Job 32:1

Usually young men are the disputants and old men the moderators; but here, when old men were the disputants, as a rebuke to them for their unbecoming heat, a young man is raised up to be the moderator. Divers of Job's friends were present, that came to visit him and to receive instruction. Now here we have,

I. The reason why his three friends were now silent. They ceased to answer him, and let him have his saying, because he was righteous in his own eyes. This was the reason they gave why they said no more, because it was to no purpose to argue with a man that was so opinionative, Job 32:1. Those that are self-conceited are indeed hard to be wrought upon; there is more hope of a fool (a fool of God's making) than of those who are fools of their own making, Pro 26:12. But they did not judge fairly concerning Job: he was really righteous before God, and not righteous in his own eyes only; so that it was only to save their own credit that they made this the reason of their silence, as peevish disputants commonly do when they find themselves run a-ground and are not willing to own themselves unable to make their part good.

II. The reasons why Elihu, the fourth, now spoke. His name Elihu signifies My God is he. They had all tried in vain to convince Job, but my God is he that can and will do it, and did it at last: he only can open the understanding. He is said to be a Buzite, from Buz, Nahor's second son (Gen 22:21), and of the kindred of Ram, that is, Aram (so some), whence the Syrians or Aramites descended and were denominated, Gen 22:21. Of the kindred of Abram; so the Chaldee-paraphrase, supposing him to be first called Ram - high, then Abram - a high father, and lastly Abraham - the high father of a multitude. Elihu was not so well known as the rest, and therefore is more particularly described thus.

1. Elihu spoke because he was angry and thought he had good cause to be so. When he had made his observations upon the dispute he did not go away and calumniate the disputants, striking them secretly with a malicious censorious tongue, but what he had to say he would say before their faces, that they might vindicate themselves if they could. (1.) He was angry at Job, because he thought he did not speak so reverently of God as he ought to have done; and that was too true (Job 32:2): He justified himself more than God, that is, took more care and pains to clear himself from the imputation of unrighteousness in being thus afflicted than to clear God from the imputation of unrighteousness in afflicting him, as if he were more concerned for his own honour than for God's; whereas he should, in the first place, have justified God and cleared his glory, and then he might well enough have left his own reputation to shift for itself. Note, A gracious heart is jealous for the honour of God, and cannot but be angry when that is neglected or postponed, or when any injury is done it. Nor is it any breach of the law of meekness to be angry at our friends when they are offensive to God. Get thee behind me, Satan, says Christ to Simon. Elihu owned Job to be a good man, and yet would not say as he said when he thought he said amiss: it is too great a compliment to our friends not to tell them of their faults. (2.) He was angry at his friends because he thought they had not conducted themselves so charitably towards Job as they ought to have done (Job 32:3): They had found no answer, and yet had condemned Job. They had adjudged him to be a hypocrite, a wicked man, and would not recede from that sentence concerning him; and yet they could not prove him so, nor disprove the evidences he produced of his integrity. They could not make good the premises, and yet held fast the conclusion. They had no reply to make to his arguments, and yet they would not yield, but, right or wrong, would run him down; and this was not fair. Seldom is a quarrel begun, and more seldom is a quarrel carried on to the length that this was, in which there is not a fault on both sides. Elihu, as became a moderator, took part with neither, but was equally displeased with the mistakes and mismanagement of both. Those that in good earnest seek for truth must thus be impartial in their judgments concerning the contenders, and not reject what is true and good on either side for the sake of what is amiss, nor approve or defend what is amiss for the sake of what is true and good, but must learn to separate between the precious and the vile.

2. Elihu spoke because he thought that it was time to speak, and that now, at length, it had come to his turn, v. 4, 5. (1.) He had waited on Job's speeches, had patiently heard him out, until the words of Job were ended. (2.) He had waited on his friends' silence, so that, as he would not interrupt him, so he would not prevent them, not because they were wiser than he, but because they were older than he, and therefore it was expected by the company that they should speak first; and Elihu was very modest, and would by no means offer to abridge them of their privilege. Some certain rules of precedency must be observed, for the keeping of order. Though inward real honour will attend true wisdom and worth, yet, since every man will think himself or his friend the wisest and worthiest, this can afford no certain rule for the outward ceremonial honour, which therefore must attend seniority either of age or office; and this respect the seniors may the better require because they paid it when they were juniors, and the juniors may the better pay because they shall have it when they come to be seniors.

Matthew Henry's Commentary on the Whole Bible (1708–1710) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

Job 32:1 So these three men ceased to answer Job, because he [was] righteous in his own eyes.

Ver. 1. So these three men ceased to answer Job] They were as quiet as men are on a Sabbath, so the word importeth; they had tired themselves with talking, and now they were resolved to rest them, and the rather, because they judged there was little good to be done by aught that they should say; for Job was set.

Because he was righteous in his own eyes] And so there was no more hope of a fool than of him. Pertinacious they held him and contentious, self-conceited and opinionated; which, indeed, was a right character of themselves, if they could have seen it. He was only constant to himself, and to the truth; whereof he showed himself a stout and resolute champion. Only, as every pomegranate hath some rotten kernels in it; so Job had his frailties, his outbursts, caused by extremity of pain and excess of passion; for the which these three did him wrong to give him up for deplored and desperate.

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.

Job_32:1-7

Then was kindled the wrath of Elihu.

Analysis of Elihus speech

After the introduction Elihu reproves Job, because he had claimed too much for himself, and had indulged in a spirit of complaining against God. He goes on to say that it is not necessary for God to develop all His counsels and purposes to men; that He often speaks in visions of the night; and that the great purpose of His dealings is to take away pride from man, and to produce true humility. This He does by the dispensations of His providence, and by the calamities with which He visits His people. Yet he says, if, when man is afflicted, he will be truly penitent, God will have mercy and restore his flesh, so that it will be fresher than that of an infant. The true secret, therefore, of the Divine dispensations, according to Elihu, the principle on which he explains all, is, that afflictions are disciplinary, or are designed to produce true humility and penitence. They are not absolute proof of enormous wickedness and hypocrisy, as the friends of Job had maintained, nor could one in affliction lay claim to freedom from sin, or blame God, as he understood Job to have done. He next reproves Job for evincing a proud spirit of scorning, and especially for having maintained that, according to the Divine dealings with him, it would be no advantage to a man to be pious, and to delight himself in God. Such an opinion implied that God was severe and wrong in His dealings. To meet this, Elihu brings forward a variety of considerations to show the impropriety of remarks of this kind, and especially to prove that the Governor of the world can do nothing inconsistent with benevolence and justice. From these considerations he infers that the duty of one in the situation of Job was plain. It was to admit the possibility that he had sinned, and to resolve that he would offend no more. He then proceeds to consider the opinion of Job, that under the arrangements of Divine Providence there could be no advantage in being righteous; that the good were subjected to so many calamities, that nothing was gained by all their efforts to be holy; and that there was no profit though a man were cleansed from sin. To this Elihu replies, by showing that God is supreme; that the character of man cannot profit Him; that He is governed by other considerations in His dealings than that man has a claim on Him; and that there are great and important considerations which lead Him to the course He takes with men, and that to complain of these is proof of rebellion. Elihu then closes his address by stating--

1. The true principles of the Divine administration, as he understood them; and

2. By saying that there is much in the Divine government which is inscrutable, but that there are such evidences of greatness and wisdom in His government, there are so many things in the works of nature, and in the course of events, which we cannot understand, that we should submit to His superior wisdom. (Albert Barnes.)

Post-exilic wisdom

Elihu appears to represent the new wisdom which came to Hebrew thinkers in the period of the exile; and there are certain opinions embodied in his address which must have been formed during an exile that brought many Jews to honour. The reading of affliction given is one following the discovery that the general sinfulness of a nation may entail chastisement on men who have not been personally guilty of great sin, yet are sharers in the common neglect of religion and pride of heart, and further, that this chastisement may be the means of great profit to those who suffer. It would be harsh to say the tone is that of a mind which has caught the trick of voluntary humility, of pietistic self-abasement. Yet there are traces of such a tendency, the beginning of a religious strain opposed to legal self-righteousness, running, however, very readily to excess and formalism. Elihu, accordingly, appears to stand on the verge of a descent from the robust moral vigour of the original author towards that low ground in which false views of mans nature hinder the free activity of faith Elihu avoids assailing the conception of the prologue, that Job is a perfect and upright man before God. He takes the state of the sufferer as he finds it, and inquires how and why it is, and what is the remedy. There are pedantries and obscurities in the discourse, yet the author must not be denied the merit of a careful and successful attempt to adapt his character to the place he occupies in the drama. Beyond this, and the admission that something is said on the subject of Divine discipline, it is needless to go in justifying Elihus appearance. One can only remark with wonder in passing, that Elihu should ever have been declared the Angel Jehovah, or a personification of the Son of God. (Robert A. Watson, D. D.)

Credulous and incredulous minds

1. Elihu appears to have been a young man of keen perception, vigorous intellect, and possessed of the idea that he had a mission to teach and criticise others. He saw their mistakes as a bystander might, and set himself to correct them. The thing which peculiarly stirs him is, that while Job was clearly wrong, the friends had not hit off the truth, they had erred more than he, and this he considers as overruled for good, that they might not fancy that they had answered him, and that they, and not God, had thrust him down. With this view of their relative positions he goes to work to answer their objections and to correct Job. The opening of his speech to Job gives the impression of a simple and intentionally humble person, nevertheless deeply persuaded that his mission to advise and teach others is from God. Yet there is an inclination to condemn others, and to an apparent arrogance. He first describes himself as full of matter. This looks like vanity, but it need not be. There is an intuitive consciousness of inspiration in the minds of some men, and those often are the young, which seems to point them out as men to do a work for God, or the advancement of souls, in their own day. The power that urges them within is one they cannot resist. It is the teaching and influence of God. Many a youth is conscious of some such energy, and, being conscious of it, can neither resist the consciousness, nor hinder the expression of the power. Society usually condemns such men, though men often have to endorse their work in after days. Such an one Elihu seems to have been. It was not the possession of the power to see truth unseen by others which was his fault; nor was it the consciousness that he possessed it; but the presuming on the power, to offend against the laws of humility and modesty, and the thrusting forward the consciousness of his ability in such a way as to contemn and despise others, or to give to others the impression that they are despised and neglected.

2. Elihu opens his speech with a warm protest in favour of the fairness of Gods dealings, and against the complaints set up by Job assailing the inequality of providence. He shows that there is an end and object in Gods dealings with man through sorrow and chastisement. He dwells on the perfection of His character. He then proceeds to show the power and omniscience of God. His complaint against Job is, not only that he has actually done wrong, but that his arguments are of a kind to fortify the wicked, and to strengthen the position of Gods enemies. He concludes his remonstrance in the magnificent language of chapter 37, in which he sets forth the greatness of the works of creation. He is offended at Jobs deviation from the recognised paths of simple religion into the more devious and intricate ones of a somewhat metaphysical search into the causes of apparent contradictions.

3. The two conditions of mind are best seen in contrast. We often do see them so in life. The following classes of men are frequent and familiar to our mind. There is a man who sincerely serves and loves God. He has no hesitation as to his faith in His love, his choice and his intense desire; nevertheless, his mind is one which surveys and weighs everything. It sees the inequality of the law of God, if only the superficial view be taken; he goes down lower, and strives to find some firm basis founded on the moral sense, and the deeper condition of the progress of society. This man accepts and defends the discoveries of science; he is not startled at seeming contradictions. Such was Job. Elihu did not understand the man of keenly inquiring mind, agitated, as Job was, about the causes of things. There are two classes of men among us; those who reach the end of faith through the gallery of inquiry, and those who rest in it from the beginning, and would shudder at having to ask the question which they consider already finally rocked to sleep in the cradle of unsuspecting and Unhesitating trust.

4. Elihu suggests to Job the various modes of Gods visitations and dealings with men. Elihu expresses some surprise that Job should not more easily and heartily acquiesce in the justice of Gods dealings, without inquiring and searching so deeply into Gods actions and motives. So many men of Elihus kind are surprised at the difficulty which deeper minds feel. He first objects to Job finding fault with God for giving him trouble, as if he had any right to object to the ways and laws of Him who made him. He tries to convince Job of the close connection between cause and effect in Gods dealing with His people, of the reality of His intentions in every act of trial or humiliation to draw the soul of man out of some snare of Satan, some pit of destruction, and to bring him near Himself. Elihus complaint against Job is, that he does not feel all this. He hesitates about this manifest connection between cause and effect; he searches more anxiously, decides more hesitatingly, and takes courage more cautiously. He searches into grounds and causes. Another man under a strong impression that some line of action is a duty, expects everything will guide him with regard to it; sees everything through that atmosphere, possessed in soul of one time, imagines everything he hears is a note which tends to recall it. See how each of these classes would deal with--

(1) Chastisement.

(2) National calamity.

(3) The discoveries and dicta of science.

(4) Natural phenomena.

The two classes of mind are very distinct; but both may be religious, and that in the very highest sense; but they will have a tendency to mistake and misunderstand each other. There is a painful tendency in religious men to be narrow towards each other. We can help being severe in our judgment on each other. (E. Monro.)

The speech of Elihu

I. Religious controversy issuing in utter failure. Long was the controversy of Job and his three friends; hot was their spirit, and varied the arguments employed on both sides. But what was the result? Neither party was convinced. Polemics have proved the greatest hindrance and the greatest curse to the cause of truth. Disagreement, says F.W. Robertson, is refreshing when two men lovingly desire to compare their views, to find out truth. Controversy is wretched when it is an attempt to prove one another wrong. Therefore Christ would not argue with Pilate. Religious controversy does only harm. It destroys the humble inquiry after truth; it throws all the energies into an attempt to prove ourselves right. In that disparaging spirit no man gets at truth. The meek will He grade in judgment. The only effective way to clear the atmosphere of religious errors, is to stir it with the breath and brighten it with the beams of Divine truth. Bring out the truth, regardless of mens opinions.

II. Indignation towards men springing from zeal to God. Then was kindled the wrath of Elihu the son of Barachel the Buzite, of the kindred of Ram: against Job was his wrath kindled, because he justified himself rather than God. Also against his three friends was his wrath kindled. Men hating their fellow creatures because their opinions concerning God tally not with their own. How arrogant is this! It is the regarding our own views as the infallible truth; and what is this but the spirit of Popery?

2. How impious is this! A zeal for God which kindles indignation to men, is a false zeal--a zeal abhorrent to the Divine nature.

3. How inhuman is this! Can anything be more inhuman than to be indignant with a man simply because his opinions are not in agreement with our own?

III. Reverence for age restraining the speech of youth. I am young, and ye are very old; wherefore I was afraid, and durst not show you mine opinion. I said, Days should speak, and multitude of years should teach wisdom. Here this young man appears in an aspect most becoming and commendable. He shows--

1. A sense of his theological inferiority arising from his youthhood.

2. A deference for the judgment of his seniors. I said, Days should speak. Age gives a man great advantage in judging things. The aged, says a modern writer, have had an opportunity of long observation. They have conversed much with men. They have seen the results of certain courses of conduct, and they have arrived at a period of life when they can look at the reality of things, and are uninfluenced now by passion. Returning respect for the sentiments of the aged, attention to their counsels, veneration for their persons, and deference for them when they speak, would be an indication of advancement in society in modern times; and there is scarcely anything in which we have deteriorated from the simplicity of early ages, or in which we fall behind the Oriental world, so much as in the want of this. (Homilist.)

The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Job 32:1. So these three men ceased to answer Job — Finding that he persevered in asserting that he was not guilty of any of the heinous crimes which they laid to his charge, they left off disputing with him; because he was righteous in his own eyes — So they said; but the fact was they could not answer him.

Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Introduction in Prose accounting for the intervention of Elihu, Job_32:1-6 a.

The sacred writer proceeds to apologize for the intervention of Elihu, and more especially for the imperfections of his first address; not only for the impetuosity and conceit which it betokened, but for its painful embarrassment and the obvious inadequacy of its exordium — the former of which were unbecoming a young man, and the latter of which should seemingly have led him to keep his silence. (See note on Job_32:6.) The introduction, however, quietly assures us in advance of the noble character of the speaker and of the fitness of his speech, notwithstanding adverse appearances; and prepares us to coincide with the estimate of Lowth: “The lenity and moderation of Elihu serve as a beautiful contrast to the intemperance and asperity of the other three. He is pious, mild, and equitable; equally free from adulation and severity; and endued with singular wisdom, which he attributes entirely to the inspiration of God; and his modesty, moderation, and wisdom are the more entitled to commendation when we consider his unripe youth. As the characters of his detractors were in all respects calculated to inflame the mind of Job, that of this arbitrator is admirably adapted to soothe and compose it. To this point the whole drift of the argument tends, and on this the very purport of it seems to depend.” — Hebrew Poetry, sec. 34.

1. Righteous in his own eyes — The friends had failed to convince him of unrighteousness. On the contrary, in arraigning the rightness of the divine government, they conceived his object to be the establishment of his own righteousness. Seemingly about to retire from the field and leave Job to his vanity and obduracy, the friends console themselves, and excuse their pitiable defeat, by the solace that Job is “righteous in his own eyes.” The author apparently makes the remark in the interest of “the friends,” notwithstanding Hengstenberg’s view that he speaks in his own person.

The words are significant in their bearing upon the solution of the problem of the book.

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

Notes

Job_32:2. “Elihu” אֱלִיהוּא “my God is He;” or, according to some: “My God is Jehovab.” Various opinions concerning him, both as to his personality, speeches, and character. He has been considered by some as Balaam, the son of Beor. So JEROME, BEDS, LYRA, and some Rabbins. BEDE saw in him a type of the enemies of the church. Bishop WARBURTON thinks him to have been Ezra, the scribe. Some, as COLEMAN, have supposed him to be the Son of God—a manifestation of the Second Person of the Trinity in the form of a man; a prelibation of His incarnation; what Melehizedech was to Abraham. HODGE regards him as a representative character of the Messiah. KITTO makes him a comparatively obscure and unknown person. According to KIEL and others he was a fourth friend of Job. ZOCKLER understands him to have been a near kinsman of the Patriarch, and not belonging to the party of friends. According to GREGORY: A mere braggadocio; full of pride and vainglory; had the knowledge of God, and boasted of it not a little: from his pride and self-conceit, a type of those who, being left to themselves, become proud of their knowledge. So CODURCUS and MICHAELIS regard him as “highly conceited.” STRIGELIUS sees in him an example of an ambitious orator, full of ostentation and audacity. So HERDER, UMBREIT, HAHN, DILLMANN. Professor TURNER speaks of him as manifesting a degree of veneration for Job and his friends, but speaking as an inflated youth, wishing to conceal his self-sufficiency under an appearance of modesty. According to VAIHINGER and others, he attempts to give a solution of the problem, but cannot. An entirely opposite view, however, is taken of him by AUGUSTIN, CHRYSOSTOM, AQUINAS, BRENTIUS, CALVIN, SCHULTENS, SCHLOTTMANN, ZOCKLER, and most of the defenders of the authenticity of the speeches ascribed to him. According to COCCEIUS and others, he “excelled in modesty, as in wisdom.” CARPZOV: “Younger, but not inferior to the others in piety.” SCULTETUS: “Rightly, but too severely blames Job’s speeches.” SCOTT, the translator, observes that the sacred writer bears witness to his modesty, and that Job’s attention evidences the pertinence of his speeches; while his plan for humbling Job was pursued and completed by the Almighty Himself. According to HUFNAGEL, he defines the state of the question; hits the true point of view in relation to Job’s conduct more than his predecessors, neither suspecting his piety, nor charging him with vice, but objecting to his impatience, and a finding fault with Divine Providence: with much power of comprehension and real goodness of heart, he has, however, too little experience. KEIL, who defends him, observes that it was not necessary to mention him in the preface; as parties were only introduced when they were to act or speak. According to ZOCKLER, he is only introduced to point out the sinfulness and perversity of Job’s speeches, and to humble his pride; his part in the poem no breach of the connection between Job’s speeches and God’s, and not superfluous, though leaving the mystery unsolved. Elihu the only one of the speakers whose genealogy is given: hence, thought by LIGHTFOOT and ROSENMULLER to have been the author of the book.

INTRODUCTION AND SPEECH OF ELIHU

The place of Elihu, introduced in this chapter, that of an umpire stepping forward of his own accord, under the promptings of zeal and conscious knowledge, to decide the controversy between Job and his three friends on the one hand, and between Job and the Almighty on the other. His speeches contribute to the solution, as showing reasons why Job might be afflicted as he was, without being what his friends suspected him to be—a secretly bad man, and also as pointing out wherein he erred—namely, in his too strongly justifying himself, and almost censuring the Almighty. His speeches preparatory to the appearance and address of Jehovah, who follows up what Elihu had begun. Elihu in relation to the Almighty, like John the Baptist in relation to Christ. Observe—

(1) An honour to be, like Elihu, a peacemaker, in seeking to compose disputes between brethren, and to remove a believer’s controversy with God.

(2) A high privilege to be, like Elihu also, a forerunner in preparing the way for God himself. Precious to be sent, like the seventy disciples, to preach in places where Christ himself is to come (Luk_10:1).

I. The occasion of Elihu’s introduction. Job_32:1.—“So these three men ceased to answer Job, because he was righteous in his own eyes”.

The great object of these friends, to make Job out to be a secret transgressor, and so deserving the sufferings inflicted on him. This view of his case required by their false theology in respect to the Divine government—God viewed by them as necessarily punishing sin and rewarding virtue in this life. Failing to convince Job that he was a bad man, and guilty of such sins as bad justly drawn upon him God’s severe judgments, they “ceased to answer Job”. Their arguments only in the direction of showing that bad men suffer in this life the consequences of their deeds, however secretly committed, and that good men are invariably prosperous and happy, even in this world. They had employed the last arrow in their quiver without making any impression, and now desist.

Their final charge against Job,—“He was righteous in his own eyes,” partly false and partly true. False, as Job acknowledged himself a sinner (ch. Job_7:20-21; Job_9:2-3). True, but both in a right and wrong sense.

1. In a right sense. In the ordinary use of the term, Job a “righteous” man. This the Divine testimony given of him. The testimony also of his own conscience. His own heart “condemned him not”. Conscious of having served God sincerely, earnestly, and perseveringly. Like Paul, could testify that he had “lived in all good conscience unto this day.” Had exercised himself in having “a conscience void of offence both towards God and towards men.” With this consciousness, Job necessarily and justly “righteous in his own eyes.” Could not truthfully deny it, or honestly confess the contrary. So far Job simply believed and maintained he was righteous, because he was so. As a matter of fact. Job’s sins not the cause of his sufferings (ch. Job_2:3).

2. In a wrong sense.

(1) As insisting too strongly on his own righteousness.

(2) In ignoring or regarding too slightly the sins that actually adhered to him.

(3) In being too prone to charge God with cruelty and injustice in dealing with him as He did.

(4) In being much more careful to justify himself than his Maker. His eye so entirely on his own integrity and uprightness as to overlook and forget his short-comings and offences against the Divine law. Righteous before men, he failed to see and acknowledge himself, as he ought, guilty before God. Job still very much in the condition of Paul before his journey to Damascus—“alive without the law” (Rom_7:9). The commandment was yet to “come,” in order to his dying in his own eyes as a sinner, and having his mouth stopped as guilty before God (Rom_3:19). Job yet to learn and realize more deeply than he had yet done, that in God’s sight no man living can be justified (Psa_143:2). This change in his views and experience soon about to take place. What the three friends failed in doing, God Himself was about to accomplish, first and in part through the instrumentality of Elihu; afterwards and more especially, by the manifestation of Himself (ch. Job_42:5-6). Observe—

(1) Possible to have a conscience void of offence towards God and men, and yet to require to be humbled as a sinner before God.

(2) One of the objects of the law of God, to strip men of self-righteousness. By the law is the knowledge of sin (Rom_3:20; Rom_7:7).

(3) The great aim in the Holy Spirit’s mission into the world, to convince men of sin and of a better righteousness than their own, in order to their acceptance with God (Joh_16:7; Joh_16:10). What was to be done in Job’s case by the appearance of God Himself and the ministry of Elihu, now done by the inward operation of the Holy Ghost and the ministry of the word.

(4). Self-righteousness the great enemy to our peace, as well as to our acceptance before God through the righteousness wrought out for us by the Son of God in our nature (Rom_10:3-4; Php_3:4; Php_3:9).

II. Elihu’s Personality (Job_32:6).

1. His NAME—“Elihu”. Denotes—“my God is he,” or, “my God is Jehovah”. Given at his birth, implies piety on the part of his parents. His name a profession of the faith of his parents, and probably intended to be that of his own. Elihu constantly reminded of the true God by his very name. Probably given him to serve as a guard against advancing idolatry. That object gained. Much in a name. More meaning in names given to individuals, and more importance attached to them, in early times and in the East, than now and with ourselves. Scripture names generally significant. Observe—

(1) Wise in parents to impress Divine truth by every suitable means on the minds of their children from their earliest days, and to keep God before them as they grow up.

(2) Not enough to know that Jehovah is the true God, but that He is our God. God is to be appropriated as our own God in Christ. “My God,” the language of faith and love,—“O God thou art my God” (Psa_63:1). The first confession of Christ after his resurrection: “My Lord and my God” (Joh_20:28). Such appropriation of God and self-consecration to Him, the will of God concerning us (Jer_3:4; Jeremiah 19, 22). In the covenant of grace, of God gives Himself over to the believing sinner as his God in Christ (Jer_31:33; Heb_8:10).

2. His PARENTAGE. “Son of Barachel”. Elihu the only individual in the poem whose parentage is recorded. Possibly in order to distinguish him from others of the same name, or because his father was a well-known and distinguished man in the country. Possibly because Elihu was yet a young man, and required thus to be distinguished. The addition of the father’s name the ordinary way of naming men in the East, except when the party was advanced in years, or a person of great distinction. The name of Elihu’s father significant as well as his own. Denotes—“the blessing of God,” or “God hath blessed”. God’s goodness and blessing probably recognized by his parents in the gift of a son. Well to mark God’s hand in in our ordinary mercies. Piety not only in Elihu’s parents but his grand parents. A precious blessing to have a pious ancestry.—The privilege of all in Christ to be a “Barachel”. God “hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in Christ Jesus” (Eph_1:3). Barachel, having realized the blessing expressed in his name, the more anxious that his son should do the same, and should be able to say: “The Lord is my God”. Hence called him Elihu. Parents enjoying the blessing of a covenant-God themselves, likely to be made a blessing to their children. Elihu the worthy son of a worthy father. “Grace does not run in the blood, but often runs in the line”.—P. Henry. Elihu distinguished for his piety and wisdom even while a young man. Reflected honour on the father whose name was connected with his own. Only truly pious children a real credit and honour to their parents. “My son, if thy heart be wise, my heart shall rejoice, even mine” (Pro_23:15).

3. His COUNTRY. “The Buzite”. Buzthe second son of Nahor, Abraham’s brother (Gen_22:21). A city of this name in Arabia Deserta, mentioned in connection with Dedan in Idumæa (Jer_25:13). The name of the city and the country around probably derived from Buz, Nahor’s son. Buz himself a Syrian. Probably some of his descendants emigrated south-westwards into Idumæa or Arabia. Buz a brother of Uz, from whom the country of Job probably took its name. Job and Elihu thus perhaps not very distantly connected. The Syriaus in general already tinged more or less with idolatry. Hence the command to Abraham to leave his country and his kindred. Idols or images, probably kept as household gods, found in the family of Laban, Nahor’s grandson (Gen_31:19). Strange gods worshipped by Terah the father of Abraham and Nahor (Jos_24:2; Jos_24:15). Barachel probably an exception. Hence the piety and wisdom of his son. Due to sovereign grace, that generally some are “among the faithless, faithful found”. Saints in Nero’s household.

4, His KINDRED. “Of the kindred (or clan) of Ram.” Ram probably the same as Aram (1Ch_29:10, with Mat_1:3-4). Ram or Aram a son of Shem, and the father or brother of Uz (Gen_10:23; 1Ch_1:17). Another, the son of Kemuel the son of Nahor, and the brother of Buz and Uz (Gen_22:21). A third and later Ram or Aram, the father of Amminadab and grandfather of Nahshou, the prince of the children of Judah at the time of the Exodus (1Ch_2:9-10; Num_1:7; Num_1:2-3). From Ram or Aram, Syria had its name, Mesopotamia, the country between the rivers—namely, the Tigris and the Euphrates, also hence called Padan Aram, or the Plain of Aram. Hence the Syriac and Chaldaic language called the Aramaic, traces of which appear in the Book of Job, but more especially in the speeches of Elihu.—This particularity in the description of Elihu significant, as—

(1) An evidence of the historic truth of the poem;

(2) Indicative of the important place he occupies in the controversy, and the part he contributed to its solution;

(3) Expressive of the honour put upon Elihu himself as the most enlightened of the speakers. “Them that honour me I will honour”.

5. His AGE. “Young”. Probably even younger than Job. A remarkable peculiarity in his case. The other speakers elderly, and even aged men (Job_32:6). Unusual in Arabia and the East for young men to take part in a religious controversy. Observe—Grace and wisdom not confined to age. John the most beloved and devoted of the Apostles, believed to have been the youngest, Paul, when chosen to be the Apostle of the Gentiles, a young man. Timothy, his friend and deputy while but a youth. Jesus among the doctors in the temple at the age of twelve. Daniel, Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego, distinguished for piety and wisdom at an early age.

III. Elihu’s Character. To be gathered from the history and from his own speeches.

1. Ardent and zealous. Hence his anger both against Job and his three friends (Job_32:2), and his eager endeavour to correct their mistakes. Full of matter, and eager to deliver himself of it (Job_32:18-19).

2. Modest. Conscious of his youth, he waits till all the other speakers had nothing more to say (Job_32:4; Job_32:11). Hesitating and afraid to deliver his opinion (Job_32:6). Spoke at length, only because inwardly constrained to do so, and conscious of having something to say on the subject (Job_32:18). Ascribes what knowledge and understanding he had to the Spirit of God (Job_32:8). The appearance of inflation in his language probably due to Oriental poetry, and to the apologetic style which he assumes in introducing himself.

3. Enlightened. Indicated in his speeches. Answered neither by Job nor his friends. The only speaker not censured by the Almighty. Jehovah’s address to Job a continuation of his own.

4. Candid and impartial. Neither justifies Job, though desirous of doing so; nor yet, like the three friends, suspects and condemns him as necessarily a wicked man. Speaks his mind, without either fear or favour, as amenable to his Maker (Job_32:21-22). Reproves Job, without, like the others, losing his temper.

Elihu may be viewed—

(1) As, in character, name, and the attitude he assumes in the controversy, a type of Christ in relation to the Pharisees and doctors of the law, as well as in his office of mediator and revealer of the Father;

(2) As, in his character and speeches, an example to pastors and preachers of the Gospel.

IV. His motives and reasons for entering into the controversy

1. His displeasure with Job and his three friends. Job_32:2-3.—“Then was kindled the wrath of Elihu (Oriental expression for strong disapprobation and displeasure); against Job was his wrath kindled, because he justified himself rather than God (or, “made himself more righteous than God). Also against his three friends was his wrath kindled, because they had no answer [to Job which was solid and satisfactory], and yet had condemned Job” (as a hypocrite and secret transgressor). Elihu, angry with Job for his offence against God; with his friends for their offence against Job.

Observe—anger, not always sinful. “Be ye angry, and sin not” (Eph_4:26.) Anger may be either holy or unholy. Shewn by God Himself. God “angry with the wicked every day.” Felt and exhibited by Christ. “Looked round about” upon his Pharisaic adversaries and opposers “with anger” (Mar_3:5). Anger a principle or passion implanted in our nature for wise and holy objects. Only right when—

(1) Directed against a proper object. This not always the case with creature anger.

(2) Excited by a just or sufficient cause. Human anger often excited by a bad cause, still more frequently by an insufficient one. Jonah first angry at Nineveh’s repentance, and then at the loss of his gourd.

(3) Held under due control. Uncontrolled anger a sinful passion—a sin itself, and leading to many others.

(4) Accompanied with love. Jesus wept over the objects of His anger (Luk_19:41).

5. Not long continued. “Let not the sun go down upon your wrath” (Eph_4:26). Anger may enter the breast of a wise man, but rests only in the bosom of fools (Ecc_7:9). Anger in fallen creatures apt to be sinful. Hence spoken of as a work of the flesh (Gal_5:25). Believers exhorted to put it away (Eph_4:31). Anger in fallen men like gunpowder in the hands of children—useful but dangerous Often sinful even in good men. Excluded Moses, though the meekest man on earth, from the promised land (Num_20:10; Num_20:12). Anger safest where directed against the sin rather than the sinner. Causeless anger murder in the heart, and often leading to murder in the act. Excessive anger a species of madness. The New Testament rule—“Slow to speak, slow to wrath.” “Not soon angry,” a precept necessary both for ministers and people. One feature of charity or love that it is “not easily provoked (1Co_13:5).

2. The inability of the three friends to answer Job. Job_32:3—“They had found no answer.” Job_32:10—Therefore I said, hearken unto me; I also will shew mine opinion. Behold, I waited for your words; I gave ear to your reasons (your arguments, or your views; Margin, ‘your understandings’), whilst (or till) ye searched out what to say. Yea, I attended unto you (or ‘to your testimonies’), and behold, there was none of you that convinced Job (refuted or convicted him of error), or that answered his words” (solidly, suitably, and satisfactorily). Job_32:15—“They (i.e., Job’s friends,—the words addressed to Job, or to others present at the controversy as by-standers), were amazed (‘struck down,’ either by Job’s arguments, his confidence in God, or his obstinacy in maintaining his innocence), they left off speaking. When I had waited (or simply, ‘I waited’—spoken after an interval of silence, leaving room for remark), for (or but) they spake not, but stood still (persevered in their silence, or stood as dumb), and answered no more; I said, I will also [though so much younger] answer my part (will contribute my part to the controversy); I also will show my opinion.” Becoming in juniors to be silent in a discussion, till others, older and likely to be better informed on the subject, have said what they are able to say upon it. Modesty an ornament to all, but especially to youth. “Slow to speak,” in most cases a safe rule. Jesus among the doctors, first heard, then asked questions, and then gave answers.

3. The general bestowment of understanding by the Creator on mankind. Job_32:7.—“I said, days (men of advanced age) should speak, and the multitude of years should teach wisdom (understanding as to God’s dealings and man’s duty). But there is a spirit in man (mankind in general, without being confined to age), and the inspiration of the Almighty giveth them understanding. Great men (great either in age or position) are not always wise; neither do the aged (necessarily or exclusively) understand judgment (what is right either in doctrine or duty). Therefore I said, Hearken to me; I also will shew mine opinion.” Observe:

(1) To speak on great and important subjects connected with Divine truth, the especial right and duty of men of age and experience. Growth in wisdom naturally expected to accompany growth in years.

(2) Wisdom not the monopoly of any age or class.

(3). Intelligence the gift of God. Christ the light that lighteth every man that cometh into the world (Joh_1:9).

(4) A preacher to speak in dependence on, and as the result of, Divine enlightenment. “If any speak, let him speak as the oracles of God.” The manifestation of the Spirit given to every [believing] man to profit [others] withal (1Co_12:7; 1Pe_4:11. Three things necessary for every preacher of Divine truth—

(1) A message given him by the Spirit.

(2) The unction of the Spirit in delivering it.

(3) The power of the Spirit to accompany it in the hearts of the hearers.

4. His conviction, in opposition to the self-conceit of the three friends, that the subject under discussion was capable of receiving a more satisfactory treatment. Job_32:13—“Lest ye should say (or ‘do not say’), We have found out wisdom; God casteth him down, and not man” (his afflictions are to be viewed as coming in righteous judgment from the hand of God, and not from man; or, “God must confute or overcome him and not man.”) Either the language of the friends, as if they had said all that could be advanced on the subject, Job being now incorrigible to all but God himself; or the language of Elihu, as indicating that what he was about to advance was not the mere argument of man, but the teaching of God himself, by whose inspiration he was about to speak. “We have found out wisdom,” generally the language of ignorance and pride, as if we ourselves had seen the whole truth in relation to a subject, and nothing more could be said about it. The language of many of the philosophers or wise men of antiquity. “Professing themselves to be wise.” The name “philosopher,” however, denoting a lover of wisdom, chosen in modesty by Pythagoras its inventor, to indicate, in opposition to many who called themselves “wise men,” that wisdom was not yet found out, and that all that men could pretend to, was to be lovers or seekers of it; while both Socrates and Plato acknowledged the necessity of a Divine revelation, and anticipated the bestowment of it at some future period. “We have found out wisdom,” still the language of a ‘vain philosophy,’ and of ‘science falsely so called.’ The boast of some modern as well as of ancient schools. Especially made at present in reference to the origin of man and of the universe. ‘Natural Selection’ to take the place of a personal and intelligent Creator. The Bible account of creation to be set aside, according to some, for the teachings or guessings of science, which yet is obliged to confess that it neither does nor can know anything certain on the subject. “I say,” says one of those who think they have ‘found out wisdom’ on this subject, “that natural knowledge, seeking to satisfy natural wants, has found the ideas which alone can satisfy spiritual cravings.” On a subject, in regard to which science professes it has and can have no evidence and can give no certain account, on which its teachings are far from being in harmony with each other, and one connected with matters of infinite and eternal importance,—it would seem not a little wiser to accept the professed and sufficiently-accredited Divine testimony, however it is to be intrepreted, which has been preserved and handed down to us through nearly four thousand years; which has been received as such by Jesus Christ and His Apostles, and by the best men in every age, both before and since, who have had the opportunity of doing so; and is infinitely more calculated to meet the wants and circumstances of humanity, than the theory or guesses which some professors of science would give us in its stead.

5. His having hitherto stood aloof from the controversy, and having arguments to produce which had not yet been advanced. Job_32:14.—“Now he (Job) hath not directed his words against me: neither will I answer him with your speeches” (either as to the matter or manner of them). Elihu proposes—

(1) To bring new matter to bear on the subject under discussion, viz., God’s providential dealings with men;

(2) To speak in a calmer and more dispassionate tone than the three friends, as not having had anything irritating addressed to him by Job. The argument of the friends, that Job’s sufferings proved him to be a transgressor. Elihu’s object to show that afflictions and trials are often of a disciplinary character.—Necessary in a discussion—

(1) To be able to say something new;

(2) To keep one’s temper.

6. His deep interest in the subject, his consciousness of having much to say upon it, and his earnest desire to deliver it. Job_32:18.—“For I am full of matter: the spirit within me (Heb of my belly’ or heart) constraineth (or straiteneth) me. Behold, my belly (or heart, as Joh_7:38) is as wine which hath no vent (or outlet for the escape of the gas generated in the course of fermentation); it is ready to burst like new bottles (or, like skin-bottles containing new wine undergoing fermentation; old skins being more liable to burst than new ones, Mat_9:17-18). I will speak that I may be refreshed (relieved of the inward pressure to deliver what I have to say on the subject); I will open my lips and answer”. In the East, a young man only justified in speaking in the presence of seniors, when he has much to say on the subject under discussion. Observe—The duty of Christians in general, and of preachers in particular:

(1) To be deeply interested in subjects pertaining to the Divine glory and the welfare of men. Well to be “zealously affected always in a good thing” (Gal_4:18).

(2) To sympathize with the sufferings of a fellow-creature, and to seek in every way we can to alleviate them.

(3) To obtain correct views as to the cause of afflictions, and the best way to improve them.

(4) To communicate for the comfort and benefit of others what we ourselves have been taught in regard to Divine things. That preacher likely to profit who feels that he has something important to say, and is inwardly constrained to say it. Desirable for a preacher to have the prophet’s experience,—God’s Word as a burning fire shut up in his bones (Jer_20:9). “We cannot but speak the things which we have seen and heard” (Act_4:20). Paul pressed in the spirit at Corinth, and so testified to the Jews that Jesus was the Christ (Act_18:5). Preachers needed who are ready to burst with the good news they have to communicate to their hearers concerning the great salvation of God. Such the preachers of the Gospel who at first turned the world up-side-down, and would do so again if found in any considerable number.

V. Elihu’s resolution to be plain and impartial in his discourse, and his reason for it. Job_32:21-22.—“Let me not, I pray you, accept any man’s person (shew partiality to any on the ground either of age or reputation), neither let me give flattering titles unto man (employing titles of honour and compliment, or speaking blandly and flatteringly, instead of plainly and honestly, and calling things by their right names). For I know not (am neither able nor willing) to give flattering titles; in so doing my Maker would soon take me away” (by some signal manifestation of His displeasure; or simply, “my Maker will soon take me away,” i.e., by death: I shall soon appear in His presence and render an account of what and how I have spoken). The Orientals remarkable for their employment of flattering titles in addressing others. Observe—

(1) Plainness of speech in a preacher not incompatible with courtesy. Paul an example of both.

(2) The preacher neither to be influenced by fear nor favour in delivering his message or performing his office. His business not to please but persuade men, or to please only in so far as it may tend to their edification, and with that object (Rom_15:2; 1Co_10:33; 1Co_9:22). His duty to declare the whole counsel of God; to speak necessary truth, however unpalatable; to deliver his message faithfully, whether men will hear or whether they will forbear.

(3) Important recollection for a preacher: “My Maker will soon take me away.” Good to speak “as a dying man to dying men.”

(4) The remembrance of Christ’s presence as a hearer the best safeguard to the faithfulness of the preacher, and the best means of deliverance from the fear of man. Fear or flattery of man on the part of a preacher, an insult to his Master. Foolish as well as base to court the page’s favour instead of the sovereign’s. “That man preaches before me as if he had the Almighty standing at his elbow”—James the First, of one of his Court Preachers. Latimer’s introduction to his sermon before Henry the Eighth: “Remember, Hugh Latimer, that thou speakest before the king, and, therefore, take good heed to what thou sayest in presence of his majesty; but remember also, Hugh Latimer, that thou speakest before the King of Kings, whose servant thou art, and who shall one day call thee to account”.

The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary (gen. ed. Joseph S. Exell; Funk & Wagnalls, c. 1892) — public domain (pre-1929). A full-Bible homiletical/sermon-outline anthology covering 65 of 66 books (2 John is absent from the source module). Text from a community e-Sword module.

The Second Stage of the Disentanglement

Job 33-37

Elihu’s Discourses, devoted to proving that there can be really no undeserved suffering, that on the contrary the sufferings decreed for those who are apparently righteous are dispensations of divine love, designed to purify and to sanctify them through chastisement: The first half of the positive solution of the problem

INTRODUCTION: ELIHU’S APPEARANCE, AND THE EXORDIUM OF HIS DISCOURSE, GIVING THE REASONS FOR HIS SPEAKING

Job_32:1 to Job_33:7

1. Elihu’s appearance (related in prose)

Job_32:1-6 a

1So these three men ceased to answer Job, because he was righteous in his own eyes. 2Then was kindled the wrath of Elihu the son of Barachel the Buzite, of the kindred of Earn; against Job was his wrath kindled, because he justified himself rather than God. 3Also against his three friends was his wrath kindled, because they had found no answer, and yet had condemned Job 4 Now Elihu had waitedtill Job had spoken, because they were elder than he. 5When Elihu saw that therewas no answer in the mouth of these three men, then his wrath was kindled. 6And Elihu the son of Barachel the Buzite answered and said:

2. An explanation addressed to the previous speakers, showing why he had taken part in their controversy: Job_32:6-10

6     b I am young, and ye are very old;

wherefore I was afraid,

and durst not show you mine opinion.

7     I said, Days should speak,

and multitude of years should teach wisdom.

8     But there is a spirit in man;

and the inspiration of the Almighty giveth them understanding.

9     Great men are not always wise;

neither do the aged understand judgment.

10     Therefore I said, Hearken to me;

I also will show mine opinion.

3. Setting forth that he was justified in taking part, because the friends had showed, and still showed themselves unable to refute Job: Job_32:11-22

11     Behold, I waited for your words;

I gave ear to your reasons,

whilst ye searched out what to say.

12     Yea, I attended unto you,

and behold, there was none of you that convinced Job,

or that answered his words.

13     Lest ye should say: “We have found out wisdom:

God thrusteth him down, not man.”

14     Now he hath not directed his words against me;

neither will I answer him with your speeches.

15     They were amazed, they answered no more:

they left off speaking.

16     When I had waited (for they spake not,

but stood still, and answered no more);

17     I said, I will answer also my part,

I also will show mine opinion.

18     For I am full of matter,

the spirit within me constraineth me.

19     Behold, ray belly is as wine which hath no vent,

it is ready to burst like new bottles.

20     I will speak, that I may be refreshed:

I will open my lips and answer.

21     Let me not, I pray you, accept any man’s person,

neither let me give flattering titles unto man.

22     For I know not to give flattering titles:

in so doing my Maker would soon take me away.

4. A special appeal to Job to listen calmly to him [Elihu], as a mild judge of his guilt and weakness: Job_33:1-7

1     Wherefore, Job, I pray thee, hear my speeches,

and hearken to all my words.

2     Behold, now I have opened my mouth,

my tongue hath spoken in my mouth.

3     My words shall be of the uprightness of my heart;

and my lips shall utter knowledge clearly.

4     The Spirit of God hath made me,

and the breath of the Almighty hath given me life.

5     If thou canst answer me,

set thy words in order before me, stand up.

6     Behold, I am according to thy wish in God’s stead:

I also am formed out of the clay.

7     Behold, my terror shall not make thee afraid,

neither shall my hand be heavy upon thee.

FIRST DISCOURSE; OF MAN’S GUILT BEFORE GOD

Job_33:8-33

a. Preparatory: Reproof of Job’s confidence in his entire innocence: Job_33:8-11

8     Surely thou hast spoken in mine hearing,

and I have heard the voice of thy words, saying:

9     I am clean without transgression,

I am innocent, neither is there iniquity in me.

10     Behold, He findeth occasions against me,

He counteth me for His enemy:

11     He putteth my feet in the stocks,

He marketh all my paths.

b. Didactic discussion of the true relation of sinful men to God, who seeks to warn and to save them by manifold dispensations and communications from above; Job_33:12-30

12     Behold, in this thou art not just:

I will answer thee, that God is greater than man.

13     Why dost thou strive against Him?

for He giveth not account of any of His matters.

14     For God speaketh once, yea twice,

yet man perceiveth it not.

15     In a dream, in a vision of the night,

when deep sleep falleth upon men,

in slumberings upon the bed;

16     then He openeth the ears of men,

and sealeth their instruction,

17     that He may withdraw man from his purpose,

and hide pride from man.

18     He keepeth back his soul from the pit,

and his life from perishing by the sword.

19     He is chastened also with pain upon his bed,

and the multitude of his bones with strong pain:

20     so that his life abhorreth bread,

and his soul dainty meat.

21     His flesh is consumed away, that it cannot be seen;

and his bones that were not seen stick out.

22     Yea, his soul draweth near unto the grave,

and his life to the destroyers.

23     If there be a messenger with him,

an interpreter, one among a thousand,

to show unto man his uprightness;

24     then He is gracious unto him, and saith,

Deliver him from going down to the pit:

I have found a ransom.

25     His flesh shall be fresher than a child’s;

he shall return to the days of his youth:

26     he shall pray unto God, and He will be favorable unto him;

and he shall see His face with joy;

for He will render unto man His righteousness.

27     He looketh upon men, and if any say,

I have sinned, and perverted that which was right,

and it profited me not;

28     He will deliver his soul from going into the pit,

and his life shall see the light.

29     Lo, all these things worketh God

oftentimes with man,

30     to bring back his soul from the pit,

to be enlightened with the light of the living.

c. Conclusion; Calling upon Job to give an attentive hearing to the discourses by which he would further instruct him: Job_33:31-33

31     Mark well, O Job, hearken unto me;

hold thy peace, and I will speak.

32     If thou hast anything to say, answer me:

speak, for I desire to justify thee.

33     If not, hearken unto me:

hold thy peace, and I shall teach thee wisdom.

EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL

1. On the general subject of the genuineness of Elihu’s discourses, comp. Introd., § 10, as well as below, Doctrinal and Ethical Remarks.—The circumstantiality of the twofold introduction to these discourses—first that of the author in prose, then the self-introduction of Elihu (Job_32:6 b—Job_33:7) which latter again consists of three subdivisions—is to be explained by the fact that in Elihu there was to be introduced the representative of a new stand-point, which had not yet received its statement, differing as it did from that of all the former speakers. For neither Job’s one-sided denial of his guilt nor the blunt and rough way in which he had been attacked, satisfies this new speaker. He appears to speak for and against Job, whose “better self” he in some measure represents (comp. Victor Andreä, p. 139); hence the three stages of his self-introduction: (1) the captatio benevolentiæ with which he begins; or the apology for his youth addressed to all the former speakers (Job_32:6 b–10); (2) the reprimand administered to the three friends, as having shown themselves incompetent to refute Job (Job_32:11-22);—and (3) the appeal to Job to give a hearing to his instructions (Job_33:1-7) an appeal full of earnest admonition and loving encouragement. The last of these divisions provides a direct transition to the first of Elihu’s discourses proper (Job_33:8-33), in which he sets forth the foundation of Job’s suffering—the universal sinfulness and guilt of men before God, this discourse again occupying three divisions, of which the middle, being the longest (Job_32:12-22), contains the proper didactic exposition of the subject, while the first, by citing the propositions of Job which are to be refuted, prepares the way for the discussion; and the third furnishes, together with a practical conclusion, the transition to the didactic discourse which follows. The most of these divisions are at the same time coincident each with a single strophe, except that the long middle sections (Job_32:11-22 and Job_33:12-30) are subdivided into several strophes, the former into two, the latter into four, together with a short epiphonema of two verses (Job 32:29–30).

2. Introduction in prose (although with poetic accents—comp. above, § 3, p. 264) [the poetic mode of accentuation retained, because a change in the middle of the book, and especially in a piece of such small compass appeared awkward,: Del.] Job_32:1-6 a.—Then the three men ceased to answer Job. This notification occurs first here, not after Job 26. or Job 28., because it was only through the last monologues of Job that the defeat of the three opponents became complete.—Because he was righteous in his own eyes;i. e., because he would not admit that his suffering was in any degree whatever the consequence of his guilt; a statement which refers back in particular to the contents of Job 31.

Job_32:2. Then was kindled the wrath of Elihu, the son of Barachel, etc.אֱלִיהוּא, which is written below without the final א (Job_32:4; Job_35:1) signifies—“my God is he,” and appears also as an Israelitish name (1Sa_1:1; 1Ch_12:20). The Elihu of our passage is a Nahorite, of the tribe of Buz (בּוּז), who in Gen_22:21 is mentioned as the brother of Uz, and the second son of Nahor, and whose tribe, according to Jer_25:23, like Dedan and Tema, belonged to the inhabitants of the Arabian desert. The “family of Ram” is mentioned only here. The identification of the name רָם with אֲרָם is inadmissible, for רָם is simply the name of a family, not of a people. The Aramaic origin of the Buzites, according to the above description, admits indeed of no doubt, and the same may be said respecting the poet’s purpose in that connection to impart an Aramaic coloring to Elihu’s discourses. Lightfoot and Rosenmüller curiously imagine that under the character of Elihu the poet has concealed himself, and that this explains the particularity with which, in opposition to what is characteristic of the book elsewhere, he describes the origin of the new speaker. This detailed account of Elihu’s genealogy is undoubtedly a little singular, but it may be satisfactorily explained by the poet’s desire to represent him as a kinsman of the same race with Job, or it may be his desire to distinguish between him and some other well-known person of the name. In respect to the question whether Elihu’s position is that of “one not simply near to the Abrahamitic revelation, but of one standing within the pale of it” (as Vilmar thinks, l. c.), nothing definite can be established from the genealogical statement before us.—Respecting the name בָּרַֽכְאֵל (instead of which some MSS. write בַּרַכְאֵל, with a latent Daghesh). It signifies—“may God-bless!” and is thus distinguished as an imperative formation from the indicative of the specifically Israelitish name בֶּרֶכְיָב (“Jehovah blesseth”).—Because he declared himself righteous before God. צִרֵּק instead of the Hiph. which, is elsewhere more common in this signification, occurs again Job_33:32, and often in Jerem. and Ezek.—מֵאֱלֹהִים, not “more than God, at the expense of God” (Ew., Delitz.) [E. V., Con., Nov., Carey, Words., etc.], but “before,” מִן accordingly as in Job_4:17. The comparison of the passage in Job_40:8 is scarcely sufficient to confirm the former rendering.

Job_32:3 states how far the conduct of the three friends had caused Elihu’s discontent:—because they found no answer, and still condemned Job. So—taking וְ in וַיַּרְשִׁיעוּ adversatively—may the words be rendered with the greatest probability (so Hirzel, Ewald) [E. V., Noy., Con., Carey, Rodwell, Elz., Schlottm., Renan]. For the fact that the friends had condemned Job notwithstanding their inability to answer him aggravates the guilt of the three in Eliun’s eyes; and that he really attributed to them double guilt, as compared with Job, is evident from the passage which follows, and which involves more rigid censure of the friends (Job_32:11 seq. ; 15 seq.) than of Job (comp. also Job_32:5). With this interpretation agrees essentially that of Delitzsch and Kamphausen: “because they, from their inability to answer him, condemned him.” [“The fut. consec. describes the condemnation as the result of their inability to hit upon the right answer; it was a miserable expedient to which they had recourse.” Del.]. The language admits still further of the explanation of Hahn and Dillmann (with the influence of the negation extended to the second member): “because they did not find an answer, and (consequently) did not, condemn him [i.e., secure his condemnation, by “stripping him of his self-righteousness”]. The opinion of the Masoretes, that in this passage we have one of the 18Tiqquney Sopherim (comp. on Job_7:20), according to which we should read אֶת־הָאֱלֹהִים instead of אֶת־אִיּוֹב, is refuted by Job_40:8, where it is not the friends, but Job, who is said to have shown himself to be one who had condemned God.

Job_32:4. But Elihu had waited for Job with words.—חִכָּה pluperf., comp. Ewald, § 135, a; i. e., he had waited until Job’s speeches were ended, until he had spoken his last word in the controversy, the reason being:—because they were older than he in days (לְיָמִים, as in Job_30:1, and below Job_32:6), i. e., because he was the youngest of all,—younger than all the former speakers.

3. First section of Elihu’s introduction: captatio benevolentiæ, addressed to all the former speakers: Job_32:6 b–10.—Young am I in days, and ye are hoary (יְשִׁישִׁים as in Job_12:12; Job_15:10; Job_29:8); therefore I was afraid and feared. זחל in Heb. elsewhere “to crawl,” here in the sense of “fearing,” customary in Aramaic, but not met with elsewhere in the O. T. [Carey: “I did slink”]. Also דֵּעַ for דֵּעַת is an expression peculiar to the Aramaizing constructions of Elihu’s language (comp. again Job_32:10; Job_32:17; Job_36:3; Job_37:16), while on the contrary חִוָּה “to declare, to communicate,” occurs else-where in our book. [“It becomes manifest even here that the Elihu section has in part a peculiar use of the language.” Del.].

Job_32:7. Respecting the plur. יוֹדִיעוּ with רֹבשָׁנִים, comp. Job_21:21.

Job_32:8. Still the spirit it is in mortal man … which gives them understanding. אָכֵןverum, only here by Elihu, instead of אוּלָם, which is elsewhere customary in this sense. The subjects רוּחַ וגו׳ and נִשְׁמַת וגו׳ have for their common predicate הִיא with תְּבִינֵם at the close of the second member as a relative clause of closer specification. The “spirit in man” is the principle of his life and thought wrought into him by the Spirit of God; here, as also in Job_27:3; Job_33:4; Job_34:14, identical with the “breath of the Almighty,” the Divine creative breath (Gen_2:7); comp. also Ecc_12:7. [Noyes happily quotes the following from Milton, in the preface to his Reason of Church Government, urged against Prelaty: “And if any man think I undertake a task too difficult for my years, I trust, through the supreme enlightening assistance, far otherwise; for my years, be they few or many, what imports it? So they bring reason, let that be looked on”].—אֱנוֹשׁ is used collectively, as is evident from the plur. suffix in b referring to it.

Job_32:9. Not the aged are wise; lit. “not the great” (רַבִּים) [grandævi], i. e., great in years, comp. the πολυχρόνιοι of the LXX., also Gen_25:23; and צָעִיר, small = young, above (Job_32:6 b).

Job_32:10. Therefore I say: Hearken to me!—The Imperfect singular, שִׁמְעָה־לּי, is used distributively, applying to each individual of those who are summoned to hear, (not referring specially to Job, to whom Elihu does not address himself until below in Job_33:1 seq.). The ancient versions, except the Targ., as well as some MSS. read שִׁמְעוּ—an emendation to relieve the difficulty [arising from El.’s addressing the friends in the plur. in the next verse]. I also will declare my knowledge (comp. Job_32:6, b). [Rather, more modestly—“I will declare my knowledge, even I.” Words.]. Respecting the appearance of vain self-praise, of which Elihu is guilty in consequence of these and the preceding expressions, comp. below Doctrinal and Ethical Remarks, No. 2.

4. Second section of Elihu’s introduction: Showing his claims to speak, in contrast with the friends, as the feeble and incompetent opponents of Job: Job_32:11-22.—a. Address to the friends touching their lack of skill in refuting Job. Behold, I waited for your words; or for words from you.” דִּבְרֵיכֶם are not the words actually uttered by them (Stick., Hahn, Schlott.), but those for which Elihu had waited in vain, expecting that they would produce them, more particularly explained in b as being their words of intelligence, speeches full of wisdom (תְּבוּנוֹת). The construction of אָזִין, contracted form for אַאֲזִין) with עַד shows clearly enough that the object of the hearkening or listening was wholly in expectation. Until ye might find out replies. מִלִּין, a second parallel term to דברים, can denote here only words from the friends, suited to refute Job, such words as they had shown themselves unable to “search out,” or “to think out.” (חקר).

Job_32:12. And unto you I gave heed.—עָֽדֵיכֵםmeans here אֵלֶיכֶם; or it may mean giving heed until they should produce a real confutation of Job. [Carey translates עַד the three times it occurs in Job_32:10-11 “to the utmost of”—perhaps a little too artificially. It does however express more emphatically than the simple לְ the act of close attention.—E.].

Job_32:13. That ye may not say; or “since ye do not say, etc.”—Respecting the dissuasive particle פֶּן “that not,” comp. Ew., § 337, b. We found wisdom (i. e., with Job): God can smite him, not man.—That is, we have come upon such superior wisdom in Job that only God can drive him out of the field (נדףdiscutere, dispellere, used elsewhere of the chasing of chaff, straw, smoke—comp. Psa_1:4; Psa_68:3 [2]) [“chosen here with great propriety, because after every answer from the three Job showed himself again in the arena.” Dillm.]. Only this explanation, adopted by most moderns, gives a meaning that is intelligent, and suited to the context, not that of the ancient commentators (also more recently of Rosenmüller, Arnheim, Welte, etc.): “Only do not say we have brought up against him true wisdom, to wit: that God Himself contends against, and routs him out of the-field (by the severe sufferings which He has decreed for him” [and so substantially Lee, Bernard. According to another explanation the second member is spoken by Elihu, not the friends, the general meaning being: Ye have been silenced, lest ye should become proud and boast of your wisdom, and that his defeat may come visibly from God and not from men. So Good, Wordsworth, Carey, Wemyss, Rodwell, Barnes, most of whom make the first member dependent on the second; e. g. Rodwell: “Lest ye should say—‘We hare found out wisdom,’—El, not man, shall vanquish him.”—Schlottmann explains: “Say not: We have found wisdom, i. e. we for our part have not erred, we have hit the exact truth, but God must smite him, not man, i. e. Job is so obstinate that the most exhaustive proofs of our doctrine fail to affect him, wherefore God only can convict him of his error.”]

Job_32:14. For he bath not arrayed words against me;i. e. he has produced no argument which actually convinces me of his innocence, עָרַךְsensu forensi as in Job_13:18; Job_23:4, The whole verse introduced by וְלא with a fin. verb following, forms a clause subordinate to that which precedes, like Job_13:3 (comp. Ewald, § 341, a).

b. A declaration respecting the unavoidable necessity of his taking part in the colloquy, the friends although still referred to being spoken of in the third person.

Job_32:15. They are confounded, they answer no more, or “without answering again” (comp. Ewald, § 849, a), words are fled away from them, i.e. have deserted them; העתיק here accordingly intransitive; “to depart, to wander away,” like Gen_12:8; Gen_26:22, not transitive, as in Job_9:5 (against Hirzel).

Job_32:16. And should I (still) await, because they speak not?—This interrogative rendering of the Perf. consec. וְהוֹחַלְתִּי is the only one that yields a suitable meaning, not the affirmative, which used to be the prevalent one, “and I waited, because,” etc., by which the verse would express a quite unendurable tautology with Job_32:11-12.

Job_32:17. So then I also will answer my part, i.e. what comes to my part (comp. Job_15:2; Pro_18:23); I will in like manner throw the weight of my opinion into the scales. [“Elihu speaks more in the scholastic tone of controversy than the three.” Delitzsch. The אַף־אֲנִי twice repeated is far from implying conceit or arrogance on the part of the speaker. It is possible indeed to explain it, with Barnes, “even I,” notwithstanding my youth and inexperience, in the tone of modest self-depreciation. More probably however it indicates rather the independent, individual position of the speaker, differing as it did from the rest, as we should say—“on my part.” In any case, as Schultens remarks: jucunda et decora formula; scire meum—quantum mihi quidem sciere, et percipere datum. Frustra sunt, qui hæc ad arrogantiam detorquent.” E.] The Fut. Hiph., אַעֲנֶה, expresses as e. g.Eccles. v. 19 (see on the passage); Hos_2:23, etc., the strengthened sense of Kal: “to make answer, to put in a reply.” Ewald renders quite too artificially: “so then I also plough my field” (אענה Hiph. from the other root ענה, “to be sunk”), which would be proverbial for—“I also begin my speech.”

Job_32:18 seq. describe the powerful inward impulse to speak, which Elihu discovers is himself, and which makes it impossible for him to be silent. The spirit (Job_32:8) constraineth me in my inward part; lit. “the spirit of my inward part, of my belly” (בִטְנִי), comp. Job_15:2; Job_15:35. Respecting the scriptio defectivaמָלֵתִי, in a, comp. on Job_1:21.

Job_32:19. Behold, my interior is like wine which is not opened, i. e. to which there is no vent, so that it threatens to burst its vessel. It is of course new, fresh wine that is intended, as in the parallel New Testament passages, which refer to this place, Mat_9:17; Luk_5:39, which show moreover that the “new bottles” in b can be none other than such as are “filled with new wine,” so that the attribute “new” denotes not the firmness of the material of the bottles, but rather the age and the quality of their contents. Furthermore, יִבָּקֵעַ is neither a relative clause to אֹבוֹת (Hirzel) [Ges., Con.], nor an adverbial subordinate clause—“when it will burst,”—but the direct predicate of בִּטְנִי, which indeed is feminine, but here with the passive, is treated as the grammatical object; comp. Job_22:9. The LXX. read חֲרָשִׁים, and rendered the preceding אֹבוֹת in the sense of “bellows:” ὤσπερ φυσητὴρ χαλκέως. The figure thus arising is not unsuitable; still, according to the preceding explanation, there is no sufficient ground for departing from the Masoretic reading. On Job_32:21 comp. Job_13:8. [The distinction between אַל and לֹא is not to be overlooked; the former expressing the subjective wish, or purpose; the latter the objective fact. E.].

Job_32:22 gives the reason for that which is declared in Job_32:21, b:For I know not how to flatter. אֲכַנֶּה is logically subordinate to the preceding לֹא יָדַעְתִּי, and is used accordingly for the Inf. כַנּוֹת, or for לְכַנּוֹת; comp. Ewald, § 285, c—Otherwise my Maker would speedily snatch me away; lit. “lift me up;” יִשָּׂאֵנִי [which “seems designedly to harmonize with עשֵֹׁנִי” Delitzsch, and perhaps involves a play on אֶשָּא, Job_32:21; Dillmann], an expression derived from a stormy wind; comp, Job_27:21; 2Ki_2:16. The Imperf. here with a modal force [= would, or might]; comp. Ewald, § 136, f.

5. Third section of Elihu’s Introduction: Calling on Job to listen calmly to the discourses of instruction and admonition which follow: Job_33:1-7.

Job_33:1. Nevertheless hear now, O Job, my discourses. וְאוּלָם interruptive, and introducing to something new, like verumtamen; com. Job_1:11; Job_11:5; Job_12:7; Job_14:18 and often. The particular address to Job by name, which it is true occurs only in the mouth of Elihu (besides here again in Job_33:31 and Job_37:14), has nothing in it that is especially surprising, seeing that in every case it serves as a special summons to Job, in distinction from the three friends.

Job_33:2. The circumstantiality with which Elihu announces here the beginning of his discourse is by no means without significance. It is designed to call attention to the importance of that which he has to say to him, and it may be compared in this respect with introductory formulas of the New Testament, such as Mat_5:2; Act_10:34; and especially 2Co_6:11. [“My tongue hath begun to speak,” lit. my tongue hath spoken in my palate (the latter word a synecdoche). The Pret. דברה denotes here the present, but as an act reaching over into the present out of the past. This, we have judged, called for the free translation which we have given.” Schlottm.]

Job_33:3. My words are the uprightness of my heart; they are the honest open expression of the thought of my heart, precisely that therefore which Job had so painfully missed in the three friends (see Job_6:25).—And the knowledge of my lips—they declare it purely.—The “knowledge of my lips” is either prefixed as casus absolutus, “and as touching the knowledge of my lips—they speak it purely;” or as the object: “and what my lips know, that,” etc.—בָּרוּר can be a predicate accusative [“and knowledge that is pure my lips declare”], referring to דַּעַת, which is elsewhere also used in the masculine (e. g.Pro_2:10; Pro_14:6); but it can just as well be taken adverbially (comp. Ewald, § 279, a).

Job_33:4. The Spirit of God hath made me, etc.—The object of this appeal to the derivation of Elihu’s spirit from God’s Spirit must be essentially the same with that of the similar utterance in Job_32:8. It is not a special, nor an altogether wonderful, prophetic inspiration that Elihu here asserts for himself; he simply claims that it is a universal human wisdom residing in his spirit by virtue of his innate dignity as a man, on the basis of which he here applies himself to instruct Job. It is, so to speak, the humanistic, the genuine original and unperverted human character of his knowledge and experimental wisdom, to which Elihu appeals, when, as a young man, he presents himself to the more aged Job as his instructor. It is to this genuinely human character of his wisdom that he calls attention, both in this passage, where he emphasizes the divine origin of his spiritual life (Job_33:4-5), and in the following, where he sets forth his participation in the material part of man’s nature, in his earthly human corporeity (Job_33:6 seq.). The older Church exegesis readily availed itself of this verse as an argument for the divine trinity, on the ground that it mentions (1) Deus omnipotens: (2) Spiritus Dei (= Sapientia s. Filius); and (3) Spiraculum Dei (= Sp. Sanctus). So e. g. Cocceius on the passage; approximately also Starke.

Job_33:5. If thou canst, then answer me (השׁיב as in Job_32:14), draw up against me (עֶרְכָה scil. מִלִּין, see Job_32:14; לְפָנַי, lit. “before me,” here “against me”), take thy stand, viz. for the controversy, take thy post; the same expression used 1Sa_17:16 of Goliath’s putting himself in a military attitude, and challenging the Israelites to combat.—[“The very ring of the words in Heb. has in them the tone of haughty defiance.” Schlottmann.]

Job_33:6. Behold, I am God’s, as thou art;i. e., I stand no nearer to him; I am, like thee, His creature. [The לְ here may be either the לְ of possession, dependence, according to the explanation just given (comp. לוֹ, Job_12:16); or the לְ of relation: “I am like thee in relation to God.” In our relation to Him we are both equal. The rendering of E. V., Bernard, Barnes: “Behold, I am according to thy wish in God’s stead,” is much less suitable to the connection, and less in harmony with Elihu’s claims.—E.]—Out of clay was I also formed: lit. “out of clay was I also cut off, nipped off” (Del.). The verb קרץ (lit. to nip, to pinch), which forcibly and onomatopoetically describes the action of the potter in forming his vessels, is found in Pual only here. Comp. Job_10:9, and the parallel passages there cited.

Job_33:7. Behold, my terror will not affright thee:i. e. in view of this my genuinely human and earthly character, thou needest not fear an unequal contest with me, as would be the case against God, whom thou didst pray, that “His majesty might not terrify thee.” The passage contains an unmistakable allusion to Job_9:34; Job_13:21,—to the latter passage also by means of the hapax legom. אֶבֶף, “pressure, weight,” which appears here in place of the like-sounding כַף, which is there used. The LXX. (ἡ χείρ μου) [E. V. “my hand”] read כַּפִי also in the present passage, but disregard in so doing the Hebrew usage, which is wont everywhere else to connect the verb כָּבֵד with יָד, not כַּף.

6. The first speech of Elihu.—a. Reference to Job’s objectionable language, in which he maintains his entire innocence in opposition to God, his hostile persecutor: Job_33:8-11.—Surely, thou hast said in mine hearing, etc.—The restrictive rendering of אַךְ = “only” [not otherwise than] (Ewald, Hahn, Dillmann, etc.) is less suitable here than the affirmative: “verily, surely” (Rosenm., Hirzel, Umbreit, Delitzsch—in general most of the moderns) [and so E. V.: “To say anything בְּאָזְנֵי of another is in Hebrew equivalent to saying it not secretly, and so as to be liable to misconstruction, but aloud and distinctly.” Del.].

Job_33:9-11. A collection of several objectionable utterances by Job, which are cited in part literally, in part according to the sense, and with the refutation of which ail that follows to the close of these discourses is occupied, so that these three verses contain to some extent the common theme of all the four discourses of Elihu (comp. below on Job_35:1).—Pure am I, without (בְּלִי as in Job_31:39) wickedness. Comp. Job_9:21; Job_10:7; Job_16:17; Job_23:10; Job_27:5 seq. The word חַף (lit. tersus, lotus, rubbed down smooth, grown fine) used here in b as a synonym of זַךְ, was not used by Job, and occurs only here. The same may be said of תְּנוּאות, “oppositions, hostilities, alienations” (comp. Num_14:34) in Job_33:10 a, with which are to be compared utterances of Job like those in Job_10:13 seq.; Job_19:11; Job_30:21. In regard to Job_33:10 b comp. Job_13:24; and with Job_33:11 comp. Job_13:27, which passage Elihu quotes with literal accuracy, doubtless because he had taken particular offense at this accusation of God as Job’s jailer and most crafty watcher.

7. Continuation.—b. Didactic exhibition of the true relation of sinful men to God, who seeks to turn them to Himself by manifold dispensations and communications, to wit: a. By the voice of conscience in dreams; Job_33:12-18.—Behold, in this thou art not right, I answer thee (not: “I will answer thee,” Hirzel [E. V.], etc.). זֹאת, accus. of nearer definition to לא־צדקת refers to the citations from Job’s speeches in Job_33:9-11. Respecting צדק in the signification “to be right,” comp. Job_11:2. The second member gives the reason for this assertion that Job, with his suspicions of God’s greatness and love, was in the wrong: for Eloah is greater than mortal man, will not therefore after the manner of man, play the part of a hateful or vindictive persecutor of feeble creatures. [Del. explains: “God is too exalted to enter into a defence of Himself against such vain-glorying interwoven with accusations against Him. And for this reason Elihu will enter the lists for God.” But a deeper and more satisfactory meaning is obtained by the explanation in the Commentary. God is too great to be actuated by the petty malignities which Job had imputed to Him. Job was wrong; God is just, because He is great.” E. V. and several commentators connect אֶעֱנֶךָּ with what follows, either rendering כִּי “that,” or “for” with Delitzsch’s explanation. But the Masoretic accentuation connects it with what precedes, and this harmonizes better with the poetic rhythm of the verse, and with the weight of thought in b.—E.]

Job_33:13. Why hast thou contended (רִיבוֹתָ instead of רַבְתָּ, Gesenius, § 73 [§ 72], 1) against Him?—Such striving or murmuring against God on the part of Job had found expression, e. g., in Job_7:20; Job_10:18; Job_13:24 seq.—The second member declares the ground or contents of this contention against God to be: that [for] He gives account of none of His doings; lit. “that He answers not (ענה as in Job_32:12; Job_40:2; Job_9:3) all His words (or matters, דְּבָרָיו). So correctly Gesenius, Umbreit, Vaih., Delitzsch [E. V., Con., Words., Rod., Elz., Bar., Renan], etc., while the explanations of other moderns vary widely, e. g. “to all his (man’s) words giveth He no answer” (Hirzel, Heiligst., Hahn) [Carey on the contrary: “since to none of His words doth man answer,” i. e. man is deaf when God speaks]; or “that all his words to Him (suffix in דבריו referring to the object) He easily answers” (Stickel, and similarly Welte): or “with not a single word does He answer” (Schlottmann, Kamph.); or “that He makes no answer to all thy words” (Dillmann, changing דבריו to דֶּבָרֻיךָ), etc.

Job_33:14. For (on the other hand) God speaketh once and twice;i. e. many times, often, repeatedly; comp. Job_40:5; also Job_5:19. Those commentators who explain: “in many ways” (Arnh., Hirz., Stick., Del., etc.) make too much of the simple form of enumeration used; it is only the πολυμερῶς of the divine revelation, and not of also its πολυτρόπως, which is here spoken of. Respecting the בְּ before אחת and שתים, comp. besides Job_40:5, also Psa_62:12 [11]. The subj. of the follg. לאֹ יְשׁוּרֶנָּה, which the Masoretic accentuation also separates from what goes before, cannot be “God” again, but only man, used indefinitely; hence “one perceiveth it not” (שׁוּר with a neut. suffix, in the general meaning of observing, perceiving, precisely as in Job_35:13). This short clause stands accordingly in a limitative, or an adversative relation to the preceding thought: “only man observes it not,” or “yet man,” etc. [E. V.]. It is possible also to render it as a circumstantial clause: “without any one observing it” (Schlottm.). [“God’s speech is unnoticed, not recognized by the senses, understood only by the susceptible feelings.” Schlottmann.] The explanation of this verse by Schultens, Ewald and Vaihinger is peculiar (comp. the Vulg. and Pesh.): “for God speaks once—He does not glance at it a second time” [i. e. to reconsider or change what He has once said]. Against this is (1) the Masoretic accentuation; (2) the connection with Job_33:15 seq., which would there stand quite torn apart; (3) the fact that שׁוּר cannot signify revidere (it would in that case have to be changed into שׁוּב).

Job_33:15 seq. now mention—if not several kinds (Hirzel, Schlottm., Del.)—at least several examples of impressive communications from God to men, or, according to the language used in Job_33:14, of “speeches” by God. The first instance mentioned is that of revelation by dreams, Job_33:15-18, which Elihu describes in language which is a close, and in part a literal copy of that of Eliphaz (Job_4:12-16). The statement prefixed of time and circumstance (Job_33:15) is almost literally the same as Job_4:13 (see on the passage).

Job_33:16. Then opens He the ear of men;i. e. He opens their understanding for His confidential communications; the same phrase in Job_36:10; Job_36:15; 1Sa_9:15, and often—And presses a seal upon their instruction (מֹסָר, an alternate form of מוּסָר, found only here); i. e. He impresses upon them all the more deeply the earnest admonitions and warnings which He administers to them by all the various experiences of life (not particularly by painful diseases as Ewald, Hahn, and Dillmann explain, on the strength of Job_33:19 seq.); He assures them by such dreams and visions that they are to recognize such serious dispensations of life as coming from Him, as rules of His divine agency in educating men; comp. Job_36:10. Note how according to this Elihu regards every man as being continually subject to the operations of a divine discipline. As to חתם with בְּ (different from חתם with בְּעַד, Job_9:7), comp. Job_37:7. Several of the ancient versions (LXX., Aqu., Pesh.) and Luther translate as though they had read יְחִתֵּם, “He terrifies them.”

Job_33:17-18. The aim of this nocturnal opening of the ear, and sealing of the divine instruction.—In order to withdraw man from transgression.—So according to the improved reading מִמַּעֲשֶׂה (Hirz., Del., Dillm., etc.), which is sufficiently attested by the ἀποστρέψαι ἅνθρωπον ἀπὸ ἀδικίας αὐτοῦ [of the LXX.]. According to the common reading מַעֲשֶׂה, man must be regarded as subj. of לְחָסִיר: “that he may put away evil-doing.” In respect to מעשׂה, facinus, comp. e. g.1Sa_20:19.—And to hide pride from man; so that he does not see it, and so remains preserved from it (Hirzel, etc.), or: “so that he becomes unaccustomed to it” (Del.). Concerning the syncopated form נֵּוָה, see on Job_22:29. It is unnecessary to amend the verb יְכַסֶּה to יְכַלֶּה “to cause to disappear” (Dillmann), or to יְנַשֶּׂה, “to set aside, to remove” (Böttcher).

Job_33:18. To keep back his soul from the grave, i.e. to preserve him from death; comp. Psa_16:10; Psa_30:4 [3], 10 [9].—And his life (חַיָּה always with Elihu, equivalent to חַיִּים elsewhere; comp. Job_33:20; Job_33:22; Job_33:28) from perishing by the dart.—So (with Dillmann) [E. V. “by the sword,” but שׁלח rather means “missile”] are we to understand the phrase עָכַר בַּשֶּׁלַח, which occurs only here and Job_36:12 (comp. עבר in Job_34:20). The common explanation: “to precipitate one’s self into [or upon] the dart” (iruere in telum) is not so natural, and is not confirmed by the expression עָבַר בַּשַּׂחַת in Job_33:28, which, although of similar sound, is essentially different in signification (against Hirzel, Delitzsch, etc.). [“Here everything in thought and expression is peculiar.” Del.]

8. Continuation. The second instance of the divine visitation; β. By grievous painful disease: Job_33:19-22. Ewald, Hahn, Dillmann, groundlessly endeavor to treat this new instance as only a special expansion of that which precedes, because that already in Job_33:16 reference is made to severe suffering on the part of him to whom God addresses His dream-revelation—an inadmissible forcing of the meaning of מֹסָר in that passage, and at the same time disproved by the וְ at the beginning of the present verse, which is a connective, introducing a new thought, not an explicative particle, referring back to מֹסָר, from which it is much too far removed.—He is chastised also with pains on his bed, while the strife in his bones goes on continually.—So according to the K’thibh רִיב = “strife, contest” [admirably describing disease as a disturbance of the equilibrium of the powers: Del.], and in accordance with the correct rendering of אֵתָן (=אֵיתן, comp. Job_32:18) as predicate, not as the attribute of רִיב (“and by the continual conflict,” etc.), for the latter rendering (Hirzel, Vaih., Del.) is forbidden by the absence of the article before אֵתָן, Following the K’ri, רוֹב, which is supported by the ancient versions, and several MSS., we should have to explain (with Ewald, Dillmann, etc.): “while the multitude of his limbs is still vigorous throughout” (comp. Job_12:19; Job_20:11). [E. V.: “and the multitude of his bones with strong (or unceasing) pain.” So Aben-Ezra, Junius, Tremellius, Arn. (Vulg.: et omnia ossa ejus marcescere facit), but the construction of אתן is unnatural.]

Job_33:20. And his life makes bread a loathing.—זִהֵם causative Piel of the verb זָהַם, not found elsewhere in the Hebrew, which, according to the Arabic, signifies “to stink;” hence to cause to stink, to excite loathing (not as intensive of Kal, “to be disgusted,” as Rosenm., Umbr., Vaih., Hahn, etc., explain it). חַיָה again is here not = craving, hunger, any more than the parallel נֶפֶשׁ in b, but as always with Elihu: “life, vital energy.” Schlottmann truly remarks: “It expresses very vividly the thought that the proper vital power, the proper ψυχή, when it is consumed by disease, gives one a loathing for that which it otherwise likes as being a necessary condition of its own existence.”

Job_33:21. So that his flesh consumes away (יִכֶל abbreviated for וַיִּכֶל, comp. Ew. § 233, a) that it cannot be seen, lit. “away from seeing,” or “away from sightliness.” Comp. in respect to רֹאִי (pausal form for רֳאִי) 1Sa_16:12; Isa_52:14; Isa_53:2.—And his wasted limbs are scarcely to be seen any more (or “are become invisible”). So following the K’thibh וּשְׁפִי, which according to the Hebrew root, שפה, “to be bare,” expresses the notion of bareness, meagreness (scarcely as Gesen., Hirz., Del., etc. think, that of rottenness, putrefaction, after the Aram.), and in connection with the genitive עַצְמוֹתָיו produces the collective notion: “the wasting of his members = his wasted members,” with which the plur. predicate, לֹא רֻאוּ, agree perfectly well (comp. the similar constructions with רֹב or מִסְפָּר above, Job_32:7; Job_15:20; Job_21:21, and often). The K’ri וְשֻׁפּוּ, “and are made bare,” owes its origin to the attention being fixed on this incorrectly understood plural רֻאוּ. [“After יִכֶל and before וַתִּקְרַב the Perf. with וְ is out of place.” Dillm.] In respect to the pointing רֻאֹוּ, with Dagh. in א, comp. Delitzsch on the passage, and Ewald, § 21, e. [Green, § 121, 1, who, however, inclines to regard it as Mappik. In either case its function is to indicate the guttural quality of א, here to be carefully observed, to give strength to the description.—E.]

Job_33:22. On a comp. Job_33:18.—And his life to the angels of death, lit. “the slayers, or destroyers” (מְמִיתִים), by which are intended not only mortal pains (Rosenm., Schlottmann) [Barnes, Carey], but, according to Psa_78:49; 2Sa_24:16; 1Ch_21:15, angelic powers sent from God, and commissioned to destroy men. [The former explanation “does not commend itself, because the Elihu section has a strong angelological coloring in common with the book of Job.” Del.]

9. Continuation. The third instance of the divine visitation: γ. By sending a mediating angel as a deliverer out of distress, and so by a wonderful removal of the painful disease and danger of death just described: Job_33:23-28.—If then there is for him [עליו, “for,” better than “with him”] an angel, a mediator (מֵלִיץ here otherwise than in Job_16:20, where it was used in malem partem), one of thousands, to declare to man his duty (lit. “his uprightness, his right way,” comp. Pro_14:2).—Oecolampad., Schult,, Schnurr., Bouil., Eichh., Rosenm., Welte, v. Hofmann [Noyes, Barnes, Carey] understand by the מַלְאָךְ מֵלִיץ a human interpreter of the will of God, a prophet, or teacher of true wisdom, such as Job had before himself in Elihu. But the ancient reference to an angel (comp. Job_4:18) to which the majority of moderns also adhere, is supported by the following considerations. (1) The mention, just before, of the angel of death, to which manifestly there is now about to be introduced a contrast. (2) The contrast with לְאָדָם in c, as well as the office of delivering from death, with which, according to Job_33:23, the מלאךְ is invested. (3) His being called “one of a thousand,” which would scarcely characterize him as a man of an extraordinary sort, such as can scarcely be met with as one among a thousand, but rather as belonging to the innumerable hosts of heaven—a description, accordingly, which is to be understood not according to Ecc_7:28, but according to Dan_7:10; Psa_68:18 [17]. The latter designation, moreover, makes it impossible to regard this mediating or interpreting angel (comp. Gen_42:23; Isa_43:27; 2Ch_32:31) as an angel of peculiarly high rank, as e. g. the Mal’ak-Jehovah of the Pentateuch, or as the “Angel of the Presence,” or the Metathron of the later Jewish literature, as Schlottmann and Del. [Lee, Wordsw., Canon Cook in Smith’s Bib. Dic.] think; for the force of the clause אחד מגי־אלף is simply to put this one messenger of God on an equality with many others, whom God might in like manner entrust with such a commission, not to exalt him above them. The Messianic meaning, which many expositors attribute to the verse (even among those who understand the מַ׳ מֵ׳ of a human messenger of God, e. g. Schultens, Velthusen, J. D. Michaelis, also J. Pye Smith, Script. Testimony to the Messiah, I. 307, the last indeed only tentatively, and without definitely deciding the question), is accordingly in any case very indirect and general. Moreover a special Christological vaticinium of the kind which the majority of the older exegetes maintained (comp. especially J. D. Michaelis: De angelo interprete, Hal. 1707), would scarcely seem appropriate in the mouth of an extra-Israelitish sage of the patriarchal era, any more than that celebrated verse of the Œdipus Coloneus of Sophocles:

“One soul, in my opinion, for ten thousand will suffice

To make atonement, if with kindly feelings it draws nigh,”

could be understood as Messianic otherwise than very remotely (comp. Luthardt, Apolog. Vorträge ii. 224).

[“In the extra-Israelitish world a far more developed doctrine of angels and demons is everywhere found than in Israel, which is to be understood not only subjectively, but also objectively; and within the patriarchal history after Genesis 16. that (אלהים) מלאך יהוח appears, who is instrumental in effecting the progress of the history of redemption, and has so much the appearance of the God of revelation, that He even calls Himself God, and is called God. He it is whom Jacob means, when (Gen_48:15 seq.), blessing Joseph, he distinguishes God the Invisible, God the Shepherd, i.e. Leader and Ruler, and “the Angel who delivered (הַגֹּאֵל) me from all evil;” it is the Angel who, according to Psa_34:8, encampeth round about them that fear God, and delivereth them; “the Angel of the Presence,” whom Isaiah in the Thephilla, 63:7 seq., places beside Jehovah and His Holy Spirit as a third hypostasis. Taking up this perception, Elihu demands for the deliverance of man from the death which he has incurred by his sins, a superhuman angelic mediator. The “Angel of Jehovah” of primeval history is the oldest prefigurement in the history of redemption of the future incarnation, without which the Old Testament history would be a confused quodlibet of premises and radii, without a conclusion and a centre; and the angelic form is accordingly the oldest form which the hope of a deliverer assumes, and to which it recurs, in conformity to the law of the circular connection between the beginning and the end, in Mal_3:1.” Delitzsch.—See further Remarks on Job_33:24.]

Job_33:24 is not the apodosis to the preceding verse (Hirzel, Hahn, Delitzsch, Kamphausen) [E. V., Con., Noyes, Renan, Rodwell], for God’s commission to the angel: “Deliver him,” etc.—belongs as yet to the preliminary conditions of the deliverance, which is first described in Job_33:25. The conditional particle of the preceding verse accordingly extends its influence over the present verse: and (if) He hath mercy on him, and saith, etc.,—This divine commission presupposes that the sorely afflicted one has truly repented, and laid to heart the salutary teachings of the angel. It is unnecessary with Schlottmann to take the angel as the subject of this brief clause, for the reason that the exercise of mercy cannot be the function of an angel.—Deliver him from going down into the pit (comp. Job_33:18 a), I have found a ransom, viz. for him. [“One is here reminded of Heb_9:12, αἰωνἰαν λύτρωσιν εὑράμενος.” Del.] By this is meant the intercession of the mediating angel, who had preached repentance, not in vain, to the sick one, and had therefore appeared before God, interceding in his behalf. Instead of פְּדָעֵהוּ (from a root פָּרַע, liberare, which is not elsewhere found, and which is hardly intelligible), it would seem natural to read either פְּדֵהוּ or פְּדָאֵהוּ (from פדה = פּוא); some MSS. show פְּוָעֵהוּ, solve eum, which, however, would be suitable only in case the angel addressed were the angel of death. [“כֹּפֶר according to its primary notion is not a covering = making good, more readily a covering = cancelling (from כָּפַר, Talmud, to wipe out, away), but, as the usual combination with עַל shows, a covering of sin and guilt before wrath, punishment, or execution on account of guilt, and in this sense λύτρον, a means of getting free, ransom-money. The connection is satisfied if the repentance of the chastened one (thus e. g. also von Hofm.) is understood by this ransom, or better, his affliction, inasmuch as it has brought him to repentance. But wherefore should the mediatorship of the angel be excluded from the notion of the כֹּפֶר? Just this mediatorship is meant, inasmuch as it puts to right him who by his sins had worked death, i.e. places him in a condition in which no further hindrance stands in the way of the divine pardon. If we connect the mediating angel, like the angel of Jehovah of the primeval history with God Himself, as then the logos of this mediating angel to man can be God’s own logos communicated by him, and he therefore as מליץ, God’s speaker (if we consider Elihu’s discourse in the light of the New Testament), can be the divine Logos himself, we shall here readily recognize a passage of the mystery which is unveiled in the New Testament: “God was in Christ, and reconciled the world unto Himself.” A presage of this mystery, flashing through the darkness, we have already read in Job_17:3 (comp. Job_16:21; and, on the other hand, in order to see how this anticipation is kindled by the thought of the opposite, Job_9:33). The presage which meets us here is like another in Psalms 107.—a Psalm which has many points of coincidence with the book of Job—where in Job_33:20 we find: ‘He sent His word, and healed them.’ At any rate Elihu expresses it as a postulate, that the deliverance of man can be effected only by a superhuman being, as it is in reality accomplished by the man who is at the same time, and from all eternity the Lord of the angels of light.” Delitzsch.

In addition to the suggestions which may be found in the two extracts from Delitzsch, given above in favor of explaining the מלאךְ מליץ of this passage in the higher sense of the O. T. מלי יהוה, the following considerations may be urged:

1. To understand the words of an ordinary angel furnishes no adequate explanation of the description here given of him. Especially is it difficult to understand on this theory why he should be spoken of as “one out of a thousand.” Is it (a) simply as a rhetorical amplification of the word “angel”—“one of the innumerable hosts of heaven?” (Renan). But this would be here a meaningless rhetorical flourish. What has his being one of a countless angelic company to do with the function here assigned to him? Is it (b) as a more precise definition of the Malakah, to indicate that he is an angelic, or celestial messenger? (Dillmann). But that would have been expressed in more definite language. Is it (c) restrictive—“but one among a thousand?” (Rodwell). Apart from the obscurity of the language to express such a thought, it is difficult to see the force of such a restriction. Not to indicate any unwillingness on the part of the angels in general, for that would be nothing to the purpose. It could only serve to magnify God’s willingness to be gracious—let but one mediator appear, and God will have mercy. But to this there are several decisive objections. (1) It is against the proper view of the connection, according to which Job_33:24 is not the consequent, but a part of the conditional antecedent. (2) It seems to be founded on the opinion that means an “intercessor” (so Rodwell—“interceding angel”), whereas he is God’s representative, not man’s. (3) It lies outside the scope of the passage. The sufferer has in the verses immediately preceding been brought to the verge of the grave. But all at once a glorious possibility presents itself—a Messenger from God, to show the sufferer the way of right, mercifully commissioned to deliver him, and lo! he is rescued, his youth renewed, and he beholds the face of God in joy] To interject the thought that such a messenger would be only one of a thousand like himself, would be confusing and weakening. The same objection would apply still more forcibly if we should take it to mean (d) any one of a thousand.

But Job 2 : understood of a מלאךְ of high rank, the words are significant. They indicate dignity, superiority.1 He is One out of, or above (מן combining its local and comparative force) a thousand, or thousands, or the thousand. Good explains: “one of the supreme chyliad, the preeminent thousand that shine at the top of the empyreal hierarchy, possessed of transcendent and exclusive powers, and confined to functions of the highest importance.” Granting that this explanation of אלף is problematical, it may still be said that whether we take it indefinitely for “a thousand” or collectively for “thousands,” i.e. all the angels, the phrase—“oneout of a thousand”—most naturally suggests rareness, pre-eminence. And this view of it accords with the rest of the description.

(1) The term מֵלִיץ, in such a connection, would naturally convey the idea of dignity. He is an ambassador, internuncius (see 2Ch_32:31), an angelic envoy endowed with an extraordinary commission—certainly not here, as the context shows, the mere mouthpiece of another (as in Gen_42:23).

(2) His function—“to show to man the right way” (his rightness, his true life)—suggests at once the Prophet foretold by Moses (Deu_18:15 seq.), one who should interpret—declare—more clearly than mere man could the will of God by which man is to be saved.

(3) His remedial commission, it will be seen, is extraordinary: (a) In its origin, in the special, solemn, formal manner in which he is invested with it. (b) In its nature—involving as it does deliverance from the pit, and the completion of man’s ransom—כֹּפֶו—a word used again by Elihu (Job_36:18) in the most solemn connection with reference to deliverance from the most terrible of destinies (comp. also Psa_49:8, and the use of the cognates כִּפֵּר כִּפֻּרִים, and כַּפֹּרֶת, as significant of the expiation of sin): (c) In its results—especially as embracing reconciliation with God (Job_33:26).

3. Add that the idea of Divine Grace, as developed so remarkably in Job_33:26-27, comes into more fitting connection with such an interpretation of the passage as involves an evangelic anticipation of the revelation of grace in Christ, the great μεσίτης.

4. The passage is not indeed to be constrained into a complete exposition of Christ’s mediatorial office. Here, as elsewhere in our book, the truth is fragmentary, obscure, a prophetic hint, little more than the yearning after a possibility. This consideration however would all the more seem to put it in the category of such passages as Job_14:14 seq.; Job_17:3; Job_19:25 seq. It is a hypothesis, hanging on an If—אִס־יֵשׁ—but it is an If, the answer to which is the Amen of the Gospel.

If, as shown above, the language itself points in the highest direction here indicated, we are still further justified in taking that direction by the position which must be accorded to Elihu’s discourses in the book. Assuming here their genuineness, they must be regarded as a part of the solution of the problem. So regarded, it would seem strange if they did not once show us those heights of aspiration and faith, of which Job’s words have already given us such wonderful glimpses. On the other hand, it should not seem to us strange that the young sage, the precursor of Jehovah, in the disentanglement of the book’s mystery, whose especial mission in the book it is to throw the light of inspired thought on the mystery, should reflect upon it some rays from the mediatorial cross. E.].

Job_33:25. Apodosis to Job_33:23 seq.: (then) his flesh swells with the vigor of youth. In respect to the Perf. quadril. רֻטֲפַשׁ “to be over-juicy, to swell,” comp. Ewald, § 131, g [Green, § 180, a]. נֹעַר [peculiar to the Elihu section] here and in Job_36:14, instead of the customary נְעוּרִים. The מִן before this word is used not comparatively, but causally, as the parallel thought in b shows.

Job_33:26. If he prayeth to Eloah, He accepteth him graciously (comp. Job_22:27), and causeth him to behold His face with rejoicing, or: “so that he sees His face with rejoicing:” both renderings are equally possible, according as we render וירא as imper. Kal, or Hiph. The rendering of Umbreit and Ewald, however, is inappropriate: “and He cause his face to look upon joy,” because ראה בְ already signifies of itself, “to see joy” (see Job_33:28 b).—And He gives back again to man his righteousness, which he had lost; not “requites to man his uprightness,” as Delitzsch (after Luther) translates, for Job_33:27 b does not agree with this. Moreover to express this idea of the recompense of upright actions, we should rather expect to find כְּצִדְקָתוֹ. The idea of a righteousness in the rescued sinner, restored to him by God as a free gift, is peculiar to Elihu. It at least retires quite into the background in the descriptions, otherwise quite similar, of the three friends, such as Job_5:19 seq.; Job_8:21; Job_11:15 seq.; Job_22:23 seq., and thus characterizes Elihu’s religious and ethical views as more free from legal narrowness and externality.

Job_33:27. He singeth to man, and saith.יָשֹׁר, abbreviated Imperf. from שִׁיר = שׁוּרי (comp. Job_36:24). עַל־אֲנָשִׁים, lit. “to men, addressed to them;” comp. Pro_25:20. As to the thought, however, comp. Psa_22:23 [Psa_22:22] seq.; Psa_51:14, and often. The song of thanksgiving chanted by the redeemed and justified one [a “psalm in nuce,” Del.] now begins, and extends to the end of the following verse.—Still it was not recompensed to me; lit. “it was not made equal to me,” non æquatum est mihi (שָׁוָה, neuter or impersonal) [E. V.: “and it profited me not” (Syr., Targ.) is a legitimate rendering of the Heb., but is far less appropriate to the connection. It misses entirely the recognition of grace, in that he had not received the just recompense of his sins. The rendering of the first part of the verse is also more forced, and less satisfactory, when יָשֹׁר is rendered: “He looketh,” and וַיֹּאמֶר: “and if any say:” against which may still further be urged the Vav. consec. here, and the Perf. פָּדָה, and the K’thibh נַפְשִׁי in 28a.—E.].

Job_33:28. He hath redeemed my soul (read with the K’thibh נַפְשִׁי, for the eucharistic discourse of the redeemed one is still continued here), from going down into the pit (comp. Job_33:18), and my life shall enjoy seeing the light;i.e. the light of this world (Joh_11:9), which, as the upper world, stands here in contrast with the gloomy “grave,” and so also in Job_33:30; comp. Job_3:16; Job_3:20. Delitzsch,, against the context, and with an interpolation of thought: “in the light of the divine (countenance, in the gracious presence of God.”

10. Conclusion: first of all (Job_33:29-30) of the second chief division—teaching the gracious and righteous dispensations of God in educating His human children; and then (Job_33:31-33) of the whole discourse—the last sentence being a summons to Job to bear attentively the discourses of instruction which follow.—Behold, all this God does—referring back to all of which he has spoken from Job_33:14 on, with a recurrence in particular of the idea of repeatedness found also in that passage, for this is what is expressed there by באחתand בשתים, here by פַּעֲמַיִם שָׁלשׁbis terque—an expression which on account of the lack of the וְ between the two adverbs of time, the ancient versions misunderstood, and so read as though it were פְּעָמִים שָׁלשׁ [“three times;” E. V. more indefinitely “oftentimes”].

Job_33:30. On a comp. Job_33:18; on b, Job_33:28, and Ps. 56:14 [Psa_56:13]. [“שַׁחַת here for the fifth time in this speech, without being anywhere interchanged with שְׁאוֹל or another synonym, which is remarkable.” Del.] לֵאוֹר, syncopated form of the Inf. Niphal, instead of לְהֵאוֹר [Gr., § 159, 2], “that he may be lighted, or enlightened with the light of life” (in contrast with the darkness of death, with which he had already been overshadowed.

Job_33:31. Attend, O Job, and hearken to me.—This can scarcely be regarded as a summons to ponder quietly on what he had heard (Del.), but rather to listen to what he had further to communicate, as b incontrovertibly proves.

Job_33:32. If (however) thou hast words, then reply to me (comp. Job_33:5); speak, for I desire thy justification, i.e. not “that thou shouldst justify thyself” (Hirzel), but that thou mayest stand vindicated, I wish to see thee declared righteous (comp. Job_32:2, with Job_33:26 c). Here also again the normal evangelical notion of justification, in contrast with all false self-justification, is expressed by Elihu.

Job_33:33. If not (אִמ אַיִן, to wit מִלִּין, comp. Gen_30:1), then do thou hear me. אַתָּה emphatic: “thou on thy part.”—Be silent (as in Job_33:31 b), and I will teach thee wisdom. חָכְמָה here instead of the דֵּעַ several times used in the introduction (comp. Job_32:6 b, 10, 17; Job_33:3). אִלֵּף, “to teach,” as in Job_15:5

DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL

1. Partly on the ground of Elihu’s circumstantial self-introduction in Job_32:6 to Job_33:7, partly on the ground of the first discourse of admonition and instruction which immediately follows, very unfavorable judgments o have from ancient times down to our own been delivered in respect to the person and the religious and ethical stand-point of this speaker. Following the example of Jerome,2 Gregory the Great, at the close of his exposition of the first discourse, describes Elihu as an arrogans, who dum vera ac mystica, loquitur, subito per tumor em cordis quædam inania ac superba permiscet. The Venerable Bede even identifies him with the false prophet (ariolus) Balaam.3 following perhaps the guidance of the Rabbis, for in the Talmud and Midrash the same worthless conceit recurs (as in like manner it seems to be an anonymous Jewish writer, who recently [in Bernstein’s Analecten, Vol. III., under the title, Der Satan als Irrgeist und Engel des Lichts] has made the attempt to represent Elihu as Satan in disguise). Olympiodorus judges him more favorably, but is still of opinion that he has not done full justice to Job, the truly pious and holy man, and is for that same reason at last neither praised nor blamed by God (Catena in Job, ed. Lond. p. 484). Most of the Jesuit commentators in modern times regard Elihu as an empty, puffed up boaster, whom God rightly ignores, and whose hatred against Job is to be explained from his near relationship to him, his Nahorite descent; so e. g. Escobai (Comment. in Biblia, Tom. IV., p. 94, 125); while other Roman Catholic exegetes, e. g. the Capuchin Volducius (Comment. Tom. II., p. 445 seq.) adjudge him to be in the right, so far as all that is essential is concerned.—Among Protestant commentators Luther, so far as may be gathered from various scattered intimations, partly from his translation of chs. 32–37., partly from his Introduction to the book of Job, and other expressions on the subject, seems to have put Elihu’s discourses, as respects their theological value and contents, on the same plane with those of the three friends. Vict. Strigel renders a decidedly unfavorable verdict upon them, Elihu being to him an exemplum ambitiosi oratoris, qui plenus sit ostentatione et audacia insinuata in mente. Herder calls Elihu’s speech, in comparison with the majestic thunder-speech of the Creator, “the weak, rambling talk of a boy,” and says: “Elihu, a young prophet, intemperate, bold, alone wise, draws fine pictures, without end or aim; hence no one answers him, and he stands there as a mere shadow” (Vom Geist der Ebr. Pœsie, p. 101, 142). Umbreit’s language is similar, only yet stronger. Elihu’s appearance he describes as “the uncalled-for stumbling in of a conceited young philosopher into the conflict that is already properly ended,” and “the silent contempt with which he is allowed to speak is the merited reward of a babbler” (Komment., 2d Ed., p. XXV seq.). In like manner Wohlfarth, who says that Elihu is “a vain-glorious conceited boaster, as it were a spiritual Goliath!” M. Sachs (Stud. u. Kritiken, 1834, IV. p. 416 seq.), and A. Hahn, who (Komment. p. 18) calls him “a most conceited and arrogant young man, who with all his undeniable scientific knowledge is boastful and officious” [Noyes, who calls him “forward”], and this in accordance with the purpose of the poet, who represents him as such a character intentionally. The judgment of those who oppose the genuineness of the Elihu-episode is naturally to some extent unfavorable. See a number of such expressions collected together out of de Wette’s Introduction, in Umbreit (l. c.); also Eichhorn in Schlottmann, p. 54; v. Hofmann in Delitzsch (II., 240); and very recently Dillmann’s closing opinion in respect to Elihu’s self-introduction (p. 297): “The impression which this long introductory discourse makes on the reader is not favorable; Elihu’s self-praise, and his verbose vaunting of that which he is about to do, is somewhat unseemly,” etc. So also what he says of the first discourse (p. 304)—that Elihu’s representation of the suffering of Job as a means of discipline and improvement employed by God exhibits throughout nothing new, that it is “precisely the same method of explanation as that which the three friends had adopted in the beginning of the controversy, which Eliphaz especially, in Job_5:17 seq., had sharply and clearly expressed.” and which Job would have been perfectly justified in rejecting as unacceptable.

To these unfavorable judgments respecting the character of their speaker there may indeed be opposed, a number equally large of such as are favorable, which, finding their principal support as well in Job 32. and 33. see in Elihu a direct forerunner, not only on the negative, but also on the positive side, of the final decision of the controversy by Jehovah. So already Augustine, according to whom Elihu ut primas partes modestiæ habuit ita et sapientiæ; Chrysostom, who represents him in two respects—in respect of his speech, and of his silence—as an eloquent witness to true Wisdom 4 subsequently Thomas Aquinas (Opp. Tom. I., p. 137, 184, ed. Venet.), Brentius, Oecolampadius, Calvin, Pareau (see the passage quoted out of his commentary above in the Introduction § 10, Rem.) Cocceius, Sebastian Schmidt, Starke, [Schultens, Lightfoot, Bp. Patrick, Matt. Henry], etc.; and quite recently in particular Schlottmann, Räbiger (Del. Jobi sent, primaria), Hengstenberg, Völk, and the greater part of those who advocate the genuineness of these discourses [to whom may be added some even of the opponents of their genuineness, such as Davidson, Introd. II., pp. 210–213; Delitzsch II., 239 seq.]. We must declare ourselves decidedly in favor of the latter estimate of the value and import of this section, although it seems to us a one-sided, or at least an incautious statement to say that it is (according to Hengstenberg’s Vortrage über das Buch Hiob, p. 27) “the throbbing heart” of the whole poem, or that (according to v. Gerlach, A. T. III., 86) these discourses “give us the true intent of the whole, the views of the author himself, or that Elihu, unlike the three friends, is introduced as standing within the pale of the Abrahamitic revelation (so Vilmar, see above on Job_32:2). It is certainly the poet’s intention that Elihu should be regarded as a factor needing to be corrected or to be supplemented by the entire colloquy, otherwise he would not actually furnish such very important supplementary additions as are found in Jehovah’s discourses, and the final action in the epilogue. But he does unquestionably represent him as a speaker who approaches very closely the complete Divine truth, nearer than any one of the preceding speakers. This is seen at the outset, in the way he introduces himself in these two chapters, and lays down the foundation of the didactic discussion which follows.

2. Respecting the point, that in Elihu’s self-introduction, as well as in the poet’s introduction which precedes it (Job_32:2-6), there is nothing that is unbecoming, nothing that justifies the charge of vanity, or an overweening self-conceit, or idle loquacity against Elihu, see above Introduction § 10, ad, 6 and 7 seq. Here attention is specially called to the fact that the frequency and confidence with which he puts forth his knowledge (Job_32:6 b, 10, 17; Job_33:3) was indispensable, inasmuch as it was precisely on this intellectual possession of the speaker that his right to make his appearance along with those men so much older than himself rested, inasmuch indeed as, if he had not been endowed with an extraordinary fullness of knowledge and wisdom, he could not have escaped the reproach of impudent self-intrusion, or shameless arrogance. The reader is still further reminded there that the humility and modesty of Elihu appear not only in the fact that as the youngest he had hitherto been silent, but also in the fact that at the close of his self-introduction he solemnly declares (Job_33:4-7) that it is his purpose to address himself to Job as man to man, as the medium accordingly of a wisdom which is purely human, and which by no means denies its earthly origin—not as though he were about presumptuously to communicate a divine revelation which should confound or terrify him, in short not as a preacher of repentance, or a prophet, thundering upon him from above (see the Exegetical Remarks on the above passages.)

3. This same purely human, and for that reason mild and humane impress stamps itself on the beginning of his didactic expositions in the first discourse. Elihu here exhibits himself as far less of a legalist than the three censurers of Job who have preceded him. He certainly does maintain against Job that his assertion that he is altogether pure and innocent, and his other assertion, that God is cruelly persecuting him, are without justification and presumptuous (Job_33:12 seq.). But instead of at once proceeding to threaten him with God’s direst punishments for his conduct, or setting before his eyes that terrible picture of the irretrievable destruction of obstinate evil-doers, which was the favorite theme of the descriptions of his predecessors, he assumes an incomparably gentler, more comforting, more affectionate tone. He puts in the foreground—herein proving himself to be a genuine teacher of wisdom, an apostle of the real Divine wisdom revealed in the New Testament—the idea of the מּוסר (Job_33:16), i. e. of chastisement, of God’s discipline, strict and yet mild as that of a father, attributes to Job’s grievous suffering essentially the significance which is conferred upon it by such a disciplinary standard (such purifying suffering in the way of temptation, in contrast with suffering merely in the way of trial 5), and in a friendly way points out to Job how near God is to him in the midst of his misery, and how little reason he has to doubt His help and deliverance. He then describes this deliverance itself, on the one side as depending on the intervention of a superhuman mediating angel, commissioned to declare to him the merciful and gracious will of God (Job_33:23 seq.), on the other side as immediately followed by the gracious restoration of his former righteousness, a “justification” (Job_33:26 c; Job_33:32) which is to be viewed as forgiveness, or a solemn readmission to the position of a child of God. In both these utterances respecting the deliverance hypothetically promised to Job, Elihu approximates most remarkably the fundamental features of the New Testament revelation of salvation. For his idea of justification differs from the evangelical Pauline idea only in the absence of a direct reference to the crucified and risen Redeemer as the ground of the δικαίωσις (causa meritoria justificationis). His supposition that God would send one of His thousands of angels, as a mediating power, to a sorely tried and chastised mortal, to rescue and convert him, and to instruct him concerning the way of salvation, and so to facilitate his redemption and restoration to the energy and joy of a new life, comes in contact indeed only remotely with the Messianic idea. For certain as it is that the mediatorial angel of salvation is put essentially on an equality with the angel of disease and death mentioned just before, not exalted above him (comp. Job_33:22 b, with Mat_8:9, and parallel passages), so certain is it that the passage is related only indirectly to the idea and fact of the Gospel revelation of the divine-human mediator, Jesus Christ. It does nevertheless unquestionably stand in a certain typical and prophetic relation to the New Testament ideas of the Messiah. This is made certain by the fact that the commission with which the mediatorial messenger from God is entrusted is not of a physical, external and medicinal character, but before all redemptive in the religious and ethical sense, and also by the fact that the messenger whom Elihu supposes to be entrusted with the execution of this divine commission is not an earthly and human, but a heavenly, superhuman being (comp. the Exeget. Rem. on Job_33:23). In more than one respect accordingly does this speaker, even in this his first didactic exposition, show his superiority to the three friends. He reveals a higher calling, and shows incomparably greater skill than they in producing an enlightening, ennobling and elevating influence on the mind of Job, longing as he does for heavenly comfort; and he proves himself to be in truth the most advanced, the most richly furnished, intellectually the largest possessor of the human Chokmah among the four who successively encounter Job as human comforters and teachers of wisdom. Comp. Starke’s remarks: “Elihu sees much deeper into the mystery of affliction than the three former friends. He is much more discreet and reasonable in his intercourse with Job than the others; he does not make him out a hypocrite, or one who is evidently ungodly, but he shows how by affliction God would purge him of all reliance on his own righteousness, and simply point him to the righteousness of the Messiah. What he says so beautifully Job_33:23 in respect to the intercession of the mediator, and the whole context clearly show this to be his purpose.”

4. In a homiletic respect, it is of course the second half of the section here embraced by us, or Job_33:8-33, that furnishes by far the richest and most fruitful material. Here Elihu, the Aramaic sage of the patriarchal age, presents himself as the proclaimer of truths which show many points of contact with those of the New Testament system of redemption, and which justify us in regarding him as an unconscious prophet of Christ, if not of His person, at least of His work. Much that is stimulating may nevertheless be derived even from the first introductory half, especially when we take, as our highest point of observation, the circumstance that Elihu there desires to apologize for his youth, and for that reason sets forth so much in detail the necessity for his speaking. The basis for such reflections might be found in some such parallel as Elihu—Jeremiah—Timothy (comp. Jer_1:6; 1Ti_4:12).

HOMILETICAL AND PRACTICAL

Particular Passages

Job_32:2 seq. Zeyss: It is not wrong to show wrath against evil, especially where God’s honor is concerned. But we must take particular care that such a holy fire of righteous anger be not mixed with the strange fire of earthly affections. Eph_4:26.

Job_32:6 seq. Cocceius: The man who is about to plant seed in his field, first weeds out noxious herbs, and ploughs thoroughly the surface of the soil. He who expects to instil his own arguments into the mind of another, must first mollify it, and free it of suspicion, in order that afterwards it may receive more eagerly that which is to be communicated. The obstacles in the way of Elihu seemed to be the suspicion of arrogance on his part, and his age, and also the authority of the friends, and their opinion concerning themselves. He attacks the first obstacle in these verses, etc.—Jo. Lange: In true wisdom, that which is of importance is—not age, but—the illumination of the Holy Spirit. If young people have a clear perception of divine things, those who are older need not be ashamed to hear them, and to learn from them.—V. Gerlach: The illumination of the Holy Ghost is not confined to old age. This very saying (Job_32:9) shows that we must not take offence at the apparent boastfulness of Elihu’s words, seeing that he gives the glory not to himself, but to God. The vivid, copious, oriental style gives to the discourse a different look in the eyes of the less ardent inhabitants of the West, from what it had in its own fatherland.

Job_32:18 seq. Starke: The man whose heart is full, his mouth runs over. Let a man therefore store up goodly treasure in his heart, and he will speak that which is good and useful.—Dost thou find in thyself a strong impulse to say or do something, first search well to see whether it proceeds from a good or an evil spirit (Rom_8:14).—V. Gerlach: At the close he repeats the assurance that although he presumes to speak, and to rebuke the aged, he nevertheless feels himself under a divine compulsion, and can therefore have in view only the glory of God, not that of any man whatsoever.

Job_33:4-7. Brentius: This is a most potent reason why one should not despise another, nor treat him scornfully. For we have all been made by the same God, through the same Word, in the same Spirit; we have earth, water, air, heaven, as our common heritage. But if you look at Christians, they have a still closer bond uniting them together; for in Ephesians 4. it is said: There is one body, one spirit, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, etc.; and in Romans 14.: Destroy not thy brother, for whom Christ died. If therefore this idea were treasured up deep in our faith, it would without difficulty restrain us from wronging, despising or slandering our brethren, if we verily believed that our brother is of such dignity that Christ, the only-begotten Son of God, for his sake descended from heaven, and poured out His blood.

Job_33:15 seq. Oecolampadius: It behooved that this way (that of an αποκάλυψις by dreams) should have been the first and most familiar to us, so that written communications would have been superfluous, the Holy Spirit writing on our hearts. But after that we had turned aside from God to the vanity of this world, it is one of the rarest things known. Philosophers, ignoring both the dignity of man and the harm wrought by sin, have decided that man can acquire knowledge only through the teaching of the senses; for which reason they also deride the gift of αποκάλυψις. Elihu seems to have spoken not of ordinary dreams, but of such as visited Abimelech and Laban.—Zeyss: After that God had at sundry times and in divers manners spoken to the fathers, by revelations, visions, and dreams, etc., as well as by the prophets, He hath at last spoken to us by His Son. He therefore who values his own happiness, and would escape destruction, let him believe and obey, the Word of God.—v. Gerlach: A sufferer, who lives in fellowship with God, receives from Him in dreams of the night (and in many such ways), instructive intimations respecting the divine purposes in his calamities; he thus learns to understand aright what God would say to him in such ways. Elihu intimates here (especially in Job_33:16) that Job might have received divine communications, without observing them.

Job_33:23 seq. Cocceius: This passage makes evident to us the faith of the Ancient Church touching the Mediator. … These things indeed are spoken by Elihu, in accordance with the condition of those times, αἰνιγματωδέστερον; but they are nevertheless in such exact accordance with the predictions of the prophets, and the declarations of the Apostles, that unless it be supposed that the Holy Spirit wished to lead the men of old somewhere else than towards the mystery of the Gospel, and to teach something else than the same forms of speech would convey in later times, there is not the slightest doubt that this is the true meaning of these words of Elihu, which had proceeded from the Spirit of God, and which were understood by himself in accordance with his own standard. Neither indeed was there anything which Elihu could more readily or suitably impress upon Job. For although Job had clearly enough professed faith in a Mediator, especially in Job 19. (?) he had nevertheless not so evidently touched upon the doctrine concerning Christ’s merits and satisfaction, nor had he in his discussions either considered this usefulness of affliction, which Elihu sets forth, or magnified it in proportion to its worth.—Starke: see above [Doctrinal, etc.] No. 3.—Wohlfarth: Although an unprejudiced exposition cannot find in these words the doctrine of an atonement through Jesus Christ, we have nevertheless so obvious a reminder of Christ here, that we cannot help observing it. If in ancient times men placed their hope in the intercession of heavenly spirits with God, how much more glorious the consolation which we have, who can say with exultation: We thank Thee, O God, that Thou hast so loved the world, etc., (Joh_3:16; 2Co_5:19-21; 1Pe_1:24).—v. Gerlach: We are not to infer from the language here used that there is a particular angel, whose office it is to bring the prayers of men before God; rather does the expression—“one of a thousand”—denote one of the many messengers of God, who are appointed to watch over the life of His people, and to conduct them to eternal bliss (Heb_1:14). It does however contain the thought of representation, intercession before God, and in so far this passage points to the only Mediator between God and men (1Ti_2:5), and likewise to the Holy Ghost, who intercedes for God’s children with groanings that cannot be uttered (Rom_8:26), and is thus an anticipation of the New Testament. The thought to which Elihu here gives expression is essentially related to that which Job has already expressed in Job_17:3; Job_19:25, although it is by no means the same thought. … But here the thought is supplied which is there wanting,—that the office of the redeeming angel is not so much to attest the innocence, or the already perfected righteousness of men before God, but rather as man’s advocate to intercede in his behalf because of his repentance. This it was in the perception of which Job was as yet lacking.

Job_33:26 seq. From the regeneration and quickening of the Gospel the most abundant fruits grow. First prayer, than which a greater gift can scarcely come from God to man. … The second fruit is the joy of the Holy Ghost, which is God’s sweet face gladdening our consciences. … The third fruit is confession—not that which is of the ear, auricular, but the true confession of the heart, the acknowledgment of sins, etc.—Starke: So beautifully has Elihu seen into the ways and purposes of God, even in the midst of trials, and where it seems as though He would destroy and cast off a soul, that he puts forth the assurance that it all has no other end in view than the true, eternal deliverance of the sufferer. And this was exactly the plaster for Job’s wounds, in order that his pain and his disquietude under the strokes of God’s hands might be assuaged and allayed, while he should be led to perceive God’s faithfulness, and to thank Him for it.

Footnotes:

[1]This is the meaning of the clause assumed by the commentators who suppose a human messenger to be referred to; e. g. Rosenmüller: facit ad dignitatem ejus commendandam.

[2]Or rather of the Pseudo-Jerome, i. e. of that presbyter, Philippus, whose Expositio interlinearis on our book, found among the works of Jerome, was afterwards revised by the Venerable Bede (comp. Opp. Hieronymi, ed, Vallars, Tom. III., Append., p. 895 seq.).

[3]Sunt alii extra ecclesiam, qui Christo ejusque ecclesiæ similiter adversantur, quorum imaginem prætulit Balaam ille ariolus, qui et Elieu sicut patrum traditio habet, qui contra ipsum sanctum Job multa improbe et injuriose locatus est, in tantum ut esiam displiceret inconcinna ejus et in disciplinata loquac tas (Bedæ Opp. ed. Basil. III., c. 602).

[4] Ἑκατέρωθεν οῦ̔ν αὐτοῦ τὴν σύνεσιν στοιχάζομεν ἀπὸ τῆς σιγῆς ἀπό τε τῆς διαλέξεως. De Patient. Job., Homil. IV.

[5]In respect to the distinction between suffering for temptation, and suffering for trial, comp. Vilmar, Past.-Theol., XI. 62 seq., (also Theolog. Moral. I. 174 seq.) A temptation is, according to this striking discrimination, which is no less instructive than Scriptural, “a punitive act of God (inflicted through Satan), by which man is to be made conscious that in his inmost soul the adversary can yet find points of contact, by which to allure and urge him onward. By the temptation the secret sin is first disclosed, then perceived, and finally overcome (comp. Psa_90:8).” The object of a trial on the other hand is simply to prove those whom God has already recognized as holy and good to be such. The suffering of trial, as the same is described especially in Psalms 42, 56 (to some extent also in the book of Job,—a fact not sufficiently recognized by Vilmar), “does not exclude the entire nearness of God, and the consciousness of this nearness, whereas in temptation the gracious nearness of God is not only not realized, but on the contrary God appears as a God afar off, as an angry God,” etc.

Lange's Commentary on the Holy Scriptures (Critical, Doctrinal, and Homiletical), ed. John Peter Lange, English translation edited by Philip Schaff (1864–1880) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

CHAPTERS 32--33:7

1. Elihu introduced (Job 32:1-5)

2. I waited, but now must speak (Job 32:6-22)

3. His address to Job (Job 33:1-7)

Job 32:1-5. As Elihu had listened to the different addresses his wrath was stirred up. His name is very suggestive. Elihu means “my God is He”; Barachel--”the Blessed God”; the Buzite, “the rejected One” of Ram, and Ram means “exalted.” These are names which find their fullest application in the person of our Lord, whom Elihu in his mediatorial work represents. But why was his wrath kindled? Because Job justified himself rather than God and because Job’s friends had found no solution of the problem, yet they condemned Job. This is indeed the result of the whole controversy in a nutshell. From the fourth verse we learn that he was a younger man; he maintained silence because they all were elder than he.

Job 32:6-22. He tells them why he waited and did not speak before. He thought “days should speak, and multitude of years should teach wisdom,” so he was not a froward, conceited young man. But he acknowledges the spirit and that the inspiration of the Almighty gives understanding. Depending on that he must speak. He tells the three friends in plain words that they did not convince Job, nor did one of them answer his words. With Job, Elihu says he has no controversy and he does not intend to use the speeches of the three men. Verse 15 is a soliloquy in the third person, spoken by Elihu as he looked on the three men. Then he says that he must speak. He is filled with words and the mighty constraint of the spirit within him, makes him like wine which has no vent and is ready to burst like new bottles.

Job 33:1-7. The chapter division here is unfortunate. The opening verses belong properly to the preceding chapter. What a difference between Elihu’s words in addressing Job and the way the three other men had acted. He is calm, gentle and kind. He assures him that what he is going to say comes from the Almighty. Now, Job, if thou canst answer me, arrange thy words and stand up. “Behold, I am according to thy wish in God’s stead.” We believe with this Elihu refers to Job’s desire for a daysman. Now in the person of Elihu he has come. He encourages Job not to be afraid, for “I am also formed of clay.” How beautifully all this may be applied to the true Daysman, our Lord, we leave to the meditation of the reader.

Arno C. Gaebelein, The Annotated Bible (1913–1922) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

32:1–37:24 Having completed three cycles of speeches between Job and his three friends, we now hear from a new voice. Elihu has not been previously introduced, but he is a young man who has listened to everything the others have said.

32:1 Job’s three friends (see 2:11) failed to comfort him (6:14-30; 13:4; 16:2; 19:21; 42:10).

Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

Hebrew, was just in his own eyes.

Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain. Text via Bolls.life.

CHAPTER XXXII

Elihu comes forward, and empresses his disapprobation both of

Job and his three friends-with the one for justifying himself;

and with the others for taking up the subject in a wrong point

of view, and not answering satisfactorily-and makes a becoming

apology for himself, 1-22.

NOTES ON CHAP. XXXII

Verse 1. These three men ceased to answer Job] They supposed that it was of no use to attempt to reason any longer with a man who justified himself before God. The truth is, they failed to convince Job of any point, because they argued from false principles; and, as we have seen, Job had the continual advantage of them. There were points on which he might have been successfully assailed; but they did not know them. Elihu, better acquainted both with human nature and the nature of the Divine law, and of God's moral government of the world, steps in, and makes the proper discriminations; acquits Job on the ground of their accusations, but condemns him for his too great self-confidence, and his trusting too much in his external righteousness; and, without duly considering his frailty and imperfections, his incautiously arraigning the providence of God of unkindness in its dealings with him. This was the point on which Job was particularly vulnerable, and which Elihu very properly clears up.

Because he was righteous tn his own eyes] The Septuagint, Syriac, Arabic, and Chaldee, all read, "Because he was righteous in THEIR eyes;" intimating, that they were now convinced that he was a holy man, and that they had charged him foolishly. The reading of these ancient versions is supported by a MS. of the thirteenth century, in Dr. Kennicott's collections; which, instead of בעיניו beeinaiv, in His eyes, has בעיניהם beeineyhem, in THEIR eyes. This is a reading of considerable importance, but it is not noticed by De Rossi. Symmachus translates nearly in the same way: Δια τον αυτον δικαιον φαινεσθαι επ' αυτων; Because he appeared more righteous than themselves.

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

XXXII.

(1) So these three men ceased.—The next six chapters are taken up with the reply of a fourth person not before mentioned, but who appears to have been present during the discussion, and who is described as Elihu, the son of Barachel the Buzite, of the kindred of Ram. The name appears to mean, He is my God. The person from whom he was descended seems to have been the son of Nahor, Abraham’s brother (Gen_22:21); and a city of the like name is mentioned in Jer_25:23. There is a Ram mentioned in Rth_4:19, who was the great grandson of Judah; but we can hardly suppose this was the Ram of whose kindred Elihu was. On the other hand, we have no clue to the identification; for even if, with some, we suppose him to have been the same as Aram, the son of Kemuel, and great nephew of Abraham, it is not easy to see how a descendant of Buz, his uncle, should have been described as of the kindred of Ram. One tradition identifies Ram with Abraham, but this is mere conjecture, and in this case highly improbable; the only inference we can draw is that this specification of Elihu serves to show that he was a real, and not an imaginary, personage. The Targum speaks of Elihu as a relative of Abraham. If we are right in putting the life of Elihu so far back, the whole position and surroundings of Job’s history become the more probable, because what is told us of Abraham and the patriarchs corresponds with the description and character of Job; and then, also, the traditional Mosaic origin of the Book of Job becomes the more probable.

Because he was righteous in his own eyes.—This appears from Job_3:26; Job_6:10; Job_6:29; Job_10:7; Job_13:15; Job_19:6, &c., Job_23:7; Job_23:10-12; Job_27:6; Job_29:12, &c.

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

1. he was righteous] i. e. would admit no guilt, or, was in the right in his plea against God. Job’s friends abandoned further argument with him because they could not move him from his assertion that God afflicted him wrongly and unjustly; comp. ch. Job_27:2-6.

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.

So these three men ceased to answer Job,.... His three friends, Eliphaz the Temanite, Bildad the Shuhite, and Zophar the Naamathite, who came to visit and comfort him under his afflictions; but unawares were led into a controversy with him, occasioned by some rash and impatient expressions of his; which controversy had been carried on between them a considerable time, but now dropped; they grew weary of it, and now rested themselves as men do on a sabbath, as the word signifies; they set themselves down, and made no reply to Job's vindication of himself, not caring to give themselves any further trouble, or labour the point any more and longer, perceiving it was all to no purpose: or "and these three men ceased", &c. the last words of the preceding chapter are, "the words of Job are ended", Job 31:40; and the copulative "and" connects these with them, and shows that these men also had done speaking; so that the dispute was closed between Job and them, and the way was clear for another disputant that might think fit to enter, as Elihu did, after mentioned

because he was righteous in his own eyes; some take this to express the state of the question between them, rendering the words, "that he was righteous", &c. (f). The notion his friends had of him was, that he was righteous in his own account, and as he professed to be, and might so seem to others; but was a wicked man, and an hypocrite, as his afflictions showed; this point they had been labouring to prove, but, upon Job's long and clear vindication of his integrity, they ceased to defend it: others suppose the words to be an inference of Job's from their silence: "therefore he was righteous", &c. they making no reply to him, he concluded himself to be quit and clear of the charge they had brought against him; but they rather, according to our version, contain a reason why they ceased to answer him; because they thought him self-conceited, self-willed, obstinate, and incorrigible; not open to conviction, stiffly insisting on his own innocence, not allowing that he was guilty of any sin or sins, which were the cause of his afflictions; otherwise, in the article of justification before God, Job was no self-righteous man, nor was he so charged by his friends; to say he was is to abuse his character, and is contrary to that which God himself has given of him; nor would he have so highly commended him as to suggest there was none like him on earth, when of all men in the world there are none more abominable to God than a self-righteous man; see Isa 65:4. It is contrary to Job's knowledge of and faith in Christ, as his living Redeemer, Job 19:25; and to many clear and strong expressions, confessing his sin, disclaiming perfection, and declaring himself no self-justiciary, Job 7:20.

(f) "quod ille (tantum) justus in oculis suis", Schmidt.

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

So these three men ceased to answer Job - Each had had three opportunities of replying to him, though in the last series of the controversy Zophar had been silent. Now all were silent; and though they do not appear in the least to have been convinced, or to have changed their opinion, yet they found no arguments with which to sustain their views. It was this, among other things, which induced Elihu to take up the subject.

Because he was righteous in his own eyes - Umbreit expresses the sense of this by adding, “and they could not convince him of his unrighteousness.” It was not merely because he was righteous in his own estimation, that they ceased to answer him; it was because their arguments had no effect in convincing him, and they had nothing new to say. He seemed to be obstinately bent on maintaining his own good opinion of himself in spite of all their reasoning, and they sat down in silence.

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

Himself. They thought it useless to say any more.

George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).

i.e. Was self-conceited, and obstinately resolved to justify himself both against God and men; therefore they give him over as incorrigible.

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

The Speeches of Elihu

It is the view of almost all scholars that the speeches of Elihu are a later addition. The grounds for this view are the following. His presence comes upon the reader with surprise, he is not mentioned with the other friends in the Prologue, and we have had no intimation that he has all the while been listening to the debate. It is still more remarkable that he is not mentioned at the close. Here God passes judgment on Job and the friends, and it is strange that Elihu is ignored. If the author intended Elihu to represent the true view, why did he not represent God as praising him, if not, why is he not condemned with the friends? This silence is the more surprising in view of the contents of the speeches. Elihu blames the friends for the ineffectiveness of their attack, yet he adopts somewhat the same attitude and repeats their arguments, though passing, to some extent, beyond them. He elaborates the thought that suffering is discipline, and may actually be an expression of the goodness of God. He works out this vein of argument more fully than the three friends. Still it is difficult to think that, after the debate between Job and the friends had been exhausted, the poet should have introduced a new speaker unless he had something better to say, unless, in fact, he could sum up the case and decide between the disputants. Job could have met the arguments of Elihu as easily as those of the friends. We may be well assured that the author who made him triumph over them would never have let him be silenced by the similar contentions of Elihu. It is also noteworthy that Elihu in his description of celestial marvels to some extent anticipates the speech of God which is to follow, and thus robs it of some of its effect. The style of the speeches is throughout on a much lower level, they are prolix and hard to understand, and the language is more coloured by Aramaic influences. It is also noteworthy that the opening words in Jehovah's speech, 'Who is this that darkeneth counsel by words without knowledge?', which refer to Job, do not well admit the view that another speaker has made a lengthy speech since Job finished speaking. There are minor arguments that need not be mentioned here.

A few scholars, however, still regard the speeches as part of the original poem. It is argued that the function of Elihu is to exhibit and correct the spiritual pride of Job, which he had himself failed to detect and overcome. Elihu brings home his fault to him, and shows how the discipline through which God has brought him was designed to purify him of his unsuspected sin and raise him to a loftier spiritual eminence. In spite of the subtle arguments urged in favour of this view it must be dismissed as very unlikely. The main lesson of the book on this theory nowhere finds clear expression, while the debate is largely irrelevant. The representation of the design of God does not harmonise with that in the Prologue, and the Divine speeches lose much of their significance. Moreover, according to the Prologue, which represents the author's view, Job is a truly blameless man, acknowledged as such by God Himself. With this Elihu does not agree, hence it was not the original author who introduced him into the book. Nor is it the fact that Elihu convicts Job, it is the vision of God that brings him to contrition.

The reasons for the insertion of these speeches lie on the surface. The author wished to reassert the doctrine held by the friends, but also to develop aspects of it which had not received due weight. He dwells on the value of affliction for discipline, and lays much stress on the goodness of God. He also wished to rebuke Job for his unbecoming words about God. And he seems to have dissented from the poet, to whom we owe the rest of the book, in his representation of Job's character before his trial, while he also thought it an impropriety to represent God as condescending to debate with Job.

The Speeches of Ellhu

Elihu explains his reasons for intervening in the debate.

2. Elihu] Heb. 'He is my God.' Buzite] In Gen_22:21; Buz is closely connected with Uz (RV), which was Job's country. To the Assyrians Huz and Buz ('Haza' and 'Baza') were known as places not far from Edom.

Ram] uncertain. It occurs again in Rth_4:19; 1Ch_2:9, 1Ch_2:10. He justified himself rather than God] Job, in asserting his own innocence so warmly, had charged God with injustice in treating him, as he thought, as if he were guilty.

3. The friends had not succeeded in refuting Job's arguments, and they only asserted that he was wicked without proving it.

8. A spirit] a divine impulse which moved him to speak.

13. RV 'Beware lest ye say, We have found wisdom; God may vanquish him, not man.' The friends must not excuse themselves for their failure on the score that Job was too clever for man to debate with. Job had not yet contended with Elihu, and the latter intended to use different arguments. The author criticises the poet for letting God intervene in the debate.

15. Elihu describes the discomfiture of the friends.

19. Belly] We use 'heart' in the same way, of the emotions. New bottles] i.e. new wine-skins. If wine was put into new skins before it had finished fermenting it might cause them to burst: cp. Mat_9:17.

21, 22. Elihu will show no partiality to either side in the remarks he is about to make.

22b. RV 'Else would my Maker soon take me away.'

J. R. Dummelow, A Commentary on the Holy Bible (Macmillan, 1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

A new personage is now introduced upon the scene, who speaks in a new style and almost in a new language. No previous mention has been made of him; no subsequent notice is taken of his arguments; and nothing is said of him in the historical section wherewith the work concludes. (Job_42:7-17) It is therefore scarcely surprising that some exception has been taken to the genuineness of the entire passage (Job 32-37), or that it has been regarded by many excellent critics as an interpolation into the Book of Job, made by one who was not the original author, at a date considerably later than the rest of tile composition. A modification of this extreme view is suggested by M. Renan, who thinks that the original author may have added the passage in his old age. This view is entitled to.consideration. The subject has been discussed at some length in the Introduction, so that no more need be stated here. We are confronted with the fact that the passage has come down in us as a substantive portion of the Book of Job, in all the Hebrew manuscripts that have reached our time, as well as in all the ancient versions the Septuagint, the Syriac, the Chaldee, the Arabic, the Aethiopic, the Vulgate, etc. To excise it, therefore, would be too bold a measure, though some moderns have not shrunk from doing so.

Vers. 1-5. The discourse of Elihu is prefaced by a short introduction in plain prose, explaining who he was, and giving the reasons which actuated him in coming forward at this point of the dialogue. So these three men ceased to answer Job. Zophar had been silenced earlier. Eliphaz and Bildad now felt that they had no more to say. They had exhausted the weapons of their armoury without any effect, and were conscious that nothing would be gained by mere reiteration. All their efforts had aimed at convincing Job of sin; and he was still unconvinced he remained righteous in his own eyes.

Vers. 1-5. The intervention of Elihu.

I THE DISCOMFITURE OF THE FRIENDS. "So these three men Eliphaz, Bildad, and Zophar to answer Job;" i.e. did not respond to the lamentations and protestations which he uttered in his parable.

1. The reason they perhaps assigned for their silence. "Because he," i.e. Job, "was righteous in his own eyes." If this was scarcely accurate in the strict theological sense of the expression, since Job had more than once acknowledged himself a sinner, (Job_7:20 Job_9:2, Job_9:3) and even subscribed to the sentiment of Eliphaz and his associates that no mortal man can be just before God, (Job_9:20 Job_14:3, Job_14:4) it is yet difficult to exonerate the patriarch entirely from the charge here preferred against him; for, though righteous to the extent of being free from flagrant transgression, which his friends alleged he was not, and sincerely devoted to the ways of holiness, as God himself had testified, (Job_1:1) he nevertheless insisted on his blamelessness of life and uprightness of character with such pertinacity as to overstep the bounds of true humility, advancing these as a ground or reason why God should have dealt with him differently from what he had done, and thus, as it were, constructing out of them a claim of merit, or self-righteousness before God.

2. The reason they forgot to assign for their silence. "Because they had found no answer," i.e. to Job. For this explanation of their conduct we are indebted to the observation of Elihu, a new interlocutor who appears upon the scene. Unable to convince Job of immorality and hypocrisy, they were likewise, in Elihu"s judgment, incompetent to reply to his arguments and protestations. Doubtless the matter did not so present itself to the contemplation of the friends. According to their theology, Job, being a great sufferer, must have been a great sinner; and any declarations on his part to the contrary only proved that he had not been sufficiently humbled before God, and was indulging in self-deception. This, however, as Job explained, entirely failed in its applicability to him, whose past life of stainless purity, fervent piety, and unwearied philanthropy gave conspicuous demonstration of the falsehood of their allegations, and whose present consciousness reproached him with no dereliction of duty, but rather loudly proclaimed the steadfast character, untarnished beauty, and unmixed sincerity of his integrity to Heaven. But, inasmuch as the above-cited nostrum was the only specific which remained in the pharmacopoeia of the friends, they judiciously abandoned the case as beyond their skill. They had spent every weapon in their quiver without overthrowing their antagonist; and, accordingly, with commendable prudence, observing a discreet reticence as to the secret motive of their behaviour, they retired from the contest.

II THE INTERPOSITION OF ELIHU. "Then was kindled the wrath of Elihu the son of Barachel the Buzite, of the kindred of Ram.

1. The personality of Elihu. Details such as these concerning the name (Elihu, equivalent to "He is my God"), parentage (son of Barachel, or "God blesseth"), country (the Buzite), probably a descendant of Nahor through his second son, (Gen_22:21) and therefore of Aramsean extraction, though by birth an Arabian, Buz being mentioned with Dedan and Tema as a city of Idumea in the time of, (Jer_25:23) kindred (of the family of Ram, otherwise unknown, unless connected with Aram, the son of Shem, Gen_10:23, the brother of Buz, Gen_22:21, or the grandfather of Nahshon, cf. Num_1:7 with 1Ch_2:9, 1Ch_2:10) dispose of the patristic conceit that the new interlocutor was Jesus Christ. Equally, however, do they preclude the hypothesis (Cox) that he was simply one of the young men of Job"s city. (Job_29:8) They ratherhint that be "belonged to a family which had retained the knowledge of the God of heaven" (Cook); and, indeed, when it is considered that Elihu distinctly claims to speak under Divine impulse, (Job_32:8 Job_33:4) proposes himself as a response to Job"s oft-repeated demand for a daysman, (Job_33:6) and unfolds views of Divine truth concerning the remedial character of affliction and the doctrine of atonement (Job_33:14-30) that seem like anticipations of gospel discoveries, it is hard to resist the inference that in Elihu we have a young Arabian prophet who had been providentially brought upon the scene, as the friends were, and was moved at the appropriate juncture to deliver certain preliminary judgments on the cause then pending.

2. The time of his appearing. We are inclined to think that, as the result of the strife of tongues between the patriarch and his friends, to which also we can suppose that Elihu had listened, the citadel of Job"s integrity, if not in danger of being captured, was at any rate rudely shaken, and that victory, in the grand fundamental debate or controversy of the poem, was inclining to the side of the devil But as God never leaves his people in their hour of need, so neither was Job suffered to be taken captive by the craft of Satan. And accordingly Elihu is at this point introduced upon the stage.

3. The purpose of his introduction.

(1) Doctrinal completeness. Considered as a theological discussion, nothing could have been less satisfactory than the position of matters at the close of Job"s monologue. On the one hand, the friends had exhausted themselves in an attempt to demonstrate their particular theory without convincing Job. On the other hand, Job had uttered his last word without converting them to his way of thinking. On the one side, they remained exactly as they were, both as to the truth of their dogma and as to its bearing on the case of Job. On the other side, Job himself was hopelessly entangled in a futile endeavour to reconcile the seemingly insoluble contradiction which existed between his outward lot and his inward condition. So far as the right relation of suffering to sin was concerned, neither of the disputants had discovered it. Occasionally, indeed, Job seemed to get a glimpse of it, (Job_23:10) as also did Eliphaz; (Job_5:17) but for the most part the remedial, corrective, beneficent, paedagogic uses of adversity were not understood. This view of affliction, therefore, required to be prominently exhibited, if the poem were at all to be redeemed from a charge of incompleteness, of starting a problem it could not answer, of propounding an enigma it could not solve; and this was done by setting forth Elihu to clear away the doctrinal fogs which had gathered around the otherwise acute mind of Job, no less than round the less penetrative intellects of his friends.

(2) Dramatic unity. Recurring to the problem lying at the basis of the poem, the controversy represented as existing between God and Satan, and solemnly put to trial in the person of Job, was not whether man, standing alone and unaided on the platform of nature, could maintain his integrity to Heaven, but whether man could do so on the platform of grace. (vide Job_1:9, homiletics) It was needful, therefore, that, just at the moment when Job seemed to be on the eve of giving way" he should receive such assistance as grace could impart; and this, again, was done by Elihu, who, speaking from a Divine impulse, "sets before Job clearer, fuller, and more accurate views of the Divine character and modes of procedure in dealing with the children of men, and thereby seeks to reinforce him in his struggle with his friends, and to prevent him from succumbing beneath the temp-rations of the foe" (vide "British and Foreign Evangelical Review" October, 1872, art. "The Problem of Job," by the Reverend T. Whitelaw, M.A.). Thus the interlocution of Elihu is not so much "what Job had repeatedly called for, a confutation of his opinions, not effected by an overwhelming display of Divine power, but by rational a "human argument" (Canon Cook, in "Speaker"s Commentary"), or "the human verdict on the controversy between Job and the friends, which we want to hear almost as much as the Divine verdict" (Cox), as the special illumination which Divine grace had to shed upon the problem agitated between him and them, which illumination was conveyed to him through the instrumentality of Elihu, as it is now more amply and luminously unfolded to us in the gospel.

4. The spirit of his intervention.

(1) His wrath was kindled. That Elihu should have given way to an uncalled-for ebullition of anger, if such be the view adopted of his passionate excitement, was no more a proof that he did not speak under inspiration than was the fact that he made use of Aramaisms, and committed certain inelegancies of style. "It is good to be zealously affected in a good thing," and Elihu"s indignation was amply vindicated by the conduct first of Job (ver. 2), and secondly of the friends (ver. 3). Yet

(2) his modesty was conspicuous. The style of severe animadversion adopted by many commentators, both ancient and modern, in stigmatizing Elihu as "an emblem of confident arrogance" (Gregory the Great), as an example of the ambitious orator (Strigei), as "arrogant and bold" (Herder), as "a conceited prater" (Umbreit), and his addresses as "the weak and rambling speeches of a boy," is quite unwarranted. Not only had he waited respectfully until his elders had concluded their disputations (vex. 4), but with much humility he attributed any value his contributions might Possess, not to the intrinsic excellence of his own genius, but to the fact of his inspiration (ver. 8), which rendered him little more than the mouthpiece of Heaven.

Learn:

1. It is one mark of true wisdom to know when to be silent.

2. It is specially becoming in young men to be deferential towards their elders.

3. It is quite possible for good men to be righteous in their own eyes.

4. It is commonly the case that of two controversialists both are wrong.

5. It is not unseemly fur even young men to be jealous of the Divine honour.

6. It is no sin for young men who know the truth to instruct old men who know it not.

7. It is right in those who speak for God to be raised above the fear of man.

8. It is certain that God never suffers saints to be tempted without reinforcing them by Divine grace and teaching.

9. It is observable that heavenly succour mostly comes to men when human resources are exhausted.

HOMILIES BY E. JOHNSON Ver. 1Ti_4:12) If young men have a sound knowledge of Divine things, the elder need not be ashamed to listen and learn from them.

III THE JUSTIFICATION OF ELIHU"S INTERFERENCE. (Vers. 11-22) In this passage his character and spirit are further unfolded in points that are worthy of admiration and imitation.

1. His love of reason: He waited expectantly to hear some satisfactory reply from the friends to Job"s clear arguments and statements in self-vindication. He expected either that they would confute him, or that they would candidly admit they were worsted in the strife. "We found wisdom (in Job); God can strike him, not man." His wisdom is so superior to ours that God only can drive him from the field (ver. 13). This is a lesson on the morals of controversy. Meet your antagonist with resin for reason; and, when you can do so no longer, be willing to own yourself beaten. Reasonableness and candour, the desire to persuade others or to be persuaded one"s self of the truth, this is the chivalry of controversy; these are the jewels that shine amidst the cloud of words; the precious balsam-drops that these woeful wars distill. A sullen conspiracy of silence is the retreat and fortress of the dishonourable and the coward.

2. His depth of heart. Elihu is not convinced by Job; his mind teems with matter of deep and living truth. His is no shallow logic of the schools, which falls powerless upon the true heart armed with the justice of its cause. His is no fool"s bolt, soon shot, and leaving him in helplessness. His bosom is like a skin of new wine; he is bursting to tell forth all that experience and reflection have taught him concerning the truths of life. "Out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks." Let us harvest the instruction of time, lay up a good store of heart-memories, that we may ever have a good and useful word to speak in season. Let us take care of those strong impulses that they are true and pure before we speak; but never hesitate to speak when we are conscious that God is inspiring us. To be led by the Spirit, we must walk in the Spirit.

3. His fearless sincerity. He has no respect of persons when truth is concerned, reverential as he otherwise is in the presence of his elders. He will not flatter; he does not understand the base art. The fear of God is before his eyes. "Flatterers are the worst kind of traitors," says Sir Walter Raleigh. He who is true to God and to himself will never distil this poison from his tongue. In Elihu, then, we have the picture of what a man should be, of what we all should desire in a friend fairness, honour, candour; sympathy and affection based upon the only sure foundation, love of truth, piety toward God.

IV ELIHU"S SPECIAL APPEAL TO JOB FOR A PATIENT HEARING. (Job_33:1-7) Here we see the following traits:

1. Intense earnestness. (Vers. 1, 2) For these opening words, which might seem to our Western ears like a "beating about the bush," are in fact Oriental phrases by which the speaker calls the most solemn attention to, and lays the greatest weight upon, what he is about to speak. Such opening formulae may be found in Mat_5:2 Act_10:34 2Co_6:11. Let it be clear in one way or another to those who listen that we mean what we say, that we are not talking to fill up time, or using words to conceal the void of thought.

2. Perfect sincerity. (Ver. 3) His sayings am the straightforward utterances of his heart, very different from the stale and secondhand commonplaces of the three friends. True eloquence, like the substance of every virtue and every art, is in the heart. The bullet finds its way to the mark, according to the old legend, that has been first dipped in the marksman"s blood. Words that come from the heart will reach to the heart.

3. The sense of dependence upon God (ver. 4), for all light and wisdom, which, while it makes a man humble, makes him truly confident and strong. God"s Spirit has made him. He appeals to no special inspiration, however, bat simply to that genuine human wisdom, that common sense which he recognizes to be a Divine endowment. It is a mark of true piety to own the presence of the Divine Spirit in all the ordinary as well as the extraordinary gifts of intelligence. It is this that chastens, sweetens, and sanctifies the use of every bright talent of the mind and heart.

4. Fellow-feeling. (Vers. 6, 7) He does not pretend to stand nearer to God than the fellow-man he has arisen to comfort and instruct. He is made of the same clay, molded by the hand of the Divine Potter. Therefore Job has not to fear an unequal struggle with Elihu as he has with God. Would that all teachers would remember this! The artificial distinctions of life, as prince or peasant, lettered or unlettered, mean but little; those of talent, character, and attainment have a certain value; but the common constitution God has given us is the great ground of appeal, the great source of authority. Those are the best teachers who most deeply read and interpret this common nature; and every truth must at last be certified, not by the ipse dixit of a dogmatizing teacher, but by the utterance of the universal heart and conscience. J.

HOMILIES BY R. GREEN Vers. 1-22. The voice of juvenile self-confidence.

We now approach the solution of the mystery, the untying of the knot, the end of the controversy. Job"s three friends have failed to convince Job that he is suffering the wellmented consequences of evil-doing; and he has failed to convince them of his integrity. Now a younger friend speaks with kindled wrath because the three friends "had found no answer." He speaks with the undue confidence of youth; but he weaves many words of truth and wisdom into his speech, from which we may gather some for our guidance. With some hesitation, and a complimentary reference to the claims of age, Elihu nevertheless reveals the impatient self-confidence of youth. Even though truth may be on its side, youthful self-confidence is an error. The error manifests itself here as so often elsewhere

I IN AN UNDUE ASSUMPTION OF EQUALITY WITH AGE, The "spirit" that is "in man" and "the inspiration of the Almighty," is assumed to give them "understanding" equally. At least Elihu puts himself on their level, though he afterwards affirms their inferiority.

II IN A DESPISAL OF THE TEACHINGS OF AGE. So the young lips are ready to affirm, "Great men are not always wise: neither do the aged understand judgment.

III IN AN UNWARRANTED SELF-CONFIDENCE. How ready is youth to give its judgment! "I also will show mine opinion.

IV IN AN EAGERNESS TO GIVE EXPRESSION TO OPINIONS. "I am full of matter, the spirit within me constraineth me," etc.

V IN A PRESUMPTION OF FREEDOM FROM PREJUDICE. "I know not to give flattering titles." Thus speaks youth in a confidence which is so often the effect of ignorance and inexperience. The true attitude for youth is

(1) lowliness and humility;

(2) teachableness;

(3) patience;

(4) reverent regard for age and for the counsels of experience. R.G.

HOMILIES BY W.F. ADENEY Ver. 1. Silence after the storm.

The three friends first comforted Job with seven days of silence. (Job_2:13) They relapse into silence after their painful controversy with the suffering man. We feel a sense of relief, and breathe freely now that their dogmatic delusions are done with, and we have silence after the storm.

I IT IS WISE TO KNOW WHEN TO BE SILENT. We cannot attribute much of this wisdom to the three friends. They would have been more commendable if they had practised it throughout. Still, they were not wholly senseless and heartless. They were able to perceive at length that no more words of theirs would help their case. Part of the art of speaking is to perceive the time for ceasing to speak. It is difficult for many people to come to an end of their words. Let us note some of the times for silencing our speech.

1. When we have no more to say. A man should only speak because he has something to say, never because he has to say something.

2. When our words are not heard. If we speak to heedless ears we waste our breath. It is vain to pour out words that our auditors cannot or will not drink in.

3. When our words are not accepted. If we cannot persuade men by what we say, we shall not do so by mere reiteration. We may find that no words will move our hearers; then further words are wasted on them. If we are altogether out of sympathy with our audience we cannot benefit them by adding words to words.

4. When the time for action has arrived. It will not be wise for the general to be haranguing his men when the enemy are already in the field. Words have their place; but this is not to usurp the place of deeds.

5. When another should be heard. Elihu has been waiting patiently while the old men have been talking. Now his time has come. Talkative people are tempted to be selfish. St. Paul ordered that when many wished to speak in the Church at Corinth each should have his turn, one giving place to another. (1Co_14:30)

II SILENCE IS MOST VALUABLE WHEN IT FOLLOWS A STORM. This second silence has not the beauty of the first silence of sympathy. But it has a deeper significance in some respects.

1. It is a relief from distressful controversy. It is painful to be perpetually arguing with our friends. When the controversy rises to angry words the best thing is to break it off and relapse into silence.

2. It affords time for reflection. If anything worth remembering has been said, it is well that people should have time to think over it. Probably our religious services would be more fruitful if people would only have patience to allow of pauses for quiet meditation.

3. It is a means of establishing peace. When words only irritate, peace will be best secured by silence. If the three friends wished to be reconciled to Job, their wisest course was to wait for the heat of discussion to cool down.

4. It is itself a blessing. Other voices speak in the silence. Then the unseen world draws near to us. After the storm is hushed the heavens open. We all need more silence, especially after times of strain and difficulty. W.F.A.

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

Some account of Elihu, and his sentiments concerning the dispute between Job and his friends, ver. 1-5. He excuses his own youth, ver. 6-10. and pleads, that he had heard all they had to say, ver. 11-13. That he had something new to offer, ver. 14-17. Could not refrain from speaking, ver. 18-20. And would speak impartially, ver. 21, 22.

Because - So they said: but they could not answer him.

John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.

1-3 So these three men ceased to answer Job, because he was righteous in his own eyes. And the wrath of Elihu, the son of Barachel the Buzite, of the family of Ram, was kindled: against Job was his wrath kindled, because he justified himself at the expense of God. And against his three friends was his wrath kindled, because they found no answer, and condemned Job.

The name of the speaker is אליהוּא (with Mahpach), son of בּרכאל (with Munach) the buwziy (with Zarka). The name Elihu signifies "my God is He," and occurs also as an Israelitish name, although it is not specifically Israelitish, like Elijah (my God is Jehovah). Brach'el (for which the mode of writing בּרכאל with Dag. implic. is also found) signifies "may God bless!" (Olsh. 277, S. 618); for proper names, as the Arabian grammarians observe, can be formed both into the form of assertory clauses (ichbâr), and also into the form of modal (inshâ); the name ברכאל is in this respect distinguished from the specifically Israelitish name בּרכיה (Jehovah blesseth). The accompanying national name defines the scene; for on the one side בּוּז and עוּץ, according to Gen 22:21, are the sons of Nahor, Abraham's brother, who removed with him (though not at the same time) from Ur Casdim to Haran, therefore by family Aramaeans; on the other side, בּוּז, Jer 25:23, appears as an Arab race, belonging to the קצוּצי פאה (comp. Jer 9:25; Jer 49:32), i.e., to the Arabs proper, who cut the hair of their heads short all round (περιτρόχαλα, Herodotus iii. 8), because wearing it long was accounted as disgraceful (vid., Tebrzi in the Hamsa, p. 459, l. 10ff.). Within the Buzite race, Elihu sprang from the family of רם. Since רם is the name of the family, not the race, it cannot be equivalent to ארם (like רמּים, Ch2 22:5, = ארמים), and it is therefore useless to derive the Aramaic colouring of Elihu's speeches from design on the part of the poet. But by making him a Buzite, he certainly appears to make him an Aramaean Arab, as Aristeas in Euseb. praep. ix. 25 calls him Ἐλιοῦν τὸν Βαραξηιὴλ τὸν Ζωβίτην (from ארם צובה). It is remarkable that Elihu's origin is given so exactly, while the three are described only according to their country, without any statement of father or family. It would indeed be possible, as Lightfoot and Rosenm. suppose, for the poet to conceal his own name in that of Elihu, or to make allusion to it; but an instance of this later custom of Oriental poets is found nowhere else in Old Testament literature.

The three friends are silenced, because all their attempts to move Job to a penitent confession that his affliction is the punishment of his sins, have rebounded against this fact, that he was righteous in his own eyes, i.e., that he imagined himself righteous; and because they now (שׁבת of persons, in distinction from חדל, has the secondary notion of involuntariness) know of nothing more to say. Then Elihu's indignation breaks forth in two directions. First, concerning Job, that he justified himself מאלהים, i.e., not a Deo (so that He would be obliged to account him righteous, as Job 4:17), but prae Deo. Elihu rightly does not find it censurable in Job, that as a more commonly self-righteous man he in general does not consider himself a sinner, which the three insinuate of him (Job 15:14; Job 25:4), but that, declaring himself to be righteous, he brings upon God the appearance of injustice, or, as Jehovah also says further on, Job 40:8, that he condemns God in order that he may be able to maintain his own righteousness. Secondly, concerning the three, that they have found no answer by which they might have been able to disarm Job in his maintenance of his own righteousness at the expense of the divine justice, and that in consequence of this they have condemned Job. Hahn translates: so that they should have represented Job as guilty; but that they have not succeeded in stamping the servant of God as a רשׁע, would wrongly excite Elihu's displeasure. And Ewald translates: and that they had nevertheless condemned him (345, a); but even this was not the real main defect of their opposition. The fut. consec. describes the condemnation as the result of their inability to hit upon the right answer; it was a miserable expedient to which they had recourse. According to the Jewish view, ויּרשׁיעוּ את־איּוב is one of the eighteen תקוני סופרים (correctiones scribarum), since it should be וירשׁיעו את־האלהים. But it is not the friends who have been guilty of this sin of הרשׁיע against God, but Job, Job 40:8, to whom Elihu opposes the sentence אל לא־ירשׁיע, Job 34:12. Our judgment of another such tiqqûn, Job 7:20, was more favourable. That Elihu, notwithstanding the inward conviction to the contrary by which he is followed during the course of the controversial dialogue, now speaks for the first time, is explained by what follows.

Keil & Delitzsch — Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament (1861–1891) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API. (Old Testament only.)

So these three

Despite minor differences, Eliphaz, Bildad, and Zophar have one view of the problem of Job’s afflictions. He is a hypocrite. Outwardly good, he is, they hold, really a bad man. Otherwise, according to their conception of God, Job’s sufferings would be unjust. Job, though himself the sufferer, will not so accuse the justice of God, and his self-defence is complete. Before God he is guilty, helpless, and undone, and there is no daysman (Job 32:9). Later, his faith is rewarded by a revelation of a coming Redeemer, and of the resurrection (Job 32:19). But Eliphaz, Bildad, and Zophar are sinners also as before God, and yet they are not afflicted. Job refutes the theory of the three that he is a secret sinner as against the common moralities, but the real problem, Why are the righteous afflicted remains. It is solved in the last chapter.

The Scofield Reference Bible (1917 edition), notes by C. I. Scofield — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

The Pause After Job’s Speech

v. 1. So these three men ceased to answer Job because he was righteous in his own eyes, because they could not get him to admit that his sufferings were in any way the result of some particular iniquity because his protestations of his innocence silenced them,

v. 2. Then was kindled the wrath of Elihu, the son of Barachel, the Buzite, a descendant of Nahor, whose tribe also lived a nomadic life in the Arabian Desert, of the kindred of Ram, that being the name of his immediate family; against Job was his wrath kindled because he justified himself rather than God, declaring himself to be righteous before God and insisting that he had not merited the sufferings which had come upon him.

v. 3. Also against his three friends was his wrath kindled because they had found no answer and yet had condemned Job. They had not been able to refute his statements, they had not hit upon the right answer to his arguments; their condemnation of Job in those circumstances was a poor substitute for a conviction, a cowardly expedient.

v. 4. Now, Elihu, who may have been present from the beginning of the debate or had heard at least a large part of it, had waited till Job had spoken, until he had finished his entire argument, all that he had to say in his own defense, because they were elder than he, he was younger than any of those who had joined in the debate till now.

v. 5. When Elihu saw that there was no answer in the mouth of these three men, they were unable to present a solution of the problem, then his wrath was kindled, he felt that he could now no longer be quiet. The respect shown by Elihu in waiting till the older men had finished their discussion is very commendable and may well serve as an example to many forward young people of our day.

Paul E. Kretzmann, Popular Commentary of the Bible (1921–1924) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Job 32:8

Genius the gift of God.

I. The intellect of man, in all the gradations of its power, and all the variety of its faculties, comes from God. He gave to every orator his eloquence, to every statesman his sagacity, to every philosopher his faculty for speculation, to every artist his eye for beauty, to every poet his genius for song.

II. If God is the Author and Giver of all intellectual life, it is our duty to offer Him grateful praise while we are doing honour to genius. We give Him thanks for a thousand inferior gifts; we ought not to leave the nobler instances of His bounty and goodness unacknowledged. Between the worth to a nation of a great genius and the worth of a good harvest, there are no conditions of comparison. We cannot measure the physical suffering averted by the one against the intellectual benefits conferred by the other; for both it is a duty to thank God.

III. We are responsible to God for our intellectual endowments. They came from Him, and are a trust for which we shall have to give account. (1) Our first and plainest duty is to improve the intellect by wise and faithful culture. There is guilt in permitting such a gift to be wasted. (2) The highest ministry of all in which the intellect can be engaged, to which by its Divine origin it is most urgently and imperatively called, is in direct connection with religion; and it is here that intellectual responsibilities become most solemn and oppressive. (3) It is the duty of the intellect to take its part in direct acts of worship.

R. W. Dale, Discourses on Special Occasions, p. 253.

The word "spirit" means literally breath, and it is applied to the soul, not merely because of its immateriality, but for the additional reason that the Almighty can breathe Himself into it and through it. The word "inspiration" as here used denotes this act of inbreathing. Any one is inspired who is breathed in, visited internally, and so, all infallibility apart, raised in intelligence, guided in choice, convinced of sin, upheld in suffering, empowered to victory. Just as it is the distinction of a crystal that it is transparent, able to let the light into and through its close, flinty body, and be irradiated by it in the whole mass of its substance, so it is the grand distinction of humanity that it is made permeable by the Divine nature, prepared in that manner to receive and entemple the Infinite Spirit, to be energized by Him and filled with His glory, in every faculty, feeling, and power.

I. Consider what and how much it signifies that we are spirit, capable in this manner of the Divine concourse. In this point of view it is that we are raised most distinctly above all other forms of existence known to us. The will or force of God can act omnipotently on all created things as things. He can penetrate all central fires, and dissolve or assimilate every most secret atom of the world, but it cannot be said that these things receive Him; nothing can truly receive Him but spirit.

II. We sometimes dwell on the fact of the moral nature of man, conceiving that in this he is seen to be most of all exalted; but the spiritual is even as much higher than the moral, as the moral is higher than the animal. To be a moral being is to have a sense of duty and a power of choice that supports and justifies responsibility; but to be spirit, or to have a spiritual nature, is to be capable, not of duty only, or of sentiments of duty, but of receiving God, of knowing Him within, of being permeated, filled, ennobled, glorified, by His infinite Spirit.

III. Observe what takes place in the human soul as an inspirable nature when it is practically filled and operated on by the Spirit of God. It has now that higher Spirit witnessing with itself. The man is no longer a simple feather of humanity, driven about by the fickle winds of this world’s changes, but in the new sense he has of a composite life, in which God Himself is a presiding force, he is raised into a glorious equilibrium, above himself, and set in rest upon the rock of God’s eternity.

IV. But we do not really conceive the height of this subject till we bring into view the place it holds in the economy of the heavenly state. All good angels and glorified men are distinguished by the fact that they are now filled with a complete inspiration from the fulness of God. It is their spiritual perfection that they are perfectly inspired, so that their whole action is in the Divine impulse. Inspiration is their heaven; the Lord God giveth them light. Man finds his paradise when he is emparadised in God.

V. An important light is shed by this great truth on many points that meet us in the facts of human life and religious experience. (1) When poets and orators invoke inspiration, it is because they are made to be inspired. They want some deific impulse. A something in their nature lifts them up to this. (2) The doctrine of the Holy Spirit is grounded in the primordial nature of all spiritual beings. It is not some new idea of the Gospel. It is an advance of the Divine love to recover lost ground and bring back guilty souls among men to that which is the original, everlasting bliss and beauty of all the created intelligences of God. (3) We discover in our subject how weak and petty is the pride which looks on spiritual religion as a humiliation, or deems it even a mortification not to be endured.

H. Bushnell, The New Life, p. 26.

References: Job 32:8.—Clergyman’s Magazine, vol. xviii., p. 271; J. E. Vaux, Sermon Notes, 4th series, p. 22; R. Thomas, Christian World Pulpit, vol. vi., p. 314; A. P. Peabody, Ibid., vol. xii., p. 341; H. Martineau, Hours of Thought, vol. ii., p. 138. Job 32-37—A. W. Momerie, Defects of Modern Christianity, p. 165; S. Cox, Commentary on Job, p. 406.

The Sermon Bible, ed. William Robertson Nicoll (1888–1900) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

XXV.

POST-EXILIC WISDOM

JOB 32-34

A PERSONAGE hitherto unnamed in the course of the drama now assumes the place of critic and judge between Job and his friends. Elihu, son of Barachel the Buzite, of the family of Ram, appears suddenly and as suddenly disappears. The implication is that he has been present during the whole of the colloquies, and that, having patiently waited his time, he expresses the judgment he has slowly formed on arguments to which he has given close attention.

It is significant that both Elihu and his representations are ignored in the winding up of the action. The address of the Almighty from the storm does not take him into account and seems to follow directly on the close of Jobs defence. It is a very obvious criticism, therefore, that the long discourse of Elihu may be an interpolation or an afterthought-a fresh attempt by the author or by some later writer to correct errors into which Job and his friends are supposed to have fallen and to throw new light on the matter of discussion. The textual indications are all in favour of this view. The style of the language appears to belong to a later time than the other parts of the book. But to reject the address as unworthy of a place in the poem would be too summary. Elihu indeed assumes the air of the superior person from the first, so that one is not engaged in his favour. Yet there is an honest, reverent, and thoughtful contribution to the subject. In some points this speaker comes nearer the truth than Job or any of his friends, although the address as a whole is beneath the rest of the book in respect of matter and argument, and still more in poetical feeling and expression.

It is suggested by M. Renan that the original author, taking up his work again after a long interval, at a period in his life when he had lost his verve and his style, may have added this fragment with the idea of completing the poem. There are strong reasons against such an explanation. For one thing there seems to be a misconception where, at the outset, Elihu is made to assume that Job and his friends are very old. The earlier part of the poem by no means affirms this. Job, though we call him a patriarch, was not necessarily far advanced in life, and Zophar appears considerably younger. Again the contention in the eighth verse (Job_32:8) -"There is a spirit in man, and the breath of the Almighty giveth them understanding"-seems to be the justification a later writer would think it needful to introduce. He acknowledges the Divine gift of the original poet and adding his criticism claims for Elihu, that is, for himself, the lucidity God bestows on every calm and reverent student of His ways. This is considerably different from anything we find in the addresses of the other speakers. It seems to show that the question of inspiration had arisen and passed through some discussion. But the rest of the book is written without any consciousness, or at all events any admission of such a question.

Elihu appears to represent the new "wisdom" which came to Hebrew thinkers in the period of the exile; and there are certain opinions embodied in his address which must have been formed during an exile that brought many Jews to honour. The reading of affliction given is one following the discovery that the general sinfulness of a nation may entail chastisement on men who have not personally been guilty of great sin, yet are sharers in the common neglect of religion and pride of heart, and further that this chastisement may be the means of great profit to those who suffer. It would be harsh to say the tone is that of a mind which has caught the trick of "voluntary humility," of pietistic self-abasement. Yet there are traces of such a tendency, the beginning of a religious strain opposed to legal self-righteousness, running, however, very readily to excess and formalism. Elihu, accordingly, appears to stand on the verge of a descent from the robust moral vigour of the original author towards that low ground in which false views of mans nature hinder the free activity of faith.

The note struck by the Book of Job had stirred eager thought in the time of the exile. Just as in the Middle Ages of European history the Divine Comedy of Dante was made a special study, and chairs were founded in universities for its exposition, so less formally the drama of Job was made the subject of inquiry and speculation. We suppose then that among the many who wrote on the poem, one acting for a circle of thinkers incorporated their views in the text. He could not do so otherwise than by bringing a new speaker on the stage. To add anything to what Eliphaz or Bildad or Job had said would have prevented the free expression of new opinion. Nor could he without disrespect have inserted the criticism after the words of Jehovah. Selecting as the only proper point of interpolation the close of the debate between Job and the friends, the scribe introduced the Elihu portion as a review of the whole scope of the book, and may indeed have subtly intended to assail as entirely heterodox the presupposition of Jobs integrity and the Almightys approval of His servant. That being his purpose, he had to veil it in order to keep the discourse of Elihu in line with the place assigned to him in the dramatic movement. The contents of the prologue and epilogue and the utterance of the Almighty from the storm affect, throughout, the added discourse. But to secure the unity of the poem the writer makes Elihu speak like one occupying the same ground as Eliphaz and the others, that of a thinker ignorant of the original motive of the drama; and this is accomplished with no small skill. The assumption is that reverent thought may throw new light, far more light than the original author possessed, on the case as it stood during the colloquies. Elihu avoids assailing the conception of the prologue that Job is a perfect and upright man approved by God. He takes the state of the sufferer as he finds it, and inquires how and why it is, what is the remedy. There are pedantries and obscurities in the discourse, yet the author must not be denied the merit of a careful and successful attempt to adapt his character to the place he occupies in the drama. Beyond this, and the admission that something additional is said on the subject of Divine discipline, it is needless to go in justifying Elihus appearance. One can only remark with wonder, in passing, that Elihu should ever have been declared the Angel Jehovah, or a personification of the Son of God.

The narrative verses which introduce the new speaker state that his wrath was kindled against Job because he justified himself rather than God, and against the three friends because they had condemned Job and yet found no answer to his arguments. The mood is that of a critic rather hot, somewhat too confident that he knows, beginning a task that requires much penetration and wisdom. But the opening sentences of the speech of Elihu betray the need the writer felt to justify himself in making his bold venture.

I am young and ye are very old;

Wherefore I held back and durst not show my knowledge.

I thought, Days should speak,

And the multitude of years teach wisdom.

Still, there is a spirit in man,

And the breath of the Almighty giveth them understanding.

Not the great in years are wise,

Nor do the aged understand what is right.

Therefore I say: Hearken to me;

I also will show my opinion.

These verses are a defence of the new writers boldness in adding to a poem that has come down from a previous age. He is confident in his judgment, yet realises the necessity of commending it to the hearers. He claims that inspiration which belongs to every reverent conscientious inquirer. On this footing he affirms a right to express his opinion, and the right cannot be denied.

Elihu has been disappointed with the speeches of Jobs friends. He has listened for their reasons, observed how they cast about for arguments and theories; but no one said anything convincing. It is an offence to this speaker that men who had so good a case against their friend made so little of it. The intelligence of Elihu is therefore from the first committed to the hypothesis that Job is in the wrong. Obviously the writer places his spokesman in a position which the epilogue condemns; and if we assume this to have been deliberately done a subtle verdict against the scope of the poem must have been intended. May it not be surmised that this implied comment or criticism gave the interpolated discourse value in the eyes of many? Originally the poem appeared somewhat dangerous, out of the line of orthodoxy. It may have become more acceptable to Hebrew thought when this caveat against bold assumptions of human perfectibility and the right of man in presence of his Maker had been incorporated with the text.

Elihu tells the friends that they are not to say we have found wisdom in Job, unexpected wisdom which the Almighty alone is able to vanquish. They are not to excuse themselves nor exaggerate the difficulties of the situation by entertaining such an opinion, Elihu is confident that he can overcome Job in reasoning. As if speaking to himself he describes the perplexity of the friends and states his intention.

"They were amazed, they answered no more;

They had not a word to say.

And shall I wait because they speak not,

Because they stand still and answer no more?

I also will answer my part,

I also will show my opinion."

His convictions become stronger and more urgent. He must open his lips and answer. And he will use no flattery. Neither the age nor the greatness of the men he is addressing shall keep him from speaking his mind. If he were insincere he would bring on himself the judgment of God. "My Maker would soon take me away." Here again the second writers self defence colours the words put into Elihus mouth. Reverence for the genius of the poet whose work he is supplementing does not prevent a greater reverence for his own views.

The general exordium closes with the thirty-second chapter, and in the thirty-third Elihu, addressing Job by name, enters on a new vindication of his right to intervene. His claim is still that of straightforwardness, sincerity. He is to express what he knows without any other motive than to throw light on the matter in hand. He feels himself, moreover, to be guided by the Divine Spirit. The breath of the Almighty has given him life; and on this ground he considers himself entitled to enter the discussion and ask of Job what answer he can give. This is done with dramatic feeling. The life he enjoys is not only physical vigour as contrasted with Jobs diseased and infirm state, but also intellectual strength, the power of God-given reason. Yet, as if he might seem to claim too much, he hastens to explain that he is quite on Jobs level nevertheless.

"Behold. I am before God even as thou art;

I also am formed out of the clay.

Lo, my terror shall not make thee afraid,

Neither shall my pressure be heavy upon thee."

Elihu is no great personage, no heaven-sent prophet whose oracles must be received without question. He is not terrible like God, but a man formed out of the clay. The dramatising appears overdone at this point, and can only be explained by the desire of the writer to keep on good terms with those who already reverenced the original poet and regarded his work as sacred. What is now to be said to Job is spoken with knowledge and conviction, yet without pretension to more than the wisdom of the holy. There is, however, a covert attack on the original author as having made too much of the terror of the Almighty, the constant pain and anxiety that bore down Jobs spirit. No excuse of the kind is to be allowed for the failure of Job to justify himself. He did not because he could not. The fact was, according to this critic, that Job had no right of self defence as perfect and upright, without fault before the Most High. No man possessed or could acquire such integrity. And all the attempts of the earlier dramatist to put arguments and defences into his heros mouth had of necessity failed. The new writer comprehends very well the purpose of his predecessor and intends to subvert it.

The formal indictment opens thus:-

Surely thou hast spoken in my hearing

And I have heard thy words:-

I am clean without transgression:

I am innocent, neither is there iniquity in me.

Behold. He findeth occasions against me,

He counteth me for His enemy;

He putteth me in the stocks

He marketh all my paths.

The claim of righteousness, the explanation of his troubles given by Job that God made occasions against him and without cause treated him as an enemy, are the errors on which Elihu fastens. They are the errors of the original writer. No one endeavouring to represent the feelings and language of a servant of God should have placed him in the position of making so false a claim, so base a charge against Eloah. Such criticism is not to be set aside as either incompetent or over bold. But the critic has to justify his opinion, and, like many others, when he comes to give reasons his weakness discloses itself. He is certainly hampered by the necessity of keeping within dramatic lines. Elihu must appear and speak as one who stood beside Job with the same veil between him and the Divine throne. And perhaps for this reason the effort of the dramatist comes short of the occasion.

It is to be noted that attention is fixed on isolated expressions which fell from Jobs lips, that there is no endeavour to set forth fully the attitude of the sufferer towards the Almighty. Eliphaz, Bildad, and Zophar had made Job an offender for a word and Elihu follows them. We anticipate that his criticism, however telling it may be, will miss the true point, the heart of the question. He will possibly establish some things against Job, but they will not prove him to have failed as a brave seeker after truth and God.

Opposing the claim and complaint he has quoted, Elihu advances in the first instance a proposition which has the air of a truism-"God is greater than man." He does not try to prove that even though a man has appeared to himself righteous he may really be sinful in the sight of the Almighty, or that God has the right to afflict an innocent person in order to bring about some great and holy design. The contention is that a man should suffer and be silent. God is not to be questioned; His providence is not to be challenged. A man, however he may have lived, is not to doubt that there is good reason for his misery if he is miserable. He is to let stroke after stroke fall and utter no complaint. And yet Job had erred in saying, "God giveth not account of any of His matters." It is not true, says Elihu, that the Divine King holds Himself entirely aloof from the inquiries and prayers of His subjects. He discloses in more than one way bath His purposes and His grace.

"Why dost thou contend against God

That He giveth not account of any of His matters?

For God speaketh once, yea twice,

Yet man perceiveth it not."

The first way in which, according to Elihu, God speaks to men is by a dream, a vision of the night; and the second way is by the chastisement of pain.

Now as to the first of these, the dream or vision, Elihu had, of course, the testimony of almost universal belief, and also of some cases that passed ordinary experience. Scriptural examples, such as the dreams of Jacob, of Joseph, of Pharaoh, and the prophetic visions already recognised by all pious Hebrews, were no doubt in the writers mind. Yet if it is implied that Job might have learned the will of God from dreams, or that this was a method of Divine communication for which any man might look, the rule laid down was at least perilous. Visions are not always from God. A dream may come "by the multitude of business." It is true, as Elihu says, that one who is bent on some proud and dangerous course may be more himself in a dream than in his waking hours. He may see a picture of the future which scares him, and, so he may be deterred from his purpose. Yet the waking thoughts of a man, if he is sincere and conscientious, are far more fitted to guide him, as a rule, than his dreams.

Passing to the second method of Divine communication, Elihu appears to be on safer ground. He describes the case of an afflicted man brought to extremity by disease, whose soul draweth near to the grave and his life to the destroyers or death angels. Such suffering and weakness do not of themselves insure knowledge of Gods will, but they prepare the sufferer to be instructed. And for his deliverance an interpreter is required.

"If there be with him an angel,

An interpreter, one among a thousand,

To show unto man what is his duty;

Then He is gracious unto him and saith,

Deliver him from going down to the pit,

I have found a ransom."

Elihu cannot say that such an angel or interpreter will certainly appear. He may: and if he does and points the way of uprightness, and that way is followed, then the result is redemption, deliverance, renewed prosperity. But who is this angel? "One of the ministering spirits sent forth to do service on behalf of the heirs of salvation"? The explanation is somewhat farfetched. The ministering angels were not restricted in number. Each Hebrew was supposed to have two such guardians. Then Malachi says, "The priests lips should keep knowledge, and they should seek the law at his mouth; for he is the angel (messenger) of Jehovah Sabaoth." Here the priest appears as an angel interpreter, and the passage seems to throw light on Elihus meaning. As no explicit mention is made of a priest or any priestly function in our text, it may at least be hinted that interpreters of the law, scribes or incipient rabbis, are intended, of whom Elihu claims to be one. In this case the ransom would remain without explanation. But if we take that as a sacrificial offering, the name "angel interpreter" covers a reference to the properly accredited priest: The passage is so obscure that little can be based upon it; yet assuming the Elihu discourses to be of late origin and intended to bring the poem into line with orthodox Hebrew thought, the introduction of either priest or scribe would be in harmony with such a purpose. Mediation at all events is declared to be necessary as between the sufferer and God; and it would be strange indeed if Elihu, professing to explain matters, really made Divine grace to be consequent on the intervention of an angel whose presence and instruction could in no way be verified. Elihu is realistic and would not rest his case at any point on what might be declared purely imaginary.

The promise he virtually makes to Job is like those of Eliphaz and the others, -renewed health, restored youth, the sense of Divine favour. Enjoying these, the forgiven penitent sings before men, acknowledging his fault and praising God for his redemption. The assurance of deliverance was probably made in view of the epilogue, with Jobs confession and the prosperity restored to him. But the writer misunderstands the confession, and promises too glibly. It is good to receive after great affliction the guidance of a wise interpreter; and to seek God again in humility is certainly a mans duty. But would submission and the forgiveness of God bring results in the physical sphere, health, renewed youth and felicity? No invariable nexus of cause and effect can be established here from experience of the dealings of God with men. Elihus account of the way in which the Almighty communicates with His creatures must be declared a failure. It is in some respects careful and ingenious, yet it has no sufficient ground of evidence. When he says-

"Lo, all these things worketh God

Oftentimes with man,

To bring back his soul from the pit"-

the design is pious, but the great question of the book is not touched. The righteous suffer like the wicked from disease, bereavement, disappointment, anxiety. Even when their integrity is vindicated the lost years and early vigour are not restored. It is useless to deal in the way of pure fancy with the troubles of existence. We say to Elihu and all his school, Let us be at the truth, let us know the absolute reality. There are valleys of human sorrow, suffering, and trial in which the shadows grow deeper as the traveller presses on, where the best are often most afflicted. We need another interpreter than Elihu, one who suffers like us and is made perfect by suffering, through it entering into His glory.

An invocation addressed by Elihu to the bystanders begins chapter 34. Again he emphatically asserts his right to speak, his claim to be a guide of those who think on the ways of God. He appeals to sound reason and he takes his auditors into counsel-"Let us choose to ourselves judgment; let us know among ourselves what is good." The proposal is that there shall be conference on the subject of Jobs claim. But Elihu alone speaks. It is he who selects "what is good."

Certain words that fell from the lips of Job are again his text. Job hath said, I am righteous, I am in the right; and, God hath taken away my judgment or vindication. When those words were used the meaning of Job was that the circumstances in which he had been placed, the troubles appointed by God seemed to prove him a transgressor. But was he to rest under a charge he knew to be untrue? Stricken with an incurable wound though he had not transgressed, was he to lie against his right by remaining silent? This, says Elihu, is Jobs unfounded impious indictment of the Almighty; and he asks:-

"What man is like Job,

Who drinketh up impiety like water,

Who goeth in company with the workers of iniquity,

And walketh with wicked men?"

Job had spoken of his right which God had taken away. What was his right? Was he, as he affirmed, without transgression? On the contrary, his principles were irreligious. There was infidelity beneath his apparent piety. Elihu will prove that so far from being clear of blame he has been imbibing wrong opinions and joining the company of the wicked. This attack shows the temper of the writer. No doubt certain expressions put into the mouth of Job by the original dramatist might be taken as impeaching the goodness or the justice of God. But to assert that even the most unguarded passages of the book made for impiety was a great mistake. Faith in God is to be traced not obscurely but as a shaft of light through all the speeches put into the mouth of his hero by the poet. One whose mind is bound by certain pious forms of thought may fail to see the light, but it shines nevertheless.

The attempt made by Elihu to establish his charge has an appearance of success. Job, he says, is one who drinks up impiety like water and walks with wicked men, -

"For he hath said,

It profiteth a man nothing

That he should delight himself with God."

If this were true, Job would indeed be proved irreligious. Such a statement strikes at the root of faith and obedience. But is Elihu representing the text with anything like precision? In Job_9:22 these words are put into Jobs mouth:-

"It is all one, therefore I say,

He destroyeth the perfect and the wicked."

God is strong and is breaking him with a tempest. Job finds it useless to defend himself and maintain that he is perfect. In the midst of the storm he is so tossed that he despises his life; and in perplexity he cries, -It is all one whether I am righteous or not, God destroys the good and the vile alike. Again we find him saying, "Wherefore do the wicked live, become old, yea, are mighty in power?" And in another passage he inquires why the Almighty does not appoint days of judgment. These are the expressions on which Elihu founds his charge, but the precise words attributed to Job were never used by him, and in many places he both said and implied that the favour of God was his greatest joy. The second author is either misapprehending or perverting the language of his predecessor. His argument accordingly does not succeed.

Passing at present from the charge of impiety, Elihu takes up the suggestion that Divine providence is unjust and sets himself to show that, whether men delight themselves in the Almighty or not, He is certainly All-righteous. And in this contention, so long as he keeps to generalities and does not take special account of the case which has roused the whole controversy, he speaks with some power. His argument comes properly to this, If you ascribe injustice or partiality to Him whom you call God, you cannot be thinking of the Divine King. From His very nature and from His position as Lord of all, God cannot be unjust. As Maker and Preserver of life He must be faithful.

"Far be from God a wickedness,

From the Almighty an injustice!

For every ones work He requiteth him,

And causeth each to find according to his ways.

Surely, too, God doth not wickedness.

The Almighty perverteth not justice."

Has God any motive for being unjust? Can any one urge Him to what is against His nature? The thing is impossible. So far Elihu has all with him, for all alike believe in the sovereignty of God. The Most High, responsible to Himself, must be conceived of as perfectly just. But would He be so if He were to destroy the whole of His creatures? Elihu says, Gods sovereignty over all gives Him the right to act according to His will; and His will determines not only what is, but what is right in every case.

"Who hath given Him a charge over the earth?

Or who hath disposed the whole world?

Were He to set His mind upon Himself,

To gather to Himself His spirit and His breath,

Then all flesh would die together,

Man would return to his dust."

The life of all creatures, implies that the mind of the Creator goes forth to His universe, to rule it, to supply the needs of all living beings. He is not wrapped up in Himself, but having given life He provides for its maintenance.

Another personal appeal in Job_34:16 is meant to secure attention to what follows, in which the idea is carried out that the Creator must rule His creatures by a law of justice.

"Shall one that hateth right be able to control?

Or wilt thou condemn the Just, the Mighty One?

Is it fit to say to a king, Thou wicked?

Or to princes. Ye ungodly?

How much less to Him who accepts not the persons of princes.

Nor regardeth the rich more than the poor?"

Here the principle is good, the argument of illustration inconclusive. There is a strong foundation in the thought that God, who could if He desired withdraw all life, but on the other hand sustains it, must rule according to a law of perfect righteousness. If this principle were kept in the front and followed up we should have a fruitful argument. But the philosophy of it is beyond this thinker, and he weakens his case by pointing to human rulers and arguing from the duty of subjects to abide by their decision and at least attribute to them the virtue of justice. No doubt society must be held together by a head either hereditary or chosen by the people, and, so long as his rule is necessary to the well being of the realm, what he commands must be obeyed and what he does must be approved as if it were right. But the writer either had an exceptionally favourable experience of kings, as one, let us suppose, honoured like Daniel in the Babylonian exile, or his faith in the Divine right of princes blinded him to much injustice. It is a mark of his defective logic that he rests his case for the perfect righteousness of God upon a sentiment or what may be called an accident.

And when Elihu proceeds, it is with some rambling sentences in which the suddenness of death, the insecurity of human things, and the trouble and distress coming now on whole nations, now on workers of iniquity, are all thrown together for the demonstration of Divine justice. We hear in these verses (Job_34:20-28) the echoes of disaster and exile, of the fall of thrones and empires. Because the afflicted tribes of Judah were preserved in captivity and restored to their own land, the history of the period which is before the writers mind appears to him to supply a conclusive proof of the righteousness of the Almighty. But we fail to see it. Eliphaz and Bildad might have spoken in the same terms as Elihu uses here. Everything is assumed that Job by force of circumstance has been compelled to doubt. The whole is a homily on Gods irresponsible power and penetrating wisdom which, it is taken for granted, must be exercised in righteousness. Where proof is needed nothing but assertion is offered. It is easy to say that when a man is struck down in the open sight of others it is because he has been cruel to the poor and the Almighty has been moved by the cry of the afflicted. But here is Job struck down in the open sight of others; and is it for harshness to the poor? If Elihu does not mean that, what does he mean? The conclusion is the the same as that reached by the three friends; and this speaker poses, like the rest, as a generous man declaring that the iniquity God is always sure to punish is tyrannical treatment of the orphan and the widow.

Leaving this unfortunate attempt at reasoning we enter at Job_34:31 on a passage in which the circumstances of Job are directly dealt with.

For hath any one spoken thus unto God,

I have suffered though I offend not:

That which I see not teach Thou;

If I have done iniquity I will do it no more?

Shall Gods recompense be according to thy mind

That thou dost reject it?

For thou must choose, and not I:

Therefore speak what thou knowest.

Here the argument seems to be that a man like Job, assuming himself to be innocent, if he bows down before the sovereign Judge, confesses ignorance, and even goes so far as to acknowledge that he may have sinned unwittingly and promises amendment, such a one has no right to dictate to God or to complain if suffering and trouble continue. God may afflict as long as He pleases without showing why He afflicts. And if the sufferer dares to complain he does so at his own peril. Elihu would not be the man to complain in such a case. He would suffer on silently. But the choice is for Job to make; and he has need to consider well before he comes to a decision. Elihu implies that as yet Job is in the wrong mind, and he closes this part of his address in a sort of brutal triumph over the sufferer because he had complained of his sufferings. He puts the condemnation into the mouth of "men of understanding"; but it is his own.

Men of understanding will say to me,

And the wise who hears me will say:-

Job speaks without intelligence,

And his words are without wisdom:

Would that Job were tried unto the end

For his answers after the manner of wicked men.

For he addeth rebellion to his sin;

He clappeth his hands amongst us

And multiplieth his words against God.

The ideas of Elihu are few and fixed. When his attempts to convince betray his weakness in argument, he falls back on the vulgar expedient of brow beating the defendant. He is a type of many would be interpreters of Divine providence, forcing a theory of religion which admirably fits those who reckon themselves favourites of heaven, but does nothing for the many lives that are all along under a cloud of trouble and grief. The religious creed which alone can satisfy is one throwing light adown the darkest ravines human beings have to thread, in ignorance of God which they cannot help, in pain of body and feebleness of mind not caused by their own sin but by the sins of others, in slavery or something worse than slavery.

William Robertson Nicoll, ed., The Expositor's Bible (London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1887–1910) — public domain. 65 of 66 books (1 Corinthians is not separately keyed, as that volume carries no machine-parseable verse references); section-level commentary keyed to the opening verse. Introductory and overview sections not keyed to a specific passage are excluded.

he was righteous in his own eyes

The eyes represent seeing, and seeing represents thoughts or judgment. AT: "he considered himself righteous" (See: Metaphor)

Then was kindled the anger of Elihu son of Barakel the Buzite, of the family of Ram; it was kindled against Job

This compares Elihu's anger to someone starting a fire. Also, this can be stated in active form. AT: "Then Elihu son of Barakel the Buzite, of the family of Ram, became very angry with Job" (See: Metaphor and Active or Passive)

Elihu ... Barakel ... Ram

These are names of men. (See: How to Translate Names)

Buzite

This is the name of a people-group. (See: How to Translate Names)

he justified himself rather than God

This means that he considered himself innocent and believed God had been wrong to punish him. AT: "he justified himself and claimed that God had been wrong to punish him" (See: Assumed Knowledge and Implicit Information)

translationWords

Job

righteous

anger

just

God

unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.