Job 35:8

Job 35:8 Thy wickedness [may hurt] a man as thou [art]; and thy righteousness [may profit] the son of man.

Ver. 8. Thy wickedness may hurt a man as thou art] Wicked men are many ways mischievous to others; and have much to answer for their other men’s sins. How many are undone by their murders, adulteries, robberies, false testimonies, blasphemies, and other rotten speeches, to the corrupting of good manners! &c. What hurt is done daily by the devil’s factors, to men’s souls, bodies, names, estates! Besides that they betray the land wherein they live into the hands of divine justice, while they do wickedly with both hands earnestly, Mic 7:3; that I speak not of the manifold miseries they pull upon themselves.

And thy righteousness may profit the son of man] Thyself and others; for the just liveth by his own faith; he maketh a living of it, and a good one too. And as for his charity, it is the mother of all manner of good works, whereof others have the benefit. Papists, and some as silly, have shrunk up charity to a hand’s breadth, to giving of alms. But besides that, a good man draweth out, not only his sheaf, but his soul to the hungry. He also warneth the unruly, comforteth the feeble-minded, supporteth the weak, and tradeth all his talents for the good of others, 1Th 5:14. He is a common blessing to all that are about him. As Plutarch said of the neighbouring villages of Rome, in Numa’s time, That sucking in the air of that city, they breathed δικαιοσυνην, righteousness; so may it be said of the city of God, and her citizens.

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.

Verse 8. Thy wickedness may hurt] It is better to translate this literally:

To a man like thyself is thy wickedness:

And to the son of man, thy righteousness:

That is: -

Thou mayest injure thyself and others by thy wickedness,

And thou mayest benefit both by thy righteousness;

But God thou canst neither hurt nor profit.

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

8. The verse reads literally: thy wickedness is to (touches, affects) a man as thou art, and thy righteousness is to one of mankind, i. e. thyself who art a man; for it cannot touch God who is exalted above such influence.

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.

Thy wickedness may hurt a Man as thou art - That is, it may injure him, but not God. He is too far exalted above man, and too independent of man in his sources of happiness, to be affected by what he can do. The object of the whole passage Job 35:6-8 is, to show that God is independent of people, and is not governed in his dealings with them on the principles which regulate their conduct with each other. One man may be greatly benefited by the conduct of another, and may feel under obligation to reward him for it; or he maybe greatly injured in his person, property, or reputation, by another, and will endeavor to avenge himself. But nothing of this kind can happen to God. If he rewards, therefore, it must be of his grace and mercy, not because he is laid under obligation; if he inflicts chastisement, it must be because people deserve it, and not because God has been injured. In this reasoning Elihu undoubtedly refers to Job, whom he regards as having urged a “claim” to a different kind of treatment, because he supposed that he “deserved” it. The general principle of Elihu is clearly correct, that God is entirely independent of human beings; that neither our good nor evil conduct can effect his happiness, and that consequently his dealings with us are those of impartial justice.

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

If God were such a one as thou art, he might have benefit or hurt by thine actions; but being an infinite, independent, and self-sufficient Being, he is far exalted above all thy good or evil.

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

8. Thy wickedness… son of man — The original reads more tersely, For a man like thyself is thy wickedness; and for a son of man thy righteousness. Man, and not God, loses or gains according as man is wicked or righteous. The comment of Clement, in one of his homilies, is befitting: “Him they profit nothing, but they save themselves: him they injure not, but they are destroyed.”

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

Thy wickedness may hurt a man as thou art; and thy righteousness may profit the son (rather, a son) of man. Job must not think, Elihu means, that, because his good actions benefit and his bad actions injure his fellow men, therefore they must also in the one case injure and in the other benefit God. The cases are not parallel. God is too remote, too powerful, too great, to be touched by his actions. Job has done wrong, therefore, to expect that God would necessarily reward his righteousness by prosper us, happy life, and worse to complain because his expectations have been disappointed. It is of his mere spontaneous goodness and bounty that God rewards the godly.

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

a man like yourself your wickedness or your righteousness can and will benefit. Observe [that there are] many wicked men. who,...

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.