Jobchapter 15
35 verses · unknown · 10th century BC · Wisdom and poetry
But you even undermine the fear of God and hinder meditation before Him.
Introduction
unknown, Wisdom and poetry, Job Overview.
This chapter opens the second round of the debate, and Eliphaz of Teman speaks first again. In his first speech he was gentle, and now he speaks as an accuser. His hearers lived where wisdom was handed down from fathers to sons and age gave a man the right to be heard. Listen for the authority he claims for himself and his companions. Listen also for the long portrait of a man who lives in dread, and ask whom it is meant to describe. The reader knows from the book's first chapters what Eliphaz does not.
Context
- Who
- Hearers who had watched a disagreement harden into an accusation
- What
- Eliphaz's second speech, a rebuke of Job's words followed by a portrait of the wicked man's anxious life and sure ruin.
- Where
- The ash heap outside Job's town, where the three friends sit with him.
- When
- The opening of the second round of speeches; the book gives no date, and its setting is usually placed in the age of the patriarchs.
- Why
- To press Job to accept that his suffering is the punishment of sin, on the authority of age and tradition.
Historical context
The politeness is finished. Eliphaz now says Job fills his belly with the east wind, the sirocco, the scorching wind off the desert that withered crops and frayed tempers, the most useless and destructive air anyone in that region knew. He accuses Job of casting off fear and restraining prayer, which in that culture was the definition of a godless man.
Show the rest of the historical context, 3 more paragraphs
He appeals to a new authority: age and pedigree. Both the grey-headed and the very aged are on our side, he says, older than your father. Then he cites wise men who received wisdom from their fathers, 'unto whom alone the earth was given, and no stranger passed among them', a claim that this teaching comes down an unmixed line, uncontaminated by foreign ideas. In a world of tribal traditions, purity of transmission was itself an argument.
The portrait of the wicked man that fills the second half is drawn from the anxieties of a violent age. He travails with pain all his days; a dreadful sound is in his ears; in prosperity the destroyer comes on him; he does not believe he will return out of darkness; he wanders abroad for bread asking where it is; trouble makes him afraid 'as a king ready to the battle'.
The physical detail is deliberately ugly: he covers his face with his fatness and makes collops of fat on his flanks. In a hungry world, visible fat meant a man who had eaten well at someone else's expense. And the closing images are agricultural failure, a vine shaking off its unripe grapes, an olive casting its blossom, and the tents of bribery consumed by fire.
Significance
Eliphaz has stopped counselling and started prosecuting. His argument is now circular: the wicked suffer, you are suffering, therefore your protests are just more evidence.
Show the rest of the significance, 1 more paragraph
First hearers, who already knew from chapter 1 what the friends did not, were watching orthodoxy curdle. The chapter is a warning to anyone who has ever defended God by convicting a sufferer.
This chapter in Jewish lifeWhat this chapter is in Jewish life and reading.
What is done
The site's table gives Job no weekly portion and draws no Haftarah from it. Probed for this lane, the site's own table in src/lib/hebraic/readings.ts printed parashot total 0 and haftarah uses total 0 for the book, and no festival reading. The same probe printed 54 weekly portions and 6 festival readings in the table as a whole.
The corpus ties the chapter to the study of the Torah portions and of the tractates. It files Midrash Tanchuma Buber, Vayetzei 19:1 under the second verse, Vayera 30:1 under the tenth, Vayeshev 17:7 under the seventeenth and Metzora 11:1 under the twentieth. Its Talmud locators sit in Bava Batra, Pesachim, Chagigah, Sotah and Beitzah.
How it is read
Malbim names the chapter in Malbim's Job, translated by Jeremy I. Pfeffer (Ktav, 2003), which Sefaria reports as CC-BY. He calls it "The Eighth Oration - Eliphaz’s Speech in the Second Round" (Malbim on Job 15:1:1).
Rashi carries the rest, quoted here from The Judaica Press complete Tanach with Rashi, translated by A. J. Rosenberg, which Sefaria reports as CC-BY. He hears Eliphaz open with scorn. A wise man should not answer with an opinion "of wind and futility" (Rashi on Job 15:2:1). Debate over a matter that brings no benefit is the charge of the third verse, and Rashi supports that sense of the word from I Kings 1:2 and Ecclesiastes 10:9 (Rashi on Job 15:3:1). At the fourth verse he reads the words as irony aimed at Job, "who are very wise" (Rashi on Job 15:4:1).
Rashi puts Job's speech down to the evil inclination. "Your evil inclination [teaches] your mouth to speak such words" (Rashi on Job 15:5:1). Eliphaz then asks a question so that Job's own mouth will condemn him, and Eliphaz will not have to (Rashi on Job 15:6:1).
The question is whether Job was born before Adam, who was formed from the earth, so that he alone knew all the wisdom of the Creator's commandments (Rashi on Job 15:7:1). At the eleventh verse he reads the consolations of God as the plenty the Rock gave Job for many days, with pleasantness and gentleness (Rashi on Job 15:11:1). At the fourteenth verse Rashi asks what strength a man has to be innocent against the Holy One, blessed be He (Rashi on Job 15:14:1).
The note a reader should weigh is at the eighteenth and nineteenth verses, where Rashi hears Eliphaz praise the wise who confess. He names the two he has in mind. "Judah confessed and was not ashamed in the incident of Tamar. Reuben confessed and was not ashamed in the incident of Bilhah." Their reward, he says, was the land (Rashi on Job 15:18:1). Judah merited eternal kingship, and neither was driven from his heritage, since both confessed (Rashi on Job 15:19:1). The wicked man of the twentieth verse is then the one who does not repent and does not confess (Rashi on Job 15:20:1).
The last notes follow that man to his end. He hears a voice saying his time of retribution has come. He is destined to the sword, he is sure to wander for bread, and anguish prevails over him (Rashi on Job 15:21:1 to 15:24:1).
The corpus carries three 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 15:9:1 and 15:17:1, and at Ibn Ezra on Job 15:13:1.
What the rabbis say
The corpus carries forty rabbinic locators on this chapter and the text of none, so each is cited and linked here by ref alone. On the second verse it holds Bereshit Rabbah 71:7, Midrash Tanchuma Buber, Vayetzei 19:1 and Yalkut Shimoni on Torah 127:2. On the fourth it holds Bava Batra 16a:13 and Ein Yaakov (Glick Edition), Bava Batra 1:36. On the fifth it holds Ein Yaakov (Glick Edition), Pesakhim 1:1, Ein Yaakov, Pesakhim 1:6 and Midrash Lekach Tov, Genesis 7:2:4. On the sixth it holds Midrash Lekach Tov, Numbers 16:1:3 and Pesachim 3a:2.
On the seventh verse it holds Bereshit Rabbati, Parashat Vayechi 29 and Midrash Sekhel Tov, Shemot 12:15:4, and on the eighth Bereshit Rabbati, Parashat Vayechi 21. On the ninth it holds Jerusalem Talmud Megillah 4:1:13 and Mekhilta DeRabbi Shimon Ben Yochai 15:6. On the tenth it holds Aggadat Bereshit 28:2 and Midrash Tanchuma Buber, Vayera 30:1. On the twelfth it holds Bamidbar Rabbah 18:16 and 18:3. On the fifteenth it holds Chagigah 5a:4 and Ein Yaakov (Glick Edition), Khagigah 1:7. On the sixteenth it holds Ein Yaakov (Glick Edition), Yoma 7:6 and Ein Yaakov, Yoma 7:7.
On the seventeenth verse it holds Midrash Tanchuma Buber, Vayeshev 17:7 and Sifrei Devarim 348:1. On the eighteenth, where Rashi hears the confession of Judah and Reuben, it holds Bamidbar Rabbah 13:4 and 9:17, and on the nineteenth Sotah 7b:7. On the twentieth it holds Kohelet Rabbah 8:10:1 and Midrash Tanchuma Buber, Metzora 11:1. On the twenty-third it holds Beitzah 32b:5 and Ein Yaakov (Glick Edition), Beitzah 4:1.
On the twenty-sixth verse it holds Avot DeRabbi Natan, Recension B 7:1. On the twenty-seventh it holds Midrash Lekach Tov, Deuteronomy 32:15:1 and Midrash Tannaim on Deuteronomy 32:15:17. On the twenty-eighth it holds Bamidbar Rabbah 13:10 and 18:15. On the thirty-fourth it holds Ein Yaakov (Glick Edition), Sotah 7:35 and Ein Yaakov, Sotah 7:40, and on the thirty-fifth Pesikta Rabbati 33:1. 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: Rashi, Rashi on Job 15:2:1 to 15:24:1, The Judaica Press complete Tanach with Rashi, translated by A. J. Rosenberg, reported CC-BY; Malbim, Malbim on Job 15:1:1, Malbim's Job, trans. Jeremy I. Pfeffer, Ktav, 2003, reported CC-BY; Metzudat David, Metzudat David on Job 15:9:1 and 15:17:1, cited by ref because the corpus carries no English text; Ibn Ezra, Ibn Ezra on Job 15:13:1, cited by ref because the corpus carries no English text; The Sefaria corpus, scripts/data/sources/sefaria/job/15.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.
Eliphaz: Should a Wise Man Answer With Windy Knowledge?
Job 15:1-3
Then Eliphaz the Temanite replied: Eliphaz opens his second speech with scorn, where his first speech in chapter 4 began with courtesy. The verb in "argue with useless words" is Job's word for pleading his case at 13:6. Henry notes that Eliphaz's three speeches grow more severe as Job keeps answering instead of yielding.
Job 15:1
“Then answered Eliphaz the Temanite,.... Or, who was of Teman, as the Targum, the first of Job's friends and comforters, the oldest of them, who first began the dispute with him; which was carried on by his two other companions, who had spoken in their turns; and now in course it fell to him to answer a second time, as he here does, and said, as follows.”
fill his belly with the hot east wind?: Eliphaz turns Job's claim to wisdom at 12:3 and 13:2 against him. Jamieson, Fausset and Brown note that the Hebrew calls such counsel windy knowledge, and the east wind was the most destructive wind of that region. To Eliphaz, Job's words are a scorching storm.
Job 15:2
“Should a wise man utter vain knowledge - Or rather, Should a wise man utter the science of wind? A science without solidity or certainty. And fill his belly with the east wind? - בטן beten, which we translate belly, is used to signify any part of the cavity of the body, whether the region of the thorax or abdomen; here it evidently refers to the lungs, and may include the cheeks and fauces.”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
useless words: The question answers Job's wish at 13:3 to argue his case with God. Barnes hears a verdict that Job's speeches serve no purpose. Clarke hears a charge of speaking to God without reverence.
Job 15:3
“Should he reason with unprofitable talk? - It does not become a man professing to be wise to make use of words that are nothing to the purpose. The sense is, that what Job said amounted to just nothing.”
3 more voices on this verse
Job 15:3
“Whence Eliphaz adds; Thou reprovest with words him that is not equal to thee, and thou speakest what is not expedient for thee. Now they suppose that no one has the fear of the Lord, saving him whom they can draw into the foolishness of their own confession.”
Gregory the Dialogist · written before 604 · Morals on the Book of Job, Book XIIpatristic
Job 15:3
“Should he reason with unprofitable talk?....”
Job 15:3
“Should he reason with unprofitable talk? - Should a man talk disrespectfully of his Maker, or speak to him without reverence? and should he suppose that he has proved any thing, when he has uttered words of little meaning, and used sound instead of sense?”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
Job 15:4-6
undermine the fear of God: Eliphaz raises the charge from bad argument to irreligion, saying Job would "undermine the fear of God and hinder meditation before Him". He claims "your iniquity instructs your mouth, and you choose the language of the crafty", the deceit Job warned the friends against at 13:7.
Job 15:4
“THIS is one of the charges brought by Eliphaz the Temanite against Job, "Yes, you cast off fear, and restrain prayer before God." I shall not use this sentence as an accusation against those who never pray, though there may be some in this House of Prayer whose heads are unaccustomed to bow down and whose knees are unaccustomed to kneel before the Lord, their Maker. You have been fed by God's bounty, you owe all the breath in your nostrils to Him, yet you have never done homage to His name!”
Charles Spurgeon · written before 1892 · The Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit, Sermon No. 2943: “Restraining Prayer” (lightly modernized text, CCEL edition)Particular Baptist
the language of the crafty: Eliphaz makes Job's own language the proof of his iniquity. Barnes paraphrases: the argument itself shows a guilty man. Clarke ties the crafty to the serpent of Genesis 3:1, a word from the same Hebrew root.
Job 15:5
“Whence it is still further added, For thine iniquity teacheth thy mouth, and thou followest the tongue of the crafty. 'Iniquity teaches the mouth,' when there is conceived by a bad life somewhat to be spoken of a worse kind. Now because blessed Job was free in speech in proportion as he was holy in action, by his friends, who hold the type of heretics, he is found fault with at once on the grounds of a wicked life and of a bold mouth, so that it should be said, Thine iniquity teacheth thy mouth.”
Gregory the Dialogist · written before 604 · Morals on the Book of Job, Book XIIpatristic
your own lips testify against you: Eliphaz needs no witness beyond Job's own mouth and lips. Henry grants that those whom their own mouth condemns are condemned most effectually, yet adds the friends had provoked the words they use against him.
Job 15:6
“But he should have considered that he and his fellows had provoked him to say that which now they took advantage of; and that was not fair. Those are most effectually condemned that are condemned by themselves, Tit. iii. Many a man needs no more to sink him than for his own tongue to fall upon him.”
Matthew Henry · Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Job 15:7-9
Were you the first man ever born?: Eliphaz mocks Job with the question of primeval wisdom, "Were you the first man ever born", which the speeches from the whirlwind ask in earnest. Barnes notes that these questions are rhetorical weapons, unlike the same form of question when God asks it.
Job 15:7
“Art thou the first man that was born? - Hast thou lived ever since the creation, and treasured up all the wisdom of past times, that thou dost now speak so arrogantly and confidently? This question was asked, because, in the estimation of Eliphaz and his friends, wisdom was supposed to be connected with long life, and with an opportunity for extended and varied observation; see Job 15:10. Job they regarded as comparatively a young man.”
the council of God: The Hebrew word for council, Barnes explains, first means a cushion or divan, then the circle of advisers who sit on it. Eliphaz asks if Job can listen in on God's council. Only such access would let him limit wisdom to himself.
Job 15:8
“Hast thou heard the secret of God? - “Hast thou hearkened in God’s council?” Wert thou one of the celestial cabinet, when God said, Let Us make man in Our image, and in Our likeness? Dost thou restrain wisdom to thyself? - Dost thou wish us to understand that God’s counsels were revealed to none but thyself? And dost thou desire that we should give implicit credence to whatsoever thou art pleased to speak? These are all strong sarcastic questions, and apparently uttered with great contempt.”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
1 more voice on this verse
Job 15:8
“Hast thou heard the secret of God?.... Or, "in the secret of God" (a), in his cabinet council, what was said and done there? hast thou stood in the council of God? hast thou been one of his privy council, or counsellors, and been let into all the secrets of God, of his purposes and providence, and into the reasons of all his administrations, that thou talkest so freely, and boldly, and confidently as thou dost?”
What do you understand: Eliphaz throws back Job's own words of 12:3 and 13:2, where Job claimed to know as much as the friends. Barnes paraphrases the reply: the friends have had equal advantages and understand just as much. The contest is now over rank in wisdom.
Job 15:9
“What knowest thou - Is it likely that thy intellect is greater than ours; and that thou hast cultivated it better than we have done ours? What understandest thou - Or, Dost thou understand any thing, and it is not with us? Show us any point of knowledge possessed by thyself, of which we are ignorant.”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
2 more voices on this verse
Job 15:9
“What knowest thou that we know not?....”
Job 15:9
“What knowest thou that we know not? - What pretensions or claims to wisdom have you which we have not? We have had, at least, equal advantages, and may be presumed to know as much as you.”
Job 15:10-11
Both the gray-haired and the aged: d are on our side" appeals to age as the guarantor of wisdom. "Are the consolations of God not enough for you" recasts the friends' speeches as divine comfort Job has despised. Gill notes the irony that Job will call these consolations miserable at 16:2.
Job 15:10
“With us are both the gray-headed - One copy of the Chaldee Targum paraphrases the verse thus: “Truly Eliphaz the hoary-headed, and Bildad the long-lived, are among us; and Zophar, who in age surpasseth thy father.” It is very likely that Eliphaz refers to himself and his friends in this verse, and not either to the old men of their tribes, or to the masters by whom they themselves were instructed. Eliphaz seems to have been the eldest of these sages; and, therefore, he takes the lead in each part of this dramatic poem.”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
2 more voices on this verse
Job 15:10
“This also serves contenders to make a noise with to very little purpose. If they are older than their adversaries, and can say they knew such a thing before their opponents were born, this will not serve to justify them in being arrogant and overbearing; for the oldest are not always the wisest, ch. xxxii.”
Matthew Henry · Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Job 15:10
“On our side, thinking with us are the aged. Job had admitted that wisdom is with them (Job 12:12). Eliphaz seems to have been himself older than Job; perhaps the other two were also (Job 32:6).”
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown · Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)reformed
the consolations of God: Barnes takes the consolations to be the counsel Eliphaz and his friends have offered, and Jamieson, Fausset and Brown point to the vision of 4:17. The gentle words are his own. Spurgeon preached on this verse and ranked these friends among men of real knowledge and experience.
Job 15:11
“Are the consolations of God small with thee? - The “consolations of God” here refer probably to those considerations which had been suggested by Eliphaz and his friends, and which he takes to be the “consolations” which God had furnished for the afflicted. He asks whether they were regarded by Job as of little value? Whether he was not willing to take such consolations as God had provided, and to allow them to sustain him instead of permitting himself to inveigh against God? The Septuagint renders this, “thou hast been chastised less than thy sins deserve.”
1 more voice on this verse
Job 15:11
“THESE are the words of Eliphaz, one of those three friends of Job who blundered dreadfully over his case. Their words are not to be despised. For they were men in the front rank of knowledge and experience. Eliphaz says, "With us are both the gray-headed and very aged men, much elder than your father." Their errors were not the superficial mistakes of fools but the profound reasoning of men of light and leading. Their utterances are, at least, equal to anything our own learned men may have to say on the same problem.”
Job 15:12-13
Why has your heart carried you away: Eliphaz reads Job's protests as a loss of self-control: "Why has your heart carried you away, and why do your eyes flash". His next words restate the charge of chapter 4 more sharply. Henry notes Eliphaz assumes the point in question, whether Job's words attack God or plead with Him.
turn your spirit against God: Eliphaz reads the flashing eyes of verse 12 as the sign of a spirit turned against God. Clarke draws the picture of an archer who fixes his eye on the mark and lets the arrow fly. Barnes traces Job's words to pride and self-confidence.
Job 15:14-16
What is man, that he should be pure: Eliphaz repeats the vision of 4:17 in sharper words, and "one born of woman" takes up Job's phrase from 14:1. The close, "how much less man, who is vile and corrupt, who drinks injustice like water", turns the doctrine of chapter 4 into open contempt.
Job 15:14
“What is man, that he should be clean? - מה אנוש mah enosh; what is weak, sickly, dying, miserable man, that he should be clean? This is the import of the original word enosh. And - born of a woman, that he should be righteous? - It appears, from many passages in the sacred writings, that natural birth was supposed to be a defilement; and that every man born into the world was in a state of moral pollution. Perhaps the word יצדק yitsdak should be translated, that he should justify himself, and not that he should be righteous.”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
1 more voice on this verse
Job 15:14
“What is he that is born of a woman, a sinful woman, that he should be righteous? Righteousness is cleanness; it makes us acceptable to God and easy to ourselves, Ps. xviii. Man, in his fallen state, cannot pretend to be clean and righteous before God, either to acquit himself to God's justice or recommend himself to his favour.”
Matthew Henry · Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
puts no trust in His holy ones: Eliphaz repeats the vision of 4:18, where God charged even His angels with error. Barnes reads the holy ones as angels, and Wesley reads the heavens the same way. They are pure from corruption, Wesley says, yet imperfect beside God.
Job 15:15
“Behold, he putteth no trust in his saints - In Job 4:18, it is, “in his servants,” but no doubt the same thing is intended. The reference is to the angels, called there servants, and here saints קדשׁים qôdeshı̂ym, holy ones; see the notes at Job 4:18. Yea, the heavens are not clean in his sight - In Job 4:18, “and his angels he charged with folly.” The general idea is the same. God is so holy that all things else seem to be impure. The very heavens seem to be unclean when compared with him.”
1 more voice on this verse
Job 15:15
“God places no confidence in saints and angels; he employs both, but trusts neither with his service, without giving them fresh supplies of strength and wisdom for it, as knowing they are not sufficient of themselves, neither more nor better than his grace makes them.”
Matthew Henry · Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
drinks injustice like water?: The argument runs from greater to lesser. If angels fall short, man falls much further, and Clarke notes that many translators render the phrase how much less. Wesley pictures a man who takes in sin as freely as men in hot countries drink water.
Job 15:16
“How much more abominable and filthy is man - As in the preceding verse it is said, he putteth no trust in his saints, it has appeared both to translators and commentators that the original words, אף כי aph ki, should be rendered how much Less, not how much More: How much less would he put confidence in man, who is filthy and abominable in his natures and profligate in his practice, as he drinks down iniquity like water?”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
Eliphaz: The Wicked Travaileth With Pain All His Days
Job 15:17-19
Listen to me and I will inform you: Eliphaz moves from the private vision of chapter 4 to tradition, "what was declared by wise men and was not concealed from their fathers". The line claims an unbroken line of wisdom, which Delitzsch places in the patriarchal age.
Job 15:17
“I will show thee ... - The remainder of this chapter is a violent declamation, designed to overwhelm Job with the proofs of personal guilt. Eliphaz professes to urge nothing which had not been handed down from his ancestors, and was the result of careful observation. What he says is made up of apothegms and maxims that were regarded as containing the results of ancient wisdom, all meaning that God would punish the wicked, or that the wicked would be treated according to their deserts.”
1 more voice on this verse
Job 15:17
“In direct contradiction of Job's position (Job 12:6, &c.), that the lot of the wicked was the most prosperous here, Eliphaz appeals (1) to his own experience, (2) to the wisdom of the ancients.”
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown · Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)reformed
declared by wise men: Eliphaz appeals to what wise men declared from their fathers. Barnes explains that the ancients had few written records and passed their observations down in short maxims from father to son. Henry warns that such wisdom is lost when one generation grows careless.
Job 15:18
“Which wise men have told from their fathers - Which they have received from their ancestors and communicated to others. Knowledge among the ancients was communicated chiefly by tradition from father to son. They had few or no written records, and hence, they embodied the results of their observation in brief, sententious maxims, and transmitted them from one generation to another. And have not hid it - They have freely communicated the result of their observations to others.”
to whom alone the land was given: Wesley and Jamieson, Fausset and Brown read the line as an answer to Job 9:24, where Job said the earth is given to the wicked. Here the land was given to the wise. Barnes adds that the fathers taught before a foreigner's opinion mixed with theirs.
Job 15:19
“To whom - By the gracious gift of God: this he alleges to make their testimony more considerable, because these were no obscure men, but the most worthy and famous men in their ages; and to confute what Job had said, chap. ix, 24, that the earth was given into the hand of the wicked. By the earth he means the dominion and possession of it.”
John Wesley · Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament (1765)evangelical
1 more voice on this verse
Job 15:19
“On this head he enlarges, showing that even those who impiously dare God's judgments yet cannot but dread them and will feel them at last. He speaks in the singular number-- the wicked man, meaning (as some think) Nimrod; or perhaps Chedorlaomer, or some such mighty hunter before the Lord.”
Matthew Henry · Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Job 15:20-24
A wicked man writhes in pain all his days: Eliphaz opens the book's first full poem on the wicked man, the doctrine the friends have assumed now set in verse. Henry reads it as settled theology of exact retribution, repeated in chapters 18 and 20 and rejected at 42:7, and Job's innocent suffering never appears.
Job 15:20
“The wicked man travaileth with pain - This is a most forcible truth: a life of sin is a life of misery; and he that Will sin Must suffer. One of the Targums gives it a strange turn: - “All the days of the ungodly Esau, he was expected to repent, but he did not repent; and the number of years was hidden from the sturdy Ishmael.” The sense of the original, מתחולל mithcholel, is he torments himself: he is a true heautontimoreumenos, or self-tormentor; and he alone is author of his own sufferings, and of his own ruin.”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
1 more voice on this verse
Job 15:20
“Oppressor - To the wicked man: he names this one sort of them, because he supposed Job to be guilty of this sin, in opposition of what Job had affirmed of the safety of such persons, chap. xii, 6, and because such are apt to promise themselves a longer and happier life than other men.”
John Wesley · Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament (1765)evangelical
Sounds of terror fill his ears: The wicked man lives in terror even in his prosperity. Barnes pictures a man who thinks himself safe and is surprised by the enemy, and Clarke describes a tyrant who expects his cruelties to return. Henry compares him to a debtor who takes every stranger for a bailiff.
Job 15:21
“A dreadful sound is in his ears - Margin, “A sound of fears.” He hears sudden, frightful sounds, and is alarmed. Or when he thinks himself safe, he is suddenly surprised. The enemy steals upon him, and in his fancied security he dies. This sentiment might be illustrated at almost any length by the mode of savage warfare in America, and by the sudden attacks which the American savage makes, in the silence of the night, on his unsuspecting foes.”
he is marked for the sword: Darkness here means calamity, Barnes explains, and the wicked man despairs of any return from it. Jamieson, Fausset and Brown see a glance at Job, who had despaired of his own restoration. Gesenius reads him as destined for the sword.
Job 15:22
“That he shall return out of darkness - If he take but a few steps in the dark, he expects the dagger of the assassin. This appears to be the only meaning of the place. Some think the passage should be understood to signify that he has no hope of a resurrection; he can never escape from the tomb. This I doubt: in the days of the writer of this book, the doctrine of a future judgment was understood in every part of the East where the knowledge of the true God was diffused.”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
1 more voice on this verse
Job 15:22
“Good men expect light at evening time, light out of darkness; but what reason have those to expect that they shall return out of the darkness of trouble who would not return from the darkness of sin, but went on in it? It is the misery of damned sinners that they know they shall never return out of that utter darkness, nor pass the gulf there fixed.”
Matthew Henry · Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
food for vultures: Barnes notes that the Septuagint makes the wanderer food for vultures, while the Hebrew pictures him wandering in poverty for bread. Clarke sees a man once wealthy who can scarcely beg enough to live. Gregory takes the day of darkness as the time of judgment.
Job 15:23
“He wandereth abroad for bread - The Septuagint renders this, “he is destined to be food for vultures” - κατατέτακται δὲ εἰς σῖτα γυψίν katatetaktai de eis sitos gupsin. The meaning of the Hebrew is, simply, that he will be reduced to poverty, and will not know where to obtain a supply for his returning needs. He knoweth that the day of darkness is ready at his hand - He is assured that the period of calamity is not far remote. It must come. He has no security that it will not come immediately.”
like a king poised to attack: Distress and anguish attack like an army. Barnes reads the king as fully prepared for battle, so that resistance is vain. Gregory applies the siege to the mind of the wicked, hedged in by anxiety in all he does.
Job 15:24
“Trouble and anguish shall make him afraid - He shall be in continual fear of death; being now brought down by adversity, and stripped of all the goods which he had got by oppression, his life is a mark for the meanest assassin. As a king ready to the battle - The acts of his wickedness and oppression are as numerous as the troops he commands; and when he comes to meet his enemy in the field, he is not only deserted but slain by his troops.”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
Job 15:25-28
he has stretched out his hand against God: The poem pictures the wicked man's arrogance as an assault on God, "rushing headlong at Him with a thick, studded shield". Gill takes the "ruined cities" and "abandoned houses" of verse 28 as the wicked man's future dwelling, ruin overtaking the prosperity his fat face described.
Job 15:25
“For he stretcheth out his hand against God - The hand is stretched out for battle. It wields the spear or the sword against an enemy. The idea here is, that the wicked man makes God an adversary. He does not contend with his fellow-man, with fate, with the elements, with evil angels, but with God. His opponent is an Almighty Being, and he cannot prevail against him; compare the notes at Isa 27:4. And strengtheneth himself - As an army does that throws up a rampart, or constructs a fortification.”
1 more voice on this verse
Job 15:25
“This applies to the audacious impiety of some sinners who are really haters of God ( Rom. i. 30 ), and whose carnal mind is not only an enemy to him, but enmity itself, Rom. viii. But, alas! the sinner's malice is as impotent as it is impudent; what can he do?”
Matthew Henry · Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
rushing headlong at Him: The man who stretched out his hand against God in verse 25 charges at Him like a soldier. Jamieson, Fausset and Brown, following Umbreit and Gesenius, take the shields as the rebel's own, locked together over the heads of his company. Clarke, after Calmet, has God rushing on the wicked.
Job 15:26
“He runneth upon him - Calmet has properly observed that this refers to God, who, like a mighty conquering hero, marches against the ungodly, rushes upon him, seizes him by the throat, which the mail by which it is encompassed cannot protect; neither his shield nor spear can save him when the Lord of hosts comes against him.”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
his face is covered with fat: Wesley reads the fat face and flesh as signs of wealth, the ease that bred his attack on God, and points to Deuteronomy 32:15. Gregory applies the covered face to the mind, whose eyes are pressed down by earthly goods. Wealth made him bold.
Job 15:27
“Because - This is mentioned as the reason of his insolent carriage towards God, because he was fat, rich, potent, and successful, as that expression signifies, Deut. xxxii, 15 Psalm lxxviii, 31 Jer. xlvi, 21.”
John Wesley · Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament (1765)evangelical
1 more voice on this verse
Job 15:27
“Why is God forgotten and slighted, but because the belly is made a god of and happiness placed in the delights of sense? Those that fill themselves with wine and strong drink abandon all that is serious and flatter themselves with hopes that tomorrow shall be as this day, Isa. lvi.”
Matthew Henry · Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
he will dwell in ruined cities: Barnes reads the line as the consequence of that attack on God: the man who lived in luxury will dwell in abandoned places. Jamieson, Fausset and Brown see robbers who seize the houses of banished citizens, the class Job had named at 12:6. His cities end as rubble.
Job 15:28
“The class of wicked here described is that of robbers who plunder "cities," and seize on the houses of the banished citizens (Isa 13:20). Eliphaz chooses this class because Job had chosen the same (Job 12:6). heaps--of ruins.”
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown · Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)reformed
1 more voice on this verse
Job 15:28
“Proud and cruel men take a strange pleasure in ruins, when they are of their own making, in destroying cities ( Ps. ix. 6 ) and triumphing in the destruction, since they cannot make them their own but by making them ready to become heaps, and frightening the inhabitants out of them.”
Matthew Henry · Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Job 15:29-35
He will no longer be rich: The poem closes with loss, and "the flame will wither his shoots" turns the plant words Job used of hope in chapter 14 into judgment. The last lines, "fire will consume the tents of bribery", state as settled law a doctrine the book leaves unsettled at 42:7.
Job 15:29
“It is contentment only that is great gain. Providence remarkably keeps some from being rich, defeating their enterprises, breaking their measures, and keeping them always behind-hand. Many that get much by fraud and injustice, yet do not grow rich: it goes as it comes; it is got by one sin and spent upon another.”
Matthew Henry · Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
the flame will wither his shoots: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown read the shoots as the man's children and recall the loss of Job's own at 1:18 and 1:19. The breath of God's mouth is His wrath. Wesley remarks that one breath is enough for God to carry away His enemies.
Job 15:30
“He shall not depart out of darkness - 4. He shall be in continual afflictions and distress. 5. The flame shall dry up his branches - his children shall be cut off by sudden judgments. 6. He shall pass away by the breath of his mouth; for by the breath of his mouth doth God slay the wicked.”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
trust in emptiness: Eliphaz turns from description to warning. Wesley reads the reward as an exchange, one vanity traded for another, a pleasing emptiness for a painful one. Barnes lists what such a man leans on, his wealth, rank, lands and armies, and none of it will hold him up.
Job 15:31
“Vanity - In the vain and deceitful things of this world, he subjoins a general caution to all men to take heed of running into the same error and mischief. Vanity - Disappointment and dissatisfaction, and the loss of all his imaginary felicity. Recompence - Hebrew. his exchange; he shall exchange one vanity for another, a pleasing vanity for a vexatious vanity.”
John Wesley · Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament (1765)evangelical
his branch will not flourish: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown read the line as a life ended before its time, and the withered branch as the childless end of the wicked. Clarke agrees that no shoot will spring from his roots, a charge that fell hard on a father who had lost his children.
Job 15:32
“It shall be accomplished before his time - I believe the Vulgate gives the true sense: Antequam dies ejus impleantur, peribit; “He shall perish before his time; before his days are completed.” 8. He shall be removed by a violent death, and not live out half his days. 9. And his branch shall not be green - there shall be no scion from his roots; all his posterity shall fail.”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
1 more voice on this verse
Job 15:32
“Literally, "it (the tree to which he is compared, Job 15:30, or else his life) shall not be filled up in its time"; that is, "he shall be ended before his time." shall not be green--image from a withered tree; the childless extinction of the wicked.”
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown · Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)reformed
like a vine stripped of its unripe grapes: The branch of verse 32 becomes a vine and an olive tree. Jamieson, Fausset and Brown note that the vine is made to shed its own unripe grapes, so the sinner's ruin grows from his own conduct. Clarke reads the lost grapes and blossoms as children.
Job 15:33
“He shall shake off his unripe grape as the vine - The idea here is, that the wicked man shall be like a vine that casts off its grapes while they are yet sour and green, and brings none to perfection; compare the notes at Isa 18:5. Scott renders this, “As when the vine her half-grown berries showers, Or poisoned olive her unfolding flowers.” It would seem from this passage that the vine might be so blasted by a hot wind or other cause, as to cast its unripe grapes to the earth.”
fire will consume the tents of bribery: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown hear an insinuation that the fire of God at 1:16 fell on Job for bribery as a chief among his people. Clarke hears the same insinuation. Henry pairs hypocrisy with bribery as deceit toward God and man.
Job 15:34
“The congregation of hypocrites - 11. Job is here classed with hypocrites, or rather the impious of all kinds. The congregation, or עדת adath, society, of such, shall be desolate, or a barren rock, גלמוד galmud. See this Arabic word explained in the note on Job 3:7 (note). Fire shall consume the tabernacles of bribery - 12. Another insinuation against Job, that he had perverted justice and judgment, and had taken bribes.”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
1 more voice on this verse
Job 15:34
“Rather, The binding together of the hypocrites (wicked) shall be fruitless [UMBREIT]. tabernacles of bribery--namely, dwellings of unjust judges, often reprobated in the Old Testament (Isa 1:23). The "fire of God" that consumed Job's possessions (Job 1:16) Eliphaz insinuates may have been on account of Job's bribery as an Arab sheik or emir.”
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown · Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)reformed
Eliphaz ends his speech on the figure of birth: trouble conceived, evil born, a womb full of deceit. Gregory traces the stages from devising wickedness to doing it. Barnes judges that all of it was meant for Job, who had to sit and hear it.
Job 15:35
“They conceive mischief - The meaning of this verse is, that they form and execute plans of evil. It is the characteristic of such men that they form such plans and live to execute them, and they must abide the consequences. All this was evidently meant for Job; and few things could be more trying to a man’s patience than to sit and hear those ancient apothegms, designed to describe the wicked, applied so unfeelingly to himself.”
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; Charles Spurgeon, The Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit, Sermon No. 2099: “Concerning the Consolations Of God”; 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 Gill, Exposition of the Old Testament; John Wesley, Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament and Matthew Henry, Commentary on the Whole Bible.