7:20'>Job 7:20</a>; <a href='B:220 16:12-13'>Job 16:12-13</a>). Job refuses to accept Eliphaz’s explanation that Job is a victim of Resheph’s arrows. For Job, if God is “the Almighty” then there is no space left for Resheph. Each blow he received, each arrow strike, was from God and not Resheph.</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>Or we can read: "Man is born unto trouble, as the sons of the burning coal lift up to fly" (AVmg:). This would be using Angel-Cherubim language to say that it is inevitable that our Angels will bring trials into our lives.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> But as for me, I would seek God. I would commit my cause to God-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Job did indeed seek God. But the friends assume that they can infer from the reality of Job's sufferings that therefore he didn’t really seek God. This is to become a major theme in the book, so relevant to those Jews in exile who struggled with the problem of evil. Experience of suffering is not to say that therefore we have specifically personally sinned, and the sufferings of the suffering servant, who was Job and ultimately the Lord Jesus, are proof enough of that.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> who does great things that can’t be fathomed, marvellous things without number-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Job was one of the earliest books of the Bible, and these words are alluded to or even quoted with affirmation by other believers (<a href='B:230 40:5'>Psa 40:5</a>; <a href='B:230 72:18'>Psa 72:18</a>; <a href='B:230 77:14'>Psa 77:14</a>; <a href='B:230 136:4'>Psa 136:4</a>). There was some truth in the words of the friends, therefore, although the problem was that they mixed aspects of truth with much wrong interpretation. But the parts which are true are shown to be so by the way the book is used in later scripture.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> who gives rain on the earth, and sends waters on the fields-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> The way that God is essentially a giver, as witnessed throughout His creation, is a reason to turn to Him. That is a truth, but Eliphaz is wrong to reason that Job has not thus turned to God because Job is suffering. See on :9.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> so that He sets up on high those who are low; those who mourn are exalted to safety-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> &nbsp;The idea of setting the low up on high is definitely applied to the exiles who would repent in <a href='B:290 57:15'>Isa 57:15</a>. Those who mourned for Zion would be delivered / 'saved'. All this came true in the experience of Job, and it could have done so for the exiles had they humbled themselves as Job did.</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>This is also quoted in <a href='B:240 3:11'>Pro 3:11</a>, which is a prophecy of the Lord Jesus Christ. <a href='B:240 3:13-15'>Pro 3:13-15</a> describes our Lord's successful finding of wisdom in the language of Job's unsuccessful search for it in <a href='B:220 28:16-19'>Job 28:16-19</a>, implying He found what Job and the friends did not (cp. <a href='B:520 9:31-32'>Rom 9:31-32</a>).<strong>&nbsp;</strong>As explained on :9, the 'true' elements in the friends' speeches are confirmed as true by their usage in later scripture.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> He frustrates the devices of the crafty, so that their hands can’t perform their enterprise-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Eliphaz clearly understands Job as "the crafty", as stated explicitly in <a href='B:220 15:5'>Job 15:5</a> (s:w:). As explained on :9, the true elements in the speeches of the friends are quoted in later scripture, although the friends misuse the 'truths' they held to condemn Job. This therefore is quoted with approval in <a href='B:530 1:19'>1Co 1:19</a>. Eliphaz is explaining why he thinks Job and&nbsp; his view of life have been brought to nothing, and Paul uses these words about the bringing down of legalism and the Judaists. Thus Paul read Job as representative of those who were influenced by the legalism of the Judaizers. Paul continues: "Where is the wise? where is the scribe? where is the disputer of this world?" (<a href='B:530 1:20'>1Co 1:20</a>). Job's constant desire to dispute with God and the friends, and the claims both he and they made to possessing wisdom, show Job was clearly in Paul's mind. "Hath not God made foolish the wisdom of the world?" he concludes, maybe thinking of the humbled Job and his friends.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> He takes the wise in their own craftiness; the counsel of the cunning is carried away headlong-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> This too is quoted in <a href='B:530 3:19'>1Co 3:19</a>; see on :12. We note that Paul here quotes the Hebrew text and not the LXX, even though most of his quotations from the Old Testament seem to prefer the LXX over the Hebrew (Masoretic) text. It wasn't that Paul personally picked and chose which version fitted his line of thought; he was a Divinely inspired writer, and God chose to interpret His word as He knew most appropriate.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> They meet with darkness in the day time, and grope at noonday as in the night-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Eliphaz considers that Job was experiencing darkness at noon. And indeed he was. But in this Job looked ahead to the sufferings of the Lord Jesus on the cross. He like the Lord suffered as a sinner without having personally sinned. Job was representative of sinful Israel under judgment, for to "grope at noonday" was their punishment for breaking the covenant (s:w. <a href='B:50 28:29'>Deu 28:29</a>).</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> But He saves from the sword of their mouth, even the needy from the hand of the mighty-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> This again is directly relevant to the exiles in Babylon; if they accepted the new covenant and repented as Job did, they too would be saved "from the hand of the mighty" (s:w. <a href='B:300 31:11'>Jer 31:11</a>).</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> So the poor has hope, and injustice shuts her mouth-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Again this was true for the exiles, "the poor", who had "the hope of Israel"- restoration and deliverance from those who had abused them as Job had been abused. Only then, in that final experience of deliverance at the restoration of the Kingdom, would injustice finally be answered. Everyone in the drama of Job, as in the world today, wanted an immediate answer and resolution of injustice. But that was not to be; it was only in the final realization of the hope of Israel that injustice would be silenced.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Behold, happy is the man whom God corrects! Therefore do not despise the chastening of the Almighty-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> As noted on :9, the true parts of the friends' words are confirmed in later scripture. These ideas are alluded to in <a href='B:240 3:12'>Pro 3:12</a>; <a href='B:650 12:5'>Heb 12:5</a>; <a href='B:660 1:12'>Jas 1:12</a>. But again, whilst the friends have some truth, they misuse it; for Eliphaz wrongly assumes that Job is despising God’s hand, and ought to be "happy" if he were a true believer. But the nature of suffering is not like that, and the picture is not so simple. The 'happiness' of God’s people is only at the end, in the Kingdom, when all things are resolved (s:w. <a href='B:50 33:29'>Deu 33:29</a>; <a href='B:340 12:12'>Dan 12:12</a>). Or in the restoration context, when Babylon fell and God’s people were restored from exile (s:w. <a href='B:230 137:8'>Psa 137:8</a>), after they had repented- for the positive effect of "chastening" is only experienced upon repentance (<a href='B:220 36:10'>Job 36:10</a> s:w:). Judah in exile didn’t repent, and so they were left with the problem of having been 'chastened' apparently in vain. The friends also fail to realize that "chastening" may not necessarily be for our own personal sins; the suffering servant was 'chastened' not for his own sins, but to achieve our peace with God (<a href='B:290 53:5'>Isa 53:5</a> s:w:).</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> For He wounds, and binds up. He injures, and His hands make whole-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> LXX "for he causes a man to be in pain, and restores him again: he smites, and his hands heal". This is relevant to the restoration of Judah which was possible at the restoration. Judah were like Job, covered in sores, but they refused to be 'bound up' by God (<a href='B:290 1:6'>Isa 1:6</a> s:w:). At the restoration, through the promised suffering servant, this binding up was envisaged (<a href='B:290 61:1'>Isa 61:1</a>; <a href='B:330 34:16'>Eze 34:16</a> s:w:)- if they "returned to the Lord" (s:w. <a href='B:350 6:1'>Hos 6:1</a>). This is why the book of Job is really a call to repentance, and his very name is a form of the Arabic word for 'repentance'. God’s ability to "make whole" and heal therefore depended upon human acceptance of it. Judah's refusal to repent precluded all this. "Make whole" is the word for "physician", and Job came to realize that his friends, his fellow worshippers, were in fact physicians of no value who could not make him whole (s:w. <a href='B:220 13:4'>Job 13:4</a>). His disillusion with the members of his religion, his brethren, led him to seek the more earnestly to God as the only one whose hands could "make whole" (s:w. "physician").</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>Although elsewhere Eliphaz reveals his belief in cosmic, supernatural evil, he is driven here by his own logic to accept that the source of both injury and healing is God.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> He will deliver you in six troubles; yes, in seven no evil shall touch you-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> "Touch" is the word used by the satan in <a href='B:220 1:11'>Job 1:11</a>, again suggesting that Eliphaz and the friends were connected with the Satan, or were in fact the Satan. <a href='B:230 91:10'>Psa 91:10</a> seems to look back to this passage in <a href='B:220 5:19'>Job 5:19</a>: "There shall no evil befall thee, neither shall any plague come nigh thy dwelling". Psalms 91 is Moses' encouragement to Joshua that the destroying Angel in the wilderness would not harm him, but he would be protected by the Angels who would "keep thee in all thy ways" (<a href='B:230 91:11'>Psa 91:11</a>). Thus Moses may have seen <a href='B:220 5:19'>Job 5:19</a> to be talking about evil brought by Angels of evil (<a href='B:230 78:49'>Psa 78:49</a> shows his appreciation of these)- i:e. Job's satan Angel who brought the trials.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> In famine He will redeem you from death; in war, from the power of the sword-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Job's calamities may well have driven him to literal famine or lack of food. And again there appears to be an oblique reference back to the "war" upon Job's home encampment. Eliphaz therefore wrongly concludes that Job has not turned to God, or else he would be redeemed from the death that surrounded him. The phrase "redeem from death" is only used elsewhere in <a href='B:350 13:14'>Hos 13:14</a>, where again we have the hope of redemption which was placed before a suffering Judah if they repented. Although Job had not personally sinned, he was representative of his suffering, sinful people. All his struggles with the injustice of it all were because he failed to realize that; and thus the representative nature of the work of the Lord Jesus is one of the major teachings of the book.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> You shall be hidden from the scourge of the tongue, neither shall you be afraid of destruction when it comes-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> As noted on :9, the true elements in the speeches of the friends are alluded to in later scripture, in this case in <a href='B:230 31:20'>Psa 31:20</a>. But as with many today, the friends misused what truth they held in their mistreatment and judgmental attitude towards Job. We can observe that the calamities listed by Eliphaz in :21-23 include many of the judgments which the prophets threaten upon Judah, and which were fulfilled at the Babylonian invasion (famine, war, devastation, wild animals). Job is presented as Judah's representative, and his repentance and restoration could have been theirs.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> At destruction and famine you shall laugh, neither shall you be afraid of the animals of the earth-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> LXX "wild beasts", as in :23. These are symbols of the enemies of Judah who devoured her (<a href='B:330 14:15'>Eze 14:15</a>). The repentant daughter of Zion could have laughed at them (Psalms 2); but she failed to follow Job's path.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> For you shall be allied with the stones of the field. The animals of the field shall be at peace with you-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> The reference may be to how invaders, the wild beasts, spoiled the land by dropping stones throughout it. The idea is of peace with the natural creation as well as the invaders. This was the ultimate prophetic picture for Judah in their restored kingdom- if they repented.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> You shall know that your tent is in peace. You shall visit your fold, and shall miss nothing-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> LXX "and the provision for thy tabernacle shall not fail", perhaps connecting with how there was no provision for the temple services until the restoration under Ezra and Nehemiah. In the immediate context, Eliphaz has in view how the tents of Job were afflicted and the animals of his fold were stolen.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> You shall know also that your seed shall be great, your offspring as the grass of the earth-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> The way Eliphaz speaks of how Job’s seed or offspring could be many or “great</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> as the grass of the earth” suggests the people of Job’s time were familiar with the promises made to Abraham, and the concept of their being applicable to them too. Eliphaz therefore suggests that Abraham is not in fact a true seed of Abraham because the promises were not having fulfilment in him; see on :26. But those promises have their ultimate fulfilment in the future Kingdom; whereas the friends, like many today, thought that the promised Divine blessings have to be fulfilled immediately, in this life. And if they aren't, then we must have sinned. But the promised blessings were all of grace, of faith and not works; and would be fulfilled in the future.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> You shall come to your grave in a full age, like a sheaf of grain comes in its season-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> This and :25 did come ultimately true for Job, and Eliphaz lived to see it, and to realize he had been wrong in his judgment of Job. The allusion is clearly to Abraham, whose seed Job was (<a href='B:10 15:15'>Gen 15:15</a>; <a href='B:10 25:8'>Gen 25:8</a>). See on :25, where Eliphaz has implied Job is not the seed of Abraham.</p>


text:
<p> Look this, we have examined it, so it is. Hear it, and know it for your good- LXX "but do thou reflect with thyself, if thou hast done anything wrong". The friends speak as if they are the final court – Eliphaz speaks of how the judges and elders of their day, the “holy ones”, had concluded Job was guilty, and that they, the friends, were right: “To which of the holy ones will you appeal [legal language]?... we have [legally] examined this, and it [Job’s guilt] is true” (<a href='B:220 5:1'>Job 5:1</a>; <a href='B:220 5:27'>Job 5:27</a>). But we learn by the end of the book that it is God’s judgment in the court of heaven which is the only judgment worth paying attention to. This is of great comfort to those who feel misjudged by man – above them in Heaven the ultimate Heavenly court is considering our case, and that is all that matters. Job appeals for ‘witnesses’ (<a href='B:220 9:33-35'>Job 9:33-35</a>; <a href='B:220 16:18-22'>Job 16:18-22</a>; <a href='B:220 19:20-27'>Job 19:20-27</a>), an advocate in Heaven (<a href='B:220 9:33'>Job 9:33</a>), denies his guilt and demands a legal list of his sins (<a href='B:220 13:19'>Job 13:19</a>), he wishes for God to come to trial (<a href='B:220 9:3'>Job 9:3</a>), and thus Job is described as a man who has taken out a ‘case’ with God (<a href='B:220 23:4'>Job 23:4</a>; <a href='B:220 40:2'>Job 40:2</a>). Job 29-31 is effectively Job’s declaration of legal innocence and an appeal to God to hear his case more sympathetically (<a href='B:220 31:35'>Job 31:35</a>). And of course God pronounces a final legal verdict at the very end (<a href='B:220 42:7'>Job 42:7</a>), in response to Job’s earlier plea: “Sleeplessly I wait for His reply” (<a href='B:220 16:22'>Job 16:22</a>). It’s as if the whole experience of Job was [at least partly] in order to test out the Canaanite theories of ‘Satan’, suffering and evil in the court of Heaven; and also the various theories which arose to explain Judah's captivity in Babylon. The friends represent the traditional views of evil, and often make reference to the myths of their day about ‘Satan’ figures.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Then Job answered-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Every time we read or hear this in the drama, we almost wish him to remain silent as the Lord did at His trial. His final silence and laying his hand upon his mouth is what the drama wishes us for him to do the longer it goes on.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Oh that my anguish were weighed, and all my calamity laid in the balances!-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> LXX "Oh that one would indeed weigh the wrath that is upon me". This was the feeling of the exiles; that the wrath upon Israel, the "sand of the sea" (:3), was heavier than it ought to have been. And they like Job were brought to realize their sinfulness and the lightness of their judgment, having been punished, as Ezra reflected, in fact less than their iniquities deserved (<a href='B:150 9:13'>Ezr 9:13</a>). Job looked in vain for someone to understand and evaluate his sufferings. The friends had come to him to do this, but had failed. We too may tell our life story to another person for days or weeks- but they will never quite understand. Job's disappointment with human relationships led him to throw himself finally upon God; for the only one to weigh accurately his calamity was of course God.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> For now it would be heavier than the sand of the seas-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> I have noted several times Job's presentation as the seed of Abraham and allusions to the promises to Abraham. We have another one here. He considers that the promises of seed like the sand of the seas were somehow outweighed by his sufferings. He felt perhaps that he was not going to inherit the promises because of his sufferings; as if they were somehow indicative that he was not the seed of Abraham. This meant that he had yet to learn that the promises to Abraham, which were the basis of the new covenant offered to the exiles, were based upon grace; and they had their ultimate fulfilment in the restored Kingdom of God on earth and the blessing of having Yahweh as a personal God- and not in the blessings of secular life.</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>Therefore have my words been rash-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Presumably Job refers to his words recorded in Job 2, 3. But he uses a situational ethic here- as if rash language is excusable because of the weight of suffering. When he finally places his hand upon his mouth, Job realizes that such rationalization of poor language use was inappropriate.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> For the arrows of the Almighty are within me. My spirit drinks up their poison. The terrors of God set themselves in array against me-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Eliphaz blames Job's troubles upon the “sons of Resheph” (<a href='B:220 5:7'>Job 5:7</a>); but Job’s response is that the source of the evil in his life is ultimately from God and not any such being. Eliphaz there speaks of how man’s trouble comes “as the sons of Resheph fly upwards”. Resheph was known as “the lord of the arrow” and the Ugaritic tablets associate him with archery (William J. Fulco, The Canaanite God Resep (New Haven, CT: American Oriental Society, 1976)). We would therefore be justified in reading in an ellipsis here: man’s trouble comes “as the [arrows of] the sons of Resheph fly upwards”. Job’s response is that “The arrows of the Almighty are in me” (<a href='B:220 6:4'>Job 6:4</a>), and he lament that God is an archer using him as his target for practice (<a href='B:220 7:20'>Job 7:20</a>; <a href='B:220 16:12-13'>Job 16:12-13</a>). Job refuses to accept Eliphaz’s explanation that Job is a victim of Resheph’s arrows. For Job, if God is “the Almighty” then there is no space left for Resheph. Each blow he received, each arrow strike, was from God and not Resheph. The "terrors" he felt in nightmares (s:w. <a href='B:220 7:14'>Job 7:14</a>) were ultimately from God. These "terrors" appear to be psychological trauma, parallel with his "spirit" being wounded by God’s arrows (<a href='B:220 13:21'>Job 13:21</a>).</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Does the wild donkey bray when he has grass? Or does the ox low over his fodder?-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Job fell into the trap of thinking that his terrible situation somehow allowed him to speak whatever words came into his head. Job felt he hadn’t been ‘fed’ and so he was entitled to “bray” and “low” over his misfortune (<a href='B:220 6:5'>Job 6:5</a>). Because of the weight of his sufferings, he thereby justified the fact that "Therefore have my words been rash (<a href='B:220 6:3'>Job 6:3</a>). Likewise “Therefore I will not refrain my mouth; I will speak in the anguish of my spirit” (<a href='B:220 7:11'>Job 7:11</a>). “I will give free course to my complaint. I will speak in the bitterness of my soul” (<a href='B:220 10:1'>Job 10:1</a> RV). Zophar criticizes Job being “full of talk” and speaking “the multitude of words”, “for thou sayest, my doctrine is pure” (<a href='B:220 11:1-4'>Job 11:1-4</a>)- as if Job felt that because he held true doctrine he was justified in pouring out words as he did. “Why should I not be impatient?” (<a href='B:220 21:4'>Job 21:4</a> RV). “Today is my complaint bitter. My stroke is heavier than my groaning” (<a href='B:220 23:2'>Job 23:2</a>)- i:e. his complaining was due to his sufferings. “If I hold my peace, I shall give up the spirit” (<a href='B:220 13:19'>Job 13:19</a> RVmg:). Job felt that the situation he was in forced him to use the words he did, and certainly justified it [we may well have used this reasoning ourselves when justifying the use of bad language]. But in the end, Elihu on God’s behalf rebuked him for his wrong words. And Job himself recognized: “I am vile. I will lay mine hand upon my mouth” in regret of his words (<a href='B:220 40:4'>Job 40:4</a>). “Wherefore I loathe my words and repent” (<a href='B:220 42:6'>Job 42:6</a> RVmg:). He realized his mistake: he had thought that the situation justified his words. Now he hung his head and admitted that there was no justification for speaking in the way he had. Especially in the matter of the tongue, we can so easily justify ourselves; ‘I only said / did it [or didn’t do it] because</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>’. And it is all so child-like. Once we leave off all attempts at self-justification, we will face up to our sins. See on :11,26.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Can that which has no flavour be eaten without salt? Or is there any taste in the white of an egg?-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> As noted on :5, Job seems to be saying that just as you can't expect a person to eat the white of an egg without salt, so his outbursts are justifiable. But of course one can eat eggs without salt. Job at this point comes over as a spoilt child refusing any food which isn't exactly to his taste. Finally he breaks down in self-realization and repentance, realizing his words have indeed been intemperate (see on <a href='B:220 40:4'>Job 40:4</a>; <a href='B:220 42:6'>Job 42:6</a>).</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> My soul refuses to touch them. They are as loathsome food to me-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> As explained on :5,6, Job comes over as a spoilt child refusing any food which isn't exactly to his taste. He may be twisting the Divine command to only offer sacrifice, His "food" upon His table or altar, with salt. But Job is twisting scripture.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Oh that I might have my request, that God would grant the thing that I long for-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> This desire for death, effectively suicidal, continues the pouting and egoistic attitude noted on :6,7.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> even that it would please God to crush me; that He would let loose His hand, and cut me off!-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Job is careful not to speak of ending his own life, but he asks God to. Job appears to allude to the dialogue between God and Satan in the prologue, for he references the source of his sufferings as God’s hand. Job was therefore aware of the dialogue; which makes sense, if the Satan figure was presenting the thoughts of the friends, who were the other "sons of God" of <a href='B:220 1:6'>Job 1:6</a>. Job knew what they thought of him. The LXX makes the allusion to the prologue (<a href='B:220 2:6'>Job 2:6</a>) even clearer: "Let the Lord begin and wound me, but let him not utterly destroy me". This would then read as if Job doubted whether God would keep His side of the agreement made with the Satan.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Be it still my consolation, yes, let me exult throughout my unending pain, that I have not denied the words of the Holy One-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> The idea seems to be that Job longed for his death because he was comforted by the fact he had not hidden God’s words; likewise he exalts in <a href='B:220 27:11'>Job 27:11</a> (s:w:) that he has not hidden God’s words. Job was a prophet&nbsp;and is quoted as one in James 5. He had perhaps heard God’s words from a "holy one", an Angel, and had taught them to others. By implication, he assumed that after death he would receive some credit for his righteousness. He had moved on to this from a simple desire for death. But aware of his righteousness, he reasons towards a belief in some future point of reward, as this was clearly not happening in this life. This becomes developed into a belief in a day of judgment and the final manifestation of God. And this happens ahead of time, as it were, in Yahweh's final manifestation at the end of the book; but this lead Job to resign all his own righteousness. See on :13; <a href='B:220 7:2'>Job 7:2</a>.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> What is my strength, that I should wait further? What is my end, that I should be patient?-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Job is definitely impatient and justified it as he justified his rash speaking (see on :5,12). And yet the patience of Job is quoted as proverbial (<a href='B:660 5:11'>Jas 5:11</a>). This may reflect how he was accounted righteous by God, and this final status was accepted by others. Or perhaps his patience refers to his endurance in faith, despite the fact that he was impatient during that endurance. He hardly comes over as patient in his speeches, but this was maybe seen as cosmetic failure compared to his final overall endurance in faith.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Is my strength the strength of stones? Or is my flesh of brass?-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> His argument is that he can't be perfectly patient because that would require superhuman strength. He blames the construction of his nature for his impatience (see on :11). And finally is led to repentance for this. It's rather like an alcoholic blaming his sin on his human nature.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Isn’t it that I have no help in me, that wisdom is driven quite from me?-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> LXX "Or have I not trusted in him? but help is far from me". If the LXX is correct then we see an extension of the argument developed on :10; he is confident that he has trusted in God, and yet no "help" from Him is forthcoming; and so he is driven to belief in a future day of Divine help, at some point after his death. That point becomes more developed in Job's understanding, as the day when God’s appointed mediator shall stand upon the earth- the return of the Lord Jesus.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> To him who is ready to faint, kindness should be shown from his friend; even to him who forsakes the fear of the Almighty-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> We can limit God’s plans to save others in the ecclesia by our attitude to them- even if they become atheists we are not to withdraw human friendship from them. We can make others stumble from the path to His salvation. If a brother doesn’t show pity to his fellow brother, this can make the afflicted brother “forsake the fear of the Almighty” (<a href='B:220 6:14'>Job 6:14</a> RVmg:). Or we can read with GNB "In trouble like this I need loyal friends— whether I've forsaken God or not".</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> My brothers have dealt deceitfully as a brook, as the channel of brooks that pass away-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> "Deceitfully" is the word used about the exiles in Babylon (<a href='B:290 48:8'>Isa 48:8</a>) and how they treated their God and His servant (cp. Job). Job is as the righteous remnant, and the friends, the other "sons of God", as the apostate Jews, who could be saved by the intercession of the righteous.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> which are black by reason of the ice, in which the snow hides itself-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> "Black" is 'turbid'. As in winter the rivers flowed freely, so the friends had promise of help, but when the heat came, they disappeared and were nowhere to be found (:17).</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> In the dry season, they vanish. When it is hot, they are consumed out of their place-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> See on :16. In <a href='B:220 24:19'>Job 24:19</a>, Job later sees the melting of the snow waters as representing the destruction of the wicked; he comes towards the conclusions that his friends, his fellow "sons of God" of <a href='B:220 1:6'>Job 1:6</a>, were in fact sinners. Job, the righteous remnant amongst the captives, were to pray for and save the unspiritual majority; but they had to be convinced of how far astray their brethren really were.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> The caravans that travel beside them turn aside. They go up into the waste, and perish-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> "Caravans" and "paths" are the same word (:19). The idea is that these friends were like caravans of travellers diverting to follow tracks towards water sources but not finding the water, because they had dried up; and they perished. This is how Job came to see the friends.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> The caravans of Tema looked. The companies of Sheba waited for them-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> He associates his deceitful brethren (:15) with the troops of Tema and the companies of Sheba which had fallen upon his cattle at Satan's behest (<a href='B:220 1:15'>Job 1:15</a>). Job knew that the friends had power over his persecutors (:24). They, Job said, had caused calamity to fall upon him, and thereby overwhelmed their one-time friend (:27 AV mg:). They thought, as Satan did, that Job's spirituality was only a sham (:28). For more evidence that the friends were the satan, see on <a href='B:220 1:6'>Job 1:6</a>. There is reason to think that Eliphaz, the leader of the friends, may have been the specific individual referred to as 'satan' in the prologue. God singles him out for especial condemnation at the end (<a href='B:220 42:7'>Job 42:7</a>). After one of Eliphaz's speeches, Job responds with what appears to be a comment upon him, rather than God: "He hath made me weary: thou hast made desolate all my company. And thou hast filled me with wrinkles... he teareth me in his wrath, who hateth me (surely Job speaks here about Eliphaz, not God): he gnasheth upon me... mine enemy (satan) sharpeneth his eyes upon me. They (the astonished friends?) have gaped upon me with their mouth, they have smitten me…they have gathered themselves together (as the friends did to Job) against me" (<a href='B:220 16:9-11'>Job 16:9-11</a>). Eliphaz was a Temanite, from where Job's afflicters came. See on :22.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> They were distressed because they were confident. They came there, and were confounded-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> LXX "They too that trust in cities and riches shall come to shame". But see on :18.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> For now you are nothing. You see a terror, and are afraid-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> LXX "But ye also have come to me without pity; so that beholding my wound ye are afraid"; GNB "You are like those streams to me, you see my fate and draw back in fear".</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Did I say, ‘Give to me?’ or, ‘Offer a present for me from your substance?’-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Perhaps there was the idea that Job had obtained his wealth from the friends and they were justified in seeking to take it back; see on :19.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> or, ‘Deliver me from the adversary’s hand?’ or, ‘Redeem me from the hand of the oppressors?’-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> I suggested on :19 that the friends themselves were involved in the work of the hand of the satan / adversary. But Job never asked them to 'stop'.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Teach me, and I will hold my peace. Cause me to understand wherein I have erred-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Job's sacrifice of a truly broken spirit was worth more than thousands of apposite words. Job had dimly imagined that this would be so: "Teach me, and I will hold my tongue; and cause me to understand wherein I have erred" (6:24). When Elihu did teach him and show him that he was erring by nature rather than specific sin, Job truly held his tongue: "I will lay mine hand upon my mouth... I will not answer... I will proceed no further" (<a href='B:220 40:4-5'>Job 40:4-5</a>; notice the threefold repetition). This is one of several examples of Job knowing the truth in abstract theory, but not appreciating it until the mixture of reflection on his trials and Elihu / Jesus, brought it home.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> How forcible are words of uprightness! But your reproof, what does it reprove?-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> This experience led Job to long for "words of uprightness", and thereby he came to be ready for the final revelation of God’s words at the end of the book. Likewise our disillusion with human words and relationships leads us to be the more eager and ready for God’s revelation. The very phrase "words of uprightness" are only found when Elihu appears and claims to speak "words of uprightness" (<a href='B:220 33:3'>Job 33:3</a>).</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Do you intend to reprove words, since the speeches of one who is desperate are as wind?-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Job seems to here place himself beyond reproof; as if he considers his desperation to mean that therefore whatever he says can't be reproved, because the weight of his sufferings meant that he was justified in saying anything. This is discussed and exemplified more on :5, and it is this continual self-justification which has to be humbled in God’s final appearance at the end of the book.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Yes, you would even cast lots for the fatherless, and make merchandise of your friend-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> See on :19. Job had worked his way up in the world (perhaps from being an orphan, "fatherless", parallel with "your friend") without consciously seeking prosperity (<a href='B:220 1:10'>Job 1:10</a> AVmg:; <a href='B:220 8:7'>Job 8:7</a>; <a href='B:220 31:25'>Job 31:25</a>), and had shared his blessings with others; he realized at least in theory the weakness of his nature; and yet when he examined himself, he really didn’t think he was too monstrous a sinner. The Lord Jesus likewise, the ultimate "suffering servant", was humanly fatherless.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Now therefore be pleased to look at me, for surely I shall not lie to your face-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> It seems the friends could not look Job in the face. That may not just have been because of the awful nature of his disease, but because of a bad conscience, seeing perhaps they were behind the things which came upon Job; see on :19. This is the very picture of the suffering servant in <a href='B:290 52:14'>Isa 52:14</a>, upon whose faces men could not look.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Please rethink. Let there be no injustice. Yes, think again. My cause is righteous-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Job implies they were being unjust. The issue of who was "just" or not is a major theme in Job (continued in :30). In this lies the significance of the Lord's final appearance, to convict all of their sin, and teach that only His justification of men is worth anything. All self-justification is meaningless at best, and effectively putting man above God.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Is there injustice on my tongue?-</p><p> See on :29. Job does later repent of his words and place his hand upon his mouth. But these words on another level make him a type of the Lord Jesus, the ultimate "suffering servant", who could ask "Which of you convinces me of sin?", whose words were perfect:&nbsp;Can’t my taste discern mischievous things?- This could be implying that his sufferings had not robbed him of his ability to sense right and wrong. If indeed the friends were connected with the Satan figure, and were responsible for the sufferings which came upon Job (see on :19), then he may be implying that despite his illness, he is quite aware of what is going on.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Isn’t a man forced to labour on earth? Aren’t his days like the days of a hired hand?-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> LXX "Is not the life of man upon earth a state of trial?"; GNB "Human life is like forced army service, like a life of hard manual labor".</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>Isaiah’s prophecies of the restoration and the Kingdom are shot full of allusions back to Job. The cry that Zion’s warfare or “appointed time” is now ended (<a href='B:290 40:2'>Isa 40:2</a>) is taken straight out of <a href='B:220 7:1'>Job 7:1</a>; indeed, <a href='B:220 7:3-7'>Job 7:3-7</a> describes Job’s haggard life in the same terms as Israel in dispersion are described in Isaiah 40. The point being, that Job’s eventual re-conversion and salvation is a pattern for that of all God’s people.</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>Job came to recognize that every moment he existed was a trial to him, sent by his satan-Angel. Thus he complained "Is there not an appointed time to man upon earth? are not his days also like the days of an hireling?" (7:1). The Hebrew for "appointed time" is exactly the same as for "host" as in hosts of Angels. This neatly connects the idea that the exact duration of his life was controlled by God’s Angel-host, as was every trial which he experienced. This would be the work of the "wonderful numberer" Angel of <a href='B:340 8:13'>Dan 8:13</a> who controls all time periods. <a href='B:220 14:13-14'>Job 14:13-14</a> says the same: "O that Thou wouldest hide me&nbsp; in the grave... if a man die, shall he live again? all the days of my appointed time will I wait, till my change come". "What is man that Thou dost magnify him? and that Thou shouldest set Thy heart upon him? (lit. 'consider him')" (7:17). Thus Job sees God- whom he probably conceived of as an Angel- as considering him, whilst we are told earlier that satan was told to do this. A human satan considering Job would not in itself have brought the trials, and Job would not have complained so bitterly about a human being considering him. An Angelic satan setting his heart upon Job would account for this 'considering' alone leading to the trials. If it is argued that it is a human satan who set his heart on Job here in Job 7, then the context is hard, though not impossible, to square: "Thou dost magnify man... Thou preserver of men" (v. 20,21). There is some hint of physical movement by 'God' which would seem applicable to the Angel too: "Thou shouldest visit him... depart from me... let me alone" (v. 18,19).</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> As a servant who earnestly desires the shadow, as a hireling who looks for his wages-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> I noted on <a href='B:220 6:10'>Job 6:10</a> that Job felt that he was owed wages for his good works and teaching of God’s word before his calamities began. He moves on from just wanting death to concluding that righteousness must have a reward; and if not in this life, then it must come at some point after life ends. This becomes developed into a belief in a day of judgment and the final manifestation of God. And this happens ahead of time, as it were, in Yahweh's final manifestation at the end of the book; but this lead Job to resign all his own righteousness.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> so am I made to possess months of misery, wearisome nights are appointed to me-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> It is unlikely that Job's period of affliction lasted more than a year or so, and yet this is the part of his life and spiritual growth that is presented to us in such detail. At times Job thinks that he is likely to die that night; here he seems to imagine death coming after "months" of such nights. This is a realistic psychological picture of a suffering man.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> When I lie down, I say, ‘When shall I arise, and the night be gone?’ I toss and turn until the dawning of the day-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> This is clearly the spirit of <a href='B:50 28:67'>Deu 28:67</a> "In the morning you will say, I wish it were evening! and at evening you will say, I wish it were morning! for the fear of your heart which you shall fear and for the sight of your eyes which you shall see". Job is clearly representative of Israel in their suffering.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> My flesh is clothed with worms and clods of dust. My skin closes up, and breaks out afresh-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> The crusts forming over the sores appeared as "clods of dust", driving Job to appreciate his humanity as mere dust and ashes. The disease sounds like leprosy or elephantiasis, and connects him with the suffering Judah of <a href='B:290 1:6'>Isa 1:6</a>. Worms are typically associated with the decaying of a dead body, so it was as if Job experienced a living death.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> My days are swifter than a weaver’s shuttle, and are spent without hope-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Originally, Job believed that his "hope" was predicated upon his upright ways (<a href='B:220 4:6'>Job 4:6</a>). But Job through his sufferings comes to feel he now has no "hope" (<a href='B:220 7:6'>Job 7:6</a>; <a href='B:220 14:19'>Job 14:19</a>; <a href='B:220 17:15'>Job 17:15</a>; <a href='B:220 19:10'>Job 19:10</a>). The friends suggest that Job had only the "hope" of the hypocrite, and this "hope" would perish (<a href='B:220 4:6'>Job 4:6</a>; <a href='B:220 8:13'>Job 8:13</a>; <a href='B:220 27:8'>Job 27:8</a>). Job had integrity, and on that basis he thought he had "hope". He suffered, and he lost that "hope", because he assumed that his sufferings meant that he was not in fact righteous. And yet he often reflects that he is righteous and is suffering unjustly. And so he is led to the realization that the "hope" of the righteous is by God’s grace and not because of the "integrity of [Job's] ways". Judah in captivity likewise lost their "hope" (<a href='B:330 19:5'>Eze 19:5</a>; <a href='B:330 37:11'>Eze 37:11</a>). But the message of the restoration prophets was that "there is hope in your end" (<a href='B:300 31:17'>Jer 31:17</a>); they were prisoners or exiles in "hope" (<a href='B:450 9:12'>Zec 9:12</a>).</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Oh remember that my life is a breath. My eye shall no more see good-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> It's unclear whether this is addressed to the friends or to God, although I suggest on :8 that it is primarily God whom he has in view. Whatever, he is asking for pity to be shown to him because he has no "good" in front of him and his life is so short. See on <a href='B:220 8:2'>Job 8:2</a>.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> The eye of him who sees me shall see me no more. Your eyes shall be on me, but I shall not be-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Again it is hard to know whether Job addresses God, "Him who sees me", or the friends, "your eyes...". He goes on to address God in :12. He thinks that because his own eye shall no longer see (:7), therefore their eyes would not see him. Job often refers to God’s eyes, perhaps a reference to the Angels, who I suggested were representing the satan figure (the friends?) in the court of heaven; see on <a href='B:220 1:6'>Job 1:6</a>. But he was to be taught that God doesn't see as man sees; our vision is not His.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> As the cloud is consumed and vanishes away, so he who goes down to Sheol shall come up no more-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> That was how he felt, although already he has hinted that there must be a day of future reward after his death; and this becomes developed into a belief in a day of judgment and the final manifestation of God (<a href='B:220 19:25-27'>Job 19:25-27</a>).</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> He shall return no more to his house, neither shall his place know him any more-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> That is true, in that there is no disembodied existence after death, and the dead don't return to haunt where they had once lived. This belief in the mortality of man was in sharp distinction to the beliefs of the primitive people amongst whom Job lived, and such understanding of death as unconsciousness and inactivity has always been characteristic of God’s true people.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Therefore I will not keep silent. I will speak in the anguish of my spirit, I will complain in the bitterness of my soul-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Job fell into the trap of thinking that his terrible situation somehow allowed him to speak whatever words came into his head. Job felt he hadn’t been ‘fed’ and so he was entitled to “bray” and “low” over his misfortune (<a href='B:220 6:5'>Job 6:5</a>). Because of the weight of his sufferings, he thereby justified the fact that "Therefore have my words been rash (<a href='B:220 6:3'>Job 6:3</a>). Likewise “Therefore I will not refrain my mouth; I will speak in the anguish of my spirit” (<a href='B:220 7:11'>Job 7:11</a>). “I will give free course to my complaint. I will speak in the bitterness of my soul” (<a href='B:220 10:1'>Job 10:1</a> RV). Zophar criticizes Job being “full of talk” and speaking “the multitude of words”, “for thou sayest, my doctrine is pure” (<a href='B:220 11:1-4'>Job 11:1-4</a>)- as if Job felt that because he held true doctrine he was justified in pouring out words as he did. “Why should I not be impatient?” (<a href='B:220 21:4'>Job 21:4</a> RV). “Today is my complaint bitter. My stroke is heavier than my groaning” (<a href='B:220 23:2'>Job 23:2</a>)- i:e. his complaining was due to his sufferings. “If I hold my peace, I shall give up the spirit” (<a href='B:220 13:19'>Job 13:19</a> RVmg:). Job felt that the situation he was in forced him to use the words he did, and certainly justified it [we may well have used this reasoning ourselves when justifying the use of bad language]. But in the end, Elihu on God’s behalf rebuked him for his wrong words. And Job himself recognized: “I am vile. I will lay mine hand upon my mouth” in regret of his words (<a href='B:220 40:4'>Job 40:4</a>). “Wherefore I loathe my words and repent” (<a href='B:220 42:6'>Job 42:6</a> RVmg:). He realized his mistake: he had thought that the situation </p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>justified his words. Now he hung his head and admitted that there was no justification for speaking in the way he had. Especially in the matter of the tongue, we can so easily justify ourselves; ‘I only said / did it [or didn’t do it] because</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>’. And it is all so child-like. Once we leave off all attempts at self-justification, we will face up to our sins. See on :20.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Am I a sea, or a sea monster, that You put a guard over me?-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> There are several allusions in Job to Babylonian legends concerning Marduk – indicating that the book must have been re-written in Babylon with allusion to these legends. Thus the Enuma Elish 4:139,140 speaks of how Marduk limited the waters of Tiamat, and set up a bar and watchmen so that the waters wouldn’t go further than he permitted. But this very language is applied to God in <a href='B:220 7:12'>Job 7:12</a> and <a href='B:220 38:8-11'>Job 38:8-11</a>. One of the purposes of Job was to urge Judah that Yahweh was greater than Marduk, He and not Marduk was to be Israel’s God.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> When I say, ‘My bed shall comfort me. My couch shall ease my complaint’-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Sleep was no way of temporary relief. If indeed he had elephantiasis as suggested on :5, then this sleeplessness and psychological disturbance was associated with that disease.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> then You scare me with dreams, and terrify me through visions-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> "Scare" is the word elsewhere translated 'dismay', and is used of how the exiles were urged not to be dismayed but to believe that God would indeed bring them from exile to restoration in His restored Kingdom (<a href='B:290 51:7'>Isa 51:7</a>; <a href='B:300 30:10'>Jer 30:10</a>; <a href='B:300 46:27'>Jer 46:27</a>). Job begins by being dismayed / scared (<a href='B:220 7:14'>Job 7:14</a>), but develops to not be dismayed (<a href='B:220 31:34'>Job 31:34</a> s:w:), following the example of the Lord's battle horse (<a href='B:220 39:22'>Job 39:22</a>).</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> so that my soul chooses strangling, death rather than to see my bones-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Clearly Job was suicidal although he later keeps himself in check, and instead pesters God to take his life. The agony in Job's bones looked forward to the experience of the Lord on the cross, where He saw His bones sticking out as He looked down upon them (<a href='B:230 22:17'>Psa 22:17</a>).</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> I loathe my life-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> This is the same word as "cast away". The grace of it all was that although he wanted to cast away his life (<a href='B:220 7:16'>Job 7:16</a>; <a href='B:220 9:21'>Job 9:21</a>), just as God’s people cast away His covenant (<a href='B:290 8:6'>Isa 8:6</a>; <a href='B:290 30:12'>Isa 30:12</a>; <a href='B:300 6:19'>Jer 6:19</a>), God would not cast away His people in their exile and depression (s:w. <a href='B:30 26:44'>Lev 26:44</a>), even if they cast him away. Job felt despised or cast away by God (<a href='B:220 10:14'>Job 10:14</a>) just as the exiles did, but this wasn't the case; God will not despise or cast away His servant people (<a href='B:220 36:5'>Job 36:5</a>; <a href='B:290 41:9'>Isa 41:9</a>; <a href='B:300 31:37'>Jer 31:37</a>; <a href='B:300 33:26'>Jer 33:26</a>).</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>I don’t want to live forever. Leave me alone, for my days are but a breath-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Continually, Job sees God and not any cosmic, evil 'Satan' figure as responsible for his sufferings. His momentary desire not to live forever suggests he knew that eternal life was on offer, but like the exiles, the weight of his sufferings caused him to lose interest in that hope. However we can understand him as meaning that he didn’t want to live forever in this life, as he was.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> What is man, that You should magnify him-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Job was aware of the promises to Abraham, and he uses the same word used of how the name of Abraham and his seed would be magnified (<a href='B:10 12:2'>Gen 12:2</a>; <a href='B:10 19:19'>Gen 19:19</a>). But in his depression and suffering, he didn’t want this, just as the exiles didn’t. They too had to be reminded that God would magnify Himself through them (s:w. <a href='B:330 38:23'>Eze 38:23</a>; <a href='B:360 2:21'>Joe 2:21</a>; <a href='B:460 1:5'>Mal 1:5</a>) just as He finally did through Job.</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>That You should set Your mind on him-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> "Hast thou considered (lit. 'set your heart upon') My servant Job::?" (<a href='B:220 2:3'>Job 2:3</a> AV) God asked satan initially. Later Job complains to God "what is man, that You should magnify him?&nbsp; that You should set Your mind on him? (lit. 'consider him')". Thus Job sees God- whom he probably conceived of as an Angel- as considering him, whilst we are told earlier that satan / the adversary was told to do this. The&nbsp;human satan considering Job would not in itself have brought the trials, the Angel representative of the Satan did;&nbsp; Job would not have complained so bitterly to God about a human being 'considering' him. See on <a href='B:220 1:6'>Job 1:6</a>.</p><p>These words are quoted and reinterpreted by David in Psalm 8. Instead of remaining awed by man's smallness, David sees the huge potential that there is in being man- to be lord of all creation. Just as he had been exalted through his faith that he could conquer Goliath, so could all men be, if they are men as God intended. And as Paul shows, this has already been exemplified in the glorification of the Lord Jesus. We are not therefore to wallow in the smallness of humanity but to glory in our potential. We who are "babies and sucklings", so weak and vulnerable, gurgling and muttering incoherently, can utter perfect praise; and be lords of heavens, sea and earth. The Son of Man has shown us the path to that glory, having been one of us, of our nature. That fact shows us what it is and what it can be to be human, and for all time shows the potential within man. This is the answer to the question "What is man?". This is not so much a lament of man's smallness, weakness and vulnerability, although on one level it is that; rather is it a rhetorical question, the answer showing us what great potential there is for man who believes as David did. Likewise "What [or 'who'] is... the Son of Man...?" is answered in the achievment and person of the Lord Jesus. "What is the Son of Man?" leads to the answer: "The son of God". David's question is in fact a reply to Job's depressed statements about man in Job 7:16,17: "I loathe my life. I don’t want to live forever. Leave me alone, for my days are but a breath. What is man, that You should magnify him, that You should set Your mind on him". David is showing that man is so much more than Job's view here, in depression, that man is nothing and better off dead than alive.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> that You should visit him every morning, and test him every moment?-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> God is involved "every moment" in the life of His people; Job, presented as the suffering exiles, came to realize this (<a href='B:290 27:3'>Isa 27:3</a> cp. <a href='B:220 7:18'>Job 7:18</a> s:w:):God watered His vineyard "every moment" (<a href='B:290 27:3'>Isa 27:3</a> s:w:). The testing "every moment" was the struggle of the exiles, resolved in the promise of <a href='B:290 54:7'>Isa 54:7</a> "For a small moment have I forsaken you; but with great mercies will I gather you". But even in this small moment, He was watering them and caring for them.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> How long will You not look away from me, nor leave me alone until I swallow down my spittle?-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Again Job connects the eyes of God with his sufferings, asking God to look away from him, to thereby end the sufferings. And the eyes of God were His Angels, representing the Satan in the court of heaven (<a href='B:220 1:6'>Job 1:6</a>).</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> If I have sinned, what do I do to You, You watcher of men?-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Job is full of self justification, as noted on :11. He now argues that the vastness of God means that He shouldn't be so sensitive to human sin. We marvel at God’s total justification of Job, His imputation of righteousness, when He later states that Job had spoken rightly about Him (<a href='B:220 42:7-8'>Job 42:7-8</a>; although that statement may simply refer to Job's repentance). "You watcher of men" is yet another reference to God’s angel-eyes every watching and noting sin; see on :19. But the idea is equally as AV "preserver" or 'keeper'. He didn’t want that preserving or watching in his depression, as the exiles didn’t; but the promise of the prophets was that God was indeed watching / preserving, in order to restore them- just as He did with Job (s:w. <a href='B:290 42:6'>Isa 42:6</a>; <a href='B:290 49:8'>Isa 49:8</a>; <a href='B:300 31:6'>Jer 31:6</a>).</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>Why have You set me as an archer’s target for You, so that I am a burden to myself?-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Eliphaz blames Job's troubles upon the “sons of Resheph” (<a href='B:220 5:7'>Job 5:7</a>); but Job’s response is that the source of the evil in his life is ultimately from God and not any such being. Eliphaz there speaks of how man’s trouble comes “as the sons of Resheph fly upwards”. Resheph was known as “the lord of the arrow” and the Ugaritic tablets associate him with archery (William J. Fulco, The Canaanite God Resep (New Haven, CT: American Oriental Society, 1976)). We would therefore be justified in reading in an ellipsis here: man’s trouble comes “as the [arrows of] the sons of Resheph fly upwards”. Job’s response is that “The arrows of the Almighty are in me” (<a href='B:220 6:4'>Job 6:4</a>), and he lament that God is an archer using him as his target for practice (<a href='B:220 7:20'>Job 7:20</a>; <a href='B:220 16:12-13'>Job 16:12-13</a>). Job refuses to accept Eliphaz’s explanation that Job is a victim of Resheph’s arrows. For Job, if God is “the Almighty” then there is no space left for Resheph. Each blow he received, each arrow strike, was from God and not Resheph.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Why do You not pardon my disobedience, and take away my iniquity?-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Job argues as if God can just do this anyway; but he fails to appreciate the role of repentance. And this is a major theme of the book, and a meaning of the very name "Job".</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>For now shall I lie down in the dust. You will seek me diligently, but I shall not be-&nbsp; Job expected his death to come at any moment (AV "Thou shalt seek me in the morning"). He felt that death would mean that no matter how hard God searched, He would not find Job. But Job was to be taught that God is the God of resurrection and final judgment, and therefore death is no escape from Him.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Then Bildad the Shuhite answered-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Bildad largely repeats the arguments of Eliphaz, although more crudely, and with more appeal to the weight of past wisdom (:8-10).</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> How long will you speak these things? Shall the words of your mouth be a mighty wind?-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> This may be commentary upon Job's complaint that his life is but a breath which will soon pass (<a href='B:220 7:7'>Job 7:7</a>). The idea may be that indeed Job will soon die and will not be speaking these things for much longer; although Job considered himself just a temporary breath, his words were a mighty breath / wind because they were so serious in their accusations against God. And we learn from this that despite the frailty of the human condition, this doesn't justify wrong speaking.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Does God pervert justice? Or does the Almighty pervert righteousness?-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> The drama is set in patriarchal times, and so the allusion would be to the belief of Abraham that God as judge shall do right (<a href='B:10 18:25'>Gen 18:25</a>), and Job was wrong to imply otherwise. Job was implying otherwise, and so we conclude that God’s later statement that Job had spoken right about Him (<a href='B:220 42:7-8'>Job 42:7-8</a>) must simply refer to Job's repentance.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> If your children have sinned against him, He has delivered them into the hand of their disobedience-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> LXX "Sent them away to the place of their disobedience". This clearly has relevance to the exiles of Judah being sent off to Babylon, whose idols they had worshipped. Clearly Job's children had indeed sinned and been judged appropriately, and Job is here accused of wrongly justifying them- although so far, he has complained only of the injustice of his own judgments.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> If you want to seek God diligently, make your supplication to the Almighty-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> GNB "But turn now and plead with Almighty God". Bildad, as noted on :1, is just repeating the words of Eliphaz (<a href='B:220 5:8'>Job 5:8</a>). Job had turned to God when afflicted, but the friends ignored that. They liked to imagine that was just mere words; for, they apparently reasoned, if someone seeks God and has repented, then God is going to solve their material problems. This is exactly the mistaken view of many within the Pentecostal movement today.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> If you were pure and upright, surely now He would awaken for you, and make the habitation of your righteousness prosperous-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> The words of the friends suggest that their view was in fact that of the satan in the prologue. Satan obviously quibbled with God’s pronunciation of Job as perfect and upright (<a href='B:220 1:8'>Job 1:8</a>). And Bildad likewise seems to allude to this when he comments concerning Job's downfall: "If thou wert pure and upright; surely now he would awake for thee" (8:6 AV). For more connections between the friends and the satan, see on <a href='B:220 1:6'>Job 1:6</a>.</p><p>God’s opinion of Job was that he was "upright" (<a href='B:220 1:1'>Job 1:1</a> s:w:). But as the drama progresses, the friends argue that if Job were in fact "upright" then God would not be afflicting him (<a href='B:220 4:7'>Job 4:7</a>; <a href='B:220 8:6'>Job 8:6</a> s:w:). Job absorbs this reasoning, and confesses that he is not "upright" and therefore cannot find God (<a href='B:220 23:7-8'>Job 23:7-8</a> s:w:). He absorbs false guilt and becomes influenced by the guilt placed upon him by his religion and "friends" amongst the "sons of God". See on :20.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Though your beginning was small, yet your latter end would greatly increase-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Job's "latter end" did increase (s:w. <a href='B:220 42:12'>Job 42:12</a>) and Bildad lived to see it, and thereby realized how wrong his judgment had been. Bildad's words may be a recognition of how Job arose to wealth from small beginnings, implying that his "latter end" would only really increase if he were repentant and Godly (:5,6). The fact Job's latter end did increase was therefore evidence that God accepted him as Godly. The same word is used of the "latter end" of Israel, which will likewise be "increased" and blessed; and could have been so for the exiles had they followed the path of Job (<a href='B:290 41:22'>Isa 41:22</a>; <a href='B:290 46:10'>Isa 46:10</a>; <a href='B:300 29:11'>Jer 29:11</a>; <a href='B:300 31:17'>Jer 31:17</a>).</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Please inquire of past generations. Find out about the learning of their fathers-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Bildad stresses the power of traditional understanding (:8-10), and one of the themes of the book is the utter failure of traditional understandings of the time compared to the ultimate reality of God and His hand in human life. Perhaps he has in view the patriarchs, beginning from Abraham. But his fathers were idolaters, and Bildad is missing the point- that the Divine truths revealed to individuals are freestanding and independent of how long they lived or to whom they have listened.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> For we are but of yesterday, and know nothing, because our days on earth are a shadow-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> The final appeal of God demonstrates that any man can at this point know and perceive His Truth, and man is not 'without knowledge' because he is out of step with ancient gurus, or ignorant of them. Perhaps Bildad may have in view the way that lifespans were far longer in the past, and therefore he considered the patriarchs wiser. But so many people live the same year every year, and the number of years lived isn't related to their wisdom.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Shall they not teach you, tell you, and utter words out of their heart?-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> This challenge to go and ask the old men of :8,9 may therefore be a reference to old sages who were alive at Job's time; for if the reference is to the patriarchs, then they were dead and could not have spoken to Job.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Can the papyrus grow up without mire? Can the rushes grow without water?-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Bildad's idea is that Job's prosperity was like a quick growing papyrus which would soon wither (:12) because it had not enough water or mud. Bildad's reasoning is wrong, but clearly the Lord quarried His parable of the sower from parts of these ideas (see on :16 also). For He speaks of the man who has no "depth of earth" as the one who responds eagerly to the word sown, but falls away "when affliction of persecution arises for the word's sake" because he has 'no root in himself' (<a href='B:480 4:5'>Mar 4:5</a>; <a href='B:480 4:17'>Mar 4:17</a>). Bildad was therefore not simply saying that Job's persecution was because he had sinned; but rather he implies that Job had lost his faith after the persecution arose, because he had no real root in faith. In this Bildad was also wrong, for Job continually seeks to God in his tribulations. Behemoth was quite at home in the "mire "(s:w. <a href='B:220 40:21'>Job 40:21</a>); and the connection is in order to demonstrate that even the "mire" was created by God and just as He saved Jeremiah out of the mire of the dungeon, so He could save Job and the exiles. And the only other usage of the word is in the description of the healing of the "miry places" (<a href='B:330 47:11'>Eze 47:11</a>) if the exiles were responsive to the prophetic call to restore the temple and city made in Ezekiel 40-48:&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> While it is yet in its greenness, not cut down-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> "Not cut down" suggests that Job had withered even before he was "cut down", just like the papyrus which is without mud and water to sustain it (:11). The word for "cut down" is used of the cutting down of Judah (<a href='B:330 17:4'>Eze 17:4</a>; <a href='B:330 17:22'>Eze 17:22</a>); Job is clearly the suffering servant who represents God’s suffering people.</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>It withers before any other reed-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> "Withers" is literally 'dried up'. The theme of 'drying up' is significant. Bildad considers Job to have been 'dried up' by God’s judgment (<a href='B:220 8:12'>Job 8:12</a>), and the word is used of how God withered or dried up Judah at the hands of their invaders (<a href='B:300 12:4'>Jer 12:4</a>; <a href='B:300 23:10'>Jer 23:10</a>; <a href='B:330 17:9-10'>Eze 17:9-10</a>; <a href='B:330 17:24'>Eze 17:24</a>; <a href='B:450 11:17'>Zec 11:17</a>; <a href='B:310 4:8'>Lam 4:8</a>; <a href='B:290 40:7-8'>Isa 40:7-8</a> - although the prophetic word of God requiring their restoration would endure, despite their drying up). The dry bones of Judah in captivity were withered or dried up (<a href='B:330 37:11'>Eze 37:11</a>). So Job's 'drying up' was again, a sharing in the representative suffering of God’s people. Job's personal response to his 'drying up' was to reflect that God dries up waters and also sends them forth as floods (<a href='B:220 12:15'>Job 12:15</a> s:w:); He can give and He can take, just as Job had initially realized (<a href='B:220 2:10'>Job 2:10</a>). Just as He dried up Job / Israel, so He could abundantly send forth waters; just as He did at the Red Sea. Restoration and salvation was just as easy for Him as destruction, to put it another way. The drying up of Job was also understood by him as referring to his death (<a href='B:220 14:11'>Job 14:11</a>), but God could raise him from the dead and have a desire to him again (<a href='B:220 14:15'>Job 14:15</a>). Eliphaz wrongly argues that the Divine 'drying up' of a person means permanent extinction (<a href='B:220 15:30'>Job 15:30</a>), as does Bildad (<a href='B:220 18:16'>Job 18:16</a>); but Job always sees the 'drying up' as part of a Divine action which also has a counterpart, the pouring out again of waters, or resurrection of the dried up, withered bones. Likewise Judah in captivity thought that their drying up, their dry bones, were incapable of revival (<a href='B:330 37:11'>Eze 37:11</a>); but the message is that they could indeed be revived, and their drying up was but a presage to their eternal revival:&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> So are the paths of all who forget God. The hope of the godless man shall perish-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Given all Job's references to God, it is patently wrong to assume he was "Godless" and had 'forgotten God'; we are hereby warned as to the dangers of assuming someone is not 'of God' because of the path of logical which our theological positions have led us down. And yet there is still some truth in what Bildad says; those who "forget God" will indeed perish, and the phrase is used about Israel in <a href='B:50 32:18'>Deu 32:18</a>; <a href='B:230 106:21'>Psa 106:21</a>. Job was experiencing the sufferings of those who "forget God" even though he himself had most clearly not done so. In this we see the nature of representational suffering and intercession, which came true in its ultimate term in the Lord Jesus, the "suffering servant" based upon Job.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> whose confidence shall break apart, whose trust is in a spider’s web-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> LXX "For his house shall be without inhabitants, and his tent shall prove a spider's web"- a reference to the collapse of the tent / house of Job's sons, killing them all.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> He shall lean on his house, but it shall not stand. He shall cling to it, but it shall not endure-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> To 'lean upon' is to trust; Job was accused of leaning upon his own large "house", his family and literal home, which had now been taken away from him. That may have been partly true; but now he 'leaned' upon God alone. And the same was intended to be true of the exiles, who had 'leaned' upon human strength, Egypt especially (<a href='B:290 30:12'>Isa 30:12</a>; <a href='B:290 31:1'>Isa 31:1</a> s:w:), desperately clinging on to it; but when that was removed, they were to 'lean upon' God alone (<a href='B:290 50:10'>Isa 50:10</a> s:w:). Again, Job is Judah.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> He is green before the sun. His shoots go forth over his garden-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> The picture is of a plant which initially grows quickly and prolifically, but is planted upon rocks (:17) and the sun will soon smite it. Again, as noted on :11, the Lord constructed His parable of the sower from this. The seed sown on stony ground was the man who responds enthusiastically initially, but then fades away once persecution arises (<a href='B:480 4:5'>Mar 4:5</a>; <a href='B:480 4:16-17'>Mar 4:16-17</a>). This was a picture of what happened to Israel; and Job was their representative, even though in the end, he was the good ground and did not faint under persecution.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> His roots are wrapped around the rock pile. He sees the place of stones-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Roots upon stones rather than earth continues the connection with the parable of the sower; see on :16.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> If he is destroyed from his place, then it shall deny him, saying, ‘I have not seen you’-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Judah in exile felt 'destroyed from their place', but the lesson of the dialogues in Job is that the friends were seeing things as they were at the moment, and failing to understand that God had a longer term program of restoration. Job would be the pattern for the exiles to follow- and they would return to their "place".</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Behold, this is the joy of his way: out of the earth, others shall spring-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> The idea of others springing up in the place of the withered papyrus, also by the waterside, is to be found in the prophecies of the exiles' restoration (s:w. <a href='B:290 44:4'>Isa 44:4</a>; <a href='B:290 42:9'>Isa 42:9</a>; <a href='B:290 43:19'>Isa 43:19</a> etc:). Bildad was wrong to think that the cut down Job could never spring up again; he would, just as the exiles likewise could have sprung up to new life in the restored kingdom. The reasoning of the friends was that of the faithless Jews in exile.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Behold, God will not cast away a blameless man-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Job appears to argue with this in his reply, insisting that he is not "blameless" or (AV) "perfect" (<a href='B:220 9:20-21'>Job 9:20-21</a>). He realizes through this false statement of Bildad's that in fact God cannot require utter perfection in order to save a man; and at the same time, He clearly blesses the sinful and brings calamity to the righteous. The conclusion therefore is that there is no direct connection between sin and present suffering; and the salvation of the righteous, none of who are "perfect", is by grace. And the narrative of the book of Job takes us beyond even that, suggesting that being blameless or perfect is only by God imputing that status to believers. For God’s opinion of Job was that he was "blameless" (<a href='B:220 1:1'>Job 1:1</a>). But as the drama progresses, Bildad argues that if Job were in fact "blameless" then God would not cast him away (<a href='B:220 8:20'>Job 8:20</a> s:w:). Job absorbs this reasoning, and confesses that he is not "blameless" (<a href='B:220 9:20-21'>Job 9:20-21</a> s:w:), and yet he is driven to the conclusion that the "blameless" and sinner are "destroyed together" by God (<a href='B:220 9:22'>Job 9:22</a> s:w:). It's quite possible that in depression and periods of suffering, we can come to have a lower view of ourselves than that which God has of us; just as at other times we can have a higher view of ourselves spiritually than we ought to. There is true guilt, the guilt which we should take, and false guilt. And Job seems to have picked up the false guilt thrown upon him by Bildad. We too need to learn this difference between false and true guilt. See on :6.</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>Neither will He uphold the evildoers-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Heb. 'hold the hand of evil-doers'. And yet this was exactly what God did to sinful Judah in captivity (<a href='B:290 41:13'>Isa 41:13</a>; <a href='B:290 42:6'>Isa 42:6</a>). That was all by grace, and grace is something which Bildad knew nothing of.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> He will still fill your mouth with laughter, your lips with shouting-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> The language of the restored exiles having their mouths filled with laughter and singing when Yahweh brought again Zion- not because they were technically righteous, as Bildad reasoned, but by His grace.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Those who hate you shall be clothed with shame. The tent of the wicked shall be no more- This was what ought to have happened to the friends, at the end. But it didn’t, again by grace, because God accepted Job's intercession for them.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Then Job answered-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> The interpretation of this chapter depends upon discerning connections with the previous speech of Bildad.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Truly I know that it is so, but how can man be just with God?-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> We naturally ask what Job is agreeing with. Perhaps it is simply the statements immediately preceding this, that God will not cast away the blameless [AV "perfect"] and will judge sinners (<a href='B:220 8:19-21'>Job 8:19-21</a>). But Job has been driven further in his thinking- as an imperfect but relatively righteous man who is suffering the apparent judgment of God. And so he asks the question which is at the root of the book: "How can man be just with God?". Paul spends Romans 1-8 discussing this question, because it is at the heart of the Christian Gospel (see on :10). His answer is that which Job finally reasons himself towards, and which is finally revealed at the end by God’s answers: by God’s grace, through faith in imputed righteousness.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> If He wishes to contend with him, he can’t answer Him one time in a thousand-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> The idea of God in legal contention is quite a theme of the restoration prophets. And the story of Job was, I have suggested, rewritten (under inspiration) for the exiles. God had contended with Judah and found them guilty (<a href='B:290 3:13'>Isa 3:13</a>; <a href='B:300 2:9'>Jer 2:9</a>), but He would not contend for ever (<a href='B:290 57:16'>Isa 57:16</a>). All contention or answer back against Him, counter accusing Him, placing God in the dock, was clearly wrong and useless (<a href='B:290 45:9'>Isa 45:9</a>):&nbsp; Instead He by grace would contend legally against the abusers of His people (<a href='B:290 49:25'>Isa 49:25</a>; <a href='B:290 51:22'>Isa 51:22</a>; <a href='B:300 50:34'>Jer 50:34</a>), so that the suffering servant would be justified / counted righteous by God, so that all legal contention against him was powerless (<a href='B:290 50:8'>Isa 50:8</a>). But this contention by God against Israel's enemies depended upon their repentance (<a href='B:400 7:9'>Mic 7:9</a>). All this was finally seen in Job's experience; he was set up as a pattern for the exiles to follow, although ultimately they didn’t follow it to the end.</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>LXX "God would not hearken to him, so that he should answer to one of his charges of a thousand". Job appeals for ‘witnesses’ (<a href='B:220 9:33-35'>Job 9:33-35</a>; <a href='B:220 16:18-22'>Job 16:18-22</a>; <a href='B:220 19:20-27'>Job 19:20-27</a>), an advocate in Heaven (<a href='B:220 9:33'>Job 9:33</a>), denies his guilt and demands a legal list of his sins (<a href='B:220 13:19'>Job 13:19</a>), he wishes for God to come to trial (<a href='B:220 9:3'>Job 9:3</a>), and thus Job is described as a man who has taken out a ‘case’ with God (<a href='B:220 23:4'>Job 23:4</a>; <a href='B:220 40:2'>Job 40:2</a>). Job 29-31 is effectively Job’s declaration of legal innocence and an appeal to God to hear his case more sympathetically (<a href='B:220 31:35'>Job 31:35</a>). And of course God pronounces a final legal verdict at the very end (<a href='B:220 42:7'>Job 42:7</a>), in response to Job’s earlier plea: “Sleeplessly I wait for His reply” (<a href='B:220 16:22'>Job 16:22</a>). It’s as if the whole experience of Job was [at least partly] in order to test out the Canaanite theories of ‘Satan’, suffering and evil in the court of Heaven; and also the various theories which arose to explain Judah's captivity in Babylon. The friends represent the traditional views of evil, and often make reference to the myths of their day about ‘Satan’ figures. They speak as if they are the final court – Eliphaz speaks of how the judges and elders of their day, the “holy ones”, had concluded Job was guilty, and that they, the friends, were right: “To which of the holy ones will you appeal [legal language]?... we have [legally] examined this, and it [Job’s guilt] is true” (<a href='B:220 5:1'>Job 5:1</a>; <a href='B:220 5:27'>Job 5:27</a>). This is of great comfort to those who feel misjudged by man – above them in Heaven the ultimate Heavenly court is considering our case, and that is all that matters.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> God who is wise in heart, and mighty in strength: who has hardened himself against Him, and prospered?-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> As explained on :3, all attempts to put God in the dock by refusing to repent, or by simply accusing Him of injustice against sinners, were therefore inappropriate and pointless. Job is effectively denying Bildad's implication that Job had "hardened himself" against God. The same word is used of Pharaoh hardening himself against Yahweh (<a href='B:20 7:3'>Exo 7:3</a>). It was Israel who hardened themselves against God (<a href='B:50 10:16'>Deu 10:16</a>), leading to their exile (<a href='B:140 36:13'>2Ch 36:13</a>; <a href='B:160 9:29'>Neh 9:29</a>; <a href='B:300 19:15'>Jer 19:15</a>). Job was accused of having done this and was apparently treated as if he had done so; again in the spirit of the Lord Jesus, being treated as a sinner, experiencing the judgment for sin, when personally innocent.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> He removes the mountains, and they don’t know it, when He overturns them in His anger-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> "Mountains" plural can be read as an intensive plural; the one great mountain which was to be removed into exile was as it were mount Zion; and it was the house of Judah which was to be overturned- but until "He come whose right it is" (<a href='B:330 23:25-27'>Eze 23:25-27</a>). The friends only dealt with present realities before their eyes, as did the exiles- they failed to see the longer term perspective. What was removed and overturned could be returned and revived. That was the Divine plan. See on :6.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> He shakes the earth out of its place. Its pillars tremble-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Language used of the shaking of the earth and heavens of Israel and Judah at the hands of their invaders. See on :5.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> He commands the sun, and it doesn’t rise, and seals up the stars-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Language used in the apocalyptic message of darkness and destruction of the kingdom of Judah (e.g. <a href='B:290 13:10'>Isa 13:10</a>). The simple point is that all that was done by the hand of God and His word of prophetic command, and not because of supernatural forces of radical evil in the cosmos.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> He alone stretches out the heavens, and treads on the back of Yam-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> God is therefore seen as far greater than the legendary sea monster Yam; see on :24. "He alone" has power; He doesn't share power with any cosmic 'Satan' being, all is under His control.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> He makes the Bear, Orion, and the Pleiades, and the rooms of the south-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> The surrounding culture believed (as many do today) that the stars influence life upon earth; Job emphasizes that God is the creator of the stars, and the present tense "makes" suggests that Job even perceived that the stars were not fixed but are part on an ongoing creation- something modern cosmology has finally come to realize. "The bear", Heb. 'the fool', alludes to the myth that there had been a rebellion against God in Heaven, and 'the bear' had been chained up in the sky for all to see. Job is deconstructing these myths; quite simply, God had "made" these constellations and placed them as they are by His sovereign power.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> He does great things past finding out; yes, marvellous things without number-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Job is moving closer to the great truths which God Himself will make explicit at His appearance at the end of the book. The friends assumed that meaning could easily be attached to event by "the wise"; whereas Job is driven to conclude by his sufferings that God’s ways are "past finding out", and yet all of His ways are wonderful. I suggested on :2 that Paul's arguments in Romans 1-8 about 'how a man can be just with God' are consciously based upon the book of Job. In Romans 9-11 he cites Israel as the parade example of what he has been saying in chapters 1-8. And so it is appropriate that he concludes that section by quoting these words of Job: "O the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and the knowledge of God! How unsearchable are His judgments and His ways past tracing out!" (<a href='B:520 11:33'>Rom 11:33</a>). The "marvellous things" which Job sensed were somehow going on are verbalized and made explicit in Romans- they are the things of God’s saving grace.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Behold, He goes by me, and I don’t see Him. He passes on also, but I don’t perceive Him-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> This is not so much a glum lament as an extension of the argument of :10; God is doing wonderful things, things connected with His grace, which are beyond human comprehension. And Job cites his own lack of perception as proof enough of that.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Behold, He snatches away-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Perhaps a reference to the snatching away of Job's cattle. He doggedly insists that all his sufferings were from God.</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>Who can hinder Him?-</p><p> The dramatic story of Job thrice uses the same phrase as in <a href='B:290 43:13'>Isa 43:13</a>, concluding that "who can hinder…?" God’s way (<a href='B:220 9:12'>Job 9:12</a>; <a href='B:220 11:10'>Job 11:10</a>; <a href='B:220 23:13'>Job 23:13</a>). The exiles were to understand that no human opposition or discouragement can turn back or hinder God’s purpose to save His people, even if they are as Job in suffering. His saving and restorative purpose will not be hindered, if we wish to identify with it.</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>Who will ask Him, ‘What are you doing?’- It is for God to ask this of sinful man (s:w. <a href='B:10 3:13'>Gen 3:13</a>; <a href='B:10 4:10'>Gen 4:10</a>); but not for man to demand this of God. It is for man to ask himself "What have I done?", and repent (s:w. <a href='B:300 8:6'>Jer 8:6</a>). And yet it could be argued that Job does indeed ask this of God, and has to lay his hand upon his mouth at the end. In the restoration context, Israel as the clay were not to ask the Divine potter "What are You doing?" (s:w. <a href='B:290 45:9'>Isa 45:9</a>). To do so would be to strive with our maker.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> God will not withdraw His anger. The cohorts of Rahab stoop under Him-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> "Rahab" is a symbol of both Egypt and Babylon. GNB "God’s anger is constant. He crushed his enemies who helped Rahab, the sea monster, oppose him". This language is clearly alluding to the helpers of Tiamat in the Babylonian myth; see on :24.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> How much less shall I answer Him, and choose my words to argue with Him?-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Job argues that God is sovereign in Heaven, with no evil rival (contrary to the view of the friends, and of many today). Therefore, who is a single man like Job to argue back with God?</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Though I were righteous, yet I wouldn’t answer Him. I would make supplication to my judge-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> LXX "For though I be righteous, he will not hearken to me: I will intreat his judgment"; GNB "Though I am innocent, all I can do is beg for mercy from God my judge". The ambiguity of the original is perhaps intentional; for Job teeters between accepting his sinfulness, and yet claiming he is without sin. See on :35 for another example.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> If I had called, and He had answered me, yet I wouldn’t believe that He listened to my voice-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Here is spiritual depression in its classic form. The cup is always seen as half empty rather than half full. Even answered prayer is seen as irrelevant and no proof that the God who appears so distant has in fact responded to little me. The weight of suffering and the sense that we are suffering at God’s hand "without cause" (:17), with no discernible meaning attached to event, outweighs all the evidence of His intense love and interest in us.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> For He bruises me with a storm, and multiplies my wounds without cause-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> "Bruises" is the same word translated "bruise" in <a href='B:10 3:15'>Gen 3:15</a>, thus implying that he is receiving the result of the covenant in Eden for no reason. Therefore he is finally led to acceptance of his sinfulness. The Lord Jesus must have been sorely tempted to adopt the same false reasoning of His great antitype, but He surely had learnt the lesson that Job like Himself was suffering as representative of God’s people and not as a consequence of personal sin. The references earlier in Job 9 to God spreading out the Heavens and creating the stars show Job's mind at this time was set early in Genesis (:8-10). See on <a href='B:220 10:9'>Job 10:9</a>; <a href='B:220 13:20-22'>Job 13:20-22</a>. This is yet another lesson which comes out of Job- we are suffering the results of living in a fallen creation. The only ultimate answer to that is through the work of the seed of the woman, the Lord Jesus, and the resolution is not going to come completely in this life.</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>God had accused the Satan figure of wanting to have Job suffer "without cause" (<a href='B:220 2:3'>Job 2:3</a> s:w:). And here Job repeats this. Again we have the impression that he had been present at these discussions between the Satan and God; and the view of the Satan was in fact the view now of the friends, who effectively acted as the Satan figure who had influenced their thinking. The Lord Jesus likewise suffered "without cause" (<a href='B:230 69:4'>Psa 69:4</a>; <a href='B:230 109:3'>Psa 109:3</a> s:w:). Israel did suffer for a "cause" or reason- they had indeed sinned (s:w. <a href='B:330 6:10'>Eze 6:10</a>; <a href='B:330 14:23'>Eze 14:23</a>). Job as their representative, like the Lord Jesus, suffered those same judgments but without a cause.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> He will not allow me to catch my breath, but fills me with bitterness-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> "Catch" is the usual word for "return"; the complaint is that God doesn't allow Job to die, to return his breath or spirit to Him in death. The suggestion is that because God has total control over the moment of human death, there is absolutely no point in arguing back with Him.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> If it is a matter of strength, behold, He is mighty! If of justice, ‘Who’, says He, ‘will summon me?’-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> No human strength or argument about justice is relevant; God cannot be summoned to court by man and placed in the dock. Therefore, one can only accept His ways and trust that He is ultimately right. That isn't what Job explicitly says nor wishes to recognize at this point, but his sufferings and reflections upon them lead him to be just moments away from this conclusion. And when God expresses this more specifically at the end of the book, He is only verbalizing what Job has already come to tacitly realize. And for us too, God’s revelation in His word often simply confirms the understandings He has led us to through our sufferings in life.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Though I am righteous, my own mouth shall condemn me. Though I am blameless, it shall prove me perverse-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> This can as well be rendered as AV "Though I be blameless", i:e. 'even if I were blameless', and likewise in :21. The ambiguity of the original is perhaps intentional; for Job teeters between accepting his sinfulness, and yet claiming he is without sin. See on :11,15 for other examples. God’s opinion of Job was that he was "blameless" (<a href='B:220 1:1'>Job 1:1</a>). But as the drama progresses, Bildad argues that if Job were in fact "blameless" then God would not cast him away (<a href='B:220 8:20'>Job 8:20</a> s:w:). Job absorbs this reasoning, and confesses that he is not "blameless" (<a href='B:220 9:20-21'>Job 9:20-21</a> s:w:), and yet he is driven to the conclusion that the "blameless" and sinner are "destroyed together" by God (<a href='B:220 9:22'>Job 9:22</a> s:w:). It's quite possible that in depression and periods of suffering, we can come to have a lower view of ourselves than that which God has of us; just as at other times we can have a higher view of ourselves spiritually than we ought to. There is true guilt, the guilt which we should take, and false guilt. And Job seems to have picked up the false guilt thrown upon him by Bildad. We too need to learn this difference between false and true guilt.</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>Those who are sure they won’t be condemned, taking the emblems with self-assurance, come together unto condemnation. Job knew this when he said that if he justifies himself, he will be condemned out of his own mouth (<a href='B:220 9:20'>Job 9:20</a> - he understood the idea of self-condemnation and judgment now). Isaiah also foresaw this, when he besought men (in the present tense): “Enter into the rock, and hide thee in the dust, for fear of the Lord, and for the glory of his majesty”, and then goes on to say that in the day of God’s final judgment, “[the rejected] shall go into the holes of the rock…for fear of the Lord and for the glory of His majesty when he ariseth to shake terribly the earth” (<a href='B:290 2:10-11'>Isa 2:10-11</a>; <a href='B:290 2:19-21'>Isa 2:19-21</a>). We must find a true, self-condemning humility now, unless it will be forced upon us at the judgment.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> I am blameless. I don’t respect myself-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> LXX "For even if I have sinned, I know it not in my soul" may be alluded to by Paul in <a href='B:530 4:4'>1Co 4:4</a>. Even if we have a good conscience, it is not our conscience which will stand and judge us at the last day. It is before God’s word that we stand or fall. Or perhaps along with GNB we can read this as simply the nadir of spiritual depression: "I am innocent, but I no longer care. I am sick of living. Nothing matters; innocent or guilty, God will destroy us".</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>Here and by implication in other places, Job effectively says that there is no point in serving God or striving for obedience to God. This is what the priests of Israel later said after the restoration, to whom this book was partly addressed in its later rewriting: "It is vain to serve God: and what profit is it that we have kept His ordinance?" (<a href='B:460 3:14'>Mal 3:14</a>). Elihu claimed that Job "hath said, It profiteth a man nothing that he should delight himself in God" (<a href='B:220 34:9'>Job 34:9</a>)- i:e. keep the commands of God, seeing that&nbsp; the Hebrew for " delight" often occurs in the context of obedience to the word. The Malachi passage is more specifically alluding to <a href='B:220 21:7'>Job 21:7</a>; <a href='B:220 21:15'>Job 21:15</a>: "What is the Almighty that we should serve Him? and what profit should we have, if we pray unto Him?". These are the words of Job, complaining about the prosperity of the wicked who had such an attitude, and the carefree happiness of their lives: "Their children dance. They take the timbrel and harp, and rejoice at the sound of the organ" (<a href='B:220 21:11-12'>Job 21:11-12</a>). It is in this that the Malachi context is so significant, for <a href='B:460 3:15'>Mal 3:15</a> continues: "We (the Israelites) call the proud happy; yea, they that work wickedness are set up" . This was also Job's view. Notice that Job is probably implying that his prosperous three friends were among the wicked whom he is describing, thus associating them with the corrupt Jewish priesthood.</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>I despise my life-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> The grace of it all was that although he wanted to cast away his life (<a href='B:220 7:16'>Job 7:16</a>; <a href='B:220 9:21'>Job 9:21</a>), just as God’s people cast away His covenant (<a href='B:290 8:6'>Isa 8:6</a>; <a href='B:290 30:12'>Isa 30:12</a>; <a href='B:300 6:19'>Jer 6:19</a>), God would not cast away His people in their exile and depression (s:w. <a href='B:30 26:44'>Lev 26:44</a>), even if they cast him away. Job felt despised or cast away by God (<a href='B:220 10:14'>Job 10:14</a>) just as the exiles did, but this wasn't the case; God will not despise or cast away His servant people (<a href='B:220 36:5'>Job 36:5</a>; <a href='B:290 41:9'>Isa 41:9</a>; <a href='B:300 31:37'>Jer 31:37</a>; <a href='B:300 33:26'>Jer 33:26</a>).</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> It is all the same. Therefore I say that He destroys the blameless and the wicked-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> This and :21 are in response to the statement in <a href='B:220 8:20'>Job 8:20</a> "Behold, God will not cast away a blameless man". Job appears to argue with this in his reply, insisting that he is not "blameless" or (AV) "perfect" (<a href='B:220 9:20-21'>Job 9:20-21</a>). He realizes through this false statement of Bildad's that in fact God cannot require utter perfection in order to save a man; and at the same time, He clearly blesses the sinful and brings calamity to the righteous. The conclusion therefore is that there is no direct connection between sin and present suffering; and the salvation of the righteous, none of who are "perfect", is by grace. And the narrative of the book of Job takes us beyond even that, suggesting that being blameless or perfect is only by God imputing that status to believers. For God’s opinion of Job was that he was "blameless" (<a href='B:220 1:1'>Job 1:1</a>). But as the drama progresses, Bildad argues that if Job were in fact "blameless" then God would not cast him away (<a href='B:220 8:20'>Job 8:20</a> s:w:). Job absorbs this reasoning, and confesses that he is not "blameless" (<a href='B:220 9:20-21'>Job 9:20-21</a> s:w:), and yet he is driven to the conclusion that the "blameless" and sinner are "destroyed together" by God (<a href='B:220 9:22'>Job 9:22</a> s:w:). It's quite possible that in depression and periods of suffering, we can come to have a lower view of ourselves than that which God has of us; just as at other times we can have a higher view of ourselves spiritually than we ought to. There is true guilt, the guilt which we should take, and false guilt. And Job seems to have picked up the false guilt thrown upon him by Bildad. We too need to learn this difference between false and true guilt. See on <a href='B:220 8:6'>Job 8:6</a>.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> If the scourge kills suddenly, He will mock at the trial of the innocent-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> What began as what I called "the nadir of spiritual depression" in :21 now moves beyond that to outright false accusation towards God. For He does not mock at the "sudden" suffering of His people, such as Job experienced in the sudden loss of all he had. We marvel the more at God’s final statement that Job had spoken rightly about Him (<a href='B:220 42:7-8'>Job 42:7-8</a>). That Divine comment may indeed simply be upon Job's statement of repentance. But all the same, we would expect God to clarify that was what He intended, and to offer some note that Job has indeed falsely accused Him. But God doesn't. He doesn't need to. He has completely justified Job by faith, clothing him with imputed righteousness. And His demonstration of His ways has in any case made the required point, and Job recognized that.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> The earth is given into the hand of the wicked. He covers the faces of its judges-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Again Job is driven towards an understanding that God will finally bring about a day of justice when He gives the earth into the hands of the righteous. He realizes that all creation is to some extent in his situation- groaning for the manifestation of the sons of God, as Paul puts it.</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>If it be not He, then who is it?-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> I noted on <a href='B:220 1:1'>Job 1:1</a>; <a href='B:220 3:8'>Job 3:8</a> that a major theme in the book of Job is the deconstruction of the ‘satan’ myth. A key passage is <a href='B:220 9:24'>Job 9:24</a>: “If it be not he, who then is it?” (R:V:); or as the G:N:B. puts it: “If God didn’t do it, who did?”. After all the theories of ‘Who’s responsible for all this evil in Job’s life?’, Job concludes that the source simply has to be God – and not anyone else. If He truly is all powerful, then who else could ultimately be responsible? Job states that “the cohorts of Rahab [a Canaanite ‘Satan’ figure] shall stoop under [God]” (<a href='B:220 9:13'>Job 9:13</a>), clearly alluding to the helpers of Tiamat in the Babylonian myth. “God alone stretches out the heavens, and treads on the back of Yam” – the sea, or sea–monster (<a href='B:220 9:8'>Job 9:8</a>). See on <a href='B:220 10:8'>Job 10:8</a>.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Now my days are swifter than a runner. They flee away, they see no good-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Seeing no good was the punishment upon God’s exiled people because of their sins (s:w. <a href='B:300 17:6'>Jer 17:6</a>; <a href='B:300 29:32'>Jer 29:32</a>). Again we see Job suffering the judgment of sinners when he himself had not sinned. This was exactly what happened to the Lord on the cross.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> they have passed away as the swift ships, as the eagle that swoops on the prey-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Heb. "ships of reed", alluding to the swift skiffs on the river Nile. Perceiving how quickly life has sped by is typical of the thoughts of dying men. I argued on <a href='B:220 1:1'>Job 1:1</a> that Job was indeed a historical person, and the language he uses in his depression and illness is poetically formulated, but all the same has absolute verisimilitude to the thoughts and feelings of an actual person in his situation.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> If I say, ‘I will forget my complaint, I will put off my sad face, and cheer up’-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> As noted on :26, these thoughts are exactly true to life of a real historical person. He realizes that putting on a brave face and forgetting his sufferings for a moment- is just not going to work. He still suffers from a nagging sense of being wrong before God (:28), and it is this which is preparing the way for his final repentance at the end of the book.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> I am afraid of all my sorrows, I know that You will not hold me innocent-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> LXX "I quake in all my limbs". That quaking was apparently in prospect of the future judgment which he feared, although at other times Job longs for that judgment day to come. This again as noted on :26 is absolutely psychologically credible. Job may be using the term translated "innocent" in the sense of 'acquitted' as it is in <a href='B:220 10:14'>Job 10:14</a>. He fears God will not forgive him at the final judgment; and this is all part of the build up towards the final bursting of the tension at the end of the book, when God appears, condemns Job and then justifies and restores him. And all Job's fears are proven ultimately unnecessary- but only because of God’s grace:&nbsp;</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> I shall be condemned. Why then do I labour in vain?-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Job's reliance on works to bring justification with God is clearly seen here, as if to say 'If I've been condemned, all these good works I've done are vain- they won't give me the salvation I thought':&nbsp;This again is part of the build up towards the final declaration of salvation by grace which we find in God’s final revelation at the end.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> If I wash myself with snow, and cleanse my hands with lye-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> This was apparently the attitude of the exiles. The question "How can a man be just with God?" is the same question as 'How can a man ever be clean before a perfect God?', and is repeated in this form in <a href='B:220 15:15'>Job 15:15</a>; <a href='B:220 25:5'>Job 25:5</a>:&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; They had considered themselves cleansed whiter than snow because of their obedience to some parts of the Mosaic law (<a href='B:310 4:7'>Lam 4:7</a>), but failed to accept that such cleansing to be whiter than snow is only possible by doing what David did, and casting ourselves upon God’s grace outside of justification by works (<a href='B:230 51:7'>Psa 51:7</a>). Job was to learn this lesson at the end. It was this offer which was made to Job just as it was to Judah under judgment (<a href='B:290 1:18'>Isa 1:18</a>).</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> yet You will plunge me in the ditch. My own clothes shall abhor me-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> This again is Job allowing his depression to lead him to unreasonable statements about God, and not speaking right about Him. The fact we are sinners doesn't mean that God makes us dirty; we make our own clothes dirty. The word translated "ditch" is usually used in Job about the grave or "pit" (<a href='B:220 17:14'>Job 17:14</a>; <a href='B:220 33:18'>Job 33:18</a>; <a href='B:220 33:22'>Job 33:22</a>; <a href='B:220 33:24'>Job 33:24</a>; <a href='B:220 33:28'>Job 33:28</a>; <a href='B:220 33:30'>Job 33:30</a>); so the idea may be that all the same, for all his efforts to be righteous and cleanse his own sin, God will plunge Job into the grave at the end:&nbsp;</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> For He is not a man, as I am, that I should answer Him, that we should come together in judgment-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Job in his own righteousness and amateur attempts to fix up his own sins was unable to come "together" or "at one" with God in judgment. Job is driven to realize his need for outside help (:33), but by the nature of his situation that help needed to be somehow also "a man" who still could approach to God as his advocate. He was driven to his need for the Lord Jesus, who is presented as the ultimate answer to this need- a man of human nature, but sinless Son of God.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> There is no umpire between us, that might lay his hand on us both-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> The word for "umpire" suggests 'one who is right', a reasoner, an advocate, one who pleads (s:w. <a href='B:220 16:21'>Job 16:21</a>), a reprover (<a href='B:220 40:2'>Job 40:2</a> s:w:). Job's request is not simply for a mediator; he would have used a different word if so. He seems to want to put God in the dock, but knows this is not appropriate; he wants someone else to do this who can legitimately do it. And he is rebuked for this in <a href='B:220 40:2'>Job 40:2</a>.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Let Him take his rod away from me-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> "Take His rod away" is the very same phrase used in <a href='B:10 49:10'>Gen 49:10</a>, promising that the sceptre (s:w. "rod") would not be taken away (s:w:) from Judah. Judah would always have God’s rod or sceptre with them; David likewise takes comfort from the fact that God’s "rod and staff" remained with him and were not taken away from him (<a href='B:230 23:4'>Psa 23:4</a> s:w:). We see here God’s grace in not in fact answering every prayer of a depressed or misunderstanding believer; we can likely look back in our own lives and see examples of this. The exiles experienced God’s "rod" (s:w. <a href='B:310 3:1'>Lam 3:1</a>), and only those who passed beneath it could enter the restored Kingdom (s:w. <a href='B:330 20:37'>Eze 20:37</a>). The desire to not experience the rod was therefore precluding a necessary step towards entrance into the Kingdom.</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>Let His terror not make me afraid-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Job repeats this fear in <a href='B:220 13:21'>Job 13:21</a>, and Elihu alludes to it when he uses the same phrase in assuring Job that his terror will not make Job afraid (<a href='B:220 33:7'>Job 33:7</a>). The terror is perhaps "the terror of the Lord", the fear of condemnation at the last day (so Paul uses the phrase, <a href='B:540 5:11'>2Co 5:11</a>). That terror should "persuade men" to accept grace, Paul argues. To have that terror unexperienced by men would mean they had no persuasion toward grace.</p>


text:
<p> then I would speak, and not fear Him; but I am not in such a position within myself- LXX "So shall I not be afraid, but I will speak: for I am not thus conscious of guilt". The ambiguity of the original is perhaps intentional; for Job teeters between accepting his sinfulness, and yet claiming he is without sin. See on :15 for another example.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> My soul is weary of my life. I will give free course to my complaint. I will speak in the bitterness of my soul-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Job fell into the trap of thinking that his terrible situation somehow allowed him to speak whatever words came into his head. Job felt he hadn’t been ‘fed’ and so he was entitled to “bray” and “low” over his misfortune (<a href='B:220 6:5'>Job 6:5</a>). Because of the weight of his sufferings, he thereby justified the fact that "Therefore have my words been rash (<a href='B:220 6:3'>Job 6:3</a>). Likewise “Therefore I will not refrain my mouth; I will speak in the anguish of my spirit” (<a href='B:220 7:11'>Job 7:11</a>). “I will give free course to my complaint. I will speak in the bitterness of my soul” (<a href='B:220 10:1'>Job 10:1</a> RV). Zophar criticizes Job being “full of talk” and speaking “the multitude of words”, “for thou sayest, my doctrine is pure” (<a href='B:220 11:1-4'>Job 11:1-4</a>)- as if Job felt that because he held true doctrine he was justified in pouring out words as he did. “Why should I not be impatient?” (<a href='B:220 21:4'>Job 21:4</a> RV). “Today is my complaint bitter. My stroke is heavier than my groaning” (<a href='B:220 23:2'>Job 23:2</a>)- i:e. his complaining was due to his sufferings. “If I hold my peace, I shall give up the spirit” (<a href='B:220 13:19'>Job 13:19</a> RVmg:). Job felt that the situation he was in forced him to use the words he did, and certainly justified it [we may well have used this reasoning ourselves when justifying the use of bad language]. But in the end, Elihu on God’s behalf rebuked him for his wrong words. And Job himself recognized: “I am vile. I will lay mine hand upon my mouth” in regret of his words (<a href='B:220 40:4'>Job 40:4</a>). “Wherefore I loathe my words and repent” (<a href='B:220 42:6'>Job 42:6</a> RVmg:). He realized his mistake: he had thought that the situation justified his words. Now he hung his head and admitted that there was no justification for speaking in the way he had. Especially in the matter of the tongue, we can so easily justify ourselves; ‘I only said / did it [or didn’t do it] because</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>’. And it is all so child-like. Once we leave off all attempts at self-justification, we will face up to our sins.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> I will tell God, ‘Do not condemn me. Show me why You contend with me-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> This somewhat contradicts Job's earlier statements in Job 9 that he is indeed a sinner and therefore fears condemnation. He knows, therefore, why he is worthy of condemnation; but his underlying sense that he is in fact innocent keeps coming out. And this is something we probably can identify with; it is one thing to admit that "I am a sinner", or "We are all sinners"; but quite another to accept the consequences and meaning of that, when compared to society we may appear very righteous.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Is it good to You that You should oppress, that You should despise the work of Your hands, and smile on the counsel of the wicked?-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Job felt despised or cast away by God (<a href='B:220 10:14'>Job 10:14</a>) just as the exiles did, but this wasn't the case; God will not despise or cast away His servant people (<a href='B:220 36:5'>Job 36:5</a>; <a href='B:290 41:9'>Isa 41:9</a>; <a href='B:300 31:37'>Jer 31:37</a>; <a href='B:300 33:26'>Jer 33:26</a>). The grace of it all was that although he wanted to cast away his life (<a href='B:220 7:16'>Job 7:16</a>; <a href='B:220 9:21'>Job 9:21</a>), just as God’s people cast away His covenant (<a href='B:290 8:6'>Isa 8:6</a>; <a href='B:290 30:12'>Isa 30:12</a>; <a href='B:300 6:19'>Jer 6:19</a>), God would not cast away His people in their exile and depression (s:w. <a href='B:30 26:44'>Lev 26:44</a>), even if they cast him away.</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>Here again we see that Job's depression leads him to charge God foolishly. He clearly does not smile on wicked counsel, nor does He despise people. We marvel the more at God’s final statement that Job had spoken rightly about Him (<a href='B:220 42:7-8'>Job 42:7-8</a>). That Divine comment may indeed simply be upon Job's statement of repentance. But all the same, we would expect God to clarify that was what He intended, and to offer some note that Job has indeed falsely accused Him. But God doesn't. He doesn't need to. He has completely justified Job by faith, clothing him with imputed righteousness. And His demonstration of His ways has in any case made the required point, and Job recognized that.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Do You have eyes of flesh? Or do You see as man sees?-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> As explained on :5,6, these desires Job had were in a sense legitimate; and they set him up to yearn for a person exactly like the Lord Jesus. The exiles' demand that God be like this was partly answered in the vision of the cherubim, which were covered with a body or "flesh" full of "eyes" (<a href='B:330 10:12'>Eze 10:12</a>). This was to teach that God was in fact legitimately aware of the human perspective of His people in exile.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Are Your days as the days of mortals, or Your years as man’s years-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> LXX "Or is thy life human?". It was to be, in the person of His Son. See on :6.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> that You inquire after my iniquity, and search after my sin?-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> The Lord Jesus can execute judgment upon human sin exactly because He is and was "Son of man" (<a href='B:500 5:27'>Joh 5:27</a>); He is the answer to Job's complaint in :5 LXX "Is thy life human?". Job's questions and struggles set him up to need and appreciate the Lord Jesus, although Job died without having seen Him, although probably believing in His future appearance.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Although You know that I am not wicked, there is no one who can deliver out of Your hand-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> This appears to contradict Job's apparent awareness of sin in Job 9. He later confesses his sin; but here he seems to expect God to accept his own view of himself. He was effectively casting God in his own human image and likeness rather than the other way around. Or we could consider the possibility that Job is trying to force a difference between his being a sinner, but not being "wicked", i:e. 'extremely sinful' by the norms of society. This false difference is tackled by Paul in Romans 1-8 and Job at the end repents, realizing that no such gradation of sin is ultimately acceptable.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Your hands have framed me and fashioned me altogether, yet You swallow me up-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> GNB "Your hands formed and shaped me, and now those same hands destroy me". This was indeed what happened at the destruction of Judah by God through Babylon; see on <a href='B:300 18:8-10'>Jer 18:8-10</a>. It was unreasonable of both Job and the exiles to consider that because they were God’s created people, therefore they were somehow immune from judgment. Job believed that it was God who was seeking to swallow him up in death (<a href='B:220 10:8'>Job 10:8</a> Heb:) – surely alluding to how Mot, the god of death, was thought to have jaws encompassing the earth and swallowing up people at their death into the underworld. But Job rejected that myth – he saw God as the swallower, and death as a return to the dust, albeit in hope of bodily resurrection at the last day (<a href='B:220 19:25-27'>Job 19:25-27</a>). See on <a href='B:220 26:6'>Job 26:6</a>.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Remember, I beg You, that You have fashioned me as clay. Will You bring me into dust again?-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> As noted on :8, it was unreasonable of both Job and the exiles to consider that because they were God’s created people, therefore they were somehow immune from judgment. A connection is made between Job and Adam here. This is <a href='B:10 3:19'>Gen 3:19</a> - the curse upon sinful Adam that he would return to the dust. Job seems to be admitting that he is like Adam in that it appeared God was going to end his life as a result of his sin- return him to the dust. But he reasons that this is unfair, seeing he has not sinned (<a href='B:220 10:7'>Job 10:7</a>; <a href='B:220 10:14-15'>Job 10:14-15</a>). Thus he oscillates between saying he has sinned and is like Adam, and then claiming that although he is being treated like Adam this is unfair. See on <a href='B:220 9:17'>Job 9:17</a>; <a href='B:220 13:20-22'>Job 13:20-22</a>.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Haven’t You poured me out like milk, and curdled me like cheese?-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> The original is obscure. Hence GNB: "You gave my father strength to beget me; you made me grow in my mother's womb". Again, as noted on :8,9, Job appears to consider that his being human, having been created by God, means that it is unreasonable of God to find fault with him. This again is leading us up to the final revelation of God, where all such justifications of sin and minimalizing of Divine judgment are taken away.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> You have clothed me with skin and flesh, and knit me together with bones and sinews-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> "Knit me together" is the same word as "hedge" when satan complains that God has made a hedge about Job (<a href='B:220 1:10'>Job 1:10</a>). Job appears to be aware of the conversation between the satan and the Lord. It therefore makes sense to understand that the gathering of the sons of God and 'satan' was a gathering of the people of God, including the friends and Job, and the conversation was heard by all. Job is therefore saying that actually the only hedge or fence he has is his own physical body. In <a href='B:220 3:23'>Job 3:23</a> and <a href='B:220 19:8'>Job 19:8</a> this hedging seems to be interpreted as a feeling of spiritual restriction- as if like Paul, Job yearned to be released from this body of sin and corruption to "the glorious (spiritual) liberty of the sons of God". Job seems to be saying 'You say&nbsp; I'm hedged about with blessings. But now the only hedge I've got is this sick body. The only help you give me now is to give me my spirit to keep me alive, only so you can torment me more'. Understandable, if faulty, reasoning in Job's situation.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> You have granted me life and grace. Your visitation has preserved my spirit-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> This is the kind of oscillation of feeling which is characteristic of depression. One moment Job sees God as unreasonable, the next, he appreciates the gift of life which he has been saying he doesn't want; and appreciates grace, and that it is God’s special and conscious "visitation" which keeps him alive every moment. Divine "visitation" is an idea used for judgment (<a href='B:300 11:23'>Jer 11:23</a>; <a href='B:300 23:12'>Jer 23:12</a>; <a href='B:300 46:21'>Jer 46:21</a> etc:). If Job understood it that way, he is coming to see the paradox later made explicit at the end of the book- that the wrath of God is the love of God, His judgment is in fact the preservation of life for those who respond to it; it is in fact His grace. And chesed is the word that features in the description of the promises to Abraham as "mercy and truth" (<a href='B:10 24:14'>Gen 24:14</a>; <a href='B:10 24:27'>Gen 24:27</a> etc:).</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Yet You hid these things in Your heart. I know that this is with You-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> LXX "Having these things in thyself, I know that thou canst do all things; for nothing is impossible with thee". Job at the end was to repeat these words in <a href='B:220 42:2'>Job 42:2</a>, but really understanding and meaning them as a result of his sufferings.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> If I sin, then You mark me. You will not acquit me from my iniquity-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Job feels here like Cain (<a href='B:10 4:15'>Gen 4:15</a>; see on <a href='B:220 11:15'>Job 11:15</a>), marked for his sin and unable to just die as he perhaps initially wanted. Still Job is far from the total confession of sin and repentance which he finally comes to; he accepts he is a sinner, but seem to always qualify it, putting it under some question, and accuses God of unjustly punishing him for sin. But the Hebrew translated "mark" is the common word for 'keeping', e.g. "the way to the tree of life" (<a href='B:10 3:24'>Gen 3:24</a>). Perhaps Job is lamenting that God still keeps him alive and doesn't let him die.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> If I am wicked, woe to me. If I am righteous, I still shall not lift up my head, being filled with disgrace, and conscious of my affliction-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Perhaps Job has in mind the two possible outcomes of his final judgment; the "woe" of condemnation if indeed he is finally judged wicked, and yet the "disgrace" he would still feel if declared righteous. We see here how he has no clear faith in salvation at this point, and dislikes the way future salvation has to come through accepting "disgrace". The final revelation of God at the end elicits both his disgrace, and also his final acceptance that God has counted him as righteous. "Righteous" is the word for "just", used in the common question and theme of the book: "How can a man be just with God?" (<a href='B:220 4:17'>Job 4:17</a>; <a href='B:220 9:2'>Job 9:2</a>). What Job had to recognize was that righteousness was a gift from God by grace, and by attempting to establish his own righteousness according to his works, he was effectively condemning God (s:w. <a href='B:220 40:8'>Job 40:8</a>). We can also reason that Job's confusion is because even if he is personally righteous, he still will feel the "disgrace" or shame of condemnation- the very term used of the "disgrace" of Israel in their condemnation and rejection (<a href='B:300 13:26'>Jer 13:26</a>; <a href='B:350 4:7'>Hos 4:7</a> etc:). And again we see the representative nature of Job as the suffering servant. He was righteous, but bore the shame / disgrace of Judah's condemnation. This confused and depressed him, but the Lord learnt from this; feeling our condemnation on account of His total identity with us, and yet being personally righteous.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> If my head is held high, You hunt me like a lion. Again You show Yourself wonderful to me-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> As noted on :15, Job struggles with what seem contradictory movements of God toward him. On one hand, he is hunted as prey being chased by a lion; but then this same God, manifest through the lion, shows tender grace to him. And again, this is how things were to be with the representative suffering servant. It was God’s people who were hunted by God, acting like a lion manifest in Babylon / Assyria. And yet that same God was "wonderful to me" personally, for Job was a righteous man. It was only when he was called upon to pray for his friends and to save them that he appreciated this; and thereby became established as a wonderful prototype of the Lord Jesus.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> You renew Your witnesses against me, and increase Your indignation on me. Changes and warfare are within me-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> This continues the theme of :16, that one moment God shows Himself "wonderful to me", and the next, He has Job in the dock calling all manner of witnesses against him, and reading out the judgment of His "indignation". And this "change" or tension, this struggle or "warfare", was "within me", deeply absorbed into Job's struggling soul. The Lord Jesus generally appeared to have none of this, until the final struggling appeal "My God, why have You forsaken me?", 'Me, the righteous one' (<a href='B:470 27:46'>Mat 27:46</a>). That struggle is shown resolved in Job.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'>‘Why, then, have You brought me forth out of the womb? I wish I had given up the spirit, and no eye had seen me-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> This despising of his own life was because (as explained on :15-18), Job had yet to appreciate that his sufferings were not just for himself; they were because he was representative of others, and his prayer for the friends would be for their salvation. This is Paul's message in 2 Corinthians 1 - that suffering is in order for us to help others, and to mediate to them the grace God gives us in our sufferings. But without that sharing further, suffering is perceived by the sufferer as solely personal. And they therefore wish to die, because suffering for our own sake seems pointless. And so the simplistic explanation of the book of Job to the effect that 'through suffering Job became a better man' is missing the point, and is a one cent answer to million dollar questions.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> I should have been as though I had not been. I should have been carried from the womb to the grave-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Job doesn't wait to hear the answer to his question to God of :18- Why…? had he been born. The answer to that was that he was to become a representative sufferer who would be prepared for a point where he could pray for his friends and save them. Without this aspect of evangelism, of pastoral effect upon others, then all human experience and suffering, even life itself, is ultimately meaningless.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Aren’t my days few? Cease then. Leave me alone, that I may find a little comfort-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Job didn’t want comfort, he wanted God to leave him alone; and this was just how the exiles felt, in effect. Hence the message of the restoration prophets was that God’s people were to be comforted (<a href='B:290 40:1'>Isa 40:1</a> etc:). By grace, God didn’t answer Job's request, and pushed forward His saving plan with him, as He sought to do with the exiles. These words were later on the lips of David (<a href='B:230 39:10-13'>Psa 39:10-13</a>), perhaps at the time of his illness after his sin with Bathsheba. But that period was the one when he wrote the Psalms which are most clearly prophetic of the feelings of the Lord Jesus upon the cross. And Job was being led toward the spirit of Christ.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> before I go where I shall not return from, to the land of darkness and of the shadow of death-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> At this point Job has apparently no faith in a resurrection. But already he has reasoned that the suffering of the righteous means that there must be a day of future judgment, involving personal resurrection. And by <a href='B:220 19:25-27'>Job 19:25-27</a> he is clear about this. His faith, like ours, went up and down in the short term, but progressing towards the final acceptance of Divine salvation, grace and restoration at the end.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> the land dark as midnight, of the shadow of death, without any order, where the light is as midnight’- The lack of "order" and darkness suggests a return to the situation as described before the creation of Genesis 1. Job is failing to perceive that his 'decreation' or 'uncreation', like the destruction of Judah's kingdom and temple, was all a necessary prelude to the new creation promised in the restoration prophecies. And it was the essence of that which Job experienced in his own restoration. And this is why</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'><a href='B:220 12:22'>Job 12:22</a> is such a significant breakthrough in Job's thinking, when he starts to accept that "He uncovers deep things out of darkness, and brings out to light the shadow of death".</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Then Zophar the Naamathite responded-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> He comes over as angry and arrogant, as if he really hates Job. He doesn't specifically answer Job's arguments nor even cite them very much. I noted on <a href='B:220 1:6'>Job 1:6</a> that Job's "friends" appear to become associated with the actual actions of the "Satan", and Zophar's anger with Job would confirm that conclusion.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Shouldn’t the multitude of words be answered? Should a man full of talk be justified?-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> The idea may be that Job was wrong to justify his much talking by saying that it was inevitable because of the greatness of his suffering; see on <a href='B:220 10:1'>Job 10:1</a>. Job was not to assume that his wild talking was simply not culpable, just because he was suffering and depressed. And again, there is some abiding truth in that. And God finally demonstrates that Job is "justified" by grace, and not by his words.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Should your boastings make men hold their peace? When you mock, shall no man make you ashamed?-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> LXX "Be not a speaker of many words", alluded to by James when he urges is not to be "many teachers" (<a href='B:660 3:1'>Jas 3:1</a>). See on <a href='B:220 10:1'>Job 10:1</a>. The friends mix elements of truth (as noted on :2) with unreasonable exaggeration of Job's weaknesses and positions. He has not so far come over as 'mocking', but that was how Job was perceived by the friends; just as our holding of alternative positions can be wrongly read as 'boasting' and 'mocking'.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> For you say, ‘My doctrine is pure. I am clean in Your eyes’-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> As noted on :1, Zophar attacks Job according to Zophar's own perceptions of him, the image of "Job" he had developed in his mind, rather than reality. As noted on :1, unlike Eliphaz he doesn't actually engage with what Job says. And he is typical of many who engage in supposed 'dialogue' today. Job has only said that even if he were to cleanse himself (implying he felt unclean), then God would not accept him (<a href='B:220 9:30'>Job 9:30</a>). The friends begin with the suspicion that Job is being judged for sin; and so their wrong theological position [that sin brings immediate Divine judgment and loss of previous blessing] leads them to interpersonal problems, and an overall negative view of their brother Job, seeking to perceive fault in everything he said or had ever done.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> But oh that God would speak, and open His lips against you-</p><p> In the end, all the participants in the dialogue get what they ask for- God’s open revelation. But it was not what any of them expected. And the opening of God’s lips was against the friends, and not against Job.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> that He would show you the secrets of wisdom! For true wisdom has two sides-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> This was finally true for them all. Both Job and the friends say many true things, but they fail to see there was 'another side' to those truths; just as so many do today.</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>Know therefore that God exacts of you less than your iniquity deserves-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Connecting with how Ezra confesses that the exiles and all Judah had been punished less than their sins deserved (<a href='B:150 9:13'>Ezr 9:13</a>). Zophar likely implies that Job's huge sins (reflected in his massive judgments) really deserved death, and the fact Job was still alive meant that he was being punished less than deserved. And so it was with Judah. God had not destroyed them as a people, He had not taken their collective life; and this meant that they were being punished less than their sins deserved. And yet they, like Job, considered they were being punished and judged disproportionately. The resolution of that was in accepting their sins and the justice and grace of God’s judgment of them, as Job finally did at the end.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Can you fathom the mystery of God?-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> This again is true so far as it stands, but Zophar uses this truth wrongly. He implies that any attempt to understand God’s ways was therefore wrong; and yet he dogmatically proceeds with his own attempts to fathom the mystery of God. Paul has this verse in mind in <a href='B:520 11:33'>Rom 11:33</a>, where he declares that the "mystery of God" (<a href='B:520 11:25'>Rom 11:25</a>) is in His saving grace which cannot be fathomed by us. And that was the declaration of the "mystery of God" which is finally made at the end of the book of Job.</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>Or can you probe the limits of the Almighty?-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Job sought to "probe" (AV "find out") the Almighty (<a href='B:220 23:3'>Job 23:3</a>; <a href='B:220 28:12'>Job 28:12</a>), whereas Elihu appears to agree with Zophar that "the Almighty" cannot be 'found out' (<a href='B:220 11:7'>Job 11:7</a>; <a href='B:220 37:23'>Job 37:23</a>). God’s own appearance at the end is perhaps an answer to this. He cannot be 'found out' by intellectual argument or personal righteousness. Instead, He 'finds out' people and saves them by grace. Paul expresses the same idea when he writes that it is not so much a case of man 'knowing God', but rather of being "known of God" by grace (<a href='B:550 4:9'>Gal 4:9</a>):&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> They are high as heaven. What can you do? They are deeper than Sheol. What can you know?-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> As discussed on :7, it is indeed true that we cannot "know" God by intellectual argument or personal righteousness. And that lesson abides. And yet on the other hand, 'knowing' God in the Hebraic sense of 'having a relationship with' is absolutely possible, and is what God seeks with men. However it is possible that Zophar uses the idea of 'heaven and sheol' as it is used in the only other two Biblical occurrences of the phrase (<a href='B:230 139:8'>Psa 139:8</a>; <a href='B:370 9:2'>Amo 9:2</a>)- where it means that one cannot escape God by going above heaven or deeper than sheol. Jonah, representative of the exiles, tried to do this and failed.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Its measure is longer than the earth, and broader than the sea-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> God’s ways are further or longer than the eretz, a word often used specifically of the land promised to Abraham. There is the hint here that the final wisdom of God was connected with a plan of global salvation, and was not limited to any single territory. This had special relevance to the captives in Babylon and Assyria, some of them now outside the eretz; and it also speaks to their tendency towards racial elitism, as if Israel were the only people God was willing to have relationship with. The prophets therefore speak of the restored people of God as being multiethnic, and His kingdom as universal and not any longer only based in the eretz of Israel.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> If He passes by, or confines-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> "Confines" is the word used of the shutting up or confining of the exiles in captivity (<a href='B:300 13:19'>Jer 13:19</a>; <a href='B:310 2:7'>Lam 2:7</a>; <a href='B:370 6:8'>Amo 6:8</a>).</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>Or convenes a court, then who can oppose Him?-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> This again has abiding truth- because we cannot simply get out of our relationship with God by as it were not turning up in court.</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>The dramatic story of Job thrice uses the same phrase as in <a href='B:290 43:13'>Isa 43:13</a>, concluding that "who can hinder…?" God’s way (<a href='B:220 9:12'>Job 9:12</a>; <a href='B:220 11:10'>Job 11:10</a>; <a href='B:220 23:13'>Job 23:13</a>). The exiles were to understand that no human opposition or discouragement can turn back or hinder God’s purpose to save His people, even if they are as Job in suffering. His saving and restorative purpose will not be hindered, if we wish to identify with it.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> For He knows false men. He sees iniquity also, even though He doesn’t consider it-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> AV "will He not then consider it?", as if God is aware of all sin, and will "consider" it in judgment. Zophar and the friends seem to think that this judgment is going on in Job's life, whereas Job is correctly driven to understand that judgment must be yet future.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> An empty-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>headed man becomes wise when a man is born as a wild donkey’s colt-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> The idea seems to be that a&nbsp; stubborn and untamed man like Job, similar to a wild donkey's colt, can still become wise- if he repents (:13). Zophar is misreading Job, but he is correct to understand the true wisdom as being in repentance. Job's vain search for wisdom in Job 28 finally comes to an end when he repents and thereby 'finds' God. Even wrong argumentation and false accusation can be used by God to bring us closer to His truth, through the process of our working it through and rejecting it.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> If you set your heart aright, stretch out your hands toward Him-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> As noted on :4, Zophar's wrong theology [his assumption that Job must have sinned to be suffering as he now was] led him to judge the state of Job's heart, as being not "set aright". And it is exactly this wrongful judgment of human hearts which arises from an insistence in believing that we can attach meaning to event in the lives of others; and this is effectively to play God.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> If iniquity is in your hand, put it far away. Don’t let unrighteousness dwell in your tents-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Clearly an oblique reference to the family "tents" of Job having been smitten because of the unrighteousness there. Job's children were indeed sinners, it would appear. For they were struck down by "the fire of God". But Zophar is reasoning that one man, Job, can be responsible for the sins of his family. But God works with individuals, and all Job's regular sacrifices for the sins of his children were revealed as irrelevant. For God deals with individuals.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Surely then you shall lift up your face without spot; yes, you shall be steadfast, and shall not fear-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Zophar possibly recognized that Job was like Cain in that his countenance had fallen and he was so angry, although also fearful of God (<a href='B:10 4:5'>Gen 4:5</a>); Job has already seen himself as Cain (<a href='B:220 10:14'>Job 10:14</a>). See on <a href='B:220 13:27'>Job 13:27</a>; <a href='B:220 16:17-18'>Job 16:17-18</a>; <a href='B:220 31:39'>Job 31:39</a>. Job has argued that even if he were righteous, still he could not lift up his face without spot and without fear. Zophar fails to realize that it was quite possible for Job to be personally righteous, and yet to experience all the sufferings and feelings of the sinful, condemned people of God. The idea of being "without spot" before God is picked up in the New Testament. We can be like this (<a href='B:560 5:27'>Eph 5:27</a>; <a href='B:680 3:14'>2Pe 3:14</a>) but only "in His sight", because the righteousness of His spotless Son has been imputed to us by grace through faith (<a href='B:650 9:14'>Heb 9:14</a>; <a href='B:670 1:19'>1Pe 1:19</a>).</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> for you shall forget your misery. You shall remember it as waters that are passed away-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> The exiles likewise could be restored so that their sufferings were seen as the waters of Noah which had passed away (<a href='B:290 54:9'>Isa 54:9</a>), and would forget the days of their misery. "Misery" is the word translated "travail" regarding the sufferings of the suffering servant (<a href='B:290 53:11'>Isa 53:11</a>). That figure is undoubtedly based upon Job as prototype.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Life shall be clearer than the noonday. Though there is darkness, it shall be as the morning-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Again, there is some level of truth in all this. This is what repentance could lead to. And the language is exactly that of the joyful dawn which could have come for the exiles, brought forth out of the darkness of captivity in Babylon. Job experienced this in his restoration, but the exiles failed to follow his path.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> You shall be secure, because there is hope. Yes, you shall search, and shall take your rest in safety-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Again, the language of the restoration prophets concerning the lying down of the returned exiles in safety with none making them afraid (<a href='B:290 14:30'>Isa 14:30</a>; <a href='B:350 2:18'>Hos 2:18</a>).</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Also you shall lie down, and none shall make you afraid-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Exactly the language of how Judah could be restored, if they repented and accepted the new covenant (<a href='B:330 34:14-15'>Eze 34:14-15</a>; <a href='B:300 33:12'>Jer 33:12</a>).</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>Yes, many shall court your favour-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> LXX "and many shall charge, and make supplication to thee", the language of later Isaiah of how the tables would turn and the Gentiles would make supplication to the restored exiles.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> But the eyes of the wicked shall fail-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Perhaps Job's health issues included failing eyesight. For here when Zophar speaks of the fate of the wicked, he has Job in view. The very language of the curses to come upon Israel for breaking covenant (<a href='B:30 26:16'>Lev 26:16</a>), experienced by them at the Babylonian invasion (<a href='B:310 2:11'>Lam 2:11</a>; <a href='B:310 4:17'>Lam 4:17</a>). The suffering servant experienced this (<a href='B:230 69:3'>Psa 69:3</a> s:w:) as did Job, sharing in the judgment of the condemned although not personally sinning.</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>They shall have no way to flee-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> The judgment upon Judah (s:w. <a href='B:300 25:35'>Jer 25:35</a>; <a href='B:370 2:14'>Amo 2:14</a>).</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>Their hope shall be the giving up of the spirit- This was what Job so hoped for, and Zophar has Job in view all through his description of the death of the wicked. As demonstrated earlier in this verse, the condemnation of the wicked did indeed happen to God’s people, and Job experienced it, whilst being personally innocent. This is the exact situation with the Lord Jesus. He who will dispense condemnation does in fact know what condemnation feels like, because He so identified with condemned humanity.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Then Job answered-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Job now seems angry in this speech, descending at times to sarcasm.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> No doubt, but you are the people, and wisdom shall die with you-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Job is responding to the friends' insistence that Job stood condemned according to the wisdom of those who had gone before. Job is saying that he doesn't accept that, and that rather the friends are projecting their ideas onto the previous 'wise men', creating those men after their own likeness and mental image. In fact, Job is saying, the friends consider that they themselves are the source of all wisdom, they see themselves as the unequalled pinnacle of wisdom, so great that when they die, so will their wisdom. In other words, their wisdom was just they themselves.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> But I have understanding as well as you; I am not inferior to you. Yes, who doesn’t know such things as these?-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Job refused to take false guilt and to be pushed down by men. Our opinion is a priori as valid as that of any other believer, no matter how they seek to shore it up allusion to other sages.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> I am like one who is a joke to his neighbour, because I called on God, and He answered. The just, the blameless man is a joke-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> The restoration prophet Jeremiah quoted this about himself (<a href='B:300 20:7'>Jer 20:7</a>; <a href='B:310 3:14'>Lam 3:14</a> s:w:), as representative of Judah in captivity, who were mocked [s:w. 'joked at') daily (<a href='B:300 48:27'>Jer 48:27</a> s:w:) by their neighbours, the Babylonians and the peoples of their confederacy.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> In the thought of him who is at ease there is contempt for misfortune. It is ready for them whose foot slips-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Suffering is intended to produce empathy with others; as 2 Corinthians 1 makes clear, this is a large reason for our experience of suffering. Job is realizing this; that there can be no empathy with the suffering from those who haven't suffered. And thus he was being led towards realizing that his sufferings were not just for himself, but were to be used to comfort others. And those "others" were the friends, whom he was to save by his forgiveness and prayers for them. LXX "For it had been ordained that he should fall under others at the appointed time, and that his houses should be spoiled by transgressors"- connecting with the destruction of the great houses of Jerusalem by the Babylonians (<a href='B:300 52:13'>Jer 52:13</a>).</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> The tents of robbers prosper. Those who provoke God are secure, who carry their God in their hands-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Job makes several references to the arguments of the satan in his replies to the friends; as if they were in fact the satan, and as if he knew perfectly well what they had said to Yahweh. Thus he tells the friends that those who provoke God are secure, whereas the satan had suggested that Job would provoke God to His face if his security was taken away. Job says that such people who provoke God have all things given into their hand by Yahweh; and it is hard not to see in this a reference to the satan, into whose hand Job had been delivered. It was as if Job was saying to them: 'You are the ones who have provoked God, you are the ones into whose hand God has delivered me; so actually you are the wicked, not me'. For more connections between the friends and the satan, see on <a href='B:220 1:6'>Job 1:6</a>.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> But ask the animals now, and they shall teach you; the birds of the sky, and they shall tell you-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> At the end of the book, we are told that it is God who not only created Behemoth, but can effortlessly control him in accord with His purpose. That’s the comfort of the message. Indeed the descriptions of the natural world which lead up to the Leviathan / Behemoth passages are there to underline this point; and it’s interesting that those passages zoom in upon the cruelties and even brutalities within nature. Yet these are all of God’s ultimate design and creation, and under His providential control. Job had earlier perceived this; for he responds to the friends’ allusions to an evil ‘Satan’ figure as the source of his suffering by observing: “Ask the animals... The birds of the air... [they show that] the hand of the Lord [and not any supernatural ‘Satan’] has done this” (<a href='B:220 12:7-9'>Job 12:7-9</a>). Job himself turned to the natural creation for lessons, and so God’s final appeal to that same creation was only really leading him further from where he had already arrived.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Or speak to the earth, and it shall teach you. The fish of the sea shall declare to you-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> "Declare" is literally 'to number'. Job's idea was that one had only to look at the natural creation, and they would 'number up' the extent of God’s activity. But later Job has to be taught that man cannot number up these things (s:w. <a href='B:220 38:37'>Job 38:37</a>; <a href='B:220 39:2'>Job 39:2</a>). They could not be numbered by man, but only by God. This is the same word used in the restoration prophecy of <a href='B:300 38:22'>Jer 38:22</a>: "As the host of the sky cannot be numbered, nor the sand of the sea measured", so God’s grace would be poured out in restoring His people. Job was being taught the same lesson. He finally believed it, but the exiles generally didn’t, and so their restoration didn’t happen after the pattern of Job's.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Who doesn’t know that in all these, the hand of Yahweh has done this-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Satan asks God: "Put forth Your hand". The hand of God is an Angelic phrase. God agrees- "he is in your hand" (:6). Thus Satan's hand is God’s hand, which in practice was articulated through an Angel. Job seems to emphasize the place of God’s hand in bringing his trials- <a href='B:220 2:5-6'>Job 2:5-6</a>; <a href='B:220 2:10'>Job 2:10</a>; <a href='B:220 6:9'>Job 6:9</a>; <a href='B:220 10:7'>Job 10:7</a>; <a href='B:220 13:21'>Job 13:21</a>; <a href='B:220 19:21'>Job 19:21</a>; <a href='B:220 27:11'>Job 27:11</a> AVmg; 28:9. Job in <a href='B:220 12:9'>Job 12:9</a> feels that in the same way as God’s hand had created the natural creation- and the Angels did this- so that same Angelic hand was upon him for evil. "By His Spirit (God makes His Angels spirits) He hath garnished the Heavens; His hand hath formed the crooked serpent" (<a href='B:220 26:13'>Job 26:13</a>). Thus Job associates God’s Spirit with His hand, which is Satan's hand. It seems far more fitting that this hand and spirit should be Angelic rather than human. For no one human being could bring these sufferings upon Job. The human Satan, the fellow worshipper, was reflected in an Angel in the court of Heaven. Again, it was Angelic work that formed the Heavens. Job recognized that his trials came from the hand of God, but knew that His hand would not kill him- "with Thy strong hand Thou opposest Thyself against me... howbeit He will not stretch out His hand to (bring me to) the grave" (<a href='B:220 30:21'>Job 30:21</a>; <a href='B:220 30:24'>Job 30:24</a> AV). This was exactly the brief given to satan- to try Job, but "preserve his life". The hand of God creating evil (<a href='B:220 2:10-11'>Job 2:10-11</a>) must surely refer to God’s "Angels of evil" (<a href='B:230 78:49'>Psa 78:49</a>) rather than to man- in the restoration context, the people and Cyrus had to be taught that no one except God (including human satans!) created evil (<a href='B:290 45:5-7'>Isa 45:5-7</a>).</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> in whose hand is the life of every living thing, and the breath of all mankind?-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> As noted on :9, this alludes to God’s command to the Satan: "He [Job] is in your hand". But Job insists that he is in God’s hand. He is labouring this point (:9), because he is perhaps answering the implication of the friends that he has sinned and is therefore in the hands of some cosmic evil being, out of God’s control.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Doesn’t the ear try words, even as the palate tastes its food?-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> The idea is that truth should not just be accepted because the source is an old or reputedly wise man (:12). For even their wisdom is nothing compared with God’s (:13). Job is looking for truth to come from direct revelation from God rather than through the wisdom of men. And that desire appears frustrated by God’s apparent silence. But all this builds up towards the final wonder of God Himself appearing and speaking at the end of the book.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> With aged men is wisdom, in length of days understanding-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> See on :11. Job may be being sarcastic here, and perhaps we could put a question mark at the end of this sentence. For to predicate wisdom upon years lived becomes laughable compared, therefore, to the wisdom of the God who is from everlasting (:13). Therefore Job is looking for truth to come from direct revelation from God rather than through the wisdom of men. And that desire appears frustrated by God’s apparent silence. But all this builds up towards the final wonder of God Himself appearing and speaking at the end of the book.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> With God is wisdom and might. He has counsel and understanding-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> See on :11,12. Job has complained about God’s apparent silence and failure to speak or dialogue with him throughout all the suffering. But Job doesn't doubt that God does have "counsel and understanding". Again, all this builds up towards the final wonder of God Himself appearing and speaking at the end of the book. Job can be read as implying that he doesn't have "counsel and understanding", but God does. This again makes his representative of Israel under judgment, who were left "without counsel and understanding" (s:w. <a href='B:50 32:28'>Deu 32:28</a>):&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Behold, He breaks down, and it can’t be built again. He imprisons a man, and there can be no release-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Here Job starts to go wrong. Because he feels that at this moment, he has no hope of restoration- therefore he assumes that this is how God is. But this was how the depressed exiles felt. The restoration prophecies speak of release from the prison of captivity, and the broken down Zion being "built again" (<a href='B:300 24:6'>Jer 24:6</a>; <a href='B:300 31:4'>Jer 31:4</a>). The fact Job was 'released' and restored, despite his momentary lack of faith that this were possible, was intended as a pattern for the exiles.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Behold, He withholds the waters, and they dry up. Again, He sends them out, and they overturn the earth-</p><p> &nbsp;The theme of 'drying up' or 'withering' is significant. Bildad considers Job to have been 'dried up' by God’s judgment (<a href='B:220 8:12'>Job 8:12</a>), and the word is used of how God withered or dried up Judah at the hands of their invaders (<a href='B:300 12:4'>Jer 12:4</a>; <a href='B:300 23:10'>Jer 23:10</a>; <a href='B:330 17:9-10'>Eze 17:9-10</a>; <a href='B:330 17:24'>Eze 17:24</a>; <a href='B:450 11:17'>Zec 11:17</a>; <a href='B:310 4:8'>Lam 4:8</a>; <a href='B:290 40:7-8'>Isa 40:7-8</a> - although the prophetic word of God requiring their restoration would endure, despite their drying up). The dry bones of Judah in captivity were withered or dried up (<a href='B:330 37:11'>Eze 37:11</a>). So Job's 'drying up' was again, a sharing in the representative suffering of God’s people. Job's personal response to his 'drying up' was to reflect that God dries up waters and also sends them forth as floods (<a href='B:220 12:15'>Job 12:15</a> s:w:); He can give and He can take, just as Job had initially realized (<a href='B:220 2:10'>Job 2:10</a>). Just as He dried up Job / Israel, so He could abundantly send forth waters; just as He did at the Red Sea. Restoration and salvation was just as easy for Him as destruction, to put it another way. The drying up of Job was also understood by him as referring to his death (<a href='B:220 14:11'>Job 14:11</a>), but God could raise him from the dead and have a desire to him again (<a href='B:220 14:15'>Job 14:15</a>). Eliphaz wrongly argues that the Divine 'drying up' of a person means permanent extinction (<a href='B:220 15:30'>Job 15:30</a>), as does Bildad (<a href='B:220 18:16'>Job 18:16</a>); but Job always sees the 'drying up' as part of a Divine action which also has a counterpart, the pouring out again of waters, or resurrection of the dried up, withered bones. Likewise Judah in captivity thought that their drying up, their dry bones, were incapable of revival (<a href='B:330 37:11'>Eze 37:11</a>); but the message is that they could indeed be revived, and their drying up was but a presage to their eternal revival:&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> With Him is strength and wisdom. The deceived and the deceiver are His-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Job is poetry, and poetry works by using familiar words and images in new ways. Hence myths can be alluded to and used, but in order to present them in a different context and to achieve more powerfully a conclusion rather than just baldly stating it; i:e. that Yahweh is all powerful and that there are actually no abiding realities behind the myths. Thus poetry is an appropriate medium through which to articulate this message. “The deceived and the deceiver are His” is poetry which even comes through somewhat in translation (<a href='B:220 12:16'>Job 12:16</a>). The expectation is that the deceiver is Satan, and God is with or sympathetic to the deceived. But no. Such dualistic expectations are set up, but crushed at the end of the strophe: both deceived and deceiver are God’s. For there is no dualistic cosmos out there. Indeed, "the deceiver" may refer to some superhuman tempter, similar to how many today understand 'Satan'. And Job is saying that God is far more powerful than any such being. Or we can note that the words for "deceived" and "deceiver" are usually used about sin and those leading into sin. Despite all that, God is still there, and His people "are His"; the words are used about spiritually "wandering" Judah in their captivity (<a href='B:330 34:6'>Eze 34:6</a>), who were still "His" in that He would never ultimately reject His people.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> He leads counsellors away stripped. He makes judges fools-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> This was to be seen in the leading away of the leaders of Judah "stripped" in exile, despite their apparent wisdom. Again Job is being driven to the view that God alone has wisdom, as the judges and counsellors represented by the friends simply have no wisdom. As noted on :11-13, all this builds up towards the final wonder of God Himself appearing and speaking at the end of the book.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> He loosens the bond of kings. He binds their waist with a belt-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> LXX "He seats kings upon thrones, and girds their loins with a girdle", exactly the language used of Cyrus. Being a leader was a gift from God which He could give and take at will, according to the wisdom of His own plans, which as yet Job could not perceive, but which was to be revealed at the end of the book.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> He leads priests away stripped, and overthrows the mighty-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> So relevant to the leading into captivity of the priests such as Ezekiel. Job appears to have been a priest for his family, and his overthrow was therefore representative of Judah's; and his path to restoration was to be theirs, if they perceived it. He could not of himself save anyone, only show an example to be followed; as stated explicitly to the exiles in <a href='B:330 14:14'>Eze 14:14</a>; <a href='B:330 14:20'>Eze 14:20</a>. And this is true of us all.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> He removes the speech of those who are trusted, and takes away the understanding of the elders-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> The "trusted" and "elders" are oblique references to the friends. All human wisdom is removed compared to God’s wisdom. But that wisdom is only finally revealed at the end of the book. The lesson of Job is to wait patiently for that, suffering when we cannot assign meaning to event for the moment, in the knowledge that finally there is a Divine wisdom at work through it all.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> He pours contempt on princes, and loosens the belt of the strong-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Job is starting to perceive that God’s style is to radically invert everything. The high are brought low, the humble exalted. This explained why Job had been brought down, and led Job towards an expectation that he the humbled, the weak, would be restored. This theme of radical inversion, the first being last and the last first, is found throughout the restoration prophets, especially Isaiah. The humbled exiles were to see in their humiliation a situation pregnant with hope for restoration.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> He uncovers deep things out of darkness, and brings out to light the shadow of death-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Earlier, Job has longed to go to the darkness of death never to return (<a href='B:220 10:21'>Job 10:21</a>), where "the land [is] dark as midnight, of the shadow of death, without any order, where the light is as midnight’" (<a href='B:220 10:22'>Job 10:22</a>). The lack of "order" and darkness suggests a return to the situation as described before the creation of Genesis 1. Job is failing to perceive that his 'decreation' or 'uncreation', like the destruction of Judah's kingdom and temple, was all a necessary prelude to the new creation promised in the restoration prophecies. And it was the essence of that which Job experienced in his own restoration. And this is why <a href='B:220 12:22'>Job 12:22</a> is such a significant breakthrough in Job's thinking, when he starts to accept that "He uncovers deep things out of darkness, and brings out to light the shadow of death".</p><p>This bringing things to light from darkness is associated with God raising and destroying nations (:23). There is a clear connection with Dan. 2:22 "He reveals deep and hidden things; He knows what is in the darkness and the light dwells with Him". Again we discern relevance to the faithful exiles, like Job suffering from the 'satan', albeit Divinely controlled, having lost all things, and struggling with the whole thing. The engagements of Job with the issue lead him to the conclusion that out of this darkness, Yahweh will bring light, in the very end. And this was what Daniel, one of the faithful exiles, was also led to realize.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> He increases the nations, and He destroys them. He enlarges the nations, and He leads them captive-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> As noted on :21, Job was beginning to perceive that all goes in cycles of exaltation and humiliation, but he is to finally learn that for God’s people, that humiliation is required for them to be exalted and restored as God intends. We too are to humble ourselves under His hand, that we may be exalted in due time. Perhaps Peter had his eye on Job's restoration as he wrote that (<a href='B:670 5:6'>1Pe 5:6</a>). These things are clearly relevant to the captives who were in Babylon, at the hands of an 'enlarged' Babylon which would also be 'destroyed' in due time.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> He takes away understanding from the chiefs of the people of the earth, and causes them to wander in a wilderness where there is no way-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> This is quoted in <a href='B:230 107:40'>Psa 107:40</a> as a summary of the history of Israel, but the Psalm goes on to say that "the poor" of Israel would be "set on high from affliction" (<a href='B:230 107:41'>Psa 107:41</a>). Again Job's experiences were understood by the Psalmist as typical of all Israel.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> They grope in the dark without light. He makes them stagger like a drunken man- Yet this was in fact the experience of Job himself (see on <a href='B:220 5:14'>Job 5:14</a>). Job was experiencing darkness at noon. But in this Job looked ahead to the sufferings of the Lord Jesus on the cross. He like the Lord suffered as a sinner without having personally sinned. Job was representative of sinful Israel under judgment, for to "grope at noonday" was their punishment for breaking the covenant (s:w. <a href='B:50 28:29'>Deu 28:29</a>).</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Behold, my eye has seen all this. My ear has heard and understood it-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> This may be in direct reference to what Job has just said in Job 12, he is saying that he has worked these things out by his own reflections, and this has led him to an understanding which is no less valid than that of the friends. Job would later confess that he has indeed heard of God by the hearing of the ear; but only at the end did he join the dots, to the point where he could say that "now my eye sees You" (<a href='B:220 42:5'>Job 42:5</a>).</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> What you know, I know also. I am not inferior to you-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> As noted on :1, Job is not saying that his knowledge or understanding is identical to that of the friends, but rather that his path to knowledge is no less valid than theirs. "Inferior" is better 'to fall down'. Job may mean that he is not falling down before them, but before God. For he uses the same word in :11 to urge the friends to fall down ['be inferior to'] God, rather than assuming they know His game plan and thereby lifting themselves up above Him.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Surely I would speak to the Almighty. I desire to reason with God-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Job has heard their demand that he turn to God, and he says that indeed he wishes to do so. But he implies that God will not speak to him. All this builds up towards the final wonder of God Himself appearing and speaking at the end of the book.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> But you are forgers of lies. You are all physicians of no value-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> "Physicians" is the same word as "make[rs] whole" in <a href='B:220 5:18'>Job 5:18</a>: "He injures, and His hands make whole". His disillusion with the members of his religion, his brethren, led him to seek the more earnestly to God as the only one whose hands could "make whole" (s:w. "physician").</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Oh that you would be completely silent! Then you would be wise-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> This was true, but Job himself was not being silent. At the end, he puts his hand upon his mouth and is silent (<a href='B:220 40:4'>Job 40:4</a>). When Job finally lays his hand upon his mouth, he is only doing what he had earlier told the friends to do in recognition of their folly (<a href='B:220 13:5'>Job 13:5</a>; <a href='B:220 21:5'>Job 21:5</a>). Through the pain and irritation of their speeches, Job came to value and appreciate the need for silence before God. But it was only when personally confronted by God at the end that he realizes that he too had spoken too much and he repents of that in silence.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Hear now my reasoning. Listen to the pleadings of my lips-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> These appeals to hear and listen may not be simply asking them to hear his words; they may be an appeal to them to hear and repent. This desire for their repentance and understanding builds up within Job as the speeches progress. And again, this is preparing him for the Lord's final request to him- to pray for the friends and bring about their salvation (<a href='B:220 42:8'>Job 42:8</a>).</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Will you speak unrighteously for God, and talk deceitfully for Him?-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> LXX "Do ye not speak before the Lord...", another hint that the friends were represented by the Satan figure of the prologue, who likewise appeared "before the Lord". Job warns them as many need warning today- that they were wrong to express their own gut feelings and assumptions in the name of God, as if they were talking on His behalf. Job differs from them in that he makes no claim to be speaking by Divine inspiration; he is simply bemoaning his lot and trying to reason through it, and that record of his words is noted down in the drama by an inspired writer.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Will you show partiality to Him?-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Perhaps the idea is that they were acting as if God were in the dock, and they were being generous to Him in their judgment of Him.</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>Will you contend for God?-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> God was not contending with Job through the friends as His representatives. The wonder of the final appearance of God is that He Himself appears and contends directly, not through any representatives such as the friends claimed to be.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Is it good that He should search you out? Or as one deceives a man, will you deceive Him?-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> The idea seems to be that if God searched out the friends, they would have to try to deceive Him, lest He find the truth about them. But Job later realizes that God does indeed search out all things (s:w. <a href='B:220 28:27'>Job 28:27</a>). He begins here by saying that if He were to search things out, He would not find a nice scene in the hearts of the friends. But Job moves on to realize that indeed this is what God is doing, on a cosmic scale- searching out all things.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> He will surely reprove you if you secretly show partiality-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> "Reprove" is a legal term, used for legal 'pleading' in court (s:w. <a href='B:220 16:21'>Job 16:21</a>; <a href='B:220 40:2'>Job 40:2</a>). Job clearly considers the friends to be guilty, and we are set up to expect that therefore God is going to open a legal case against the friends. And this is exactly what happens when God finally appears at the end of the book.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Shall not His majesty make you afraid, and His dread fall on you?-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> "Fall" is the same word translated "inferior" in :2: "I am not inferior to you". Job may mean that he is not falling down before them, but before God. For he uses the same word in :11 to urge the friends to fall down ['be inferior to'] God, rather than assuming they know His game plan and thereby are lifting themselves up above Him. At the end of the book, as noted on :10, God does appear in majesty, and they are indeed afraid before Him.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Your memorable sayings are proverbs of ashes, your defences are defences of clay-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> LXX "And your glorying shall prove in the end to you like ashes, and your body like a body of clay". They were bodies of clay; but only through their humiliation at the end of the book would they appreciate this in reality rather than merely as theory. And we see this happening in the events at the end of the book. And it is so with us today; the mortality of man can never be a mere theological proposition. It must be believed and felt, with an appropriate humility, rather than having to be reminded of it through Divine humiliation.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Be silent, leave me alone, that I may speak. Let come on me what will-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> LXX "Be silent, that I may speak, and cease from mine anger". In this case Job is wrongly thinking that his anger is legitimate because once he has blown it all out, he will then be silent. This was wrong, because at the end of the book he lays his hand on his mouth and recognizes that he has spoken wrongly. We too can falsely justify sin or unwise talking on the basis that once we've done it, we will then somehow stop being angry and get over our problem.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Why should I take my flesh in my teeth, and put my life in my hand?-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> The simple sense is as in GNB "I am ready to risk my life". That risk of life was in order to justify himself before God (:15). This was demonstrated at the end as being indeed wrong and punishable by death. Job did indeed risk his life, and was saved from condemnation by grace alone. However, taking "my flesh in my teeth" may be a figure drawn from a wild beast taking its prey in its teeth and carrying it off to safety; meaning therefore 'Why should I seek anxiously to preserve my life?'.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Even if He slays me, still I will trust in Him-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> The language of ‘slaying’ takes us back to the Mosaic commands about how a ‘slayer’ of a man might be killed by the ‘avenger of blood’. Job saw God as slaying him; yet he also sees God as the ‘witness’ in the case (<a href='B:220 16:19'>Job 16:19</a>), and the avenger of Job’s blood (<a href='B:220 19:25'>Job 19:25</a>). Job even asks God to not let the earth cover his blood, so that God as the avenger of Job’s blood may avenge Job’s death (<a href='B:220 16:18'>Job 16:18</a>). Job does not see ‘Satan’ as his slayer, and God as the avenger of his blood. Instead Job – in a quite breathtaking set of associations – sees God in all these things: the slayer, the legal witness to the slayer, the avenger of blood, and the One who will enforce the doing of justice in this case, the One who will not let the earth cover Job’s blood. If Job really believed in a superhuman Satan, in Satan as the bad guy and God as the avenger of the injustice, he surely would’ve expressed himself differently. As Job imagines God as it were taking vengeance on Himself, so he came to portray for all time the way that evil and good are indeed both ultimately from God.</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>"Trust" here is the usual Hebrew word translated to wait or be patient (<a href='B:220 13:15'>Job 13:15</a>; <a href='B:220 14:14'>Job 14:14</a>; <a href='B:220 30:26'>Job 30:26</a>). Even if God slew him, Job would still be patient or wait (<a href='B:220 13:15'>Job 13:15</a>), he would patiently wait for his "change" to come at some point after his death (<a href='B:220 14:14'>Job 14:14</a>), and waited for light to somehow come out of his current darkness (<a href='B:220 30:26'>Job 30:26</a>). This was the legendary "patience of Job" which we are bidden follow (<a href='B:660 5:11'>Jas 5:11</a>). He was impatient, but he was "patient" in the Hebrew sense of enduring in faith; faith that even if things didn’t work out at all in this life, even if God was apparently unfair in this life, he would be finally restored at the resurrection. This was his 'endurance', and it is a parade example for all who struggle with the justice of God and the incomprehensible problem of suffering:&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;Nevertheless, I will justify my ways before Him-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> This was what was the matter with Job, and it was this weakness which was removed from him by Yahweh's final appearance. The connection between the two halves of the verse, and the preceding verse, is that Job was willing to be slain by God for justifying himself before God. And he would die, he says, still trusting in God, but willing to die for the sake of self justification. So many are like this today. To accept God’s justification of us, His imputed righteousness by grace, is so deeply counter instinctive to men.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> This also shall be my salvation-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> LXX "And this shall turn to me for salvation". See on Php_1:19, where this is quoted by Paul. The referent of "this..." is unclear. It could be Job's enduring hope that he would be saved finally, despite life not working out for him in this life (see on :15). This would fit the context in which Paul quotes this in Php_1:19.</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>In that a Godless man shall not come before Him-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Job concludes at this point that he will finally be saved, even though God is apparently against him in this life. And he concludes that therefore he must be Godly and not Godless, seeing no Godless man would be accepted "before Him" finally. Job may be making an oblique reference to how the friends as the "sons of God" came "before Him" in worship (<a href='B:220 1:6'>Job 1:6</a>); but Job implies they would not ultimately do this at the last day. As it happened, Job's intercession for them "before Him" was to mean that they did.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Hear diligently my speech. Let my declaration be in Your ears-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> This may not merely be an appeal for them to pay attention to what he is saying; but rather an appeal for them to "hear" him and repent, taking his appeal deeply within themselves.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> See now, I have set my cause in order. I know that I am righteous-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Job had judged himself, setting in order his legal case ["cause"], but declaring himself righteous (<a href='B:220 13:8'>Job 13:8</a>). By <a href='B:220 23:4'>Job 23:4</a>, Job is realizing that he needs to set his case in order before God; but he can't find God, or get God to engage in this game of judgment. He needed the final appearance of God at the end of the book to review his case, and declare that he is in fact wrong and condemned. But by grace, God will count him as right. He was prepared for this by Elihu's speech in <a href='B:220 37:19'>Job 37:19</a>: "Teach us what we shall tell Him, for we can’t make our case by reason of darkness". "Make our case" is s:w. "set my cause in order".</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Who is he who will contend with me? For then would I hold my peace and give up the spirit-</p><p> Job is challenging anyone to come forward and contend with him in court by proving him wrong. If they did, then he would be silent ["hold my peace"] and willingly die. This of course is exactly what happens at the end. God does contend with Job, and he is proven guilty. He lays his hand upon mouth in silence (<a href='B:220 40:4'>Job 40:4</a>), and we can deduce from his challenge here that he wanted to die. He saw then saved from that position by grace alone. The connection with the exiles is in <a href='B:290 50:8'>Isa 50:8</a>, where a similarly convicted Israel would be justified by Divine grace to the point they could again challenge any to convict them of sin, seeing that "He is near that justifies me".</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>Or we can read this quite differently:&nbsp;“If I hold my peace, I shall give up the spirit” (<a href='B:220 13:19'>Job 13:19</a> RVmg:). Job felt that the situation he was in forced him to use the words he did, and certainly justified it [we may well have used this reasoning ourselves when justifying the use of bad language]. Job fell into the trap of thinking that his terrible situation somehow allowed him to speak whatever words came into his head. Job felt he hadn’t been ‘fed’ and so he was entitled to “bray” and “low” over his misfortune (<a href='B:220 6:5'>Job 6:5</a>). Because of the weight of his sufferings, he thereby justified the fact that "Therefore have my words been rash (<a href='B:220 6:3'>Job 6:3</a>). Likewise “Therefore I will not refrain my mouth; I will speak in the anguish of my spirit” (<a href='B:220 7:11'>Job 7:11</a>). “I will give free course to my complaint. I will speak in the bitterness of my soul” (<a href='B:220 10:1'>Job 10:1</a> RV). Zophar criticizes Job being “full of talk” and speaking “the multitude of words”, “for thou sayest, my doctrine is pure” (<a href='B:220 11:1-4'>Job 11:1-4</a>)- as if Job felt that because he held true doctrine he was justified in pouring out words as he did. “Why should I not be impatient?” (<a href='B:220 21:4'>Job 21:4</a> RV). “Today is my complaint bitter. My stroke is heavier than my groaning” (<a href='B:220 23:2'>Job 23:2</a>)- i:e. his complaining was due to his sufferings. But in the end, Elihu on God’s behalf rebuked him for his wrong words. And Job himself recognized: “I am vile. I will lay mine hand upon my mouth” in regret of his words (<a href='B:220 40:4'>Job 40:4</a>). “Wherefore I loathe my words and repent” (<a href='B:220 42:6'>Job 42:6</a> RVmg:). He realized his mistake: he had thought that the situation justified his words. Now he hung his head and admitted that there was no justification for speaking in the way he had. Especially in the matter of the tongue, we can so easily justify ourselves; ‘I only said / did it [or didn’t do it] because</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>’. And it is all so child-like. Once we leave off all attempts at self-justification, we will face up to our sins.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Only don’t do two things to me; then I will not hide myself from Your face-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> This is so arrogant, to think that he could himself from God. The allusion is to Adam hiding in Eden from God. Job seeks a guarantee from God that he will not be condemned, and then says he will agree to respond to God’s call (:22)- another allusion to Adam, who was 'called' to account by God after his sin. It would appear that Job was recognizing that he had sinned, that he knew that the sense of spiritual limbo he was in paralleled Adam's hiding from God in Eden, but that he would only respond to God’s call and come out of hiding to confess his sin as he knew God wanted him to, if God withdrew His hand- i:e. relieved him of the immediate trials he was then experiencing. Thus Job was trying to barter with God- wanting Him to withdraw the trials in return for Job making the confession which he knew God wanted. See on <a href='B:220 10:9'>Job 10:9</a>; <a href='B:220 9:17'>Job 9:17</a>.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> withdraw Your hand far from me-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> From here to the end of the chapter could be addressed to God, or to the friends. If the latter, then it would appear that Job considers the friends guilty for bringing his sufferings upon him. This would confirm the connection suggested between the friends and the Satan figure. For as soon as Satan is as it were off the stage, the friends appear. See on :20.</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>And don’t let Your terror make me afraid-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Job repeats this fear in <a href='B:220 9:34'>Job 9:34</a>, and Elihu alludes to it when he uses the same phrase in assuring Job that his terror will not make Job afraid (<a href='B:220 33:7'>Job 33:7</a>). The terror is perhaps "the terror of the Lord", the fear of condemnation at the last day (so Paul uses the phrase, <a href='B:540 5:11'>2Co 5:11</a>). That terror should "persuade men" to accept grace, Paul argues. To have that terror unexperienced by men would mean they had no persuasion toward grace.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Then call, and I will answer; or let me speak, and You answer me-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> See on :20. In the end, God does call Job; and he lays his hand upon his mouth in silence. For he has no answer, nor does he desire to speak. For God has already answered him.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> How many are my iniquities and sins? Make me know my disobedience and my sin-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> This seems an arrogant denial of sinfulness and a false accusation of God. Job, like the friends, cannot understand suffering as having any reason apart from sin. And he indignantly insists that he has not sinned. This insistence upon never moving beyond the paradigm whereby suffering reflects sin led Job to thereby falsely accuse God. And we can so easily do the same.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Why do You hide Your face, and hold me for Your enemy?-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> The implication of the argument is that Job had a right to see God’s unhidden face, because God (so Job thinks) cannot convict Job of sin. Cain was hidden from God’s face (s:w. <a href='B:10 4:14'>Gen 4:14</a>); Job again feels he is being treated like Cain, with a mark set upon him (:27); when he is innocent. He totally failed to perceive his sinfulness, and was convicted of it only by the revelation of God at the end- whereby, by grace alone, God no longer hid His face but revealed Himself. God hid His face from the exiles (s:w. <a href='B:50 31:17-18'>Deu 31:17-18</a>; <a href='B:50 32:20'>Deu 32:20</a>; <a href='B:290 8:17'>Isa 8:17</a>; <a href='B:290 54:8'>Isa 54:8</a>; <a href='B:290 59:2'>Isa 59:2</a>; <a href='B:290 64:7'>Isa 64:7</a>; <a href='B:300 33:5'>Jer 33:5</a>; <a href='B:330 39:23'>Eze 39:23</a>), and again, His apparent hiding of His face from Job was not because Job had sinned but because he was suffering as representative of his people.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Will You harass a driven leaf? Will You pursue the dry stubble?-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Job argues that he is so dead and insignificant that God should stop bothering with him. But this is exactly the point- that God is indeed to interested in the dead and insignificant. The leaf driven by the autumn wind and the stubble after harvest being blown away are all pictures of judgment, and again connect Job to the judged people of Judah in captivity.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> For You write bitter things against me, and make me inherit the iniquities of my youth-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> see on <a href='B:220 29:13-14'>Job 29:13-14</a>. Job's denial of sin was to be totally overcome by Yahweh's final appearance. Here he reasons as many do today: 'I am not a sinner, if I did sin, well that was years ago'. We make the passage of years a kind of pseudo atonement for sin. But sin needs atoning, and "just" one sin means death. That is the lesson of Eden.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> You also put my feet in the stocks, and mark all my paths. You set a mark on the soles of my feet-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Job complains that although he is associated with Cain (as in :24), this is not really fair. The mark on him that was a witness wherever he went echoes that which God put on Cain. God’s preservation of Cain from death also finds a parallel in Job's feeling that God is preserving him unnaturally (<a href='B:220 3:21-23'>Job 3:21-23</a>; <a href='B:220 10:9-15'>Job 10:9-15</a>). See on <a href='B:220 11:15'>Job 11:15</a>; <a href='B:220 16:17-18'>Job 16:17-18</a>; <a href='B:220 31:39'>Job 31:39</a>. The exiles felt as Job- marked, unable to die, miraculously preserved, and yet imprisoned in stocks. The restoration prophets have the message of deliverance from the stocks, and paths directed back to Zion- towards a restoration as Job experienced. But most of them refused this and remained in Babylon, and those who did return precluded the fulfilment of the restoration prophecies.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> though I am decaying like a rotten thing, like a garment that is moth-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>eaten- This is parallel in reference to <a href='B:290 50:9'>Isa 50:9</a>: "Behold, all they shall wax old as a garment, the moth shall eat them up". The "they" are any possible adversaries who might bring charges against us. This had particular relevance to all the adversaries to the rebuilding of Jerusalem. With Yahweh justifying the returned exiles, the court room was effectively empty of adversaries, all charges were to be seen in the perspective of God’s ultimate justification of His people (see on <a href='B:290 50:8'>Isa 50:8</a>). These words are also found in <a href='B:220 13:28'>Job 13:28</a>, where it is God who consumes them, as it were manifesting Himself in a tiny moth. We find the same ideas in <a href='B:290 51:6'>Isa 51:6</a>, where the "they" is the 'heavens and earth' of any system, be it Persia / Babylon or an unbelieving Jewish system, which is adversarial to God’s people and purpose. The contrast is with how the clothing of Israel in the wilderness did not "wax old" (s:w. <a href='B:50 8:4'>Deu 8:4</a>; <a href='B:50 29:5'>Deu 29:5</a>; <a href='B:160 9:21'>Neh 9:21</a>). The exodus and journey to the promised land is repeatedly alluded to in Isaiah as a pattern for the exiles to follow in returning to Judah, and for us in our exodus from this world and journey towards the Kingdom.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Man, who is born of a woman, is of few days, and full of trouble-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Job slips back into the argument that human nature or condition is such that behaviour doesn't matter, as it will all soon be over anyway; and so it is God’s problem if He wastes His time so closely concerned with our lives (:3). Job has at times a clearer view of the future, even looking forward to resurrection and judgment. But his faith in that goes up and down, with his depression always clawing him back towards a negative view of the outcome facing him.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> He comes forth like a flower, and is cut down. He also flees like a shadow, and doesn’t continue-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> <a href='B:290 37:27'>Isa 37:27</a> speaks of how the nations around Judah at Hezekiah's time were like this, and were of "small power", s:w. "few" in <a href='B:220 14:1'>Job 14:1</a>. Job was reasoning as if he were just any man with human nature. What he says about the brevity and frailty of life is true as far as it stands; but he fails to see that God’s way with His chosen give them hope beyond the narrow limits of human nature. Hence the connection with Hezekiah continues- in his case, the shadow did "continue", its fleeing was "brought back" (<a href='B:290 38:8'>Isa 38:8</a>). <a href='B:290 40:7-8'>Isa 40:7-8</a> specifically says that although the flower is cut down, the word of restoration would endure for ever.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Do You open your eyes on such a one, and bring me into judgment with You?-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> I noted on <a href='B:220 1:6'>Job 1:6</a> that the 'Satan' figure refers to both fellow worshippers and also their Angelic representative in the heavenly throne room. The "eyes" of the Lord are His angels, and Job seems to be asking why God is using His Angel-eyes to take such a special interest in him; why God has asked His Angel to "consider My servant Job". When Job asks God to ‘look away’ from him, or remove His eyes from him (<a href='B:220 7:8'>Job 7:8</a>; <a href='B:220 7:19'>Job 7:19</a> RV and frequently in Job), this would then be understood as a reference to God’s Angel-eyes, whom Job perceived as bringing about his problems. The restoration prophecy of <a href='B:450 12:4'>Zec 12:4</a> turns all this around, saying that Yahweh will "open My eyes upon the house of Judah" to restore them.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Who can bring a clean thing out of an unclean? Not one-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> This is not to say that all born of a woman must be morally unclean; for all we posit about human nature we say about the Lord Jesus, who fully had human nature, and yet was holy and undefiled. The LXX may be better, therefore: "For who shall be pure from uncleanness? not even one". And in any case, Job is wrongly assuming things about the human condition at this point. God doesn't make man a laughing stock or target practice, for example, nor is man without hope of resurrection as Job elsewhere thinks (:10). And there is a way for sinful man to be purged from uncleanness, as the law of Moses taught. It was and is a lame excuse to blame any human sin upon our nature.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Seeing his days are determined, the number of his months is with You, and You have appointed his bounds that he can’t pass-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> This may be a reference to the 'wonderful numberer' Angel of <a href='B:340 8:13'>Dan 8:13</a> who controls the timing of all things. LXX "if even his life should be but one day upon the earth: and his months are numbered by him: thou hast appointed him for a time, and he shall by no means exceed it". The restoration prophets interpret this more positively, in that the appointed time was set to favour Zion (<a href='B:230 102:13'>Psa 102:13</a>)- just as a time was set for the end bounds of Job's sufferings. "Determined" is the word used for the 'determined time' of Judah's judgment and restoration (<a href='B:290 10:22-23'>Isa 10:22-23</a>; <a href='B:290 28:22'>Isa 28:22</a>; <a href='B:340 9:27'>Dan 9:27</a>; <a href='B:340 11:36'>Dan 11:36</a>). "Bounds" is the word translated "appoint me a set time" in :13. Job longed for that point to come, in that he assumed that the bound or end of his suffering was in death. When God finally appears, that bound or set time is reached- and by pure grace, Job is restored and not slain in death. And this was what could have happened for the exiles when the appointed 70 year period ended.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> look away from him, that he may rest, until he shall accomplish, as a hireling, his day-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Job's faith in resurrection or future restoration comes and goes; in :13 he looks for a future "set time" of change of fortune, but now he just longs for death, counting the days toward it, considering that there is more hope of a tree reviving than of human restoration (:7-10). The way restoration finally comes for Job is therefore proof enough that God doesn't require perfect faith.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> For there is hope for a tree, If it is cut down, that it will sprout again, that the tender branch of it will not cease-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Job's idea that a tree will revive because it can sprout again with a "tender branch" is contrasted in his own mind with how he considers he doesn't have such hope (:10). However, these very images are reworked into a positive take by the restoration prophets. The revived Judah were indeed to have a "tender branch", a Messiah figure. Zerubbabel, the 'sprout from Babylon', could have fulfilled the prophecies in the sort term. There was indeed "hope" for the tree of Judah, once cut down by Babylon; just as finally, we are to see that Job also was "cut down" and yet sprouted again at his restoration.</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'>The imagery is taken over in <a href='B:290 6:13'>Isa 6:13</a>: "If there is a tenth left in it, that also will in turn be consumed: as a terebinth, and as an oak, whose stump remains when they are felled; so the holy seed is its stump". The idea is of new life being sown from a minority (ten per cent?) as a result of the destruction of the majority. The image is similar to that of the Messianic "Branch" shooting forth from the decaying stump of the house of David. A ten percent minority is also envisaged in <a href='B:370 5:3'>Amo 5:3</a>; <a href='B:370 6:9-10'>Amo 6:9-10</a>. The point is that as those trees even when cut down retain the seed in their roots, which will again spring up into a great tree, so out of the judgments to come upon Judah there would arise a remnant who would grow up into the great tree of God’s restored Kingdom.</p>


text:
<p style='margin-left:1:415em'> Though its root grows old in the earth, and its stock dies in the ground-</p><p style='margin-left:1:415em'> "Earth" is eretz, the land (of Israel). If merely "soil" was intended, a different word would have been used. Again, we see the drama of Job has been tweaked, under Divine inspiration, to become the narrative for the exiles. The root had indeed largely died in the land at the time of the Babylonian invasion, but it still had some life and would "bud" again (<a href='B:220 14:9'>Job 14:9</a>). Job was the man with great roots who had been cut down but hadn't completely died (<a href='B:220 8:17'>Job 8:17</a>); his roots had been dried up (<a href='B:220 18:16'>Job 18:16</a>; <a href='B:220 29:19'>Job 29:19</a>). He represented Judah, whose roots were throughout the land as a tree transplanted by God (s:w. <a href='B:230 80:9'>Psa 80:9</a>). Those roots were withered by the invasions (<a href='B:290 5:24'>Isa 5:24</a>), but out of those dry roots would grow up a "tender plant / branch" (<a href='B:290 11:1'>Isa 11:1</a>; <a href='B:290 11:10'>Isa 11:10</a>; <a href='B:290 53:2'>Isa 53:2</a>), using the same word for "tender" as in <a href='B:220 14:7'>Job 14:7</a>. This Messianic suffering servant was to be based upon Job, and representative of all God’s restored people. They were to again spread their roots in the land of promise in a restored Kingdom (<a href='B:290 37:31'>Isa 37:31</a>; <a href='B:300 17:8'>Jer 17:8</a>), after the pattern of Job's restoration.</p>


