Jobchapter 29
25 verses · BSBJob book hub →
Speaks with:Job 1×2Deuteronomy 32×2Job 31×2Proverbs 29×2Psalms 72×2Isaiah 61×2
Summary
Chapter summary
Job's closing defense begins in memory. 'Oh that I were as in the months of old, as in the days when God watched over me; when his lamp shined upon my head' (29:2-3), when the Almighty was yet with him and his children were about him. He sat in the gate; young men hid themselves and princes refrained from talking; the ear that heard him blessed him. The reason follows, answering Eliphaz's invented charges: 'I delivered the poor that cried, the fatherless also, that had none to help him'; he put on righteousness as clothing, and 'I was eyes to the blind, and feet was I to the lame' (29:15).
Context
Poetry · Unknown — Job overview
- A. 1–11 Job: Oh That I Were as in the Months of Old
- B. 12–25 Job: I Was Eyes to the Blind and Feet to the Lame
The outline
A.Job: Oh That I Were as in the Months of Oldvv. 1 to 11
Read vv. 1 to 11 →B.Job: I Was Eyes to the Blind and Feet to the Lamevv. 12 to 25
Read vv. 12 to 25 →
The world behind this chapter
Job 29The history
The gate of an ancient town was its courthouse, its council chamber, and its marketplace. The gateway was a deep structure with benches built into recesses on either side, and the elders sat there to hear cases, witness contracts, and settle disputes in public where anyone could listen. Archaeologists have excavated gate complexes with exactly these stone benches.
Job describes his arrival at that place. The young men saw him and hid themselves; the aged rose and stood. Princes stopped talking and laid a hand on their mouth — the standard gesture of deliberate silence before a superior. The voice of the nobles was hushed and their tongue stuck to the roof of their mouth. This is not vanity; it is the ordinary protocol of rank in a face-to-face society, and it tells hearers exactly how high Job stood.
What he did there is the answer to Eliphaz's invented charges in chapter 22, point for point. He delivered the poor that cried, and the fatherless who had no helper; the blessing of the man ready to perish came upon him; he caused the widow's heart to sing. He was eyes to the blind and feet to the lame, and a father to the poor. He searched out the case he did not know — that is, he investigated rather than taking the first story. And he broke the jaws of the wicked and plucked the spoil out of his teeth, the image of a shepherd forcing a predator's mouth open to take back a lamb.
His picture of his own security is the imagery of a well-watered tree and a settled household: I shall die in my nest and multiply my days as the sand; my root was spread out by the waters, and the dew lay all night on my branch; my glory was fresh in me and my bow renewed in my hand. The bow stood for a man's strength, and dew on the branch was the difference between life and death in a dry country.
What it meant to them
The chapter is Job's evidence for the defence, delivered as memory rather than argument. He was not the wealthy man who ignored the poor; he was the one the poor went to when nobody else would hear them.
First hearers were being given the standard by which a powerful man is measured — not what he owned, but who could get his attention at the gate.
Sources cited
- Roland de Vaux, Ancient Israel: Its Life and Institutions
- John H. Walton, Victor H. Matthews & Mark W. Chavalas, The IVP Bible Background Commentary: Old Testament
The text of this chapter
This page carries no textual note on Job 29. Where this site has examined a place the manuscripts differ, the examination is in the manuscripts room. Every place this site examines →
This page draws on Jamieson, Fausset & Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory; John Wesley, Notes on the Old Testament and Matthew Henry, Complete Commentary.