16 My face is red with weeping, And on my eyelids is the shadow of death;
Mine eye also is dim by reason of sorrow, And all my members are as a shadow.
I am weary with my groaning; Every night make I my bed to swim; I water my couch with my tears. Mine eye wasteth away because of grief; It waxeth old because of all mine adversaries.
When I kept silence, my bones wasted away Through my groaning all the day long.
I am weary with my crying; my throat is dried: Mine eyes fail while I wait for my God.
For I have eaten ashes like bread, And mingled my drink with weeping,
The cords of death compassed me, And the pains of Sheol gat hold upon me: I found trouble and sorrow.
For these things I weep; mine eye, mine eye runneth down with water; Because the comforter that should refresh my soul is far from me: My children are desolate, because the enemy hath prevailed.
Then Jonah prayed unto Jehovah his God out of the fish's belly. And he said, I called by reason of mine affliction unto Jehovah, And he answered me; Out of the belly of Sheol cried I, `And' thou heardest my voice. For thou didst cast me into the depth, in the heart of the seas, And the flood was round about me; All thy waves and thy billows passed over me. And I said, I am cast out from before thine eyes; Yet I will look again toward thy holy temple. The waters compassed me about, even to the soul; The deep was round about me; The weeds were wrapped about my head. I went down to the bottoms of the mountains; The earth with its bars `closed' upon me for ever: Yet hast thou brought up my life from the pit, O Jehovah my God. When my soul fainted within me, I remembered Jehovah; And my prayer came in unto thee, into thy holy temple. They that regard lying vanities Forsake their own mercy. But I will sacrifice unto thee with the voice of thanksgiving; I will pay that which I have vowed. Salvation is of Jehovah. And Jehovah spake unto the fish, and it vomited out Jonah upon the dry land.
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Commentary on Job 16 Matthew Henry Commentary
Chapter 16
This chapter begins Job's reply to that discourse of Eliphaz which we had in the foregoing chapter; it is but the second part of the same song of lamentation with which he had before bemoaned himself, and is set to the same melancholy tune.
Job 16:1-5
Both Job and his friends took the same way that disputants commonly take, which is to undervalue one another's sense, and wisdom, and management. The longer the saw of contention is drawn the hotter it grows; and the beginning of this sort of strife is as the letting forth of water; therefore leave it off before it be meddled with. Eliphaz had represented Job's discourses as idle, and unprofitable, and nothing to the purpose; and Job here gives his the same character. Those who are free in passing such censures must expect to have them retorted; it is easy, it is endless: but cui bono?-what good does it do? It will stir up men's passions, but will never convince their judgments, nor set truth in a clear light. Job here reproves Eliphaz,
Job 16:6-16
Job's complaint is here as bitter as any where in all his discourses, and he is at a stand whether to smother it or to give it vent. Sometimes the one and sometimes the other is a relief to the afflicted, according as the temper or the circumstances are; but Job found help by neither, v. 6.
Here is a doleful representation of Job's grievances. O what reason have we to bless God that we are not making such complaints! He complains,
Job 16:17-22
Job's condition was very deplorable; but had he nothing to support him, nothing to comfort him? Yes, and he here tells us what it was.