Job 9 commentary

JOB 9 COMME TARY
EDITED BY GLE PEASE
Job
1 Then Job replied:
GILL, "Then Job answered and said. Without taking notice of Bildad's
harsh expressions and severe censures, or his unfriendliness to him; he
enters directly into the argument, grants some things, confutes others, and
defends himself and his conduct.
HE RY 1-2, "Bildad began with a rebuke to Job for talking so much, Job_
8:2. Job makes no answer to that, though it would have been easy enough to
retort it upon himself; but in what he next lays down as his principle, that
God never perverts judgment, Job agrees with him: I know it is so of a
truth, Job_9:2. Note, We should be ready to own how far we agree with
those with whom we dispute, and should not slight, much less resist, a
truth, though produced by an adversary and urged against us, but receive it
in the light and love of it, though it may have been misapplied. “It is so of a
truth, that wickedness brings men to ruin and the godly are taken under
God's special protection. These are truths which I subscribe to; but how can
any man make good his part with God?” In his sight shall no flesh living be
justified, Psa_143:2. How should man be just with God? Some understand
this as a passionate complaint of God's strictness and severity, that he is a
God whom there is no dealing with; and it cannot be denied that there are,
in this chapter, some peevish expressions, which seem to speak such
language as this. But I take this rather as a pious confession of man's
sinfulness, and his own in particular, that, if God should deal with any of us
according to the desert of our iniquities, we should certainly be undone.
K&D 1-4, "Job does not (Job_9:1) refer to what Eliphaz said (Job_4:17),
which is similar, though still not exactly the same; but “indeed I know it is
so” must be supposed to be an assert to that which Bildad had said
immediately before. The chief thought of Bildad's speech was, that God does
not pervert what is right. Certainly (‫ם‬ָ‫נ‬ ְ‫מ‬ፎ‫ם‬ָ‫נ‬ ְ‫מ‬ፎ‫ם‬ָ‫נ‬ ְ‫מ‬ፎ‫ם‬ָ‫נ‬ ְ‫מ‬ፎ, scilicet, nimirum, like Job_12:2), -
says Job, as he ironically confirms this maxim of Bildad's, - it is so: what
God does is always right, because God does it; how could man maintain that

he is in the right in opposition to God! If God should be willing to enter into
controversy with man, he would not be able to give Him information on one
of a thousand subjects that might be brought into discussion; he would be so
confounded, so disarmed, by reason of the infinite distance of the feeble
creature from his Creator. The attributes (Job_9:4) belong not to man
(Olshausen), but to God, as Job_36:5. God is wise of heart (‫ב‬ ֵ‫ל‬‫ב‬ ֵ‫ל‬‫ב‬ ֵ‫ל‬‫ב‬ ֵ‫ל‬ = νοሞνοሞνοሞνοሞςςςς) in
putting one question after another, and mighty in strength in bringing to
nought every attempt man may make to maintain his own right; to defy Him
(‫ה‬ ָ‫שׁ‬ ְ‫ק‬ ִ‫ה‬‫ה‬ ָ‫שׁ‬ ְ‫ק‬ ִ‫ה‬‫ה‬ ָ‫שׁ‬ ְ‫ק‬ ִ‫ה‬‫ה‬ ָ‫שׁ‬ ְ‫ק‬ ִ‫,ה‬ to harden, i.e., ‫ף‬ ֶ‫ּר‬‫ע‬‫ף‬ ֶ‫ּר‬‫ע‬‫ף‬ ֶ‫ּר‬‫ע‬‫ף‬ ֶ‫ּר‬‫ע‬, the neck), therefore, always tends to the
discomfiture of him who dares to bid Him defiance.
BENSON, "Job 9:1. Then Job answered and said — “In reply to Bildad, Job
begins with hinting, that their opinions seemed a little to clash; Eliphaz had
insisted, from revelation, that the common failings of men were a sufficient
justification of providence, even in the most afflicting dispensations. Bildad
says, if he were pure and upright, God would interpose in his behalf. Job
replies, that all this is very true; but the difficulty is, to be thus pure and
upright: ‘for I am not exempt from the common failings of men: if,
therefore, they are sufficient to account for the great calamities which have
befallen me, I am still without a remedy. As to God’s power and wisdom, I
am as thoroughly convinced, and can give as many instances of it as you;
and, therefore, I know it is in vain for me to contend with him, Job 9:2-13. I
have nothing left but to acknowledge my own vileness, and to make my
supplication to him, Job 9:14-19. But yet, as to any heinous crimes, beyond
the common infirmities of human nature, these I disclaim; and let the event
be what it will, I will rather part with my life than accuse myself wrongfully.
And whereas you affirm, that affliction is an infallible mark of guilt, you
quite mistake the matter; for afflictions are indifferently assigned to be the
portion of the innocent and the guilty. God, indeed, sometimes in his anger
destroys the wicked; but, doth he not as frequently afflict the innocent? The
dispensations of providence, in this world, are frequently such, that, were it
not that God now and then lets loose his fury against them, one would be
almost tempted to imagine the rule of this world was delivered over into the
hands of wicked men, Job 9:21-24. As for my own part, my days are almost
come to an end: it is therefore labour lost for me to plead the cause of my
innocence: besides, that in the sight of God I must appear all vileness; so
that it is not for such a one as me to pretend to put myself on a level with
him. And, even though I were able to do so, there is no one that hath
sufficient authority to judge between us, Job 9:25-33. Yet, were it his
pleasure to grant me a little respite, I could say a great deal in my own
vindication; but, as matters stand, I dare not; for which reason my life is a
burden to me, and my desire is, it may speedily come to an end, chap. 10.
Job 9:1, to the end. I would, however, expostulate a little with the Almighty.’
And here he enters into the most beautiful and tender pleading which heart
can conceive; ending, as before, with a prayer, that his sufferings and life
might soon come to a period; and that God would grant him some little
respite before his departure hence.” — Heath and Dodd.

STEDMA
We must carefully understand what Job is saying here. His problemWe must carefully understand what Job is saying here. His problemWe must carefully understand what Job is saying here. His problemWe must carefully understand what Job is saying here. His problem
is, basically, that he, as well as his friends, has an inadequateis, basically, that he, as well as his friends, has an inadequateis, basically, that he, as well as his friends, has an inadequateis, basically, that he, as well as his friends, has an inadequate
theology. All four of them come at life with the same basic outlook,theology. All four of them come at life with the same basic outlook,theology. All four of them come at life with the same basic outlook,theology. All four of them come at life with the same basic outlook,
and Job accepts the principle that these friends believe, that troubleand Job accepts the principle that these friends believe, that troubleand Job accepts the principle that these friends believe, that troubleand Job accepts the principle that these friends believe, that trouble
comes only because of sin. He would have analyzed another'scomes only because of sin. He would have analyzed another'scomes only because of sin. He would have analyzed another'scomes only because of sin. He would have analyzed another's
problems along the same line before his trials.problems along the same line before his trials.problems along the same line before his trials.problems along the same line before his trials.
But his dilemma is caused by the fact that in the long dark hours ofBut his dilemma is caused by the fact that in the long dark hours ofBut his dilemma is caused by the fact that in the long dark hours ofBut his dilemma is caused by the fact that in the long dark hours of
searching his own heart, he has not been able to put his finger uponsearching his own heart, he has not been able to put his finger uponsearching his own heart, he has not been able to put his finger uponsearching his own heart, he has not been able to put his finger upon
any sin that he has not already dealt with. He was a righteous and aany sin that he has not already dealt with. He was a righteous and aany sin that he has not already dealt with. He was a righteous and aany sin that he has not already dealt with. He was a righteous and a
blameless man, which means that when he was aware of evil in hisblameless man, which means that when he was aware of evil in hisblameless man, which means that when he was aware of evil in hisblameless man, which means that when he was aware of evil in his
life, he did not try to deny it, but brought the offerings, and acceptedlife, he did not try to deny it, but brought the offerings, and acceptedlife, he did not try to deny it, but brought the offerings, and acceptedlife, he did not try to deny it, but brought the offerings, and accepted
God's forgiveness. He has done that, and still the torment goes on.God's forgiveness. He has done that, and still the torment goes on.God's forgiveness. He has done that, and still the torment goes on.God's forgiveness. He has done that, and still the torment goes on.
So his dilemma is, "I'm not aware of sin in myself, yet the trouble isSo his dilemma is, "I'm not aware of sin in myself, yet the trouble isSo his dilemma is, "I'm not aware of sin in myself, yet the trouble isSo his dilemma is, "I'm not aware of sin in myself, yet the trouble is
there, therefore, the problem must lie in God."there, therefore, the problem must lie in God."there, therefore, the problem must lie in God."there, therefore, the problem must lie in God."
But his problem is that he has no way to examine God, and that is what heBut his problem is that he has no way to examine God, and that is what heBut his problem is that he has no way to examine God, and that is what heBut his problem is that he has no way to examine God, and that is what he
goes on to state in very eloquent termsgoes on to state in very eloquent termsgoes on to state in very eloquent termsgoes on to state in very eloquent terms
COFFMA , "JOB'S THIRD SPEECH:
JOB RESPO DED TO BILDAD'S ALLEGATIO S
In this chapter, Job replies to the false theory of Bildad that every person gets
exactly what he deserves in this life. If he does right he will be rich and prosperous;
and if he is wicked, he will suffer disease and hardship. The only thing wrong with
that theory was its being absolutely false: (1) o man is righteous enough to deserve
all of the blessings which are poured out upon all men; and (2) "Such a theory
makes every poor man, and every martyr, a wicked sinner,"[1] and every wealthy
person a saint of God. o fair-minded person could accept such a theory.
The response of Job begins with a sarcastic agreement with Bildad on the greatness
of God; "But it closes with a vehement contradiction of Bildad's closing and
dominant contention,"[2] namely, that Job's misfortunes are due to his wickedness.
Both this and the following chapters are essentially, "A monologue in which God is
addressed in the third person, although occasionally directly."[3]

The thing missing from this whole central section of Job is the knowledge of Satan,
the great enemy of mankind. If, as we believe, Moses was the author of the prologue
and the conclusion, that leaves Job and his friends apparently in total ignorance
regarding the part that Satan had in the fall of mankind. ot one of them made any
reference whatever to Satan. This is a significant link in the chain of evidence that
makes Job a far older book, even, than the Pentateuch. It indicates that Job lived
and wrote his book at a time and in a part of the world which had no knowledge of
the Books of Moses.
Job not only extols the greatness and power of God, but he also indicates his
knowledge that no man, in the infinite sense, can be just in God's sight (Job 9:1). He
perceives that God is the Creator of all things, even the great constellations, and that
God is a spiritual being, invisible to mortal man, even when he "goeth by" him (Job
9:11). "Job is here saying some wonderful things about God. Man is so insignificant,
and God is so great"![4]
"He commandeth the sun, and it riseth not" (Job 9:7). "The word here has the
meaning of `to beam' or `to shine forth' and is not confined to the literal rising of the
sun. It refers to abnormal obscurations of the sun such as those caused by heavy
thunderstorms, dust storms, or eclipses."[5]
"He maketh the Bear, Orion, and Pleiades" (Job 9:9). These are among the best
known constellations. The Bear is Ursa Major, generally known as the Great
Dipper. Orion dominates the winter skies, and the Pleiades those of the spring.
COKE, "Job 9:1. Then Job answered and said— In reply to Bildad, Job begins with
hinting that their opinions seemed a little to clash; Eliphaz had insisted from
revelation, that the common failings of men were a sufficient justification of
Providence, even in the most afflicting dispensations. Bildad says, if he were pure
and upright, God would interpose in his behalf. Job replies, that all this is very true;
but the difficulty is, to be thus pure and upright; "For I am not exempt from the
common failings of men: if, therefore, they are sufficient to account for the great
calamities which have befallen me, I am still without a remedy. As to God's power
and wisdom, I am as thoroughly convinced, and can give as many instances of it, as
you; and, therefore, I know it is in vain for me to contend with him; Job 9:2-13. I
have nothing left but to acknowledge my own vileness, and to make my supplication
to him, Job 9:14-19. But yet, as to any heinous crimes, beyond the common frailties
of human nature, there I disclaim; and, let the event be what it may, I will rather
part with my life, than accuse myself wrongfully. And whereas you affirm, that
affliction is an infallible mark of guilt, you quite mistake the matter; for afflictions
are indifferently assigned to be the portion of the righteous and the guilty. God,
indeed, sometimes in his anger destroys the wicked; but doth he not as frequently
afflict the righteous? The dispensations of Providence in this world are frequently
such, that, were it not that God now and then lets loose his fury against them, one
would be almost tempted to imagine the rule of this world was delivered over into
the hands of wicked men; Job 9:21-24. As for my own part, my days are almost

come to an end; therefore it is labour lost for me to plead the cause of my innocence.
Besides, in the sight of God I must appear all vileness; so that it is not for such a one
as me to pretend to put myself on a level with him: and even if I were able to do so,
there is no one who hath sufficient authority to judge between us; Job 9:25-33. Yet
were it his pleasure to grant me a little respite, I should say a great deal in my own
vindication; but, as matters stand, I dare not; for which reason my life is a burden
to me, and my desire is, that it may speedily come to an end; Job 10:1 to the end. I
would, however, expostulate a little with the Almighty;"—And here he enters into
the most beautiful and tender pleadings that heart can conceive; ending, as before,
with a prayer, that his sufferings and life might soon come to a period, and that God
would grant him some little respite before his departure hence.
PULPIT, "Job, in answer to Bildad, admits the truth of his arguments, but declines
to attempt the justification which can alone entitle him to accept the favourable side
of Bildad's alternative. Man cannot absolutely justify himself before God. It is in
vain to attempt to do so. The contest is too unequal. On the one side perfect wisdom
and absolute strength (verse 4); on the other, weakness, imperfection, ignorance.
guilt (verses 17-20). And no "daysman," or umpire, between them; no third party to
hold the balance even, and preside authoritatively over the controversy, and see that
justice is done (verses 33-35). Were it otherwise, Job would not shrink from the
controversy; but he thinks it ill arguing with omnipotent power. What he seems to
lack is the absolute conviction expressed by Abraham in the emphatic words'" Shall
not the Judge of all the earth do right?" (Genesis 18:25).
And Job answered and said, I know it is so of a truth. "I freely admit," is; "all that
has been said." God would not cast away a perfectly righteous man (Job 8:20); and,
of course, he punishes evil-doers. But, applied practically, what is the result? How
should man be just with God? or, before God? Apart from any knowledge of the
doctrine of original or inherited sin, each man feels, deep in his heart, that he is
sinful—"a chief of sinners." Bradford looks upon the murderer as he mounts the
scaffold, and says, "But for the grace of God, there goes John Bradford!" Job has a
similar conviction, that in the sight of God, righteousness, such as it is, shrinks away
into insignificance, and is as nothing, cannot anyhow be relied upon. Such must be
the attitude before God of every human soul that is not puffed up with pride or
utterly insensate and sunk in apathy.
BIBIBIBI1111----4444, ", ", ", "Then Job answered and said.
Job’s answer to Bildad
Job was utterly unaware of the circumstances under which he was
suffering. If Job had known that he was to be an example, that a great battle
was being fought over him, that the worlds were gathered round him to see
how he would take the loss of his children, his property, and his health, the

circumstances would have been vitiated, and the trial would have been a
mere abortion. Under such circumstances Job might have strung himself up
to an heroic effort. If everything with us were plain and straightforward,
everything would be proportionately easy and proportionately worthless.
Trials, persecutions, and tests are meant for the culture of your strength,
the perfecting of your patience, the consolidation of your hope and love.
God will not explain the causes of our affliction to us, any more than He
explained the causes of Job’s affliction to the patriarch. But history comes
to do what God Himself refrains from doing. What course does Job say he
will take? A point of departure is marked in the tenth chapter. Now he
speaks to Heaven. He will speak in the bitterness of his soul. That is right.
Let us hear what Job’s soul has to say. Do not be harsh with men who speak
with some measure of indignation in the time of sorrow. We are chafed and
vexed by the things which befall our life. Yet even in our very frankness we
should strive at least to speak in chastened tones. Job says he will ask for a
reason.
“Shew me wherefore Thou contendest with me?” Job will also appeal to the
Divine conscience, if the expression may be allowed (Job_10:3). We must
have confidence in the goodness of God. Job then pleads himself—his very
physiology, his constitution (Job_10:8-11). What lay so heavily upon Adam
and upon Job, was the limitation of their existence. This life as we see it is
not all; it is an alphabet which has to be shaped into a literature, and a
literature which is to end in music. The conscious immortality of the soul, as
that soul was fashioned in the purpose of God, has kept the race from
despair. Job said, if this were all that we see, he would like to be
extinguished. He would rather go out of being than live under a sense of
injustice. This may well be our conviction, out of the agonies and throes of
individual experience, and national convulsions, there shall come a creation
fair as the noonday, quiet as the silent but radiant stars! (J. Parker, D. D.)
Job’s idea of God
I. He regarded Him as just. “I know it is so of a truth: but how should man
be just with God?” His language implies the belief that God was so just, that
He required man to be just in His sight. Reason asserts this; the Infinite can
have no motive to injustice, no outward circumstance to tempt Him to
wrong. Conscience affirms this; deep in the centre of our moral being, is the
conviction that the Creator is just. The Bible declares this. Job might well
ask how can man be just before Him? He says, not by setting up a defence,
and pleading with Him; “if he will contend with Him, he cannot answer him
one of a thousand.” What can a sinner plead before Him?
1. Can he deny the fact of his sinfulness?
2. Can he prove that he sinned from a necessity of his nature?
3. Can he satisfactorily make out that although he has sinned, sin has
been an exception in his life, and that the whole term of his existence has
been good and of service to the universe? Nothing in this way can he do;
no pleading will answer. He must become just before he can appear just
before God.

II. He regarded Him as wise. “He is wise in heart.” Who doubts the wisdom
of God? The whole system of nature, the arrangements of Providence, and
the mediation of Christ, all reveal His “manifold wisdom.” He is wise, so
that—
1. You cannot deceive Him by your falsehoods; He knows all about you,
sees the inmost depths of your being.
2. You cannot thwart Him by your stratagems. His purposes must stand.
III. As strong. “Mighty in strength.” His power is seen in the creation,
sustenance, and government of the universe. The strength of God is
absolute, independent, illimitable, undecayable, and always on the side of
right and happiness.
IV. He regarded him as retributive. There is a retributive element in the
Divine nature—an instinct of justice. Retribution in human governors is
policy. The Eternal retributes wrong because of His instinctive repugnance
to wrong. Hence the wrong doer cannot succeed. The great principle is, that
if a man desires prosperity, he must fall in with the arrangements of God in
His providence and grace; and wisdom is seen in studying these
arrangements, and in yielding to them. (Homilist.)
But how should man be just with God.
On justification
With respect to the relation in which man stands with God, two
considerations are essential: the one regarding ourselves, the other
regarding our Maker. We are His creatures, and therefore wholly and
undividedly His, and owe Him our full service. Our employing any part of
ourselves in anything contrary to His wish, is injustice towards Him; and
therefore no one who does so can be just with Him in this. But since our
wills and thoughts are not in our own power, whatever we do, it is hopeless
to endeavour to bring the whole man into the service of God. Such a perfect
obedience as we confess we owe as creatures to our Creator, is utterly
unattainable. Are we then to lower, not indeed our efforts, but our
standard? Will God be satisfied with something less than absolute
perfection? Since we are God’s creatures, we owe Him a perfect and
unsinning obedience in thought, word, and deed. And God cannot be
satisfied with less. If His holiness and His justice were not as perfect as His
mercy and His love, He would not be perfect, or in other words He would
not be God.
1. That man cannot be justified by the law—that is, by his obedience to
the law, or the performance of its duties,—is clear from its condition,
“This do, and thou shalt live.” It makes no abatement for sincerity; it
makes no allowance for infirmity. Mercy is inadmissible here; it just asks
its due, and holds out the reward upon the payment of it.
2. Neither can he be justified by a mitigated law; that is, by its being
lowered till it is within reach.
3. Nor yet can he be absolved by the passing by of his transgressions

through the forgetfulness (so to speak) of God; as if He would not be
extreme to mark what was done amiss.
4. How then shall man be just with God? It must be in a way that will
honour the law. Christ hath “magnified the law, and made it
honourable”—
(1) By keeping it entire and unbroken; and
(2) By enduring its curse, as if He had broken it; becoming “sin for us
who knew no sin, that we might be made the righteousness of God in
Him.” (George Jeans, M. A.)
The mode of the sinner’s justification before God
How is man justified before God? We speak of man as he is now found in the
world—fallen, guilty, and polluted. Man was made upright at the first. The
first action of his nature, in its several parts, was in harmony with the laws
pertaining to each, and so for a short time it continued. When I speak of the
laws pertaining to each part, I mean those of matter and of mind, of body,
sense, and intellect. God had laid a prohibition upon him, and to the
observance of this He had promised His continued favour, and to the non-
observance He attached the forfeiture of that favour. The trial here was not
whether man would attain to the Divine favour, but whether he should
retain it. The danger to be apprehended, for danger is involved in the very
notion of a probation, was, that Adam might fall, not that he might not rise,
as is the case with us, his descendants. How was Adam kept, as long as he
stood in a state of acceptance before God; i.e., how Adam was justified, so
far as the term justification can be predicated of him? He continued in the
Divine favour as long as he obeyed the law. He was justified by works. There
is nothing evil necessarily in the idea of justification by works. Conscience
naturally knows of no other mode of justification, and where that is
impossible, she gives the offender over to condemnation and despair.
Conscience knows of no justification but that of works. When it is possible,
the first, the obvious, and the legitimate, the natural mode of securing the
Divine favour is by a perfect obedience, in one’s own person, to the Divine
commands as contained in the moral law. How are Adam’s posterity
justified? Not in the same way that he was. Their circumstances are so
different. He was innocent, they are guilty; he was pure, they are impure; he
was strong, they are weak. The Gospel mode of justification cannot be by
works. But what is it positively? A knowledge of this subject must embrace
two things, namely, what God has done to this end—to make justification
possible; and what man does when it is become actual. It has pleased God to
save us, not arbitrarily, but vicariously. He has not cancelled our sin, as a
man might cancel the obligation of an indebted neighbour, by simply
drawing his pen across the record in his ledger. This may do for a creature
in relation to his fellows. We are told in Holy Writ that God the Father has
given His Son to be a “ransom” for us, a “sacrifice for our sins,” a “mediator
between Him and us,” the “only name under heaven amongst men whereby
we can be saved.” The Father hath laid in His atoning death the foundation
of our hopes, the “elect cornerstone” of our salvation. By the Holy Spirit and
through that Son, He hath also granted to mankind, besides an offer of

pardon, an offer of assistance, yea, assistance in the very offer. The
mediatorship of the Spirit began the moment the Gospel was first preached
to fallen Adam. So indeed did the Mediatorship of Christ, i.e., God began
immediately to have prospective regard to the scene one day to be enacted
upon Calvary. But the mediatorship of the Spirit could not be one moment
deferred. In order to render the salvation of men subjectively possible, the
Spirit must be actually and immediately given. What then is necessary on
the part of man? This may appear to some a dangerous way of viewing the
subject. I am not about to establish a claim of merit on the part of man.
When a man is justified, as justification takes place on the part of God, there
must be something correlative to it on the part of man—man must do
something also. This great act of God must find some response in the heart
of man. There must needs be, in a fallen, guilty, and polluted creature,
emotions which were at first unknown in Paradise. Deep penitence befits
him, pungent sorrow, bitter self-reproach, and utter self-loathing. If we
look to the honour of God, or the exigencies of His moral government, we
come to the same conclusion. As His honour requires that the obedient
should continue obedient, so does it require that, having disobeyed, they
should repent, and cease to be disobedient: it is, in truth, the Same spirit in
both cases, only adapted to the adversity of the circumstances. If God
should, in mercy, justify the ungodly, it must be in such a manner as shall
not conflict with these first and manifest principles; and the Gospel,
therefore, must have some contrivance by which men may attain to
justification without impairing the Divine government, or degrading the
Divine character, or thinking highly of themselves. What then is that
contrivance? It is not the way of works. What suits Adam in Paradise cannot
suit us, driven out into the wilderness of sin and guilt. We are inquiring, as
the correlative to justice and law on the part of God is obedience on the part
of man, what is the correlative to merely and atonement? it cannot be that
self-satisfied feeling which belongs to him who has fulfilled the law. His
present obedience, however perfect, could not undo past disobedience. The
correlative to the Divine acts of justification cannot be human acts in
obedience to law. “By the deeds of the law shall no flesh be justified.” But
may not man be justified by obedience to a mitigated law? Is not the Gospel,
after all, only the moral law with some abatements designed to bring it
down to the level of our infirmity? This is the most plausible and deceptive
supposition that could be made. It suits exactly man’s natural pride, his
fondness for his idols, and has withal an air of mingled mercy and justice.
But, however specious, it is utterly unfounded in reason or Scripture. It
supposes the law, which we regard as a transcript of the Divine character, to
be found faulty, and its requirements in consequence to be cut down to the
true level. Neither the violation of the law, nor yet its observance in its
original or any mitigated form, can be the ground of our justification before
God, in our present state, what way then remains to this infinitely desirable
object? Are we not shut up to the way of faith? “Being justified by faith.”
Nothing that is morally good either precedes justification, or is
simultaneously instrumental of it; all real good follows it. By faith we
understand a reliance upon Christ as our atoning sacrifice, and the Lord our
righteousness, for acceptance before God. It is reliance on another. There is
no self-reliance or self-complacence here. This principle consults and
provides for every interest involved in a dispensation of mercy to fallen

creatures through a Divine Redeemer. It humbles the sinner. It exalts the
Saviour. Holiness is promoted. If such then be the nature and tendency of
faith, if it be the sole instrument of justification, and if it is only in a state of
justification that man can render real and acceptable obedience, how
earnest and ceaseless ought to be our prayer, “Lord, increase our faith!”
(W. Sparrow, D. D.)
Atonement and modern thought
What extorted this cry from Job was a crushing consciousness of God’s
omnipotence. How could I, the impotent creature I am, stand up and assert
my innocence before Him? What prompts the exclamation now is
something quite different. We have lost even Job’s sense of a personal
relation to God. The idea of immediate individual responsibility to Him
seems in this generation to be suffering eclipse. The prevailing modern
teaching outside Christianity makes man his own centre, and urges him
from motives of self-interest to seek his own well-being, and the good of the
whole as contributory to his own. In the last resort he is a law unto himself.
Such moral rules as he finds current in the world are only registered
experiences of the lines along which happiness can be secured. They have a
certain weight, as ascertained meteorological facts have weight with
seamen, but that is all. He is under no obligation in the strict moral sense.
The whole is a question of interest. Now we hold that all this is not true to
fact. Obligation pressing upon us from without establishes an authority over
us; and conscience, recognising obligation, yea, stamping the soul with an
instinctive self-judgment, as it fulfils or refuses to fulfil obligations—these
go with us wherever we go, into school, college, business, social relations,
public duty. If we recognise our obligations, and conscientiously meet them,
we secure our highest interests. But that by no means resolves obligation
into interest. The two positions are mutually exclusive. If a man from mere
self-interest were to do all the things which another man did from a sense of
obligation, not a shadow of the peace and righteous approval of the latter
would be his. The selfish aim would evacuate the acts of all their ennobling
qualities. While the conscientious man would find himself by losing himself,
the selfish man would be shut up in a cold isolation, losing himself—having
no real hold on any other soul—because his aim all along has been to save
and serve himself. But if this is the true view of life, we must accept all that
flows from it. Let us trust our moral nature as we do that part of our nature
which looks out to the world of sense. If I be really under obligation then I
am free. Obligation has no meaning such as we attach to it, unless we pre-
suppose freedom. If the moral is highest in me, if every faculty and interest
of right is subject to its sway, then in simple allegiance to facts I must infer
that the highest order of this world is a moral order. But once grant that,
and you are in the region of personality at once. The moment you feel
yourself under duty you know yourself a person, free, moral, self-conscious.
You are face to face with a Divine Moral Governor, in whom all your lower
moral obligations find their last rest, since He established them; and who,
as your author and sustainer, has a right to the total surrender of your
whole being. The supreme meaning of life for you is, meeting your
obligations to your God. Being made by a God of holiness, we must suppose

that we have been called into existence as a means of exemplifying and
glorifying the right. The right is supreme over every merely personal
interest of our own. We exist for the right. The man can be justified with
himself only as he pleases God: With the consciousness of disobedience
comes guilt, fear, estrangement. When this unfortunate ease ensues, as it
has ensued in the ease of all, the first point is settling this question of right
as between man and God. Before anything and everything else in religion,
before sanctification, before even we consider in detail how our life is to be
brought into union with God, comes the great question of our meeting and
fulfilling the claims of God’s law. Atonement is our first and most pressing
concern. The Bible commits itself to three statements about you. Take the
last first. By the works of the law, or by your own actions, you cannot be
counted a perfectly just man in God’s sight. Secondly, you cannot clear
yourself of guilt for this result. Thirdly, you see the Bible occupies ground of
its own, and you must judge it on its own ground Now consider the chief
difficulty exercising men’s minds at this hour. We live in a practical rather
than in a theoretical age. We say—How can a mere arrangement, such as the
atonement, rectify my relations with God, separate me from sin, and secure
my actual conformity to God’s will? Taking the Gospel way as it stands, I go
on to show what a real root and branch all-round redemption and
restoration it confers. Where men err is that they leave out of view the great
personality of Christ. They forget that the redemption is in Him. (John
Smith, M. A.)
The demand of human nature for the atonement
1. Our subject is the atonement, and facts in human nature which
demand it. Religion can account for all its principles and doctrines by an
appeal to the facts of our being. The doctrine of reconciliation with God
through the atoning death of Jesus is confessedly the chief and, in some
respects, the most obscure doctrine of the Christian religion.
Nevertheless, belief in its general features is essential to any honest
acceptance of the Gospel. Without discussing obscurities, I wish, in aid
of faith, simply to point out how true it is to all the facts of human
nature.
2. “How should man be just with God?” It is not a question that is raised
by recent ethical culture or by the progress of man in moral
development, as some have thought. It is as old as the human soul, as
ancient as the sense of sin, as universal as humanity, and is heard in all
the religions. Beneath the burning skies of primeval Arabia this mighty
problem is debated by an Arab sheik and his three friends. First—
(1) Bildad, the Shuhite, states the incontrovertible premise from
which the discussion starts—a premise grounded in universal
consciousness, and axiomatic in its truth: “Behold, God will not east
away a perfect man, neither will He help the evildoer.” That is to say,
God makes an everlasting distinction between and a difference in His
treatment of righteous and unrighteous men.
(2) Then up speaks Job: “I know it is so of a truth. But how should
man be just with God? If he will contend with Him, he cannot answer

Him one of a thousand!” “There is none that doeth good; no, not one.”
(3) Despondently, Job continues: “If God will not withdraw His anger,
the proud helpers do stoop under Him. How much less shall I answer
Him, and choose out nay words to reason with Him?” That is to say,
all our repentances and righteousnesses, upon which we so much
rely, are, for the nakedness of our need, but as filthy rags. The cry for
mercy, instead of justice, must be our only plea.
(4) Then Job continues again: “I am afraid of all my sorrows. I know
Thou wilt not hold me innocent.” “All my sorrows.” There is the
remorse, the hell that is in me, the sense of justice unsatisfied, “I am
afraid of them!”
(5) Then Job resumes once more: “Neither is there any daysman
betwixt us, that he might lay his hand upon both!” Ah, the blessed
Christ, the Mediator, our Daysman, laying one hand on Justice and
the other on our guilty heads, our Atonement, making God and man
to be at one in peace—He had not come! “Neither is there any
daysman betwixt us, that He might lay His hand upon both!” Do you
see now why Abraham and Job and all the ancient kings and prophets
longed to see the day of Christ, and how hard it was for them to die
without the sight? “We have no daysman!” Oh, the abysmal depth of
longing in that word, “We have no daysman,” and “How should man
be just with God?” And then, for all we are told, that desert colloquy
stopped there, in utter sadness and gloom. Oh, if some one of us had
only been there, and had been able to smite out and drop into the
abyss the years that intervened between Job’s day and Christ’s. Or, if
we could have led John the Apostle up to that company of Job and his
three friends, and could have bidden John speak up, with clear tone,
on their debate, and had him say to those, ancient Arabs, as he said to
us: “If any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ
the Righteous. And He is the propitiation for our sins, and not for
ours only, but also for the whole world!” But Paul says it again, in his
exact, positive way, and insists upon it. “To declare, I say, at this time
His righteousness, that He might be just and the justifier of him
which believeth in Jesus!” And then they are satisfied. And now Job,
and Bildad, and Zophar, and Elihu spring to their feet upon the desert
sands, and with John and Paul lift their eyes and hands heavenward,
and cry with one voice: “Unto Him that hath loved us, and washed us
from our sins in His own blood—to Him be glory and dominion, and
honour, and power, forever and ever. Amen.”
3. I affirm, as a matter of Christian experience, that all the necessary
features and implications of the orthodox doctrine of the atonement are
true to the facts of human nature. When I say the orthodox view, I mean
that view in the highest form of its statement, the substitutional view,
namely, that Christ’s death becomes an actual satisfaction to justice, to
that sense of justice which exists in our own bosoms and in the bosoms
of all intelligent creatures, and which, in the nature of things, must be a
duplication of the sense of justice within the bosom of God Himself; that
Christ’s sufferings and death become an actual satisfaction to justice for
our sins that are past, when we accept it as such by faith. And the proof

that it is a satisfaction, the evidence that it does take away the sense of
demerit, the feeling that we owe something to justice, is that we are
conscious it does. The philosophers have sometimes voted consciousness
down and out by large majorities, but it refuses to stay down and out. It
comes back and asserts itself. “A man just knows it, sir,” as Dr. Johnson
said, “and that is all there is about the matter.” All that we Christians can
do, all that we need to do, is to have the experience of it, and then stand
still, and magnificently and imperiously declare that it does, for we feel it
to be so. Men may tell us that it ought not to be so; we will rejoin that it is
so. They may say that our sense of right and wrong is very imperfectly
developed, or we could not derive peace from the thought that an
innocent Being has suffered in our stead. Against our experience the
world can make no answer. We aver that man feels his sin needs
propitiation, and that, if he will, he may find that the death of Christ
meets that need.
4. Let us go outside distinctively Christian experience, and note some
facts in human nature which show its trend toward the atonement in
Jesus.
(1) We aver that repentance and reformation alone will not satisfy the
sense of right in man. Twenty-five years ago a friend of mine, a boy,
under circumstances of great temptation, stole, and then had to lie to
conceal the theft. He did not afterward have courage to confess and
restore. The opportunity to own his sin and to make restitution soon
passed away forever. Within a few years, he has assured me that the
memory of that early, only theft yet lies heavily upon his soul, and
that he can never feel at ease until that matter is somehow made
right. Standing by this blazing fact in experience, I aver that the
moral sense demands satisfaction, Repentance is not enough—he has
repented. Reformation is not enough—he has never stolen since. Still
he cannot answer God nor himself. He is not innocent, and the
“proud helpers do stoop under him.” Propitiation of his own sense of
right was necessary. He and my friend go and stand beside Job in the
desert yonder, and say with him, “I am afraid of my sorrows. I know
that Thou wilt not hold me innocent.” They do not hold themselves
innocent. Let me add some more specimens of the innermost feelings
of representative men which look in the same direction. Byron was
not a man given to superstition or flightiness. In his “Manfred,” he is
known to have spoken out the facts of his own guilty heart. There he
says—
“There is no power in holy men,
Nor charms in prayer, nor purifying form
Of penitence, nor outward look, nor fast,
Nor agony, nor, greater than them all,
The innate tortures of that deep despair
Which is Remorse without the fear of hell,
But all in all sufficient of itself

Would make a hell of heaven—can exorcise
From out the unbounded spirit the quick sense
Of its own sins, sufferings, and revenge
Upon itself.”
Now, recollect that this is poetry. In poetry we get the deepest philosophy—
there the heart speaks. It has no voice but the voice of nature. Byron speaks
true to nature when he declares not prayer, nor fast, nor agony, nor
remorse, can atone for sin or satisfy the soul. Is there not in the confession
of that volcanic spirit a fact which looks toward man’s need of Calvary? I
take down my Shakespeare and open it at “Macbeth,” that awfulest tragedy
of our tongue, matchless in literature for its description of the workings of a
guilty conscience, to be studied evermore. Lady Macbeth—King Duncan
having been murdered—walks in her sleep through her husband’s castle at
night bearing a taper in her hands. “Physician: How came she by that light?
Servant: Why, it stood by her; she has light by her continually; ‘tis her
command.” As she walks, she rubs her hands. A servant explains: “It is an
accustomed action with her to seem thus washing her hands; I have known
her to continue in this a quarter of an hour.” Then Lady Macbeth speaks:
“Yet here’s a spot. What! will these hands ne’er be clean?. . .Here’s the smell
of the blood still; all the perfumes of Arabia will not sweeten this little
hand!” Is there not something there which sounds like the echo of Job’s
words in the desert: “I am afraid of all my sorrows”? Does not Lady
Macbeth, walking at night and repenting of her crime and washing her
hands in dreams from Duncan’s blood, look as if an accusing conscience and
the sense of justice unsatisfied could make its own hell?
(2) Still further, I aver that the moral sense is never appeased until
atonement is somehow made. The atoning stroke must fall
somewhere, even though it be upon himself, before a man can be at
peace with himself. That is a profoundly instructive, because
profoundly true, series of passages in Coleridge’s tragedy of
“Remorse,” which sets out this fact. “The guilty and guilt-smitten
Ordonio is stabbed by Alhadra, the wife of the murdered Isadore. As
the steel drinks his heart’s blood, he utters the one single word,
‘Atonement!’ His self-accusing spirit, which is wrung with its
remorseful recollections, and which the warm and hearty forgiveness
of his injured brother has not been able to soothe in the least, actually
feels its first gush of relief only as the avenging knife enters, and
crime meets penalty.” Ordonio, shortly dying, expires saying—
“I stood in silence, like a slave before her,
That I might taste the wormwood and the gall,
And satiate this self-accusing heart
With bitterer agonies than death can give.”
That seems to say to me that nothing will give the soul peace but atonement
of some kind.
5. I think, therefore, that if you could bring Job and his three friends,
and my acquaintance who stole in his youth, and Byron, and

Shakespeare, and Coleridge here today, they would see eye to eye, and
agree upon some things in the name of facts in human nature.
(1) They would agree that repentance alone does not make a man to
be at peace. All this company had most bitterly repented.
(2) They would agree that reformation was not sufficient.
(3) They would agree that the guilty soul’s remorse, its “biting back”
upon itself, was its own hell, enough for its punishment.
(4) They would agree that the mind so sternly demands that
atonement be made, somewhere and somehow, that it will sooner
offer its own bosom, as Ordonio did, than that its own sense of justice
should go unsatisfied.
(5) They would probably agree with Socrates, when he says to Plato,
as some of you may have said today, “Perhaps God may forgive sin,
but I do not see how He can, for I do not see how He ought.” That is to
say, “I do not see how the man who has sinned can ever be at peace.”
(6) And then I aver that, if the years between could be dropped out
and Paul could join that company and say, “Behold the Lamb of God,
whom God set forth to be a propitiation by His “blood, to show His
righteousness because of the passing over of the sins done aforetime,
that He might Himself be just and the justifier of him that hath faith
in Jesus”—if Paul could say that to them, and that company could
accept Christ as their Daysman, transferring by sincere repentance
and faith their guilt to Him, and consenting in their minds that He
should discharge its penalty by His body and blood, then I aver, in the
name of millions of Christians, that they would find peace. And I aver
that this feeling of indebtedness to justice, which is alike in the bosom
of God and the bosom of man, being satisfied, Job and his friends,
and Byron, and Shakespeare, and Coleridge, and all sinful men would
spring to their feet and say, with John and Paul and all that other
company of the saved in heaven, “Unto Him that hath loved us and
washed us from our sins in His own blood, to Him be glory and
dominion and honour and power, forever and ever. Amen!” Such are
a few of the facts in the consciousness of men which a brief survey
enables us to notice. The logic of human nature is Christ. No
Humboldt, or Cuvier, or Darwin, with keen scientific eye, ever noted
such an array of physical facts, all bearing toward one end in the
physical world, as we find in the moral realm, all tending toward
Jesus. Tertullian claimed that the testimony of the mind was
naturally Christian. His claim is just. Men may raft at these facts in
consciousness; they may declare that they make God a Moloch, and
that the doctrine of the atonement is the bloody invention of gross
minded men, but the facts remain still, and their scientific trend and
drift is wholly toward the Blessed Man of Calvary. If anyone does not
feel so now, he is drugged with sin; he has taken opiates; he is not
himself. (J. C. Jackson, D. D.)

PARKER, "Job"s Answer to Bildad.
II.
Job 9-10
We must remember, if we would understand Job"s mournful and
noble complaint and eloquence, that Job himself is utterly unaware of
the circumstances under which he is suffering. Unfortunately for
ourselves as readers, we know all that the historian or dramatist can
tell us about the case; but Job knew only his suffering. A Why? almost
indignant came from his lips again and again. And no wonder. It is
one thing, we have seen, to read the Book of Job , and another to be
Job himself. A pitiful thing if we can only annotate the Book of Job ,
an excellent if we can comment upon it through our experience and
our sympathy. Consider the case well, then:—
There has been an interview between God and the devil: the subject of
that interview was Job"s integrity and steadfastness: the devil
challenged Job"s position, and said that he was but circumstantially
pious; he had everything heart could wish; a hedge was round about
him on every side, and if such a man were not pious the more shame
be his: take away, said the enemy, the hedge, the security, the
prosperity, and this praying saint will curse thee to thy face. Job knew
nothing about this. There is an unconscious influence in life—a
mysterious ghostly discipline, an unexplained drill; a sorrow
anonymous, and lacking explication. Job understood that he was a
servant of the living God, a diligent student of the divine law, a
patient follower of the divine statutes and commandments; he was to
his own consciousness a good man; certainly inspired by noble
aspirations, sentiments, and impulses; good to the poor, and helpful
to those who needed all kinds of assistance; and, therefore, why he
should have been struck by these tremendous thunderbursts was an
inquiry to which he had no answer. But consider, on the other hand,
that the whole pith of the story and meaning of the trial must be
found in the very fact that Job had no notion whatever of the
circumstances under which he was suffering.
Had Job known that he was to be an example, that a great battle was
being fought over him, that the worlds were gathered around him to
see how he would take the loss of his children, his property, and his
health, the circumstances would have been vitiated, and the trial
would have been a mere abortion: under such conditions Job might
have strung himself up to an heroic effort, saying, if it has come to
this—if God is only withdrawing himself from me for a moment, and
is looking upon me from behind a cloud, what care I if seven hells
should burn me, and all the legions of the pit should sweep down
upon me in one terrific assault? this is but for a moment: God has

made his boast of me; I am God"s specimen Prayer of Manasseh ,
God"s exemplary saint; he is pointing to me, saying, See in Job what I
myself am; behold in him my grace magnified and my providence
vindicated. This would have been no lesson to the ages. We must
often suffer, and not know the reason why: we must often rise from
our knees to fight a battle, when we intended to enjoy a long repose:
things must slip out of our hands unaccountably, and loss must befall
our estate after we have well tended all that belongs to it, after we
have securely locked every gate, and done the utmost that lies within
the range of human sagacity and strength to protect our property.
These are the trials that we must accept. If everything were plain and
straightforward, everything would be proportionately easy and
proportionately worthless. It is after we have prayed our noblest
prayer, and brought back from heaven"s garden all the flowers we
asked for, that we must be treated as if we were wicked, and
overthrown as if we had defied the spirit of justice. So must our
education proceed. Brethren, count it all joy when ye fall into divers
trials and persecutions and tests: all these things are meant for the
culture of your strength, the perfecting of your patience, the
consolidation of your hope and love. Thus we should interpret
history. God will not explain the causes of our affliction to us, any
more than he explained the causes of Job"s affliction to the patriarch.
But history comes to do what God himself refrains from doing: all
history says that never is a good man tried without the trial being
meant to answer some question of the devil, or to test some quality of
the man. God does not send trials merely for the sake of sending
them; he is not arbitrary, capricious, governing his universe by
whims and fancies and changeable moods. But seeing that he made
us, as Job here contends, and knows us altogether, we must accept
the trials of life as part of the education of life.
What course does Job say he will take? A point of departure is
marked in the tenth chapter. Hitherto Job has more or less answered
the men who have spoken to him; now he turns away from them, and
says—I will speak straight up to heaven. He determines to be frank. "I
will speak in the bitterness of my soul." That is right. Let us hear what
the soul has to say. Let us make room for pale, haggard grief, that she
may tell her harrowing tale. Men are sickened by luxury. Men are
sated with mere delights. Life would be poor but for the wealth of
agonised experience, and dull but for the music of sanctified
desolation. Job has begun well in saying he will speak right out to
God. It soothes poor misery "hearkening to her tale." If a man could
once assure himself that he was speaking as it were face to face with
God, the greatness of the auditor would lift up the speech to a worthy
level, and the very interview with one divine would help our human
nature up to the very divinity to whose radiance it has been admitted.
Do not let us speak our misery downwards; otherwise our tears will
soak into the dust, and there will be no answer in flowers. Let us

venture to lift up our heads even in the time of grief and misery and
loss and loneliness, and speak all we feel right into the ear of God. He
will not be angry with us. He will make room for our speech. He
framed us; he knows our composition; he understands us altogether,
and blessed be his name and his love, he knows that a little weeping
would ease our hearts, and that long talk with himself would end in a
mitigation of our grief. Do not be harsh with men who speak with
some measure of indignation in the time of sorrow. Sorrow is not
likely to soothe our feelings, and to pick out for us the very daintiest
words in our mother-tongue. We are chafed and fretted and vexed by
the things which befall our life. It is not easy to put the coffin-lid upon
the one little child"s face; it is not easy to surrender the last crust of
bread that was meant to satisfy our hunger; it is not pleasant to look
into the well-head and find the water gone at the spring. Yet, in our
very frankness, we should strive at least to speak in chastened tones,
and with that mystic spirit of hopefulness which, even in the very
agony of fear, whispers to the soul, Perhaps, even now, at the very
last, God may be gracious unto me. Have we thus turned our sorrows
into spiritual controversies with God? or have we degraded them into
mere criticisms upon his providence, and turned them to stinging
reproaches upon the doctrine which teaches that all things work
together for good to them that love God? Let us go alone, shut the
door of the chamber, and spend all day with God, and all night; for
even in talking over our grief, sentence by sentence, and letter by
letter, in the presence and hearing of the King, without his personally
saying one word to us, we may feel that much of the burden has been
lifted, and that light is preparing to dawn upon an experience which
we had considered to be doomed to enduring and unrelieved
darkness.
Job says he will ask for a reason. "I will say unto God, do not condemn
me; show me wherefore thou contendest with me" ( Job 10:2). I
cannot tell why; I am not conscious of any reason; the last time we
met it was in prayer, in loving fellowship; the last interview I had with
heaven was the pleasantest I can remember; lo, I was at the altar
offering sacrifices for my children, when the great gloom fell upon my
life, and the whole range of my outlook was clothed with thunder-
clouds—oh, tell me why! We need not ask whether these words
actually escaped Job"s lips, because we know they are the only words
which he could have uttered, or that this is the only spirit in which he
could have expressed himself; he would have been God, not Prayer of
Manasseh , if under all the conditions of the case he had expressed
himself in terms less agonising, and in wonder less distracting.
EBC, "THE THOUGHT OF A DAYSMAN
Job 9:1-35; Job 10:1-22

Job SPEAKS
IT is with an infinitely sad restatement of what God has been made to
appear to him by Bildad’s speech that Job begins his reply. Yes, yes; it
is so. How can man be just before such a God? You tell me my
children are overwhelmed with destruction for their sins. You tell me
that I, who am not quite dead as yet, may have new prosperity if I put
myself into right relations with God. But how can that be? There is no
uprightness, no dutifulness, no pious obedience, no sacrifice that will
satisfy Him. I did my utmost; yet God has condemned me. And if He is
what you say, His condemnation is unanswerable. He has such
wisdom in devising accusations and in maintaining them against
feeble man, that hope there can be none for any human being. To
answer one of the thousand charges God can bring, if He will contend
with man, is impossible. The earthquakes are signs of His
indignation, removing mountains shaking the earth out of her place.
He is able to quench the light of the sun and moon, and to seal up the
stars. What is man beside the omnipotence of Him who alone
stretched out the heavens, whose march is on the huge waves of the
ocean, who is the Creator of the constellations, the Bear, the Giant,
the Pleiades, and the chambers or spaces of the southern sky? It is the
play of irresistible power Job traces around him, and the Divine mind
or will is inscrutable.
"Lo, He goeth by me and I see Him not:
He passeth on, and I perceive Him not.
Behold, He seizeth. Who will stay Him?
Who will say to Him, What doest Thou?"
Step by step the thought here advances into that dreadful imagination
of God’s unrighteousness which must issue in revolt or in despair.
Job, turning against the bitter logic of tradition, appears for the time
to plunge into impiety. Sincere earnest thinker as he is, he falls into a
strain we are almost compelled to call false and blasphemous. Bildad
and Eliphaz seem to be saints, Job a rebel against God. The Almighty,
he says, is like a lion that seizes the prey and cannot be hindered from
devouring. He is a wrathful tyrant under whom the helpers of Rahab,
those powers that according to some nature myth sustain the dragon
of the sea in its conflict with heaven, stoop and give way. Shall Job
essay to answer Him? It is vain. He cannot. To choose words in such a
controversy would be of no avail. Even one right in his cause would be

overborne by tyrannical omnipotence. He would have no resource but
to supplicate for mercy like a detected malefactor. Once Job may have
thought that an appeal to justice would be heard, that his trust in
righteousness was well founded. He is falling away from that belief
now. This Being whose despotic power has been set in his view has no
sense of man’s right. He cares nothing for man.
What is God? How does He appear in the light of the sufferings of
Job?
"He breaketh me with a tempest,
Increaseth my wounds without cause.
If you speak of the strength of the mighty, ‘Behold Me,’ saith He;
If of judgment-‘Who will appoint Me a time?’"
No one, that is, can call God to account. The temper of the Almighty
appears to Job to be such that man must needs give up all
controversy. In his heart Job is convinced still that he has wrought no
evil. But he will not say so. He will anticipate the wilful condemnation
of the Almighty. God would assail his life. Job replies in fierce revolt,
"Assail it, take it away, I care not, for I despise it. Whether one is
righteous or evil, it is all the same. God destroys the perfect and the
wicked" (Job 9:22).
Now, are we to explain away this language? If not, how shall we
defend the writer who has put it into the mouth of one still the hero of
the book, still appearing as a friend of God? To many in our day, as of
old, religion is so dull and lifeless, their desire for the friendship of
God so lukewarm, that the passion of the words of Job is
incomprehensible to them. His courage of despair belongs to a range
of feeling they never entered, never dreamt of entering. The
calculating world is their home, and in its frigid atmosphere there is
no possibility of that keen striving for spiritual life which fills the soul
as with fire. To those who deny sin and pooh-pooh anxiety about the
soul, the book may well appear an old-world dream, a Hebrew
allegory rather than the history of a man. But the language of Job is
no outburst of lawlessness; it springs out of deep and serious thought.
It is difficult to find an exact modern parallel here; but we have not to
go far back for one who was driven like Job by false theology into

bewilderment, something like unreason. In his "Grace Abounding,"
John Bunyan reveals the depths of fear into which hard arguments
and misinterpretations of Scripture often plunged him, when he
should have been rejoicing in the liberty of a child of God. The case of
Bunyan is, in a sense, very different from that of Job. Yet both are
urged almost to despair of God; and Bunyan, realising this point of
likeness, again and again uses words put into Job’s mouth. Doubts
and suspicions are suggested by his reading, or by sermons which he
hears, and he regards their occurrence to his mind as a proof of his
wickedness. In one place he says: "Now I thought surely I am
possessed of the devil: at other times again I thought I should be
bereft of my wits; for, instead of lauding and magnifying God with
others, if I have but heard Him spoken of, presently some most
horrible blasphemous thought or other would bolt out of my heart
against Him, so that whether I did think that God was, or again did
think there was no such thing, no love, nor peace, nor gracious
disposition could I feel within me." Bunyan had a vivid imagination.
He was haunted by strange cravings for the spiritually adventurous.
What would it be to sin the sin that is unto death? "In so strong a
measure," he says, "was this temptation upon me, that often I have
been ready to clap my hands under my chin to keep my mouth from
opening." The idea that he should "sell and part with Christ" was one
that terribly afflicted him; and, "at last," he says, "after much
striving, I felt this thought pass through my heart, Let Him go if He
will. . . . After this, nothing for two years together would abide with
me but damnation and the expectation of damnation. This thought
had passed my heart-God hath let me go, and I am fallen. Oh, thought
I, that it was with me as in months past, as in the days when God
preserved me."
The Book of Job helps us to understand Bunyan and those terrors of
his that amaze our composed generation. Given a man like Job or like
Bunyan, to whom religion is everything, who must feel sure of Divine
justice, truth, and mercy, he will pass far beyond the measured
emotions and phrases of those who are more than half content with
the world and themselves. The writer here, whose own stages of
thought are recorded, and Bunyan, who with rare force and sincerity
retraces the way of his life, are men of splendid character and virtue.
Titans of the religious life, they are stricken with anguish and bound
with iron fetters to the rock of pain for the sake of universal
humanity. They are a wonder to the worldling, they speak in terms
the smooth professor of religion shudders at. But their endurance,
their vehement resolution, break the falsehoods of the time and enter
into the redemption of the race.
The strain of Job’s complaint increases in bitterness. He seems to see
omnipotent injustice everywhere. If a scourge (Job 9:23) such as
lightning, accident, or disease slayeth suddenly, there seems to be
nothing but mockery of the innocent. God looks down on the wreck of

human hope, from the calm sky after the thunderstorm, in the
evening sunlight that gilds the desert grave. And in the world of men
the wicked have their way. God veils the face of the judge so that he is
blinded to the equity of the cause. Thus, after the arguments of his
friends, Job is compelled to see wrong everywhere, and to say that it
is the doing of God. The strophe ends with the abrupt fierce demand, -
If not, who then is it?
The short passage from the twenty-fifth verse to the end of chapter 9
(Job 9:25-35) returns sadly to the strain of personal weakness and
entreaty. Swiftly Job’s days go by, more swiftly than a runner, in so
far as he sees no good. Or they are like the reed skiffs on the river, or
the darting eagle. To forget his pain is impossible. He cannot put on
an appearance of serenity or hope. God is keeping him bound as a
transgressor. "I shall be condemned whatever I do. Why then do I
weary myself in vain?" Looking at his discoloured body, covered with
the grime of disease, he finds it a sign of God’s detestation. But if he
could wash it with snow, that is, to snowy whiteness, if he could
purify those blackened limbs with lye, the renewal would go no
further. God would plunge him again into the mire; his own clothes
would abhor him.
And now there is a change of tone. His mind, revolting from its own
conclusion, turns towards the thought of reconciliation. While as yet
he speaks of it as an impossibility there comes to him a sorrowful
regret, a vague dream or reflection in place of that fierce rebellion
which discoloured the whole world and made it appear an arena of
injustice. With that he cannot pretend to satisfy himself. Again his
humanity stirs in him:-
"For He is not a man, as I, that I should answer Him,
That we should come together in judgment.
There is no daysman between us
That might lay his hand upon us both.
Let Him take away His rod from me,
And let not His terror overawe me;

Then would I speak and not fear Him:
For I am not in such case in myself."
If he could only speak with God as a man speaks with his friend the
shadows might be cleared away. The real God, not unreasonable, not
unrighteous nor despotic, here begins to appear; and in default of
personal converse, and of a daysman, or arbiter, who might lay
reconciling hands upon both and bring them together, Job cries for
an interval of strength and freedom, that without fear and anguish he
may himself express the matter at stake. The idea of a daysman,
although the possibility of such a friendly helper is denied, is a new
mark of boldness in the thought of the drama. In that one word the
inspired writer strikes the note of a Divine purpose which he does not
yet foresee. We must not say that here we have the prediction of a
Redeemer at once God and man. The author has no such affirmation
to make. But very remarkably the desires of Job are led forth in that
direction in which the advent and work of Christ have fulfilled the
decree of grace. There can be no doubt of the inspiration of a writer
who thus strikes into the current of the Divine will and revelation.
Not obscurely is it implied in this Book of Job that, however earnest
man may be in religion, however upright and faithful (for all this Job
was), there are mysteries of fear and sorrow connected with his life in
this world which can be solved only by One who brings the light of
eternity into the range of time, who is at once "very God and very
man," whose overcoming demands and encourages our faith.
Now, the wistful cry of Job-"There is no daysman between us"-
breaking from the depths of an experience to which the best as well as
the worst are exposed in this life, an experience which cannot in
either case be justified or accounted for unless by the fact of
immortality, is, let us say, as presented here, a purely human cry.
Man who "cannot be God’s exile," bound always to seek
understanding of the will and character of God, finds himself in the
midst of sudden calamity and extreme pain, face to face with death.
The darkness that shrouds his whole existence he longs to see
dispelled or shot through with beams of clear revealing light. What
shall we say of it? If such a desire, arising in the inmost mind, had no
correspondence whatever to fact, there would be falsehood at the
heart of things. The very shape the desire takes-for a Mediator who
should be acquainted equally with God and man, sympathetic toward
the creature, knowing the mind of the Creator-cannot be a chance
thing. It is the fruit of a Divine necessity inwrought with the
constitution and life of the human soul. We are pointed to an
irrefragable argument; but the thought meanwhile does not follow it.
Immortality waits for a revelation.

Job has prayed for rest. It does not come. Another attack of pain
makes a pause in his speech, and with the tenth chapter begins a long
address to the Most High, not fierce as before, but sorrowful,
subdued.
"My soul is weary of my life.
I will give free course to my complaint;
I will speak in bitterness of my soul."
It is scarcely possible to touch the threnody that follows without
marring its pathetic and profound beauty. There is an exquisite
dignity of restraint and frankness in this appeal to the Creator. He is
an Artist whose fine work is in peril, and that from His own seeming
carelessness of it, or more dreadful to conceive, His resolution to
destroy it.
First the cry is, "Do not condemn me. Is it good unto Thee that Thou
shouldest despise the work of Thine hands?" It is marvellous to Job
that he should be scorned as worthless, while at the same time God
seems to shine on the counsel of the wicked. How can that, O Thou
Most High, be in harmony with Thy nature? He puts a supposition,
which even in stating it he must refuse, "Hast Thou eyes of flesh? or
seest Thou as man seeth?" A jealous man, clothed with a little brief
authority, might probe into the misdeeds of a fellow creature. But
God cannot do so. His majesty forbids; and especially since He knows,
for one thing, that Job is not guilty, and, for another thing, that no
one can escape His hands. Men often lay hold of the innocent, and
torture them to discover imputed crimes. The supposition that God
acts like a despot or the servant of a despot is made only to be east
aside. But he goes back on his appeal to God as Creator, and bethinks
him of that tender fashioning of the body which seems an argument
for as tender a care of the soul and the spirit life. Much of power and
lovingkindness goes to the perfecting of the body and the
development of the physical life out of weakness and embryonic form.
Can He who has so wrought, who has added favour and apparent
love, have been concealing all the time a design of mockery? Even in
creating, had God the purpose of making His creature a mere
plaything for the self-will of Omnipotence?
"Yet these things Thou didst hide in Thine heart."
These things-the desolate home, the outcast life, the leprosy. Job uses

a strange word: "I know that this was with Thee." His conclusion is
stated roughly, that nothing can matter in dealing with such a
Creator. The insistence of the friends on the hope of forgiveness,
Job’s own consciousness of integrity go for nothing.
"Were I to sin Thou wouldst mark me,
And Thou wouldst not acquit me of iniquity.
Were I wicked, woe unto me;
Were I righteous, yet should I not lift up my head."
The supreme Power of the world has taken an aspect not of
unreasoning force, but of determined ill-will to man. The only safety
seems to be in lying quiet so as not to excite against him the activity of
this awful God who hunts like a lion and delights in marvels of
wasteful strength. It appears that, having been once roused, the
Divine Enemy will not cease to persecute. New witnesses, new causes
of indignation would be found; a changing host of troubles would
follow up the attack.
I have ventured to interpret the whole address in terms of
supposition, as a theory Job flings out in the utter darkness that
surrounds him. He does not adopt it. To imagine that he really
believes this, or that the writer of the book intended to put forward
such a theory as even approximately true, is quite impossible. And
yet, when one thinks of it, perhaps impossible is too strong a word.
The doctrine of the sovereignty of God is a fundamental truth; but it
has been so conceived and wrought with as to lead many reasoners
into a dream of cruelty and irresponsible force not unlike that which
haunts the mind of Job. Something of the kind has been argued for
with no little earnestness by men who were religiously endeavouring
to explain the Bible and professed to believe in the love of God to the
world. For example: the annihilation of the wicked is denied by one
for the good reason that God has a profound reverence for being or
existence, so that he who is once possessed of will must exist forever;
but from this the writer goes on to maintain that the wicked are
useful to God as the material on which His justice operates, that
indeed they have been created solely for everlasting punishment in
order that through them the justice of the Almighty may be clearly
seen. Against this very kind of theology Job is in revolt. In the light
even of his world it was a creed of darkness. That God hates
wrongdoing, that everything selfish, vindictive, cruel, unclean, false,
shall be driven before Him-who can doubt? That according to His

decree sin brings its punishment yielding the wages of death-who can
doubt? But to represent Him who has made us all, and must have
foreseen our sin, as without any kind of responsibility for us, dashing
in pieces the machines He has made because they do not serve His
purpose, though He knew even in making them that they would not-
what a hideous falsehood is this; it can justify God only at the expense
of undeifying Him.
One thing this Book of Job teaches, that we are not to go against our
own sincere reason nor our sense of justice and truth in order to
square facts with any scheme or any theory. Religious teaching and
thought must affirm nothing that is not entirely frank, purely just,
and such as we could, in the last resort, apply out and out to
ourselves. Shall man be more just than God, more generous than
God, more faithful than God? Perish the thought, and every system
that maintains so false a theory and tries to force it on the human
mind! Nevertheless, let there be no falling into the opposite error;
from that, too, frankness will preserve us. No sincere man, attentive
to the realities of the world and the awful ordinances of nature, can
suspect the Universal Power of indifference to evil, of any design to
leave law without sanction. We do not escape at one point; God is our
Father; righteousness is vindicated, and so is faith.
As the colloquies proceed, the impression is gradually made that the
writer of this book is wrestling with that study which more and more
engages the intellect of man-What is the real? How does it stand
related to the ideal, thought of as righteousness, as beauty, as truth?
How does it stand related to God, sovereign and holy? The opening of
the book might have led straight to the theory that the real, the
present world charged with sin, disaster, and death, is not of the
Divine order, therefore is of a Devil. But the disappearance of Satan
throws aside any such idea of dualism, and pledges the writer to find
solution, if he find it at all, in one will, one purpose, one Divine event.
On Job himself the burden and the effort descend in his conflict with
the real as disaster, enigma, impending death, false judgment,
established theology and schemes of explanation. The ideal evades
him, is lost between the rising wave and the lowering sky. In the
whole horizon he sees no clear open space where it can unfold the
day. But it remains in his heart; and in the night sky it waits where
the great constellations shine in their dazzling purity and eternal
calm, brooding silent over the world as from immeasurable distance
far withdrawn. Even from that distance God sends forth and will
accomplish a design. Meanwhile the man stretches his hands in vain
from the shadowed earth to those keen lights, ever so remote and
cold.
Show me wherefore Thou strivest with me.

Is it pleasant to Thee that Thou should’st oppress,
That Thou should’st despise the work of Thy hands
And shine upon the counsel of the wicked?
Hast Thou eyes of flesh?
Or seest Thou as man seeth?
Thy days-are they as the days of man?
Thy years-are they as man’s days,
That Thou inquirest after fault of mine,
And searchest after my sin,
Though Thou knowest that I am not wicked,
And none can deliver from Thy hand?
Thine hands have made and fashioned me
Together round about; and Thou dost destroy me. [Job 10:2-8]
GUZIK 1-13, "a. Truly I know it is so: Job’s answer to Bildad seems so
much more gracious than the hard words Bildad had for Job in the
previous chapter. He began by agreeing with Bildad’s general
premise: that God rewards the righteous and corrects (or judges)
sinners.
b. But how can a man be righteous before God? Job’s response to
Bildad was wisely stated. Job obviously suffered more than normal;
yet no one could rightly accuse him of sinning more than normal. If

Job was not righteous before God, then how could any man be?
i. It is important for us to understand that the Bible speaks of human
righteousness in two senses.
— A man can be righteous in a relative sense, where one can
properly be considered as righteous among men as both Noah
(Genesis 7:1) and Job (Job 1:1) were so considered.
— A man can be righteous in a forensic (legal) sense, declared and
considered righteous by God through faith (Romans 5:19)
ii. Job’s question here concerns the first aspect of righteousness,
though it is also relevant to the other aspect of righteousness. Job
primarily wanted to know, “If I have not been righteous enough to
escape the judgment of God, then who can be?”
iii. Yet in the ultimate sense, Job’s question is the most important
question in the world. How can a man find God’s approval? How can a
man be considered righteous and not guilty before God?
c. If one wished to contend with Him, he could not answer Him one
time out of a thousand: Job understood that man could not debate
with God or demand answers from him. Sadly, this will become the
basic sin of Job in the story, the sin he repented of in Job 42:1-6.
i. “Here the word contend is the technical term for conducting a law-
suit.” (Andersen)
d. He made the Bear, Orion, and the Pleiades, and the chambers of
the south: Job praised the great might of God, who created the worlds
and put the sun and stars in the sky. Yet the might of God was no
comfort to Job; it just made him feel that God was more distant than
ever.
i. Chambers of the south: “The most remote, hidden, and secret parts
of the south; so called, because the stars which are under the
southern pole are hidden from us, and are enclosed and lodged as in a
chamber.” (Trapp)
ii. “G. Schiaparelli . . . notes that as a result of precession many stars

that were visible on the southern horizon in Palestine are no longer
visible there.” (Smick)
e. Who has hardened himself against Him and prospered? Job agreed
with the basic premise of Bildad, that one is never blessed by
hardening one’s self against God. Yet Job did not think that this
principle applied to himself in this situation, because he knew in his
heart that he had not hardened himself against God.
f. He does great things past finding out, yes, wonders without
number: Job considered the great works of God in the universe, and
how they displayed the majesty and power of God. Yet this
understanding of the greatness and might of God did not comfort Job;
it made him feel that God was too great to either notice (If He goes by
me, I do not see Him) or care and help Job (God will not withdraw
His anger).
i. It was as if Job cried out, “Why is God so hard to figure out?” His
friends did not think that God was hard to figure out; the problem
was simple to them. Job had sinned in some bad an unusual way,
therefore all this disaster came upon him. Yet Job, knowing not all
the truth (as revealed in Job 1-2), but at least knowing his own heart
and integrity, knew that God was not so simple to figure out.
2 "Indeed, I know that this is true.
But how can a mortal be righteous before
God?
BAR ES, "I know it is so of a truth - Job here refers, undoubtedly, to
something that had been said before; but whether it is to the general strain
of remark, or to some particular expression, may be doubted. Rosenmuller
supposes that he refers to what was said by Eliphaz in Job_4:17; but it
seems more probable that it is to the general position which had been laid
down and defended, that God was just and holy, and that his proceedings
were marked with equity. Job admits this, and proceeds to show that it was
a truth quite as familiar to him as it was to them. The object of his dwelling
on it seems to be to show them that it was no new thing to him, and that he

had some views on that important subject which were well worthy of
attention.
But how should man be just with God? - Margin, “before.” The meaning is,
that he could not be regarded as perfectly holy in the sight of God; or that so
holy and pure a being as God must see that man was a sinner, and regard
him as such; see the sentiment explained in the notes at Job_4:17. The
question here asked is, in itself, the most important ever propounded by
man - “How shall sinful man be regarded and treated as righteous by his
Maker?” This has been the great inquiry which has always been before the
human mind. Man is conscious that he is a sinner. He feels that he must be
regarded as such by God. Yet his happiness here and hereafter, his peace
and all his hope, depend on his being treated as if he were righteous, or
regarded as just before God. This inquiry has led to all forms of religion
among people; to all the penances and sacrifices of different systems; to all
the efforts which have been made to devise some system that shall make it
proper for God to treat people as righteous.
The question has never been satisfactorily answered except in the
Christian revelation, where a plan is disclosed by which God “may be just,
and yet the justifier of him that believeth.” Through the infinite merits of
the Redeemer, man, though conscious that he is personally a sinner, may be
treated as if he had never sinned; though feeling that he is guilty, he may
consistently be forever treated as if he were just. The question asked by Job
implies that such is the evidence and the extent of human guilt, that man
can never justify himself. This is clear and indisputable. Man cannot justify
himself by the deeds of the law. Justification, as a work of law, is this: A man
is charged, for example, with the crime of murder. He sets up in defense
that he did not kill, or that if he tools life it was in self-defense, and that he
had a right to do it. Unless the fact of killing be proved, and it be shown that
he had no right to do in the case as he has done, he cannot be condemned,
and the law acquits him. It has no charge against him, and he is just or
justified in the sight of the law. But in this sense man can never be just
before God. He can neither show that the things charged on him by his
Maker were not done, or that being done, he had a right to do them; and
being unable to do this, he must be held to be guilty. He can never be
justified therefore by the law, and it is only by that system which God has
revealed in the gospel, where a conscious sinner may be treated as if he
were righteous through the merits of another, that a man can ever be
regarded as just before God; see Rom_1:17, note; Rom_3:24-25, note.
CLARKE, "I know it is so of a truth - I acknowledge the general truth of
the maxims you have advanced. God will not ultimately punish a righteous
person, nor shall the wicked finally triumph; and though righteous before
man, and truly sincere in my piety, yet I know, when compared with the
immaculate holiness of God, all my righteousness is nothing.
GILL, "I know it is so of a truth,.... That is, that God is just, and does not
pervert justice and judgment, as Bildad had observed, Job_8:3; Job was a

man of great natural parts and capacity; he had a large share of knowledge
of things, natural, civil, and moral; and he was a good man, in whom the
true light of grace shined; and being, enlightened by the spirit of wisdom
and revelation, in the knowledge of divine things, he knew much of God, of
his being and perfections, and of the methods of his grace, especially in the
justification of men, as appears by various passages in this chapter; he knew
that God was just and holy in all his ways and works, whether of providence
or grace; and this he kept in sight amidst all his afflictions, and was ready to
acknowledge it: he knew this "of a truth"; that is, most certainly; for there
are some truths that are so plain and evident that a man may be assured of,
and this was such an one with Job; he had no need to be instructed in this
article; he was as knowing in this point, as well as in others, as Bildad or any
of his friends; nor did he need to be sent to the ancients to inquire of them,
or to prepare himself for the search of the fathers, in order to acquire the
knowledge of this, to which Bildad had advised; yet, though this was so clear
a point, about which there was no room for further contest; but then the
matter is:
how should man be just with God? if not angels, if not man in his best estate,
in which he was vanity when compared with God; then much less frail,
feeble, mortal, sinful men, even the best of men, considered in themselves,
and with respect to their own righteousness: for, to "be just" is not to be so
through an infusion of righteousness and holiness into men, which in the
best of men is their sanctification and not their justification; but this is a
legal term, and stands opposed to condemnation, and signifies a man's
being condemned and pronounced righteous in a judiciary way; so a man
cannot be adjudged, reckoned, or accounted by God upon the foot of works
of righteousness done by him; since his best works are imperfect, not
answerable to the law, but very defective, and so not justifying; are opposite
to the grace of God, by which, in an evangelic sense, men are justified; these
would encourage boasting, which is excluded in God's way of justifying
sinners; and could justification be by them, the death of Christ would be in
vain, and there would have been no need of him and his justifying
righteousness: especially, it is a certain thing, that a man can never be
"just", or "justified with God", in such a way, or through any righteousness
wrought out by him; that is, either he is not and cannot be just in
comparison of God; for, if the inhabitants of the heavens are not pure in his
sight, the holy angels; and if man, at his best estate, was altogether vanity
when compared with him, what must sinful mortals be? or not be just at his
bar; should he mark their iniquities, enter into judgment with them, or an
action against them, summon them before him to answer to charges he has
to exhibit; they could not stand before him, or go off acquitted or
discharged: or in his account; for his judgment is according to truth; he can
never reckon that a perfect righteousness which is an imperfect one: or in
his sight; for, though men may be just in comparison of others, or at an
human bar, in an human court of judicature, and in the account of men, and
in their sight, to whom they may appear outwardly righteous, as well as in
their own sight; yet not in the sight of God, who sees all things, the heart
and all in it, every action, and the spring of it; see Psa_143:2 Rom_3:20; in
this sense, a man can only be just with God through the imputation of the
righteousness of Christ, accounting that to him, putting it upon him, and

clothing him with it, and so reckoning and pronouncing him righteous
through it; and which is entirely consistent with the justice of God, since by
it the law is fulfilled, magnified, and made honourable, and justice satisfied;
so that God is just, while he is the justifier of him that believes in Jesus,
Rom_3:26.
JAMISO , "I know it is so of a truth — that God does not “pervert justice”
(Job_8:3). But (even though I be sure of being in the right) how can a mere
man assert his right - (be just) with God. The Gospel answers (Rom_3:26).
GEOFF THOMAS, " ow Bildad's final point, "Surely God does not reject a
blameless man or strengthen the hands of evildoers" (8:20), is absolutely correct. So
Job begins in verse 2, of chapter 9 in this way, "Indeed I know that this is true," he
says. We all know what is true in Bildad's pontificating. It is his application of the
justice of God to Job that in unacceptable.
That is the greatest question a person can ask. How can a sinner be righteous before
God? If God does judge men by their works all hope is gone. ow Bildad's religion
was this, that if men do good then God blesses them; if they do evil, then God
punishes them. Bildad's religion, in other words, is a religion without grace. But the
dilemma Job's life creates for Bildad and those who share Bildad's beliefs is this:
Job has been the man who has done exceptional good, he strengthened the hands of
the weak, and spoke up for righteousness. He was a friend to the widow and he
helped the needy. Job had done no particular act of wickedness worthy of the grief
he had known losing his property, children, health, the affection of his wife,
reputation and influence. Bildad's only response is dark mutterings to the effect that
there must be hidden sins somewhere, and Job must acknowledge them. ot
knowing that God has allowed the devil to bring these afflictions into his life, Job
has to resort to other explanations for his pain."
BE SO , "Job 9:2. I know it is so of a truth — amely, as you say, that God must
be just and righteous; that purity and uprightness are qualities belonging to him;
that he cannot possibly be biased or prejudiced in judging and determining the state
and condition of mankind. I am likewise satisfied, that the time we have to live here
is too short to compass any considerable points of knowledge; and that, whenever he
pleases, he can exercise his power so as to change our exalted mirth to most bitter
weeping, our highest joy to the most abject sorrow: can bring the most insolent
offender to shame, and dispossess the wicked of his strongest and most magnificent
situation. But how — Hebrew, And how, should man — Enosh, weak, frail man,
imperfect as he is, be just with God? — Be justified, or clear himself in God’s
account. I know that no man is absolutely holy and righteous, if God be severe to
mark what is amiss in him.
SIMEO 2-4, "THE FOLLY OF SELF-RIGHTEOUS ESS A D PRESUMPTIO
Job 9:2-4. How should man be just with God? If he will contend with him, he cannot

answer him one of a thousand. He is wise in heart, and mighty in strength: who hath
hardened against him, and hath prospered?
THE fundamental doctrines of our holy religion are not like the deductions of
human reason, which leave a degree of doubt upon the mind: they correspond with
something within us, which contributes to assure us that the things which we have
received upon the divine testimony are unquestionably true. The inspired writers
indeed, knowing by whom they were inspired, delivered without hesitation those
things of which they had no internal evidence, as well as those which were
confirmed by their own experience. evertheless there is a peculiar energy in their
mode of declaring experimental truths: they make them a subject of appeal to their
very enemies, and challenge the whole universe to deny the things whereof they
affirm. Thus it was with Job. Bildad had charged him with asserting his own perfect
innocence, and accusing God as unjust in his proceedings towards him: “Doth God
pervert judgment? or doth the Almighty pervert justice!” Job, in his reply, allowed
the premises of his opponent, but denied the consequences which were deduced
from them: “I know it is so of a truth;” that is, I know God will not pervert justice:
“but” I deny that I ever intended to justify myself before God, or to harden myself
against him; for I am as fully convinced of the folly of acting in such a manner, as
you or any one else can be: “How can man,” &c.
In this reply Job strongly asserts two things;
I. The folly of justifying ourselves before God—
Many there are who justify themselves before God—
[Few indeed, if any, will deny that they have sinned: but all unregenerate persons
will deny that they deserve the wrath of God: at least, if, on account of some flagrant
transgression, they be constrained to confess themselves obnoxious to eternal
punishment, they hope by some repentance or reformation to compensate for their
sins, and to establish a righteousness whereby they may find acceptance with God.]
But this proceeds from an ignorance of the divine law—
[“The law of God is perfect [ ote: Psalms 19:7.];” “the commandment is exceeding
broad [ ote: Psalms 119:96.]:” it extends not to actions only, but to the thoughts
and desires of the heart [ ote: “Thou shall not covet,”i. e. Thou shall not harbour,
thou shalt not even have, an inordinate desire, Romans 7:7.]; and it requires perfect
and perpetual obedience [ ote: Galatians 3:10.]. On our failure in any one
particular, it denounces a curse against us [ ote: Galatians 3:10.]; and from that
period it can never justify us. It admits of no repentance on our part, or relaxation
on God’s part [ ote: Matthew 5:18.]. It is as immutable as God himself: and it is
owing to men’s ignorance of this law that they so foolishly build upon it as the
foundation of their hopes.]
one who understand this law will ever look for justification from it—

[If amongst a thousand perfect actions, one only were found defective, it were
sufficient to condemn us for ever. But, if we will try ourselves by the law, we shall
not find “one action of a thousand,” no, nor one in our whole lives, that will not
condemn us. If we should presume to “contend with God” respecting the perfection
of our best action, how soon would he confound us! Even we will venture to expose
the folly of such presumption. Bring forth your action to the light: was there nothing
amiss in its principle, nothing defective in the manner, nothing of a selfish mixture
in its end? See if you can answer a weak sinful creature like yourselves: and, if you
cannot, how will you “answer” the pure heart-searching “God?”
See then the folly of hoping ever to “be just with God;” and adopt the language of
David, “Enter not into judgment with thy servant; for in thy sight shall no man
living be justified [ ote: Psalms 19:12; Psalms 40:12; Psalms 130:3; Psalms
143:2.].”]
But there is another point in the text to which we must advert, namely,
II. The folly of hardening ourselves against God—
Those who justify themselves before God are equally prone to harden themselves
against him—
[This they do by their unbelief and impenitence: they will not give credit to the
declarations of God concerning them: they think, in direct opposition to all that God
has spoken, that he will never execute his threatenings against the transgressors of
his law. They profess to hope that repentance will appease his anger; and yet they
put off their repentance from year to year, and take occasion even from his mercy to
sin the more against him.]
The folly of this appears,
1. From the character of God—
[If God were ignorant of what passes in our minds, or unable to punish us for our
sins, we need not concern ourselves so much about him. But are “the thick clouds a
covering to him, so that he cannot see us [ ote: Job 22:13-14.]?” or “are we stronger
than he, so that we can provoke him to jealousy [ ote: 1 Corinthians 10:22.]”
without any fear of his resentment? o: “he is wise in heart, and mighty in
strength:” he beholds the most secret emotions of our hearts, and will surely call us
into judgment for them. What folly is it then to “harden ourselves against him,”
when “neither rocks nor mountains can conceal us from him,” nor the whole
universe combined deliver us from his hands [ ote: Daniel 4:37. Proverbs 11:21.]!]
2. From the experience of men—
[”Who amongst all the sons of men ever prospered,” while he lived in an impenitent

Job 9 commentary

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Job 9 commentary