Job 33:17

17, 18. The object of this intervention of God is the gracious one of anticipating the sinner in the evil which he meditates and hindering it, and withdrawing him from his sinful purpose, Job_33:17; and the effect of it is that man is preserved from committing deadly sin, which would have brought destruction upon him, Job_33:18.

The “sword” or javelin, Job_33:18, is a figure for God’s destructive judgments; comp. ch. Job_36:12.

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.

Job 33:17 That he may withdraw man [from his] purpose, and hide pride from man.

Ver. 17. That he may withdraw man from his purpose] Or, rather, practice. Heb. work, that is, evil work, called a man’s own work, Heb 4:10; for when we do evil we work de nostro, et secundum hominem, 1Co 3:3, as when the devil speaketh a lie he speaketh of his own, Joh 8:44. Now from such bad work God taketb men off, by dreams sometimes, as he did Abimelech, Gen 20:3, and Laban, Gen 31:24 but more frequently by corrections of instruction, which are the way of life, Pro 6:23 : Christianornm Theologia, as Luther calleth it; Virtutum officina, as Ambrose; Bonorum omnium thesaurus, as Brentius upon this text.

And hide pride from man] Which else, as a master pock, will break out in his forehead and testify to his face. By pride we may understand all other sins, which God both covereth and cureth in his penitent people; but pride is fitly instanced, because it was one of the first sins, and is still the root and source of all other sins. God therefore humbleth all under his mighty hand, and preserveth them from the perilous pinnacle of self exaltation; as he dealt with Paul, both when he met him on the way to Damascus, and unhorsed him, as also when by that thorn in the flesh he let out the swollen matter of pride out of his heart, which might else have broken forth into odious and loathsome practices.

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.

He showeth for what end God sendeth afflictions: to beat down man’s pride, and to turn from evil.

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

purpose--Margin, "work." So Job 36:9. So "business" in a bad sense (Sa1 20:19). Elihu alludes to Job's words (Job 17:11). "Pride," an open "pit" (Job 33:18) which God hides or covers up, lest man should fall into it. Even the godly need to learn the lesson which trials teach, to "humble themselves under the mighty hand of God."

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

(17) From his purpose.—Rather, That He may witharaw man from carrying out his evil actions, and may remove that pride from man which he secretly cherishes. This is the main point of Elihu’s teaching: that the purposes of God are disciplinary, to keep man from the sin which otherwise he would be prone to commit. In this way Job might have been a righteous man, and yet be justly chastened lest he should prove unrighteous.

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

That he may withdraw a man from his purpose,.... Or "work" (m), his wicked work, as the Targum; either which he has begun upon, or which he designed to do. Thus Abimelech and Laban were restrained from their intentions by a divine admonition in a dream, the one from taking Abraham's wife, as he intended, and the other from doing harm to Jacob, which he designed:

and hide pride from man; by pardoning his sins, in which there is always pride, so some; pardon of sin being expressed by covering it, Psa 32:1; or rather by repressing, weakening, and preventing it; and that by not suffering vain and proud men to perform their enterprises, but obliging them to submit to the will of God, and humble themselves under his mighty hand. These are the ends proposed, and which are effected through the Lord speaking to men in dreams, opening their ears, and sending instructions to them; and others also for their good follow.

(m) "opere", Pagninus, Montanus, Mercerus, &c.

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

That he may withdraw man from his purpose - Margin, “work.” The sense is plain. God designs to warn him of the consequences of executing a plan of iniquity. He alarms him by showing him that his course will lead to punishment, and by representing to him in the night visions, the dreadful woes of the future world into which he is about to plunge. The object is to deter him from committing the deed of guilt which he had contemplated, and to turn him to the paths of righteousness. Is it unreasonable to suppose that the same thing may occur now, and that God may have a purpose in the dreams which often visit the man who has formed a plan of iniquity, or who is living a life of sin? It cannot be doubted that such people often have alarming dreams; that these dreams are such as are fitted to deter them from the commission of their contemplated wickedness; and that in fact they not unfrequently do it.

What shall hinder us from supposing that God intends that the workings of the mind when the senses are locked in repose, shall be the means of alarming the guilty, and of leading them to reflection? Why should not mind thus be its own admonisher, and be made the instrument of restraining the guilty then, as really as by its sober reasonings and reflections when awake? Many a wicked man has been checked in a career of wickedness by a frightful dream; and not a few have been brought to a degree of reflection which has resulted in sound conversion by the alarm caused on the mind by having the consequences of a career of wickedness traced out in the visions of the night. The case of Colonel Gardiner cannot be forgotten - though in that instance it was rather “a vision of the night” than a dream. He was meditating an act of wickedness. and was alone in his room awaiting the appointed hour. In the silence of the night, and in the solitude of his room, he seemed to see the Savior on the cross. This view, however, it may be accounted for, restrained him from the contemplated act of wickedness, and he became an eminently pious man; see Doddridge’s Life of Col. Gardiner. The mind, with all its faculties, is under the control of God, and no one can demonstrate that he does not make its actings, even in the wanderings of a dream, the designed means of checking the sinner, and of saving the soul.

And hide pride from man - Probably the particular thing which Elihu here referred to, was pride and arrogance toward God; or an insolent bearing toward him, and a reliance on one’s own merits. This was the particular thing in Job which Elihu seems to have thought required animadversion, and probably he meant to intimate that all people had such communications from God by dreams as to save them from such arrogance.

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

Him. Septuagint, "his body from the fall [of iniquity.]" (Grabe) (Haydock)

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).

That he, i.e. God, who was expressed Job 33:14, and designed by this pronoun he both in the foregoing and following verses.

From his purpose, i.e. from the execution of his purpose. Heb. from his work, i.e. from his evil work as the Chaldee and LXX. understand it; from sin, which is truly and fitly called man’s work, because it hath its rise in and from him, and is his own proper work, and very agreeable to his nature in his present corrupt estate; as, on the contrary, all the good that is in man is God’s proper and peculiar work, and is generally ascribed to him in Scripture. So this is noted as the design of God’s giving man this warning, to keep him from executing that evil work which possibly he had designed to do; of which see examples, Gen 20:5,6; 31:24.

Hide pride, i.e. either,

1. To take it away, as God is said to hide sin, when he quite removes and forgives it, Psa 32:1; and sorrow is said to be hid, Job 3:10, when it never is nor was; and understanding is said to be hid when it perisheth, Isa 29:14. And

pride is here mentioned as the root of those evil purposes or works last mentioned; which for the most part proceed from haughtiness of spirit, whereby men scorn to submit themselves and their wills and actions to God’s authority, and presume to advance themselves above God, and resolve to follow their own wills and lusts in spite of God, and with contempt of him. Or pride may be here put for all matter or occasion of pride. And God by this means is said to

hide pride from man, because by these glorious and terrible representations of his Divine majesty to a man, he takes him off from the contemplation and admiration of his own excellency, which men are generally very prone to reflect upon, and brings him to a sight of his own nothingness and weakness, and to a sense of his dependence upon God, and to a humble and ready submission to his will and pleasure.

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

17. Purpose — מעשׂה, deed; used, like the Latin facinus, in the sense of evil deed. Of the two words employed for man, the second, geber, expresses might, and thus forms an antithesis. For “weak man,” (adham,) God interposes obstacles to the commission of sin, and from “the man of might” covers up (hides) the dazzling object of temptation. No one can estimate the restraint God thus exercises over the soul. Were there no protecting grace there would be but little, if any, human virtue. Pride is specially mentioned, because it is a sin to which human beings are most easily subjected, a kind of leader among temptations, and a vice, too, when once in possession, which cleaveth with a tenaciousness greater than that of all other sins.

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

That he (i.e. God) may withdraw man from his purpose; literally, from his work, assumed to be a wrongful work. Elihu regards the Divine teaching through visions as intended to elevate and purify men. Sometimes God so works upon them as to make them abandon an evil course on which they had entered. Sometimes his object is to save them from indulgence in an evil temper into which, without his help, they might have fallen. In this latter case he may occasionally hide pride from man. Elihu, perhaps, thinks that Job is unduly proud of his integrity.

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

Pride - And God by this means is said to hide pride from man, because by these glorious representations of his Divine majesty to man, he takes him off from the admiration of his own excellency, and brings him to a sight of his own weakness, and to an humble and ready submission to his will.

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

To restrain man in his illness.

a deed that he had intended to do.

and He covers haughtiness from man with his suffering, in order to vanquish him and humble him to repent, so that he withhold his soul from utter death.

haughtiness Heb. וְגֵוָה, like גַאֲוָה.

Rashi on the Tanakh — English translations: “The Judaica Press complete Tanach with Rashi, translated by A. J. Rosenberg” (CC BY 4.0); “Pentateuch with Rashi's commentary by M. Rosenbaum and A.M. Silbermann, 1929-1934” (public domain); “The Metsudah Tanach series, Lakewood, N.J” (CC BY 4.0); and “The Book of Joshua, Metsudah Publications, 1997” (CC BY 4.0). Text via Sefaria.