3 What profit is it to you to be cruel, to give up the work of your hands, looking kindly on the design of evil-doers?
Be not very angry, O Lord, and do not keep our sins in mind for ever: give ear to our prayer, for we are all your people.
The Lord will make all things complete for me: O Lord, your mercy is eternal; do not give up the works of your hands.
Get your strength together like a man of war: I will put questions to you, and you will give me the answers.
For this reason let those who by the purpose of God undergo punishment, keep on in well-doing and put their souls into the safe hands of their Maker.
By him I have been made to go in the dark where there is no light. Truly against me his hand has been turned again and again all the day. My flesh and my skin have been used up by him and my bones broken. He has put up a wall against me, shutting me in with bitter sorrow. He has kept me in dark places, like those who have been long dead. He has put a wall round me, so that I am not able to go out; he has made great the weight of my chain. Even when I send up a cry for help, he keeps my prayer shut out. He has put up a wall of cut stones about my ways, he has made my roads twisted. He is like a bear waiting for me, like a lion in secret places. By him my ways have been turned on one side and I have been pulled in bits; he has made me waste. With his bow bent, he has made me the mark for his arrows. He has let loose his arrows into the inmost parts of my body. I have become the sport of all the peoples; I am their song all the day. He has made my life nothing but pain, he has given me the bitter root in full measure. By him my teeth have been broken with crushed stones, and I am bent low in the dust. My soul is sent far away from peace, I have no more memory of good. And I said, My strength is cut off, and my hope from the Lord.
You are in the right, O Lord, when I put my cause before you: still let me take up with you the question of your decisions: why does the evil-doer do well? why are the workers of deceit living in comfort? They have been planted by you, they have taken root; they go on and give fruit: you are near in their mouths but far from their thoughts. But you, O Lord, have knowledge of me; you see me, searching and testing how my heart is with you: let them be pulled out like sheep to be put to death, make them ready for the day of death.
For the ears of the Lord are open to the poor, and he takes thought for his prisoners.
Truly, God will not give up him who is without sin, and will not take evil-doers by the hand.
He who says to a king, You are an evil-doer; and to rulers, You are sinners; Who has no respect for rulers, and who gives no more attention to those who have wealth than to the poor, for they are all the work of his hands.
For Job has said, I am upright, and it is God who has taken away my right; Though I am right, still I am in pain; my wound may not be made well, though I have done no wrong. What man is like Job, a man who freely makes sport of God,
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible » Commentary on Job 10
Commentary on Job 10 Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
CHAPTER 10
Job 10:1-22. Job's Reply to Bildad Continued.
1. leave my complaint upon myself—rather, "I will give loose to my complaint" (Job 7:11).
2. show me, &c.—Do not, by virtue of Thy mere sovereignty, treat me as guilty without showing me the reasons.
3. Job is unwilling to think God can have pleasure in using His power to "oppress" the weak, and to treat man, the work of His own hands, as of no value (Job 10:8; Ps 138:8).
shine upon—favor with prosperity (Ps 50:2).
4-6. Dost Thou see as feebly as man? that is, with the same uncharitable eye, as, for instance, Job's friends? Is Thy time as short? Impossible! Yet one might think, from the rapid succession of Thy strokes, that Thou hadst no time to spare in overwhelming me.
7. "Although Thou (the Omniscient) knowest," &c. (connected with Job 10:6), "Thou searchest after my sin."
and … that none that can deliver out of thine hand—Therefore Thou hast no need to deal with me with the rapid violence which man would use (see Job 10:6).
8. Made—with pains; implying a work of difficulty and art; applying to God language applicable only to man.
together round about—implying that the human body is a complete unity, the parts of which on all sides will bear the closest scrutiny.
9. clay—Job 10:10 proves that the reference here is, not so much to the perishable nature of the materials, as to their wonderful fashioning by the divine potter.
10. In the organization of the body from its rude commencements, the original liquid gradually assumes a more solid consistency, like milk curdling into cheese (Ps 139:15, 16). Science reveals that the chyle circulated by the lacteal vessels is the supply to every organ.
11. fenced—or "inlaid" (Ps 139:15); "curiously wrought" [Umbreit]. In the fœtus the skin appears first, then the flesh, then the harder parts.
12. visitation—Thy watchful Providence.
spirit—breath.
13. is with thee—was Thy purpose. All God's dealings with Job in his creation, preservation, and present afflictions were part of His secret counsel (Ps 139:16; Ac 15:18; Ec 3:11).
14, 15. Job is perplexed because God "marks" every sin of his with such ceaseless rigor. Whether "wicked" (godless and a hypocrite) or "righteous" (comparatively sincere), God condemns and punishes alike.
15. lift up my head—in conscious innocence (Ps 3:3).
see thou—rather, "and seeing I see (I too well see) mine affliction," (which seems to prove me guilty) [Umbreit].
16. increaseth—rather, "(if) I lift up (my head) Thou wouldest hunt me," &c. [Umbreit].
and again—as if a lion should not kill his prey at once, but come back and torture it again.
17. witnesses—His accumulated trials were like a succession of witnesses brought up in proof of his guilt, to wear out the accused.
changes and war—rather, "(thou settest in array) against me host after host" (literally, "changes and a host," that is, a succession of hosts); namely, his afflictions, and then reproach upon reproach from his friends.
20. But, since I was destined from my birth to these ills, at least give me a little breathing time during the few days left me (Job 9:34; 13:21; Ps 39:13).
22. The ideas of order and light, disorder and darkness, harmonize (Ge 1:2). Three Hebrew words are used for darkness; in Job 10:21 (1) the common word "darkness"; here (2) "a land of gloom" (from a Hebrew root, "to cover up"); (3) as "thick darkness" or blackness (from a root, expressing sunset). "Where the light thereof is like blackness." Its only sunshine is thick darkness. A bold figure of poetry. Job in a better frame has brighter thoughts of the unseen world. But his views at best wanted the definite clearness of the Christian's. Compare with his words here Re 21:23; 22:5; 2Ti 1:10.