Job 19:11

Verse 11. And he counteth me unto him as one of his enemies.] From the seventh to the thirteenth verse there seems to be an allusion to a hostile invasion, battles, sieges, c.

1. A neighbouring chief, without provocation, invades his neighbour's territories, and none of his friends will come to his help. "I cry out of wrong, but I am not heard," Job 19:7.

2. The foe has seized on all the passes, and he is hemmed up. "He hath fenced up my way that I cannot pass," Job 19:8.

3. He has surprised and carried by assault the regal city, seized and possessed the treasures. "He hath stripped me of my glory, and taken the crown from my head," Job 19:9.

4. All his armies are routed in the field, and his strong places carried. "He hath destroyed me on every side," Job 19:10.

5. The enemy proceeds to the greatest length of outrage, wasting every thing with fire and sword. "He hath kindled his wrath against me, and treateth me like one of his adversaries, Job 19:11.

6. He is cooped up in a small camp with the wrecks of his army and in this he is closely besieged by all the power of his foes, who encompass the place, and raise forts against it. "His troops come together, and raise up their way against me, and encamp round about my tabernacle."

7. Not receiving any assistance from friends or neighbours, he abandons all hope of being able to keep the field, escapes with the utmost difficulty, and is despised and neglected by his friends and domestics because he has been unfortunate. "I am escaped with the skin of my teeth," Job 19:20. "My kinsfolk have failed-all my intimate friends abhorred me," Job 19:14-19.

Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

Job 19:11 He hath also kindled his wrath against me, and he counteth me unto him as [one of] his enemies.

Ver. 11. He hath also kindled his wrath against me] Now if his wrath was kindled, yea, but a little, woe be to all those against whom it is bent. He will surely heap mischiefs upon them, he will spend his arrows upon them, Deu 32:22-23 Psa 2:12. Job felt them striking in the sides of his soul, even the envenomed arrows of the Almighty; and yet this was only a refiner’s fire, Mal 3:2, or, if a consuming fire, as Heb 12:29, yet it was to waste his corruptions only, to sever the sin which he hated from the Son whom he loved; to try and exercise his patience, &c., all which notwithstanding, he complaineth heavily about these spunks and sparks of divine displeasure.

And counteth me unto him as one of his enemies] Heb. As his enemies; not as a single enemy, but a rabble of rebels, an army of enemies, such as shall one day meet at Armageddon, their rendezvous. See Job 13:24.

John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

enemies-- (Job 13:24; Lam 2:5).

Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

(11) He hath also kindled . . .—Comp. Job_16:9; Job_16:12, &c.

A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

11–12. Figures of hostile assault; God directs charge after charge of His army against Him. The reference is to his afflictions, cf. ch. Job_10:17.

The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

His troops come together,.... Afflictions which are many, and of which it may be said, as was at the birth of God, who had his name from the word here used, "a troop cometh": Gen 30:11; and these sometimes come together, or follow so quick one upon another, that there is scarce any interval between them, as did Job's afflictions; and they are God's hosts, his troops, his soldiers, which are at his command; and he says to them, as the centurion did to his, to the one, Go, and he goes, and to another, Come, and it comes:

and raise up their way against me; as an army, when it comes against a place, throws up a bank to raise their artillery upon, that they may play it to greater advantage; or make a broad causeway, for the soldiers to march abreast against it; or an high cast up way, as the word (y) signifies, over a ditch or dirty place in a hollow, that they may the better pass over: some read it, "they raise up their way upon me" (z); he opposing and standing in the way was crushed down by them, and trampled upon, and over whom they passed as on an highway, and in a beaten path; see Isa 51:23; but most render it, "against me"; for Job looked upon all his afflictions, as Jacob did Gen 42:36, to be against him, to militate against him, and threaten him with ruin, when they were all working for him, even for his good:

and encamp round about my tabernacle: as an army round about a city when besieging it. Job may have respect to the tabernacle of his body, as that is sometimes so called, Co2 5:1; and to the diseases of it; which being a complication, might be said to encamp about him, or surround him on all sides.

(y) "aggerant", Cocceius, Schultens; "straverunt", Montanus, Schmidt; a "via strata et elevata", Mercerus, Drusius. (z) "super me", Pagninus, Montanus, Mercerus, Schmidt, Michaelis.

John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

He hath also kindled his wrath - He is angry. Wrath in the Scriptures is usually represented as burning or inflamed - because like fire it destroys everything before it.

And he counteth me unto him as one of his enemies - He treats me as he would an enemy. The same complaint he elsewhere makes; see Job 13:24; perhaps also in Job 16:9. We are not to understand Job here as admitting that “he” was an enemy of God. He constantly maintained that he was not, but he was constrained to admit that God “treated him” as if he were his enemy, and he could not account for it. “On this ground,” therefore, he now maintains that his friends ought to show him compassion, instead of trying to prove that he “was” an enemy of God; they ought to pity a man who was so strangely and mysteriously afflicted, instead of increasing his sorrows by endeavoring to demonstrate that he was a man of eminent wickedness.

Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

He hath stirred up his wrath against me of his own accord, without any provocation of mine, human infirmity excepted.

He counteth me unto him as one of his enemies, i.e. he useth me as sharply as if I were an inveterate enemy of God and of all goodness, though he knoweth I am and have ever been a hearty lover and servant of him.

Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

11. One of his enemies — Hebrew, his foes; not one, but several. God treats him as if he were many enemies in one.

Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

He hath also kindled his wrath against me. It is not what has happened to him in the way of affliction and calamity that so much oppresses and crushes the patriarch, as the cause to which he, not unnaturally, ascribes his afflictions, vie. the wrath of God. Participating in the general creed of his time, he believes his sufferings to come direct from God, and to be proofs of God"s severe anger against him. He is not, however, prepared on this account to renounce God. "Though he slay me, yet will I trust in him" (Job_13:15) is still his inward sustaining thought and guiding principle. And he counteth me unto him as one of his enemies. Job felt himself treated as an enemy of God, and supposed that God must consider him such. He either had no glimpse of the cheering truth, "Whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth", (Heb_12:6) or he could not imagine that such woes as his were mere chastenings.

The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.