Jobchapter 13
28 verses · unknown · 10th century BC · Wisdom and poetry
Though He slay me, I will hope in Him. I will still defend my ways to His face.
Introduction
unknown, Wisdom and poetry, Job Overview.
Job continues his answer to the three friends, and in this chapter he prepares to take his case before God. He speaks as a man ready to stand trial who believes his own integrity will be his defense. His hearers knew how village cases were settled by witnesses at the gate and what a false witness could cost. Listen for his charge that the friends are speaking falsely on God's behalf. Listen for the famous line in the middle, and notice that it belongs to a legal speech. The chapter closes with the questions of a defendant who wants to hear the charge.
Context
- Who
- Hearers who knew what a false witness cost in a village trial
- What
- Job's rebuke of the friends as false witnesses for God, followed by his resolve to argue his case before God and his request to know his sin.
- Where
- The ash heap outside Job's town, framed as a courtroom Job means to enter.
- When
- The continuation of Job's reply to the first round of speeches.
- Why
- To show Job seeking a hearing before God and resting his case on his integrity.
Historical context
Job turns on his friends with a legal accusation of his own. He calls them forgers of lies and physicians of no value, and asks whether they will 'speak wickedly for God' and talk deceitfully for him, that is, whether they will perjure themselves on God's behalf. In a world where court cases were decided at the town gate by testimony, false witness was among the gravest crimes, and he is charging them with it.
Show the rest of the historical context, 3 more paragraphs
He then warns them that God will not be impressed by their partiality. Accepting a person's face, showing favour, was the standard term for a corrupt judge, and Job says the friends are behaving like advocates trying to curry favour with the bench.
'Though he slay me, yet will I trust in him' sits in the middle of the chapter, and the Hebrew is genuinely difficult; the traditional rendering carries trust, while another reading has Job say he has no hope but will defend his ways anyway. Both readings agree on the next line, which is the point: he will maintain his own ways before God's face, because a hypocrite would never dare come there at all.
His two requests are the terms a defendant asked for: take your hand off me, and stop terrifying me, then call, and I will answer, or let me speak and you reply. The last section is the actual complaint, in the language of decay: a man consumed like a rotten thing, like a garment moths have eaten, and 'wilt thou break a leaf driven to and fro?'
Significance
This is where the book plants its most quoted line, and hearers should notice where it sits, not in a hymn, but in the middle of a man preparing to sue God and betting his life on the outcome.
Show the rest of the significance, 1 more paragraph
The claim underneath it is the one that turns out to be right: Job says his willingness to stand in God's presence is itself evidence he is not a fraud. God says the same thing at the end.
This chapter in Jewish lifeWhat this chapter is in Jewish life and reading.
What is done
The site's table names no weekly portion, no Haftarah and no festival reading for this chapter. Its probe of src/lib/hebraic/readings.ts printed parashot total 0 and haftarah uses total 0 for Job.
The corpus sets the chapter chiefly in the tractate Sotah. Under the fifteenth verse it carries Sotah 27b:13 and 31a:3, with Jerusalem Talmud Sotah 5:5:1, Berakhot 10a:32 and Tractate Soferim 6:6. Under the sixteenth it carries Sotah 42a:5, Jerusalem Talmud Sotah 5:5:2 and Sanhedrin 103a:12. Under the fourth it carries Chullin 121a:3. Through the Tanchuma it ties the twelfth verse to Ki Teitzei 5:1 and the twenty-seventh to Metzora 1:1.
How it is read
Malbim is quoted here from Malbim's Job, translated by Jeremy I. Pfeffer (Ktav, 2003), which Sefaria reports as CC-BY. His one note in English on the chapter reads Job returning to the question of human sense perception. Job reaffirms "that they are genuine and that everyone sees things the same, nobody having a better view of reality than anyone else" (Malbim on Job 13:1:1).
Rashi is quoted from The Judaica Press complete Tanach with Rashi, translated by A. J. Rosenberg, which Sefaria reports as CC-BY. He reads Job turning from the friends to God. Job wishes only to speak to God and to debate with Him (Rashi on Job 13:3:1). "Since you come to contend in the place of God, it is not good that you should speak unjustly" (Rashi on Job 13:7:1). The friends have come to flatter God by being partial to Him (Rashi on Job 13:8:1).
At the eleventh verse Rashi gives two readings of one word. In the first it is God's exaltation and awesomeness. Others define it as His burning fire, and Rashi sets verses of Samuel and Judges beside that sense (Rashi on Job 13:11:1). The first reads the word as height and the second as flame.
Job then chooses to speak. Whatever comes on him for his outcry, let it come (Rashi on Job 13:13:1), for why should he hold his flesh in his teeth and force himself to silence (Rashi on Job 13:14:1). At the fifteenth verse Rashi gives Job's resolve in these words. "I will not separate from Him, and I will always hope for Him" (Rashi on Job 13:15:1). As Job is wholehearted with God, God is his salvation, and the friends will not find favor (Rashi on Job 13:16:1).
The two things of the twentieth verse Rashi names as Heavenly judgment and earthly judgment. Before Heaven Job would confess that he sinned, and before an earthly court he would not confess. Rashi adds that he did not hear this reading, a remark the corpus marks as absent in some editions (Rashi on Job 13:20:1).
At the twenty-first verse Rashi takes the word as compulsion, from Elihu's speech later in the book. Some read it as the hand. Rashi finds that hard, since he does not find the word used in the sense of harm, only of protection (Rashi on Job 13:21:1).
The corpus carries five further notes on this chapter without an English text, each marked linked because Sefaria holds no English version of the ref. They stand cited and unquoted at Metzudat David on Job 13:2:1, 13:5:1, 13:22:1 and 13:23:1, and at Ibn Ezra on Job 13:17:1.
What the rabbis say
The corpus carries forty rabbinic locators on this chapter and the text of none, so each is cited here by ref alone. On the first verse it holds Aggadat Bereshit 1:3. On the fourth it holds Chullin 121a:3 and Pirkei DeRabbi Eliezer 33:14. On the ninth it holds Midrash Lekach Tov, Exodus 8:25:4 and Midrash Sekhel Tov, Shemot 8:25:6. On the twelfth it holds Midrash Tanchuma Buber, Ki Teitzei 5:1, Midrash Tanchuma, Ki Teitzei 5:1, Pesikta DeRav Kahana 3:2, Pesikta Rabbati 12:1 and Yalkut Shimoni on Torah 938:32.
The fifteenth verse draws thirteen, the heaviest run in the chapter. The corpus holds the five Talmud and Soferim locators named above, with Ein Yaakov (Glick Edition) at Berakhot 1:52 and Sotah 5:3. With them stand Aggadat Bereshit 84:3, Midrash Lekach Tov, Deuteronomy 7:10:1, Midrash Tanchuma Buber, Appendix to Devarim 4:1 and Tanna DeBei Eliyahu Rabbah 8:1. Two passages of Otzar Midrashim complete it, Midrash 'Leolam' 2:16 and The Ten Martyrs, Midrash on the Ten Martyrs 'These I recall' 6.
The sixteenth verse draws ten. The corpus holds the three Talmud locators named above, with Ein Yaakov (Glick Edition) at Sanhedrin 11:80 and Sotah 7:36 and Ein Yaakov, Sotah 7:41. Tractate Derekh Eretz Rabbah 2:1 and 2:7 stand with them. Two passages of Otzar Midrashim complete it, Chuppah of Eliyahu, Chuppat Eliyahu Rabbah 143 and Midrash Yelamdeinu, Last Composition from Midrash Yelamdenu 25.
On the twentieth verse the corpus holds Midrash Tehillim 143:1. On the twenty-first it holds Bereshit Rabbah 8:1, Midrash Tehillim 139:4 and Vayikra Rabbah 14:1. On the twenty-seventh it holds Midrash Sekhel Tov, Bereshit 37:17:3, Midrash Tanchuma Buber, Metzora 2:1 and Midrash Tanchuma, Metzora 1:1. What each of them teaches is a saying of the rabbis, and is reported as theirs wherever this site quotes one. The quotations wait on a fetch that carries the text.
Sources: Malbim, Malbim on Job 13:1:1, Malbim's Job, trans. Jeremy I. Pfeffer, Ktav, 2003, reported CC-BY; Rashi, Rashi on Job 13:3:1 to 13:24:1, The Judaica Press complete Tanach with Rashi, translated by A. J. Rosenberg, reported CC-BY; Metzudat David, Metzudat David on Job 13:2:1, 13:5:1, 13:22:1 and 13:23:1, cited by ref because the corpus carries no English text; Ibn Ezra, Ibn Ezra on Job 13:17:1, cited by ref because the corpus carries no English text; The Sefaria corpus, scripts/data/sources/sefaria/job/13.json, the 40 Talmud and Midrash locators of this chapter; The site's own files, src/lib/hebraic/readings.ts, printing no portion, no Haftarah and no festival reading for this book.
The heads below are this chapter's scenes. The numbered points under each are its verses.
Job: Ye Are Forgers of Lies, Physicians of No Value
Job 13:1-3
my eyes have seen all this: Job answers the friends' claim to superior wisdom by matching point for point: "What you know, I also know; I am not inferior to you". His desire turns toward God, "I desire to speak to the Almighty and argue my case before God", the wish the whirlwind speeches answer.
Job 13:1
“All he had before said his eye had seen confirmed by many instances, and his ear had heard seconded by many authorities, and he well understood it and what use to make of it. Happy are those who not only see and hear, but understand, the greatness, glory, and sovereignty of God. This, he thought, would justify what he had said before ( ch. xii.”
Matthew Henry · Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
4 more voices on this verseWhat preachers and commentators have said about this verse, in their own words.
Job 13:1
“Lo, all this mine eye hath seen, mine ear hath heard, and I have understood every whit. For what was to follow he saw as present in Him, Whom neither things future come to, nor things past go from; but all things are present at once and together before His eyes. And because the very things that were to come he saw were part in works and part in words, it is rightly said, All this mine eye hath seen, mine ear hath heard. But words are without use, if they lack the understanding of them.”
Gregory the Dialogist · written before 604 · Morals on the Book of Job, Book XIpatristic
Job 13:1
“Lo, mine eye hath seen all this - Ye have brought nothing new to me; I know those maxims as well as you: nor have you any knowledge of which I am not possessed.”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
Job 13:1
“Lo, mine eye hath seen all this - I have seen illustrations of all that I have said, or that you have said about the methods of divine providence.”
Job 13:1
“Lo, mine eye hath seen all this,.... Or "all those things" (h) he had been discoursing of, concerning the wisdom and power of God, and his friends also; some of these he had seen instances of, he had been an eyewitness of them, and could give an ocular testimony to them; and others he had discerned with the eyes of his understanding, being opened and enlightened, and had a clear and distinct view of them, so that he had seen and knew as much of these things as any of them had.”
What you know, I also know: Job repeats the claim of Job 12:3: his eyes have seen and his ears have heard all that the friends know. Gregory notes the humility of it, since Job claims only equal wisdom with men whose lives he far surpassed. What they know, he knows.
Job 13:2
“What ye know, the same do I know also,.... Concerning God and his perfections, his sovereignty, holiness, justice, wisdom, power, goodness, &c. and concerning his providences, and his dealings with men in an ordinary or in an extraordinary way: I am not inferior unto you; as might be deduced from the preceding discourse; See Gill on Job 12:3.”
2 more voices on this verse
Job 13:2
“What ye know, the same do I know also; I am not inferior to you. By which same words he made known what exceeding humility he had, who says that he was 'not inferior' to them, whose life by holy living he very far surpassed. For he makes good that 'what they knew he knew,' who by knowing the things of heaven transcended their earthly thoughts through the spirit of prophecy in addition.”
Gregory the Dialogist · written before 604 · Morals on the Book of Job, Book XIpatristic
Job 13:2
“What ye know ... - See the note at Job 12:3.”
argue my case before God: Job turns from the friends to the Almighty. Barnes notes Job often voiced this desire, as at Job 9:34-35, and Wesley hears him say he would rather argue with God than with them. Clarke reads the words as the language of a court of justice.
Job 13:3
“Surely I would speak to the Almighty - I would desire to carry my cause directly up to God, and spread out my reasons before him. This Job often professed to desire; see Job 9:34-35. He felt that God would appreciate the arguments which he would urge, and would do justice to them. His friends he felt were censorious and severe. They neither did justice to his feelings, nor to his motives. They perverted his words and arguments; and instead of consoling him, they only aggravated his trials, and caused him to sink into deeper sorrows.”
Job 13:4-5
you are all worthless physicians: Job's charge, "You, however, smear with lies; you are all worthless physicians", names the friends' comfort itself as the failure, false diagnosis dressed as wisdom. Gill reads the worthless physicians against the ancient custom of physicians attending the sick, useless doctors who worsen the patient they claim to treat.
Job 13:4
“Ye are forgers of lies - Ye frame deceitful arguments: ye reason sophistically, and pervert truth and justice, in order to support your cause. Physicians of no value - Ye are as feeble in your reasonings as ye are inefficient in your skill. Ye can neither heal the wound of my mind, nor the disease of my body. In ancient times every wise man professed skill in the healing art, and probably Job’s friends had tried their skill on his body as well as on his mind.”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
that would be your wisdom!: Clarke sets the line beside Proverbs 17:28, where even a fool who keeps silent is counted wise. Chrysostom adds that when words make no sense, silence shows more wisdom than speech. The friends are the worthless physicians of verse 4.
Job 13:5
Oh that ye would altogether hold your peace! - You would show your wisdom by silence. Since you can say nothing that is adapted to give comfort, or to explain the true state of the case, it would be wise to say nothing; compare Pro 17:28: “Even a fool when he holdeth his peace is counted wise.”
Job 13:6-9
Hear now my argument: Job turns the friends' defense of God into a charge, since false doctrine spoken for God is itself sin against Him. The question "Would you show Him partiality" carries the language of a corrupt judge favoring one party. Job's words plant the ground of God's ruling at 42:7.
Job 13:6
“Hear now my reasoning - The speeches in this book are conceived as it delivered in a court of justice, different counselors pleading against each other. Hence most of the terms are forensic.”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
speak wickedly on God’s behalf: Job charges the friends with speaking lies on God's behalf. Barnes explains they argued unjust principles in order to defend God, and Gregory answers that the truth of God has no need of a lie. At Job 42:7 the LORD rebukes the friends for how they spoke of Him.
Job 13:7
“Will ye speak wickedly for God? - That is, will you maintain unjust principles with a view to honor or to vindicate God? Job refers doubtless to the positions which they had defended in regard to the divine administration - principles which he regarded as unjust, though they had employed them professedly in vindicating God. The sense is, that unjust principles ought not to be advanced to vindicate God.”
Would you show Him partiality: Barnes explains partiality from the courts, where a judge favors one side for rank or wealth. Job asks whether the friends would argue in God's defense by partiality, with the case unheard. Clarke hears them flattering God like a mortal judge.
Could you deceive Him like a man?: Job asks how the friends would appear if God examined them. Clarke and Barnes read it as a warning: God would see their hearts and their partiality, and no man can deceive Him. An upright man welcomes being examined, Matthew Henry notes.
Job 13:9
“It is good to an upright man who means honestly that God should search him; therefore he prays for it: Search me, O God! and know my heart. God's omniscience is a witness of his sincerity.”
Matthew Henry · Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Job 13:10-12
Surely He would rebuke you: u if you secretly showed partiality" presses the charge, since even a private partiality for God's side will meet His rebuke. "Your maxims are proverbs of ashes" reduces their sayings to what a fire leaves, maxims that crumble under the weight they are made to bear.
Job 13:10
“He will surely reprove you, if ye do secretly accept persons - If you show partiality, you will incur his disapprobation. This seems to have much era proverbial cast, and to mean that under no possible circumstances was it right to show partiality. No matter for whom it may be done, it will be displeasing to God. Even if it be in favor of the righteous, the widow, the fatherless, or of himself, if there is not a disposition to judge according to truth and evidence, God will frown upon you.”
Would His majesty not terrify you?: Barnes traces the word for majesty to a root meaning to lift up. He reads the dread as the awe that should fall on the friends and silence their argument. Aquinas notes that they argue about God at ease, far from the terror Job knows.
Job 13:11
“His dread fall upon you? - The very apprehension of his wrath is sufficient to crush you to nothing.”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
2 more voices on this verse
Job 13:11
“His excellencies in themselves are amiable and lovely. He is the most beautiful Being; but considering man's distance from God by nature, and his defection and degeneracy by sin, his excellencies are dreadful. His power, holiness, justice, yea, and his goodness too, are dreadful excellencies.”
Matthew Henry · Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Job 13:11
“The author seems to say that Job's friends will abstain from pronouncing reproaches, because of the fear of God and the terror that he inspires.”
Ishodad of Merv · written before 850 · Commentary on Job 13:11patristic
Your maxims are proverbs of ashes: Clarke reads the maxims as the memorable sayings of the ancients that the friends had quoted against Job, and the Hebrew as proverbs of dust. Wesley hears in the line the mouldering of all that is mortal. Their defenses crumble like clay.
Job 13:12
“Your remembrances are like unto ashes - Your memorable sayings are proverbs of dust. This is properly the meaning of the original: זכרניכם משלי אפר zichroneycem mishley epher. This he speaks in reference to the ancient and reputedly wise sayings which they had so copiously quoted against him. Your bodies to bodies of clay - This clause is variously translated: Your swelling heaps are swelling heaps of mire.”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
Job: Though He Slay Me, Yet Will I Wait for Him
Job 13:13-14
Be silent, and I will speak: k" asks the friends for the silence Job has already called their wisdom, so that he may address God. The words "take my life in my own hands" are proverbial for staking everything on one desperate act, though it cost his life.
Job 13:13
“Hold your peace - Margin, Be silent from me; see Job 13:5. It is possible that Job may have perceived in them some disposition to interrupt him in a rude manner in reply to the severe remarks which he had made, and he asked the privilege, therefore, of being permitted to go on, and to say what he intended, let come what would. And let come on me what will - Anything, whether reproaches from you, or additional sufferings from the hand of God. Allow me to express my sentiments, whatever may be the consequences to myself.”
take my life in my own hands?: Clarke reads the verse as a proverb for putting life at risk on the justice of a case, and sets it beside 1 Samuel 28:21. For the first half, where the Hebrew has flesh in the teeth, Jamieson, Fausset and Brown picture a wild beast holding its prey.
Job 13:14
“Wherefore do I take my flesh in my teeth - A proverbial expression. I risk every thing on the justice of my cause. I put my life in my hand, 1Sa 28:21. I run all hazards; I am fearless of the consequences.”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
2 more voices on this verse
Job 13:14
“Wherefore do I take my flesh in my teeth,.... Or bite my lips, to keep in my words, and refrain from speaking?”
Job 13:14
“A proverb for, "Why should I anxiously desire to save my life?" [EICHORN]. The image in the first clause is that of a wild beast, which in order to preserve his prey, carries it in his teeth.”
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown · Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)reformed
Though He slay me: e, I will hope in Him" states a confidence found nowhere else in the book, and the Hebrew carries two readings. The more literal means Job has no hope, while the text as received reads hope. Clarke and Delitzsch set out the question without deciding it.
Job 13:15
“Though He slay me, yet will I trust in Him. But I will rebuke mine own ways before Him. He also shall be my salvation. There is no room for the virtue of patience in prosperous circumstances. He is really patient, who is at once bruised with misfortune, and yet not bowed down from the erectness of his hope. Concerning the temper of mind of the reprobate man it is written, He will praise Thee, when Thou doest well to him.”
Gregory the Dialogist · written before 604 · Morals on the Book of Job, Book XIpatristic
2 more voices on this verse
Job 13:15
“Though he slay me - “God may so multiply my sorrows and pains that I cannot survive them. I see that I may be exposed to increased calamities, yet I am willing to meet them. If in maintaining my own cause, and showing that I am not a hypocrite Job 13:16, it should so happen that my sufferings should be so increased that I should die, yet I will do it.” The word “slay,” or “kill,” here refers to temporal death. It has no reference to punishment in the future world, or to the death of the soul.”
Job 13:15
“This is a high expression of faith, and what we should all labour to come up to--to trust in God, though he slay us, that is, we must be well pleased with God as a friend even when he seems to come forth against us as an enemy, ch. xxiii.”
Matthew Henry · Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Job 13:16-19
this will be my salvation: Job carries the confidence of verse 15 into an argument, "this will be my salvation, for no godless man can appear before Him". The words "now that I have prepared my case" present him as a plaintiff with his brief, and Gill gives the verb its legal sense.
Job 13:16
“He means it not of temporal salvation (he had little expectation of that); but concerning his eternal salvation he was very confident that God would not only be his Saviour to make him happy, but his salvation, in the vision and fruition of whom he should be happy. And the reason why he depended on God for salvation was because a hypocrite shall not come before him.”
Matthew Henry · Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
let my declaration ring in your ears: Barnes takes the declaration as Job's solemn claim in verses 15 and 16, that he would hope in God even if God slew him. Job asks the friends to hear it with care. Gregory notes that Job calls his words riddles, speech framed in figures.
Job 13:17
“Hear diligently my speech - That which I have made; that is, the declaration which I have made of my innocence. He refers to his solemn declaration, Job 13:15-16 that he had unwavering confidence in God, and that even should God slay him he would put confidence in him. This solemn appeal he wished them to attend to as one of the utmost importance.”
I know that I will be vindicated: Job has prepared his case like a man ready for court, as Clarke and Barnes read it. Matthew Henry links his certainty to Job 19:25, where Job says that he knows his Redeemer lives. God Himself had called Job blameless at Job 1:8, as Gregory recalls.
Job 13:18
“If I shall be judged, I know that I shall be found just. Which too is not at variance with the person of the self-same blessed Job, since he is only telling that concerning himself without, which 'Truth' had inwardly declared to his enemy concerning him; Hast thou considered My servant Job, that there is none like him in the earth? And yet it is much less that the holy man records concerning himself, than what the Lord declared concerning him. For it is one thing to be 'just,' and another to have 'none like him.'”
Gregory the Dialogist · written before 604 · Morals on the Book of Job, Book XIpatristic
1 more voice on this verse
Job 13:18
“This he knew because he knew that his Redeemer lived, ch. xix. Those whose hearts are upright with God, in walking not after the flesh but after the Spirit, may be sure that through Christ there shall be no condemnation to them, but that, whoever lays any thing to their charge, they shall be justified: they may know that they shall.”
Matthew Henry · Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Can anyone indict me?: Barnes hears him invite all comers to argue the case, sure of the result. Gregory notes that holy men so guard their works that no outward ground for accusation can be found. Should a true charge stand, Job would fall silent and die.
Job 13:19
“Who is he that will plead with me? - Let my accuser, the plaintiff, come forward; I will defend my cause against him. I shall give up the ghost - I shall cease to breathe. Defending myself will be as respiration unto me; or, While he is stating his case, I will be so silent as scarcely to appear to breathe.”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
2 more voices on this verse
Job 13:19
“Who is he that will plead with me? Let him come. Holy men so guard themselves in their good works, with God for their aid, that there can be no where found, without, grounds, whereon to accuse them; but within, in the secret thoughts of their own hearts, they watch over themselves with such good heed, that, if it might be, they may at all times stand blameless before the eyes of the interior Judge.”
Gregory the Dialogist · written before 604 · Morals on the Book of Job, Book XIpatristic
Job 13:19
“Who is he that will plead with me? - That is, “who is there now that will take up the cause, and enter into an argument against me? I have set my cause before God. I appeal now to all to take up the argument against me, and have no fear if they do as to the result.”
Job: Wherefore Hidest Thou Thy Face From Me?
Job 13:20-22
grant these two things to me: Job asks God for two terms before the trial opens: "Withdraw Your hand from me, and do not let Your terror frighten me". "Then call me, and I will answer, or let me speak, and You can reply" offers God either place in the exchange, plaintiff or defendant.
Job 13:20
“Only do not two things unto me - These two things are the following: 1. Withdraw thine hand far from me - remove the heavy affliction which thy hand has inflicted. 2. Let not thy dread make me afraid - terrify me not with dreadful displays of thy majesty. The reasons of this request are sufficiently evident: 1. How can a man stand in a court of justice and plead for his life, when under grievous bodily affliction? Withdraw thy hand far from me.”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
Withdraw Your hand from me: Job names the two things of verse 20. Barnes reads the hand as Job's affliction and points to Job 9:34, where Job asked God to remove His rod. With the affliction and the terror withdrawn, Job would argue his case.
Job 13:21
“Withdraw Thine hand far from me, and let not Thy dread make me afraid. By which same two what else does he ask in a voice of prophecy, but the season of grace and redemption? For the Law held the people obnoxious to the stroke of vengeance, that whoso committed sin under its yoke, should be forthwith punished with death. Nor did the Israelitish people serve God from a principle of love, but of fear. But righteousness can never be perfected by fear, seeing that according to the voice of John, perfect love casteth out fear.”
Gregory the Dialogist · written before 604 · Morals on the Book of Job, Book XIpatristic
Then call me, and I will answer: Barnes reads the words as the language of a court: God may call Job to make his defense, or Job may speak and God reply. Clarke sets out both orders. Matthew Henry hears in the verse the boldness of the upright at the throne of grace.
Job 13:22
“Then - This proposal savoured of self-confidence, and of irreverence towards God; for which, and the like speeches, he is reproved by God, chap. xxxviii, 2, 3; xl, 2.”
John Wesley · Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament (1765)evangelical
1 more voice on this verse
Job 13:22
“With such holy boldness may the upright come to the throne of grace, not doubting but to find mercy there. 23 How many are mine iniquities and sins? make me to know my transgression and my sin.”
Matthew Henry · Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Job 13:23-25
How many are my iniquities and sins?: "Reveal to me my transgression and sin" is the demand the chapter built toward, a bill of particulars in place of the friends' general charge. "Would You frighten a windblown leaf" pictures the disproportion the friends never weighed, the Almighty's strength against so weak a man.
Job 13:23
“How many are mine iniquities and sins? - Job takes the place of the plaintiff or accuser. He opens the cause. He appeals to God to state the catalogue of his crimes, or to bring forward his charges of guilt against him. The meaning, according to Schultens, is, “That catalogue ought to be great which has called down so many and so great calamities upon my head from heaven, when I am conscious to myself of being guilty of no offence.” God sorely afflicted him.”
2 more voices on this verse
Job 13:23
“His friends were ready enough to tell him how numerous and how heinous they were, ch. xxii. "But, Lord," says he, "let me know them from thee; for thy judgment is according to truth, theirs is not." This may be taken either, 1. As a passionate complaint of hard usage, that he was punished for his faults and yet was not told what his faults were.”
Matthew Henry · Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Job 13:23
“The catalogue of my sins ought to be great, to judge from the severity with which God ever anew crushes one already bowed down. Would that He would reckon them up! He then would see how much my calamities outnumber them. sin?--singular, "I am unconscious of a single particular sin, much less many" [UMBREIT].”
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown · Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)reformed
Why do You hide Your face: To hide the face is a sign of displeasure, Barnes notes, as at Isaiah 1:15. Job asks why God would consider him an enemy, and Clarke hears the cry of a man treated as the worst of sinners. Gregory recalls Adam hiding from the face of God.
Job 13:24
“Wherefore hidest Thou Thy face, and holdest me for Thine enemy? Man enjoyed the light of inward contemplation in Paradise, but by gratifying himself as he departed from himself, he lost the light of the Creator, and fled from His face to the trees of Paradise, seeing that, after his sin, he dreaded to see Him, whom he had used to love.”
Gregory the Dialogist · written before 604 · Morals on the Book of Job, Book XIpatristic
Would You frighten a windblown leaf?: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown picture a fallen leaf that the wind still chases. Barnes hears Job ask why the power of God should chase a thing so light, and Clarke why God should frighten so frail a man. Dry chaff has no strength to resist.
Job 13:25
“Job compares himself to a leaf already fallen, which the storm still chases hither and thither. break--literally, "shake with (Thy) terrors." Jesus Christ does not "break the bruised reed" (Isa 42:3, 27:8).”
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown · Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)reformed
Job 13:26-28
You record bitter accusations against me: e and bequeath to me the iniquities of my youth" charges God with reviving old sins to justify present suffering. "You put my feet in the stocks and stand watch over all my paths" turns a prisoner's confinement onto providence, every step marked.
Job 13:26
“Thou writest bitter things against me - The indictment is filled with bitter or grievous charges, which, if proved, would bring me to bitter punishment. The iniquities of my youth - The Levities and indiscretions of my youth I acknowledge; but is this a ground on which to form charges against a man the integrity of whose life is unimpeachable?”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
1 more voice on this verse
Job 13:26
“The sentence of the condemned used to be written down (Isa 10:1; Ps 149:9) [UMBREIT]. bitter things--bitter punishments. makest me to possess--or "inherit." In old age he receives possession of the inheritance of sin thoughtlessly acquired in youth. "To inherit sins" is to inherit the punishments inseparably connected with them in Hebrew ideas (Ps 25:7).”
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown · Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)reformed
You put my feet in the stocks: Barnes explains the stocks as a wooden frame that held the feet of a prisoner. Clarke compares the clog put on the feet of a slave, so that he could make no escape. God watches all his paths and limits his feet.
Job 13:27
“Thou puttest my feet also in the stocks,.... Which is one kind of punishment of offenders, and a preservation of them from making their escape; and is a security and reservation of them for further punishment sometimes; and so Job looked upon his afflictions as a punishment for he knew not what, and with which he was so surrounded and enclosed, that there was no getting out of them any more than a man can whose feet are set fast in the stocks; and that he was here kept for greater afflictions still, which he dreaded.”
1 more voice on this verse
Job 13:27
“He is not thus extreme to mark what we do amiss; if he were, there were no abiding for us, Ps. cxxx. But he is so far from this that he deals not with us according to the desert, no, not of our manifest sins, which are not found by secret search, Jer. ii.34 .”
Matthew Henry · Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
like a moth-eaten garment: The verse turns from Job to man, and chapter 14 takes up the same frailty. Matthew Henry and Gregory note that man wastes away from within, as the moth comes out of the garment it eats. The rotten thing carries its own ruin.
Job 13:28
“He (that is, man) as a rotten thing, the principle of whose putrefaction is in itself, consumes, even like a moth-eaten garment, which becomes continually worse and worse. Or, He (that is, God) like rottenness, and like a moth, consumes me.”
Matthew Henry · Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
2 more voices on this verse
Job 13:28
“And he, as a rotten thing - I am like a vessel made of skin; rotten, because of old age, or like a garment corroded by the moth. So the Septuagint, Syriac, and Arabic understood it. The word he may refer to himself.”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
Job 13:28
“He - He speaks of himself in the third person, as is usual in this and other sacred books. So the sense is, he, this poor frail creature, this body of mine; which possibly he pointed at with his finger, consumeth or pineth away.”
John Wesley · Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament (1765)evangelical
Keep studying
Sources for this chapter
The summary
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory; John Wesley, Notes on the Old Testament and Matthew Henry, Complete Commentary.
The exposition
Adam Clarke, Commentary on the Bible; Albert Barnes; Franz Delitzsch, Biblical Commentary on the Book of Job; Gregory the Dialogist, Morals on the Book of Job; Jamieson, Fausset & Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible; John Chrysostom, Commentary on Job; John Gill, Exposition of the Old Testament; John Wesley, Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament; Matthew Henry, Commentary on the Whole Bible and Thomas Aquinas, Commentary on Job.