Giobbe 19:3 Commento

This chapter is Job's answer to Bildad's discourse in the foregoing chapter. Though his spirit was grieved and much heated, and Bildad was very peevish, yet he gave him leave to say all he designed to say, and did not break in upon him in the midst of his argument; but, when he had done, he gave him a fair answer, in which, I. He complains of unkind usage. And very unkindly he takes it. 1. That his comforters added to his affliction (Job 19:2-7). 2. That his God was the author of his affliction (Job 19:8-12). 3. That his relations and friends were strange to him, and shy of him, in his affliction (Job 19:20-22). II. He comforts himself with the believing hopes of happiness in the other world, though he had so little comfort in this, making a very solemn confession of his faith, with a desire that it might be recorded as an evidence of his sincerity (Job 19:23-27). III. He concludes with a caution to his friends not to persist in their hard censures of him (Job 19:28, Job 19:29) If the remonstrance Job here makes of his grievances may serve sometimes to justify our complaints, yet his cheerful views of the future state, at the same time, may shame us Christians, and may serve to silence our complaints, or at least to balance them.

INTRODUCTION TO JOB 19 This chapter contains Job's reply to Bildad's second speech, in which he complains of the ill usage of his friends, of their continuing to vex him, and to beat, and bruise, and break him in pieces with their hard words, and to reproach him, and carry it strange to him, Job 19:1; which he thought was very cruel, since, if he was mistaken, the mistake lay with himself, Job 19:4; and if they were determined to go on at this rate, he would have them observe, that his afflictions were of God, and therefore should take care to what they imputed them, since he could not get the reasons of them, or his cause to be heard, though he vehemently and importunately sought it, Job 19:5; and then gives an enumeration of the several particulars of his distress, all which he ascribes to God, Job 19:8; and he enlarges upon that part of his unhappy case, respecting the alienation of his nearest relations, most intimate acquaintance and friends, from him, and their contempt of him, and the like treatment he met with from his servants, and even young children, Job 19:13; all which, with other troubles, had such an effect upon him as to reduce him to a mere skeleton, and which he mentions to move the pity of these his friends, now conversing with him, Job 19:20; and yet after all, and in the midst of it, and which was his great support under his trials, he expresses his strong faith in his living Redeemer, who should appear on the earth in the latter day, and be his Saviour, and in the resurrection of the dead through him, which he believed he should share in, and in all the happiness consequent on it; and he wishes this confession of his faith might be written and engraven, and be preserved on a rock for ever for the good of posterity, Job 19:23; and closes the chapter with an expostulation with his friends, dissuading them from persecuting him any longer, since there was no reason for it in himself, and it might be attended with bad consequences to them, Job 19:28.

And be it indeed that I have erred,.... Which is a concession for argument's sake, but not an acknowledgment that he had erred; though it is possible he might have erred, and it is certain he did in some things, though not in that respect with which he was charged; "humanum est errare", all men are subject to mistakes, good men may err; they may err in judgment, or from the truth in some respect, and be carried away for a while and to some degree with the error the wicked, though they shall be turned from it again; they may err in practice, and wander from the way of God's commandments; and indeed their strayings and aberrations of this sort are so many, that David says, "who can understand his errors?" Psa 19:12; and they may err in words, or make a mistake in speech; but then no man should be made an offender for a word for he must be a perfect man that is free from mistakes of this kind: now Job argues that supposing this to be his case in any of the above instances; yet, says he, mine error remaineth with myself; I only am chargeable with it, and answerable for it; it is nothing to you, and why should you trouble yourselves about it? it will not be imputed to you, nor will you suffer on account of it; or, admitting I have imbibed an error, I do not publish it abroad; I keep it to myself; it lies and lodges in my own breast, and nobody is the worse for it: or "let it remain", or "lodge with me" (k); Why should my mistakes be published abroad, and all the world be made acquainted with them? or else this expresses his resolution to abide by what his friends called an error; and then the so is, if this is an error which I have asserted, that God afflicts both good and bad men, and that afflictions are no argument of a man's being an hypocrite and a wicked man, I am determined to continue in it; I will not give it up, I will hold it fast; it shall remain with me as a principle never to be departed from; or it may be rather his meaning is, that this notion he had imbibed would remain with him, and was likely to do so, for anything they had said, or could say to the contrary. (k) "mecum maneat", Beza; to the same sense Mercerus, Schmidt, Junius and Tremellius, Piscator, Michaelis, Schultens.

“Only know that the Lord has dealt with me thus.… You speak against me; you do not feel for me but bear hard upon me.… May the dignity of him who punishes me make you change your mind,” he says. We do not have to trample underfoot the people who are punished by God, but we must shed tears and grieve over their fate. Above all, we must not rejoice over the death of anybody, because such an action will not be left unpunished. Who would have not respected Job’s misfortune, at least because of the dignity of him who chastised him?

Lo, these ten times ye confound me. On enumerating the successive times of the speeches of Job's friends, we learn that as yet they had spoken but five times. But for this reason, that he had five times heard rebukes from them, and five times himself replied to their rebukes, he says that he had been ten times confounded; because both herein, viz. that he had been causelessly reproached, he suffered deeply, and in this, that he uttered words of instruction to those that gave no ear, he underwent confusion. And so, while in hearing he held his peace, and in speaking was not heard, that person had trouble put upon him, who both in holding his peace submissively, and in speaking to them fruitlessly, experienced pain within his heart; and hence he says above, What shall I do? If I speak, my grief is not assuaged; and though I forbear, it will not depart from me. ALLEGORICAL INTERPRETATION But if we make these words refer to a type of Holy Church, it is well known that it is her great delight to keep the precepts of the Ten Commandments; and the wicked 'confound her ten times,' in that by all that they do wrong in their wicked principles, they forsake the precepts of the Ten Commandments, and cause confusion to the good as often as they set themselves against the words of God in their doings, It goes on; And ye are not ashamed that ye oppress me. There are some persons, whom bad principle suddenly springing up invites to the commission of wickedness, yet respect for their fellow-creatures recalls again. And very often from this, viz. that they are made ashamed outwardly, they are brought back into their own interior heart, and pass an inward judgment upon themselves; in that if they are afraid to do what is evil on man's account, how much more ought they not even to have longed after what is evil, on God's account, Who sees all things? And in the case of these persons it is brought to pass, that they correct greater evil by inferior good, i.e. interior sin by exterior shame. Again, there are some, who, when once they have brought themselves to contemn God in their hearts, despise the judgments of their fellow-creatures much more, and all the evil that they long after, they do not blush to execute boldly, which persons secret wickedness invites to the commission of sin, and outward shame holds not back; as it is said also of a certain wicked judge, Which feared not God, neither regarded man. Hence too it is said of certain persons sinning with shameless effrontery; And they have declared their sin as Sodom. Thus very often there are such persons enemies of Holy Church, persons who are not withheld from committing wicked things, either by the fear of God, or regard of man; and it is well said to these by blessed Job, And ye are not ashamed that ye oppress me; seeing that though it was wrong to have wished bad things, it is worse not to be ashamed of things wrongly desired.

It is tolerable if someone speaks against his own friend once, but if the man says the same things over and over he seems to be firmly established in malice, and so he then says, "Behold! You have confused me ten times," both by speaking yourselves and by listening to me with some anger. Before this present response, Job is found to have spoken five times if we begin from when he said, "Cursed be the day I was born." (3:13) and the friends are found to have answered him five times. Even if they should not cease to afflict the one they were tormenting for friendship's sake, they at least could stop afflicting him because they were refuting and so he then says, "and you do not blush in oppressing me," for you wear me as much out with your reproaches as your lengthy discourses.

The worth of a poor upright man. Riches preserve friends. False witnesses. False friends. A king's wrath. The foolish son. The prudent wife. Slothfulness. Pity for the poor. The fear of the Lord. The spendthrift son. Obedience to parents.

These ten times - The exact arithmetical number is not to be regarded; ten times being put for many times, as we have already seen. See particularly the note on Gen 31:7 (note). Ye make yourselves strange to me - When I was in affluence and prosperity, ye were my intimates, and appeared to rejoice in my happiness; but now ye scarcely know me, or ye profess to consider me a wicked man because I am in adversity. Of this you had no suspicion when I was in prosperity! Circumstances change men's minds.

JOB'S REPLY TO BILDAD. (Job 19:1-29) How long, &c.--retorting Bildad's words (Job 18:2). Admitting the punishment to be deserved, is it kind thus ever to be harping on this to the sufferer? And yet even this they have not yet proved.

These--prefixed emphatically to numbers (Gen 27:36). ten--that is, often (Gen 31:7). make yourselves strange--rather, "stun me" [GESENIUS]. (See Margin for a different meaning [that is, "harden yourselves against me"]).