Job himself understands how right Eliphaz is to call him to turn to God in prayer and repentance. But, he says, this understanding does not ease his suffering...
Job himself understands how right Eliphaz is to call him to turn to God in prayer and repentance. But, he says, this understanding does not ease his suffering: God remains invisible and beyond his reach. ‘Oh, if only I knew where to find him and could approach his throne!’ These sorrowful words express the thoughts of very many people who, in every age, have suffered from God's inaccessibility. Job says that the opportunity to bring his tragedy before God would be precious to him: ‘If only he would pay attention to me!’ The Creator's attention would be enough for Job; compared with that, the content of his answer to Job's lament is secondary.
Job's friends tend to think that God needs nothing from a human being, and therefore God's attention is too great a gift for a person; to dream of it is excessive boldness. As far as we can judge from Job's own words, he thinks so too, yet he cannot do without the Creator's attention. His words recall Psalm 8:4, where the psalmist exclaims: ‘What is man, that you remember him, and the son of man, that you visit him?’
Nevertheless, it is impossible to touch God, to meet him in direct experience. ‘I go forward, and he is not there,’ says Job; ‘No one has ever seen God,’ the Evangelist John repeats. God knows a person's entire path—Job has not the slightest doubt of that. Yet a person still does not see him; even God's commandments, which reveal the Creator's will, do not make an encounter with God possible. The impossibility of meeting God except through the barrier of the law is one of the Old Testament's important themes. Isaiah and Ecclesiastes, the author of Job and Jeremiah, Ezekiel and other prophets devote their most important words to it. ‘Those awaiting the consolation of Israel’: this is how the Evangelist Luke describes those who dreamed that a direct encounter with God would one day become possible, those who hoped for it while scarcely daring to hope.
Job says that with all his heart he needs God, needs God himself to answer him. But until this happens, Job tries to understand the Lord's ways through reflection—and this makes his heart falter and fear overcome him. Indeed, when God is far away, all of life turns to darkness.
In this darkness, which Job believes only God's own gaze can penetrate, cruelty and unimaginable suffering, terror and injustice fill the earth. Violence and impunity reign in the human world, and so for Job God's answer is not merely a dream but an urgent necessity. What he really needs is not an answer to why God allows all this, but an answer about what the Creator's heart is like.
23 Here seems to be a struggle throughout this chapter between nature and grace, Job complains of his condition, yet with an assurance of God's clemency, Job 23:1-7.
He cannot understand God's dealings, nor hope for relief, yet holds fast his integrity, Job 23:8-14.
He is in deep trouble, Job 23:15-17.
23:2 To - day - Even at this time, notwithstanding all your pretended consolations. Stroke - The hand or stroke of God upon me.Groaning - Doth exceed my complaints.
23:3 O - I desire nothing more than his acquaintance and presence; but alas, he hides his face from me. Seat - To his throne or judgment - seat to plead my cause before him.
23:5 Know - If he should discover to me any secret sins, for which he contendeth with me, I would humble myself before him, and accept of the punishment of mine iniquity.
23:6 No - He would not use his power against me, but for me; by enabling me to plead my cause, and giving sentence according to that clemency, which he uses towards his children.
23:7 There - At that throne of grace, where God lays aside his majesty, and judges according to his wonted clemency. Dispute - Humbly propounding the grounds of their confidence. So - Upon such a fair and equal hearing.Delivered - From the damnatory sentence of God. This and some such expressions of Job cannot be excused from irreverence towards God, for which God afterwards reproves him, and Job abhorreth himself.
23:8 Is not - As a judge to hear and determine my causes, otherwise he knew God was essentially present in all places.
23:10 Gold - Which comes out of the furnace pure from all dross.
23:11 Steps - The steps or paths which God hath appointed men to walk in.
23:14 Performeth - Those calamities which he hath allotted to me.And - There are many such examples of God's proceeding with men.
23:16 Soft - He hath bruised, and broken, or melted it, so that I have no spirit in me.
23:17 Because - God did not cut me off by death. Before - These miseries came upon me. Covered - By hiding me in the grave.
24 Job shews that open sinners are often prosperous, Job 24:1-12.
That secret sinners often pass undiscovered, Job 24:13-18.
That God punishes such by secret judgments, and reserves them for future judgment, Job 24:19-25.
24:1 Why - Why (how comes it to pass) seeing times, (the fittest seasons for every, action, and particularly for the punishment of wicked men,) are not hidden from, or unknown to the Almighty God, (seeing all times, and men that live, and things that are done, orto be done in their times and seasons, are exactly known to God) do they that know him, (who love and obey him) not see (whence is it that they cannot discern) his (that is, God's) days? His times and seasons which he takes for the punishment of ungodly men; which if they were constant and fixed in this life, they would not be unknown to good men, to whom God uses to reveal his secrets.
24:3 Pledge - Contrary to God's law, first written in mens hearts, and afterwards in holy scripture, Exo 22:26-27.
24:4 Way - Out of the path or place in which these oppressors walk and range. They labour to keep out of their way for fear of their farther injuries. Hide - For fear of these tyrants.
24:5 Wild asses - Which are lawless, and fierce, and greedy of prey.Desert - Which is the proper habitation of wild asses. They - The oppressors. Go - To spoil and rob.
24:6 They - The oppressors. Wicked - Of such as themselves: so they promiscuously robbed all, even their brethren in iniquity.
24:7 Naked - Those whom they stripped of their garments and coverings.
24:8 Wet - With the rain - water, which runs down the rocks or mountains into the caves, to which they fled for shelter. Rock - Are glad when they can find a cleft of a rock in which they may have some protection against the weather.
24:9 They - The oppressors. Pluck - Out of covetousness; they will not allow the mother time for the suckling of her infant.
24:10 The sheaf - That single sheaf which the poor man had got with the sweat of his brow to satisfy his hunger.
24:11 Walls - Within the walls of the oppressors for their use.Suffer - Because they are not permitted to quench their thirst out of the wine which they make.
24:12 Groan - Under grievous oppressions. Soul - The life or blood of those who are wounded to death, as this word properly signifies, crieth aloud to God for vengeance. Yet - Yet God doth not punish them.
24:13 Light - As well the light of reason and conscience, as the light of Divine revelation, which was then in good measure imparted to the people of God, and shortly after committed to writing. Know not - They do not approve, nor love, or chuse them.
24:14 Poor - Where he finds nothing to satisfy his covetousness, he exercises his cruelty.
24:16 They - The robber: having on that occasion inserted the mention of the adulterer as one who acted his sin in the same manner as the night - thief did, he now returns to him again.
24:17 Is - Terrible and hateful.
24:18 Swift - That is, he quickly passeth away with all his glory, as the waters which never stay in one place, but are always hasting away. Portion - His habitation and estate which he left behind him.He - He shall never more see or enjoy his vineyards, or other pleasant places and things, which seem to be comprehended under this particular.
24:20 Womb - His mother that bare him in her womb. Wickedness - The wicked man. Broken - Broken to pieces, or violently broken down, as the word signifies. Tree - Which being once broken down never grows again.
24:21 He - He here returns to the declaration of his farther wickednesses, the cause of these judgments. Barren - Barrenness was esteemed a curse and reproach; and so he added affliction to the afflicted.
24:22 Draweth - Into his net.
24:23 Yet - Yet his eyes are upon their ways: although God gives them such strange successes, yet he sees and observes them all, and will in due time punish them.
24:24 The way - Out of this world. Other - They can no more prevent or delay their death, than the meanest men in the world. Corn - In its greatest height and maturity.