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Job's friends are like Job's messengers: the latter followed one another close with evil tidings, the former followed him with harsh censures: both, unawares, served Satan's design; these to drive him from his integrity, those to drive him from the comfort of it. Eliphaz did not reply to what Job had said in answer to him, but left it to Bildad, whom he knew to be of the same mind with himself in this affair. Those are not the wisest of the company, but the weakest rather, who covet to have all the talk. Let others speak in their turn, and let the first keep silence, Co1 14:30, Co1 14:31. Eliphaz had undertaken to show that because Job was sorely afflicted he was certainly a wicked man. Bildad is much of the same mind, and will conclude Job a wicked man unless God do speedily appear for his relief. In this chapter he endeavours to convince Job, I. That he had spoken too passionately (Job 8:2). II. That he and his children had suffered justly (Job 8:3, Job 8:4). III. That, if he were a true penitent, God would soon turn his captivity (Job 8:5-7). IV. That it was a usual thing for Providence to extinguish the joys and hopes of wicked men as his were extinguished; and therefore that they had reason to suspect him for a hypocrite (Job 8:8-19). V. That they would be abundantly confirmed in their suspicion unless God did speedily appear for his relief (Job 8:20-22).

Bildad here discourses very well on the sad catastrophe of hypocrites and evil-doers and the fatal period of all their hopes and joys. He will not be so bold as to say with Eliphaz that none that were righteous were ever cut off thus (Job 4:7); yet he takes it for granted that God, in the course of his providence, does ordinarily bring wicked men, who seemed pious and were prosperous, to shame and ruin in this world, and that, by making their prosperity short, he discovers their piety to be counterfeit. Whether this will certainly prove that all who are thus ruined must be concluded to have been hypocrites he will not say, but rather suspect, and thinks the application is easy. I. He proves this truth, of the certain destruction of all the hopes and joys of hypocrites, by an appeal to antiquity and the concurring sentiment and observation of all wise and good men; and an undoubted truth it is, if we take in the other world, that, if not in this life, yet in the life to come, hypocrites will be deprived of all their trusts and all their triumphs: whether Bildad so meant or no, we must so take it. Let us observe the method of his proof, Job 8:8-10. 1. He insists not on his own judgment and that of his companions: We are but of yesterday, and know nothing, Job 8:9. He perceived that Job had no opinion of their abilities, but thought they knew little. "We will own," says Bildad, "that we know nothing, are as ready to confess our ignorance as thou art to condemn it; for we are but of yesterday in comparison, and our days upon earth are short and transient, and hastening away as a shadow. And hence," (1.) "We are not so near the fountain-head of divine revelation" (which then for aught that appears, was conveyed by tradition) "as the former age was; and therefore we must enquire what they said and recount what we have been told of their sentiments." Blessed be God, now that we have the word of God in writing, and are directed to search that, we need not enquire of the former age, nor prepare ourselves to the search of their fathers; for, though we ourselves are but of yesterday, the word of God in the scripture is as nigh to us as it was to them (Rom 10:8), and it is the more sure word of prophecy, to which we must take heed. If we study and keep God's precepts, we may by them understand more than the ancients, Psa 119:99,Psa 119:100. (2.) "We do not live so long as those of the former age did, to make observations upon the methods of divine providence, and therefore cannot be such competent judges as they in a cause of this nature." Note, The shortness of our lives is a great hindrance to the improvement of our knowledge, and so are the frailty and weakness of our bodies. Vita brevis, ars longa - life is short, the progress of art boundless. 2. He refers to the testimony of the ancients and to the knowledge which Job himself had of their sentiments. "Do thou enquire of the former age, and let them tell thee, not only their own judgment in this matter, but the judgment also of their fathers, Job 8:8. They will teach thee, and inform thee (Job 8:10), that all along, in their time, the judgments of God followed wicked men. This they will utter out of their hearts, that is, as that which they firmly believe themselves, which they are greatly affected with and desirous to acquaint and affect others with." Note, (1.) For the right understanding of divine Providence, and the unfolding of the difficulties of it, it will be of use to compare the observations and experiences of former ages with the events of our own day; and, in order thereto, to consult history, especially the sacred history, which is the most ancient, infallibly true, and written designedly for our learning. (2.) Those that would fetch knowledge from the former ages must search diligently, prepare for the search, and take pains for the search. (3.) Those words are most likely to reach to the hearts of the learners that come from the hearts of the teachers. Those shall teach thee best that utter words out of their heart, that speak by experience, and not by rote, of spiritual and divine things. The learned bishop Patrick suggests that Bildad being a Shuhite, descended from Shuah one of Abraham's sons by Keturah (Gen 25:2), in this appeal which he makes to history he has a particular respect to the rewards which the blessing of God secured to the posterity of faithful Abraham (who hitherto, and long after, continued in his religion) and to the extirpation of those eastern people, neighbours to Job (in whose country they were settled), for their wickedness, whence he infers that it is God's usual way to prosper the just and root out the wicked, though for a while they may flourish. II. He illustrates this truth by some similitudes. 1. The hopes and joys of the hypocrite are here compared to a rush or flag, v. 11-13. (1.) It grows up out of the mire and water. The hypocrite cannot gain his hope without some false rotten ground or other out of which to raise it, and with which to support it and keep it alive, any more than the rush can grow without mire. He grounds it on his worldly prosperity, the plausible profession he makes of religion, the good opinion of his neighbours, and his own good conceit of himself, which are no solid foundation on which to build his confidence. It is all but mire and water; and the hope that grows out of it is but rush and flag. (2.) It may look green and gay for a while (the rush outgrows the grass), but it is light and hollow, and empty, and good for nothing. It is green for show, but of no use. (3.) It withers presently, before any other herb, v. 12. Even while it is in its greenness it is dried away and gone in a little time. Note, The best state of hypocrites and evil-doers borders upon withering; even when it is green it is going. The grass is cut down and withers (Psa 90:6); but the rush is not cut down and yet withers, withers before it grows up (Psa 129:6): as it has no use, so it has no continuance. So are the paths of all that forget God (v. 13); they take the same way that the rush does, for the hypocrite's hope shall perish. Note, [1.] Forgetfulness of God is at the bottom of men's hypocrisy, and of the vain hopes with which they flatter and deceive themselves in their hypocrisy. Men would not be hypocrites if they did not forget that the God with whom they have to do searches the heart and requires truth there, that he is a Spirit and has his eye on our spirits; and hypocrites would have no hope if they did not forget that God is righteous, and will not be mocked with the torn and the lame. [2.] The hope of hypocrites is a great cheat upon themselves, and, though it may flourish for a while, it will certainly perish at last, and they with it. 2. They are here compared to a spider's web, or a spider's house (as it is in the margin), a cobweb, Job 8:14, Job 8:15. The hope of the hypocrite, (1.) Is woven out of his own bowels; it is the creature of his own fancy, and arises merely from a conceit of his own merit and sufficiency. There is a great deal of difference between the work of the bee and that of the spider. A diligent Christian, like the laborious bee, fetches in all his comfort from the heavenly dews of God's word; but the hypocrite, like the subtle spider, weaves his out of a false hypothesis of his own concerning God, as if he were altogether such a one as himself. (2.) He is very fond of it, as the spider of her web; pleases himself with it, wraps himself in it, calls it his house, leans upon it, and holds it fast. It is said of the spider that she takes hold with her hands, and is in kings' palaces, Pro 30:28. So does a carnal worldling hug himself in the fulness and firmness of his outward prosperity; he prides himself in that house as his palace, fortifies himself in it as his castle, and makes use of it as the spider of her web, to ensnare those he has a mind to prey upon. So does a formal professor; he flatters himself in his own eyes, doubts not of his salvation, is secure of heaven, and cheats the world with his vain confidences. (3.) It will easily and certainly be swept away, as the cobweb with the besom, when God shall come to purge his house. The prosperity of worldly people will fail them when they expect to find safety and happiness in it. They seek to hold fast their estates, but God is plucking them out of their hands; and whose shall all those things be, which they have provided? or what the better they will be for them? The confidences of hypocrites will fail them. I tell you, I know you not. The house built on the sand will fall in the storm, when the builder most needs it and promised himself the benefit of it. When a wicked man dies his expectation perishes. The ground of his hopes will prove false; he will be disappointed of the thing he hoped for, and his foolish hope with which he buoyed himself up will be turned into endless despair; and thus his hope will be cut off, his web, that refuge of lies, swept away, and he crushed in it. 3. The hypocrite is here compared to a flourishing and well-rooted tree, which, though it do not wither of itself, yet will easily be cut down and its place no it no more. The secure and prosperous sinner may think himself wronged when he is compared to a rush and a flag; he thinks he has a better root. "We will allow him his conceit," says Bildad, "and give him all the advantage he can desire, and bring him in suddenly cut off." He is here represented as Nebuchadnezzar was in his own dream (Dan 4:10) by a great tree. (1.) See this tree fair and flourishing (Job 8:16) like a green bay-tree (Psa 37:35), green before the sun, it keeps its greenness in defiance of the scorching sun-beams, and his branch shoots forth under the protection of his garden-wall and with the benefit of his garden-soil. See it fixed, and taking deep root, never likely to be overthrown by stormy winds, for his roots are interwoven with the stones (Job 8:17); it grows in firm ground, not, as the rush, of mire and water. Thus does a wicked man, when he prospers in the world, think himself secure; his wealth is a high wall in his own conceit. (2.) See this tree felled and forgotten notwithstanding, destroyed from his place (Job 8:18), and so entirely extirpated that there shall remain no sign or token where it grew. The very place say, I have not seen thee; and the standers by shall say the same. I sought him, but he could not be found, Psa 37:36. He made a great show and a great noise for a time, but he is gone of a sudden, and neither root nor branch is left him, Mal 4:1. This is the joy (that is, this is the end and conclusion) of the wicked man's way (Job 8:19); this is that which all his joy comes to. The way of the ungodly shall perish, Psa 1:6. His hope, he thought, would in the issue be turned into joy; but this is the issue, this is the joy. The harvest shall be a heap in the day of grief and of desperate sorrow, Isa 17:11. This is the best of it; and what then is the worst of it? But shall he not leave a family behind him to enjoy what he has? No, out of the earth (not out of his roots) shall others grow, that are nothing akin to him, and shall fill up his place, and rule over that for which he labored. Others (that is, others of the same spirit and disposition) shall grow up in his place, and be as secure as ever he was, not warned by his fall. The way of worldlings is their folly, and yet there is a race of those that approve their sayings, Psa 49:13.

INTRODUCTION TO JOB 8 In this chapter Bildad enters the discussion with Job; proceeding upon the same lines as Eliphaz, he reproves him for his long and loud talk, Job 8:1; asserts the justice of God in his providence, of which the taking away of Job's children by death for their transgression was an instance and proof, Job 8:3; and suggests, that if Job, who had not sinned so heinously as they had, and therefore was spared, would make his submission to God, and ask forgiveness of him, and behave for the future with purity and uprightness, he need not doubt but God would immediately appear and exert himself on his behalf, and bless him and his with prosperity and plenty, Job 8:5; for this was his ordinary way of dealing with the children of men, for the truth of which he refers him to the records of former times, and to the sentiments of ancient men, who lived longer, and were more knowing than he and his friends, on whose opinion he does not desire him to rely, Job 8:8; and then by various similes used by the ancients, or taken from them by Bildad, or which were of his own inventing and framing, are set forth the short lived enjoyments, and vain hope and confidence, of hypocrites and wicked men; as by the sudden withering of rushes and flags of themselves, that grow in mire and water, even in their greenness, before they are cut down, or cropped by any hand, Job 8:11; and by the spider's web, which cannot stand and endure when leaned upon and held, Job 8:14; and by a flourishing tree destroyed, and seen no more, Job 8:16; and the chapter is concluded with an observation and maxim, that he and the rest of his friends set out upon, and were tenacious of; that God did not afflict good men in any severe manner, but filled them with joy and gladness; and that he would not long help and prosper wicked men, but bring them and their dwelling place to nought; and this being the case of Job, he suggests that he was such an one, Job 8:20.

For we are but of yesterday (s),.... Which is not to be understood strictly of the day last past, but of a short space of time backward; and especially when compared with the antediluvian fathers, who lived the far greater part of them upwards of nine hundred years; otherwise Bildad and his two friends were men in years; Eliphaz says, that with them were the gray headed and very aged men, much older than the father of Job, and Elihu speaks of himself as a young man, and of them as very old; see Job 15:10, and know nothing; which is not to be taken in an absolute sense, for they knew much of the things of nature, providence, and grace; they were men of great understanding in things natural, civil, and religious, as appears by their discourses; but in a comparative sense, or when compared with the long lived patriarchs, who through the length of their days had much time and opportunity to make their observations on things, to learn the arts and sciences, and improve themselves in all useful knowledge, human and divine; for which reason Job is sent to inquire of them; whereas they had been but a little while in the world, and knew but little, to whom might be applied that saying, as now to men since, "ars longa, vita brevis"; and they knew nothing as it is to be known, or perfectly, or in comparison of the saints in heaven; for they that know most here know but in part, see through a glass darkly; but in the other world they see face to face, and know as they are known. Moreover, Bildad might say this of himself and his friends, in a modest manner, having learned to know themselves, their weakness, and their folly; and the first and great lesson of wisdom is to become fools in men's own apprehension, in order to be truly wise, having the like sense of themselves as Agur had, Pro 30:2; see Co1 3:18; or rather this might be said as being the sense of Job concerning them, who had a very mean and indifferent opinion of them; see Job 12:2; and therefore Bildad would not have him take their sense of things, but inquire of persons older and wiser: because our days upon earth are a shadow; man's time is rather measured by days than by months and years, being so short; and these are called "days" on earth, to distinguish them from the days of heaven, which are one everlasting day, in which there is no night of darkness, either in a literal or figurative sense, and which will never end; but the days of this life are like a "shadow", dark and obscure; full of the darkness of adversity and trouble, as well as greatly deficient in the light of knowledge; there is nothing in them solid and substantial; the greatest and best things of this life are but a vain show; in heaven there is a better and more enduring substance: every thing is mutable and uncertain here; man is subject to a variety of changes in his mind and body, in family and outward estate and circumstances: and life itself is but a vapour, which appears a while and soon vanishes away; or rather like a shadow, that declines, is fleeting, and quickly gone; see Ch1 29:15. (s) Pindar. Pythia, Ode 8.

In order to give authority to his words, Bildad calls the venerable past as a witness, so that he may appear to know through long experience what he has said or is about to say. In a different sense, Bildad wants Job to learn from ancient examples what he had said before, that is, that God is appeased by the prayers of the righteous. Through God’s support not only are calamities dissolved but also prosperity and happiness are returned. Thus God, whom they had invoked, protected Abraham and his descendants in their distress. Observe a third sense in Bildad’s words: “I want you to consider the ancient examples, so that you may not despise my advice because of my youth.”

For inquire, I pray thee, of the former age, and diligently search into the memory of the fathers. They give us notice that 'the former generation' and 'the memory of the fathers' are not seen but 'searched,' because they will not have that to be seen therein, which lies open before the eyes of all men. But sometimes, like good men, they give some instruction of a moral kind, and shew how the present may be gathered from the past; and from the things which are even now withdrawn from our eyes by passing away, they shew how little there is in the things that are seen before our eyes.

In the preceding verses, Bildad of Shuah defended the same opinion Eliphaz the Temanite had proposed that men divinely punished in this present life for sin return to a state of prosperity after their conversion. He now intends to prove this in two ways: first from experience, second from analogy. Learning through experience is especially effective in particular things as far as proof and much more so the longer it has been observed and found without error. Those things which require long observation are especially verified by the memories of the ancients and so he has recourse to prove his proposition to the memories of the ancients. With reference to the ancients he says, "Question the generation that has passed." With reference to those immediately preceding him he says, "carefully investigate the memory of your fathers," that is those things which your fathers remember. The questioning of an earlier generation is done by considering what is written about the deeds of the ancients and what is reported about the ancients in tradition. Since many things both written and told about deeds of old are legends, he refers Job to the fathers who can speak about those things which they have actually seen so that no one can think him duped.

A man's wisdom makes his face shine, Ecc 8:1. Kings are to be greatly respected, Ecc 8:2-4. Of him who keeps the commandment; of the misery of man; of the certainty of death, Ecc 8:5-8. Of him that rules another to his own hurt, Ecc 8:9. The end of the wicked, Ecc 8:10. God's longsuffering, Ecc 8:11, Ecc 8:12. It shall be ill with wicked men, Ecc 8:13. Strange events in the course of Providence, Ecc 8:14, Ecc 8:15. God's works cannot be found out, Ecc 8:16, Ecc 8:17.

Inquire - of the former age - לדור רישון ledor rishon, of the first age; of the patriarchs; the first generation of men that dwelt upon the earth: not of the age that was just past, as Mr. Peters and several others have imagined, in order to keep up the presumption of Job's high antiquity. Bildad most evidently refers to an antiquity exceedingly remote.

THE ADDRESS OF BILDAD. (Job 8:1-22) like a . . . wind?--disregarding restraints, and daring against God.

The sages of the olden time reached an age beyond those of Job's time (see on Job 42:16), and therefore could give the testimony of a fuller experience.

8 For inquire only of former ages, And attend to the research of their fathers - 9 For we are of yesterday, without experience, Because our days upon earth are a shadow - 10 Shall they not teach thee, speak to thee, And bring forth words from their heart? This challenge calls Deu 32:7 to mind. לבּך is to be supplied to כּונן; the conjecture of Olshausen, וּבונן, is good, but unnecessary. רשׁון is after the Aramaic form of writing, comp. Job 15:7, where this and the ordinary form are combined. The "research of their fathers," i.e., which the fathers of former generations have bequeathed to them, is the collective result of their research, the profound wisdom of the ancients gathered from experience. Our ephemeral and shadowy life is not sufficient for passing judgment on the dealings of God; we must call history and tradition to our aid. We are תּמול (per aphaeresin, the same as אתמול), yesterday = of yesterday; it is not necessary to read, with Olshausen, מתּמול. There is no occasion for us to suppose that Job 8:9 is an antithesis to the long duration of life of primeval man. לב (Job 8:10) is not the antithesis of mouth; but has the pregnant signification of a feeling, i.e., intelligent heart, as we find לבב אישׁ, a man of heart, i.e., understanding, Job 34:10, Job 34:34. יוציאוּ, promunt, calls to mind Mat 13:52. Now follow familiar sayings of the ancients, not directly quoted, but the wisdom of the fathers, which Bildad endeavours to reproduce.