Bible Commentaries

Job 15:12 — there were no devil, yet our corrupt nature would act Satan’s part against itself; it would have a supply of wickedness (as a serpent hath of poison) from itself, it hath a spring to feed it. Keep thy heart therefore with all custody, Proverbs 4:24 ; it will get away else, and carry thee away with it. And what do thy eyes wink at? — Nictant, celeriter scilicet, et subtiliter. Possibly Job, through pain and anguish, might be made to wink while he was speaking to them, or they to him; and

Job 15:21 — and those Persians and Saracens overcome by Theodosius! Panico terrore incusso, saith the historian, afraid of their own shadows, they desperately cast themselves into the river Euphrates, and there perished above a hundred thousand of them, A.D. 394. The wicked flee when none pursueth, Proverbs 28:1 ; the sound of a shaken leaf chaseth him, Leviticus 26:36 , when the righteous is bold as a lion, and not dismayed at evil tidings, Psalms 112:7 . His heart is balanced with the fear of God; and thence

Job 16:4 — could speak as you do, … — Every whit as curiously, as furiously. I could scold and scoff as freely as you do, but I know no warrant so to retort and retaliate; "being reviled, we bless; being defamed, we entreat," 1 Corinthians 4:12-13 . To render railing for railing is to think to wash off dirt with dirt. If your soul were in my soul’s stead — Some read it optatively, as Isaiah 64:1 , Would to God your soul were in my soul’s stead; for then I would heap up

Job 19:19 — correspondence; lo, these now abhor me, and keep aloof off from me; yea, they apostatize from their professed friendship; and renouncing the laws of love, they deal despitefully with me, and are turned against me. Such a one was Ahithophel to David, Psalms 55:14-15 , Judas to Christ, Matthew 26:23 , and Bildad to Job (as some conceive that he conceited by the latter clause of this verse). And they whom I loved, … — Heb. And this man whom I loved, this bitter Bildad, that in his last speech hath

Job 20:22 — 6:6 . True piety hath true plenty, and is never without a well contenting sufficiency, wherein the good man is, when in the fulness of straits. See it in David, 1 Samuel 30:6 , in Habakkuk, Habakkuk 3:16-17 , in Paul, 2 Corinthians 6:10 Philippians 4:11 , he had nothing, and yet possessed all things. But that which Zophar here drives at, is to show that the oppressor shall be ruined when at highest, and when he least looketh for it; as was Nebuchadnezzar, Haman, Belshazzar, Babylon the Great, Revelation

Job 22:25 — shalt have plenty of silver. Yea, the Almighty shall be thy defence — Or, thy gold, for the same word signifieth both, Job 36:19 , because gold is the worldly man’s defence, Proverbs 18:11 , though but a sorry one, Zephaniah 1:18 Proverbs 11:4 Ezekiel 7:19 . It is as if he should say, Either thou shalt have gold gods plenty; or else, thou shalt have that which is better than gold, viz. God the maker and master of all the world, saith Junius, who rendereth the text thus, And the Almighty shall

Job 24:4 — poor of the earth hide themselves together. They turn the needy out of the way — Either to make room for themselves, as the only men. Stand back, say the Sodomites to Lot, Genesis 19:9 . Stand further off, say those in Isaiah. See Proverbs 30:14 Amos 8:4 . Or else, because when these spoilers are abroad, they beset the ways, and no travellers, be they never so poor and needy, can pass freely by them (Beza); insomuch that they are constrained to leave the broad beaten way, and everywhere to

Job 24:8 — reckons it for a piece of his sufferings that he was ανεστιος , and had no settled station, no certain dwelling place, αστατουμεν , 1 Corinthians 4:11 .

Job 27:3 — Dum spiritus hos regat artas, While I have an hour to breathe, I will hold to this oath of mine; neither may you ever hope to dispute me out of mine integrity. Life is described by breath, which, when it faileth, the man dieth, 1 Kings 17:17 Psalms 146:4 Isaiah 2:22 . Cease ye from man, whose breath is in his nostrils, every moment ready to puff out. What is man, saith Nazianzen, but soul and soil, breath and body, a puff of wind the one, a pile of dust the other, no solidity in either? Jovinian,

Job 28:14 — earth, nor with pearls and coral in the sea; we must be taught by God, and the Holy Spirit must join himself to our chariot, as Philip did to the eunuch’s, Acts 8:29 ; he must teach us this wisdom from above, or we can never learn it, Isaiah 54:13 . A man may read the figure on the dial, but he cannot tell how the day goes unless the sun shine upon the dial; we may read over the book of the creature, and the book of the Scripture, but we cannot learn to purpose till the Spirit of God shine

Job 32:19 — of those bottles, speech to the opening of them, by taking away the stopple of silence. And although in this discourse Elihu may seem to lay on more words than the matter requireth, yet he doth not; for he saith no more than the psalmist doth, Psalms 45:1 , and Jeremiah, Jeremiah 6:11 , and the apostles, Acts 4:20 , "We cannot but speak," … And whereas Gregory saith that all this came from pride in Elihu, Chrysostom praiseth him rather (and therein he is in the right) for his zeal,

Job 33:16 — bore bigger, as it were, that good counsel may enter; he calleth up the ears of the soul to the ears of the body, that one sound may pierce both; he saith, as to him in the Gospel Ephphatha; and together with his word there goeth forth a power, as Luke 4:32 . See Job 36:10 ; Job 36:15 . And sealeth their instruction — Or, their correction, for they go together, Psalms 94:12 Proverbs 3:12-13 ; Proverbs 6:14 , and God sealeth, or setteth on, the one by the other; as when a schoolmaster would have

Job 38:36 — Jeremiah 17:10 ; and hath given wisdom to man to moderate his affections and concupiscences which are here seated, and to get truth into these inward parts, Psalms 51:6 , that this hidden man of the heart may be highly accepted in heaven, 1 Peter 3:4 . Or who hath given understanding to the heart? — To the cock, saith the Vulgate Latin, after the Talmudists and Jewish doctors; who teach their disciples whensoever they hear the cock crow by night to say this benediction, The Lord be praised,

Job 38:7 — these in the morning of the creation, when first those heavenly torches began to shine, and joyfully to dance, as it were, in number and measure. This they do still in their kind, Psalms 19:1 , beckoning also, as it were, to us to do the like, Psalms 145:3 . And all the sons of God shouted for joy? — i.e. All the angels, as Job 1:6 , meant also by those morning stars, as Piscator and others will have it. These being created, together with the highest heavens, on the first day (as it is probable,

Job 42:4 — Hear, I beseech thee, and I will speak: I will demand of thee, and declare thou unto me. Hear, I beseech thee, and I will speak — We have had his confession; follow now his petition here, his humiliation and reformation, Job 42:6 . These are the parts and properties of true repentance, that fair daughter of a foul mother, sin. But had not Job promised to speak no more, to proceed no farther? Job 40:4-5 . How then doth he say here, I beseech, and I will speak? The answer is

Psalms 10:4 — that the ground whereon the peacock useth to sit is by that occasion made exceeding barren; so where pride roosteth and reigneth, no good groweth. God is not in all his thoughts — God is neither in his head, as here, nor in his heart, Psalms 14:1 , nor in his words, Psalms 12:4 , nor in his ways, Titus 1:16 ; he is wholly without God in the world, Ephesians 2:1-3 , he studies atheism, and all his thoughts are, There is no God, so this text may be read, he would fain so persuade himself.

Psalms 119:1 — 119:122 ), under the name of testimonies, laws, statutes, word, judgments, precepts, … Who walk in the law of the Lord — Who walk towards heaven in heaven’s way; avoiding the corruptions that are in the world through lust, 2 Peter 1:4 .

Psalms 50:15 — that if he sent that ring to her at any time when he was in distress she would remember and deliver him. He sent it, but it never came to her hands; but prayer never miscarrieth. And thou shall glorify me — Servati sumus, ut serviamus, Luke 1:74 . And yet it is ten to one that any returneth, with the leper, to give God the glory of a deliverance. Plerique ut accipiant importuni, donec acceperint inquieti, ubi acceperint ingrati, saith Bernard truly: Most men are importunate that they may receive

Psalms 58:3 — them, and quite turned away their hearts from God and goodness, whereunto they stand utterly across, and have an innate antipathy; they are not only averse thereto, but adverse also; yea, to their sinews of iron they have added brows of brass, Isaiah 48:4 . Sinful, indeed, we are all by nature, and a birth blot we bring into the world with us, making us strangers to and strayers from God. But some God sanctifieth even from the womb, as he did Jeremiah; and some by the light of nature, not altogether

Psalms 68:1 — arcam in arcem, the ark of God into the tower of Sion. Confer Psalms 68:1 with Numbers 10:35 . Herein also he treateth of the greatest secrets of Christ’s kingdom, and prophesieth of things to come, as Acts 2:30-31 ; witness the apostle, Ephesians 4:8 . Let God arise — He need do no more that his enemies may be scattered, though never so closely united, etiamsi cataphraetus incedat Satan, as Luther speaketh; digitum suum tantum moveat, et dissipabuntur hostes, Let the Lord but stir his finger