Jobchapter 5
27 verses · KJVJob book hub →
Key verse
He shall deliver thee in six troubles: yea, in seven there shall no evil touch thee.
It stands in scene C of the chapter, verses 17 to 27.
The chapter
Chapter summary
Eliphaz finishes his first speech. Call now. Which of the holy ones will answer? Vexation kills the foolish man; affliction springs not from the dust, for 'man is born unto trouble, as the sparks fly upward' (5:7). His counsel is to seek unto God, who does great things past finding out, gives rain, sets the lowly on high, and 'taketh the wise in their own craftiness'. The one line of Job that Paul quotes outright (1 Corinthians 3:19). Then the promise that will curdle in Job's mouth: 'happy is the man whom God correcteth… for he maketh sore, and bindeth up' (5:17-18), with death at a full age like a shock of grain gathered in season.
Context
Poetry · Unknown · Job overview
Where the chapter sits
Job 5 falls in Dialogue: three cycles (chapters 3–27). Job's opening complaint (3); three rounds with Eliphaz, Bildad, Zophar; the friends' rigid retribution theology; the third cycle breaks: Zophar does not speak again. The dialogue exhausts itself as argument.
Before it: Prose prologue: heavenly court, chapters 1–2. After it: Hymn to wisdom, chapters 28.
The whole shape of Job→The world behind this chapter
Job 5The history
'Man is born unto trouble, as the sparks fly upward' uses a Hebrew phrase that literally means 'the sons of flame', the embers that leap off a fire and are gone. Eliphaz's images are all farm and household: the fool taking root and his sons crushed in the gate with no rescuer, the hungry eating the harvest a rich man stored, the crop the thief swallows up.
His closing section is the standard blessing list of that world, and it is worth reading as a picture of what security meant. Rescue in six troubles and seven; safety from famine and the sword; a covenant with the stones of the field, meaning ground cleared of rock and fit for the plough; peace with the wild animals that killed livestock and children; a tent found intact on return; descendants as many as the grass; and death at a ripe age, coming to the grave 'like as a shock of corn cometh in in his season', the sheaf carried in exactly when it is ready, the good death of a farmer.
The rest of the history, and what it meant to them
Between the warnings sits a line hearers would have loved and later generations quoted often: God wounds and his hands make whole, he binds up. Eliphaz has hold of a genuine truth about discipline. He has simply decided in advance which category Job belongs in.
He also tells Job that appealing to the holy ones will get him nowhere, no member of the heavenly assembly will take his case. Hearers who remembered chapter 1 knew that the heavenly assembly was precisely where Job's case had been opened.
What it meant to them
Read on its own, this is a beautiful and largely true speech about a God who disciplines in love and restores. Read in place, it is a man telling a bereaved father that his children died because of the family's sin, and that a quick confession will get the farm back.
That gap between good theology and cruel counsel is the lesson the first hearers were meant to take. What is true in general can be a lie when aimed at a particular man.
Sources cited
- John E. Hartley, The Book of Job
- John H. Walton, Victor H. Matthews & Mark W. Chavalas, The IVP Bible Background Commentary: Old Testament
A. Eliphaz: Man Is Born Unto Trouble
1. (vv. 1-3)
a.Call now, if there be any that will answer thee: Eliphaz challenges Job to find any holy one who will take his side, call now, if there be any that will answer thee, and to which of the saints wilt thou turn, framing appeal to heaven itself as futile for a man under judgment. Wrath killeth the foolish man, and envy slayeth the silly one restates his doctrine that violent passions, not innocent suffering, are what destroy a life. Henry notes Eliphaz has already decided which category holds Job before he finishes the sentence. Gill reads I have seen the foolish taking root as Eliphaz's own eyewitness claim, offered as proof though it answers only for the cases he happened to observe.
Job 5:1, 1 voiceWhat preachers and commentators have said about this verse, in their own words.
Job 5:1
“Call now - The expressions used here, as Noyes has well observed, seem to be derived from the law, where the word “call” denotes the language of the complainant, and answer that of the defendant. According to this, the meaning of the words “call now” is, in jus voca: that is, call the Deity to account, or bring an action against him: or more properly, enter into an argument or litigation, as before a tribunal; see the notes at Isa 41:1, where similar language occurs.”
Job 5:2, 2 voices
Job 5:2
“For wrath killeth the foolish man, and envy slayeth the silly man. MORAL INTERPRETATION. Which same sentence would have been true, had it not been delivered against the patience of so great a man. But let us weigh well the thing that is said, though it be made to recoil by the virtue of his hearer, that we may shew how right the matter is, which is put forth, if it were not unjustly put forth against blessed Job; since it is written, But Thou, Lord, Judgest with tranquillity.”
Gregory the Dialogist· written before 604· Morals on the Book of Job, Book Vpatristic
Job 5:2
“For wrath killeth the foolish man - Foolish, silly, and simple, are epithets given by Solomon to sinners and transgressors of all kinds. Such parallelisms have afforded a presumptive argument that Solomon was the author of this book. See the preface. The words of Eliphaz may be considered as a sort of maxim, which the wisdom and experience of ages had served to establish; viz., The wrath of God is manifested only against the wicked and impious; and if thou wert not such, God would not thus contend with thee.”
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
Job 5:3, 2 voices
Job 5:3
“I have seen the foolish - The wicked. To confirm the sentiment which he had just advanced, Eliphaz appeals to his own observation, and says that though the wicked for a time seem to be prosperous, yet he had observed that they were soon overtaken with calamity and cut down. He evidently means that prosperity was no evidence of the divine favor; but that when it had continued for a little time, and was then withdrawn, it was proof that the man who had been prospered was at heart a wicked man.”
Job 5:3
“He seems here to parallel Job's case with that which is commonly the case of wicked people. Job had prospered for a time, seemed confirmed, and was secure in his prosperity; and it is common for foolish wicked men to do so: I have seen them taking root --planted, and, in their own and others' apprehension, fixed, and likely to continue.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
2. (vv. 4-5)
a.His children are far from safety: Eliphaz presses the doctrine into the next generation, his children are far from safety, and they are crushed in the gate, an accusation that lands with particular cruelty on a man who has just buried ten children. Whose harvest the hungry eateth up pictures a ruined estate stripped even to what grew among the thorns, poverty following judgment as surely as harvest follows planting. Barnes observes that Eliphaz speaks in general maxims about the wicked while every hearer in the room knows exactly whose children he means.
Job 5:4, 2 voices
Job 5:4
“His children are far from safety - His posterity shall not continue in prosperity. Ill gotten, ill spent; whatever is got by wrong must have God’s curse on it. They are crushed in the gate - The Targum says, They shall be bruised in the gate of hell, in the day of the great judgment.”
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
Job 5:4
“Children - Whose greatness he designed in all his enterprizes, supposing his family would be established forever. Safely - Are exposed to dangers and calamities, and can neither preserve themselves, nor the inheritance which their fathers left them. There is no question but he glances here, at the death of Job's children.”
John Wesley· Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament (1765)evangelical
Job 5:5, 2 voices
Job 5:5
“Harvest - Which they confidently expect to reap after all their cost and labour, but are sadly and suddenly disappointed. The hungry - The hungry Sabeans eat it up.”
John Wesley· Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament (1765)evangelical
Job 5:5
“16 So the poor hath hope, and iniquity stoppeth her mouth. Eliphaz, having touched Job in a very tender part, in mentioning both the loss of his estate and the death of his children as the just punishment of his sin, that he might not drive him to despair, here begins to encourage him, and puts him in a way to make himself easy.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
3. (vv. 6-7)
a.Although affliction cometh not forth of the dust: Eliphaz denies that suffering is random, affliction cometh not forth of the dust, neither doth trouble spring out of the ground, insisting trouble has a moral cause rather than growing wild like a weed. Yet man is born unto trouble, as the sparks fly upward states the general rule so memorably that it has outlived the argument it was built to serve. Delitzsch notes the proverb is true of fallen humanity at large even where Eliphaz misapplies it to one particular case. Wesley reads the sparks rising as nature's own picture of trouble's certainty, as fixed as fire's upward motion.
Job 5:6, 1 voice
Job 5:6
“We must not attribute our afflictions to fortune, for they are from God, nor our sins to fate, for they are from ourselves; so that, whatever trouble we are in, we must own that God sends it upon us and we procure it to ourselves: the former is a reason why we should be very patient, the latter why we should be very penitent, when we are afflicted.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Job 5:7, 2 voices
Job 5:7
“Man is born to labour, and the bird to flying. For 'man is born to labour,' in that he, who is furnished with the gift of reason, bethinks himself that it is wholly impossible for him to pass through this season of his pilgrimage without sorrowing. Hence when Paul was recounting his woes to his disciples, he justly added, For yourselves know that we are appointed thereto.”
Gregory the Dialogist· written before 604· Morals on the Book of Job, Book VIpatristic
Job 5:7
“Yet--rather, "Truly," or, But affliction does not come from chance, but is the appointment of God for sin; that is, the original birth-sin of man. Eliphaz passes from the particular sin and consequent suffering of Job to the universal sin and suffering of mankind.”
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown· Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)reformed
B. Eliphaz: As for Me, I Would Seek Unto God
1. (vv. 8-9)
a.I would seek unto God, and unto God would I commit my cause: Eliphaz now gives counsel that is right in itself though wrong for the case at hand, I would seek unto God, and unto God would I commit my cause, advice any reader of the book could follow. Which doeth great things and unsearchable, marvellous things without number opens a hymn to providence that will run through verse sixteen. Henry notes that the counsel is sound and would serve Job well if only the diagnosis beneath it were not mistaken, since Job has never stopped seeking God even while protesting to him. Gill reads the language of unsearchable and marvellous things as drawn from the same vocabulary the whirlwind speeches will use of God's works in chapters thirty-eight through forty-one, Eliphaz reaching for truth greater than his own argument.
Job 5:9, 1 voice
Job 5:9
“Eliphaz acknowledges that God is the ruler and creator of all things. It is likely that he has these convictions. He is a man who possesses wisdom in human things. Eliphaz also has an understanding of the invisible and visible, since he speaks of the …”
Didymus the Blind· written before 398· COMMENTARY ON JOB 5:9-10patristic
2. (vv. 10-11)
a.Who giveth rain upon the earth: The hymn continues with two workings of providence held together, who giveth rain upon the earth, and sendeth waters upon the fields, and the reversal of fortune, to set up on high those that be low, that those which mourn may be exalted to safety. Clarke reads the rain as the commonest mercy made to prove the greatest point, that the God who governs weather also governs the raising and lowering of men. JFB notes the exaltation of mourners is offered as a general promise that Eliphaz will apply to Job's own case only later in the chapter, once repentance has been assumed.
Job 5:10, 1 voice
Job 5:10
“Who giveth rain upon the earth - The Chaldee gives this verse a fine turn: “Who gives rain on the face of the land of Israel, and sends waters on the face of the provinces of the people.” Similar to our Lord’s saying, which is expressed in the half of the compass: Your Father which is in heaven - Sendeth Rain on the Just and on the Unjust; Mat 5:”
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
Job 5:11, 1 voice
Job 5:11
“Those whom proud men contrive to crush he raises from under their feet, and sets them in safety, Ps. xii. The lowly in heart, and those that mourn, he advances, comforts, and makes to dwell on high, in the munitions of rocks, Isa. xxxiii. Sion's mourners are the sealed ones, marked for safety, Ezek. ix.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
3. (vv. 12-13)
a.He disappointeth the devices of the crafty: Eliphaz's hymn turns from nature to human schemes, he disappointeth the devices of the crafty, so that their hands cannot perform their enterprise, and then states the one sentence of this book the New Testament quotes word for word, he taketh the wise in their own craftiness. Paul cites it at 1 Corinthians 3:19 with it is written, canonizing Eliphaz's line even though the chapter that carries it is a speech God will later say did not speak of him the thing that is right. Gill holds the two facts together without softening either: the sentence is true and belongs to Scripture, and the man who first said it used a true word to build a false case against an innocent sufferer. Barnes notes the craftiness undone here is exactly what will happen to the friends' own arguing by the book's final chapter.
Job 5:12, 1 voice
Job 5:12
“There is a supreme power that manages and overrules men who think themselves free and absolute, and fulfils its own purposes in spite of their projects. Observe, First, The froward, that walk contrary to God and the interests of his kingdom, are often very crafty; for they are the seed of the old serpent that was noted for his subtlety.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Job 5:13, 1 voice
Job 5:13
“Paul (1Co 3:19) quoted this clause with the formula establishing its inspiration, "it is written." He cites the exact Hebrew words, not as he usually does the Septuagint, Greek version (Ps 9:15). Haman was hanged on the gallows he prepared for Mordecai (Es 5:14; 7:10). the wise--that is, "the cunning." is carried headlong--Their scheme is precipitated before it is ripe.”
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown· Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)reformed
Job 5:13
- Quoted in1 Corinthians 3:19For the wisdom of this world is foolishness in God’s sight. As it is written: “He catches the wise in their craftiness.”
'He taketh the wise in their own craftiness' ('it is written')
4. (vv. 14-16)
a.They meet with darkness in the daytime: The hymn's reversal completes itself, they meet with darkness in the daytime, and grope in the noonday as in the night, the crafty stumbling in broad light while he saveth the poor from the sword, from their mouth, and from the hand of the mighty. So the poor hath hope, and iniquity stoppeth her mouth closes the section with the silencing of wrongdoing rather than its punishment. Henry reads the whole hymn as true doctrine about God's ordinary providence, offered here as an argument it was never built to carry against one righteous man's case. Wesley notes the image of iniquity stopping her own mouth as wickedness silenced by its own exposure rather than by any human argument.
Job 5:15, 1 voice
Job 5:15
“MORAL INTERPRETATION. But he shall save the poor from the sword of their mouth, and from the hand of the mighty. For the 'poor' is everyone that is not set up in his own eyes. And hence 'Truth' saith in the Gospel, Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Now a person is drawn into sin in two ways. For either he is led on by pleasure, or overcome by fear. For 'the sword of the mouth' is the mischievousness of persuasion, but 'the hand of the mighty' is the opposition of power.”
Gregory the Dialogist· written before 604· Morals on the Book of Job, Book VIpatristic
Job 5:16, 1 voice
Job 5:16
“So the poor - דל dal, he who is made thin, who is wasted, extenuated; hath hope - he sees what God is accustomed to do, and he expects a repetition of gracious dealings in his own behalf; and because God deals thus with those who trust in him, therefore the mouth of impiety is stopped. Religion is kept alive in the earth, because of God’s signal interventions in behalf of the bodies and souls of his followers.”
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
C. Eliphaz: Happy Is the Man Whom God Correcteth
1. (vv. 17-18)
a.Behold, happy is the man whom God correcteth: , therefore despise not thou the chastening of the Almighty stands beside Proverbs 3:11 through 12, the text Hebrews 12 later quotes on the same subject, a parallel the bench draws though the two passages address different situations. Eliphaz means the words as diagnosis, that Job's suffering is corrective discipline for a fault yet to be found and confessed. He maketh sore, and bindeth up: he woundeth, and his hands make whole states a true pattern of God's dealing that the book's own ending will vindicate in a different way than Eliphaz intends. Davidson notes the verse is right about God's character and wrong, in this mouth, about which of God's dealings is actually in view.
Job 5:17, 2 voices
Job 5:17
“Behold, happy is the man whom God correcteth - This verse commences a new argument, designed to show that afflictions are followed by so important advantages as to make it proper that we should submit to them without a complaint. The sentiment in this verse, if not expressly quoted, is probably alluded to by the apostle Paul in Heb 12:5. The same thought frequently occurs in the Bible: see Jas 1:12; Pro 3:11-”
Job 5:17
“Nay, he is happy because he is afflicted; correction is an evidence of his sonship and a means of his sanctification; it mortifies his corruptions, weans his heart from the world, draws him nearer to God, brings him to his Bible, brings him to his knees, works him for, and so is working for him, a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Job 5:18, 2 voices
Job 5:18
“For he maketh sore, and bindeth up - Thus nervously rendered by Coverdale, For though he make a wounde, he giveth a medicyne agayne; though he smyte, his honde maketh whole agayne.”
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
Job 5:18
“All is well again; and he comforts them according to the time wherein he afflicted them. God's usual method is first to wound and then to heal, first to convince and then to comfort, first to humble and then to exalt; and (as Mr. Caryl observes) he never makes a wound too great, too deep, for his own cure.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
2. (vv. 19-23)
a.He shall deliver thee in six troubles: Eliphaz catalogues deliverance in a rising number, six troubles and a seventh where no evil shall touch, covering famine, war, slander, destruction, wild beasts, and the stones and beasts of the field turned to allies rather than threats. Clarke notes the six-and-seven pattern as a Hebrew idiom for completeness rather than a literal count, promising total safety rather than protection from exactly seven named dangers. The promise is offered as a guarantee attached to Job's repentance, which is the friends' whole method: name a sweeping future blessing and let it argue backward for a present hidden sin. Wesley reads the peace with the stones and beasts of the field as language the book itself will answer literally in Job's own restoration, when the created order stands at peace with him again.
Job 5:19, 3 voices
Job 5:19
“He shall deliver thee in six troubles, yea, in seven there shall no evil touch thee. For what is denoted by the number 'six,' which is followed by 'the seventh,' saving the labour and course of the present life? For God, finishing all things on the sixth day, created man, and God rested on the seventh day; and this same seventh day is without an evening, for there is no longer any end to close the rest that followeth.”
Gregory the Dialogist· written before 604· Morals on the Book of Job, Book VIpatristic
Job 5:19
“He shall deliver thee in six troubles - Six is used here to denote an indefinite number, meaning that he would support in many troubles. This mode of speech is not uncommon among the Hebrews, where one number is mentioned, so that an extreme number may be immediately added. The method is, to mention a number within the limit, and then to add one more, meaning that in all instances the thing referred to would occur.”
Job 5:19
“This intimates that,as long as we are here in this world, we must expect a succession of troubles, that the clouds will return after the rain. After six troubles may come a seventh; after many, look for more; but out of them all will God deliver those that are his, 2 Tim. iii.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Job 5:20, 3 voices
Job 5:20
“In famine He shall redeem thee from death, and in war from the power of the sword. As the 'famine' of the flesh is the withdrawal of the support of the body, so the hunger of the soul is the silence of divine revelation. Hence it is rightly delivered by the Prophet, I will send a famine in the land, not a famine of bread, nor a thirst of water, but a famine of hearing the word of the Lord.”
Gregory the Dialogist· written before 604· Morals on the Book of Job, Book VIpatristic
Job 5:20
In famine he shall redeem thee - The Chaldee, which understands this chapter as speaking of the troubles and deliverances of the Israelites in Egypt and the wilderness, renders this verse as follows: “In the famine of Egypt he redeemed thee from death; and in the war of Amalek, from the slaying of the sword.”
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
Job 5:20
“Hebrew, "hands." of the sword-- (Eze 35:5, Margin). Hands are given to the sword personified as a living agent.”
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown· Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)reformed
Job 5:21, 1 voice
Job 5:21
“Thou shalt be hid from the scourge of the tongue - Margin, Or, “when the tongue scourgeth.” The word rendered “scourge” - שׁוט shôṭ - means properly a whip. It is used of God when he scourges people by calamities and punishments; Isa 10:26; Job 9:23. See the use of the verb שׁוּט shûṭ in Job 2:7. Here it is used to denote a slanderous tongue, as being that which inflicts a severe wound upon the reputation and peace of an individual.”
Job 5:22, 2 voices
Job 5:22
“At destruction and famine thou shalt laugh - This most forcibly expresses the strongest security, and confidence in that security. “In the desolation of Sihon, and in the famine of the desert, thou shalt laugh; and of the camps of Og, who is compared to a wild beast of the earth, thou shalt not be afraid.” - Targum.”
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
Job 5:22
“Blessed Paul laughed at destruction when he said, O death! where is thy sting? when, in the name of all the saints, he defied all the calamities of this present time to separate us from the love of God, concluding that in all these things we are more than conquerors, Rom. viii.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Job 5:23, 3 voices
Job 5:23
“But with the stones of the countries shall be thy covenant. And the beasts of the earth shall be peacemakers to thee. The Churches of the nations are like separate countries in the world, which, while they be planted in one faith, are separated by a diversity of customs and of tongues. What then do we take the stones of the countries to mean but the Elect ones of the Church, to whom it is declared by the voice of him who was the first among the teachers, Ye also as lively stones are built up a spiritual house?”
Gregory the Dialogist· written before 604· Morals on the Book of Job, Book VIpatristic
Job 5:23
“For thou shalt be in league with the stones of the field - In the Hebrew, “There shall be a covenant between thee and the stones of the field.” The sense is, they shall not harm thee. They are here spoken of as enemies that were made to be at peace, and that would not annoy or injure. It is to be remembered that this was spoken in Arabia, where rocks and stones abounded, and where traveling, from that cause, was difficult and dangerous.”
Job 5:23
“18 , I will make a covenant for them with the beasts of the field. This implies that while man is at enmity with his Maker the inferior creatures are at war with him; but tranquillus Deus tranquillat omnia--a reconciled God reconciles all things. Our covenant with God is a covenant with all the creatures that they shall do us no hurt but be ready to serve us and do us good.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
3. (vv. 24-26)
a.thou shalt know that thy tabernacle shall be in peace: Eliphaz's promised future, thou shalt know that thy tabernacle shall be in peace, and thou shalt visit thy habitation, and shalt not sin, along with a great seed and a grave in a full age like a shock of corn gathered in its season, will come true almost word for word at 42:12 through 17. Henry notes the irony the friends never see: what Eliphaz predicts as the reward of Job's repentance for a hidden sin instead comes to Job after God rebukes Eliphaz's own speech as wrong. Barnes reads the shock of corn image as the patriarchal ideal of a long life ended in season rather than cut off, the very picture Job's restored years will fulfill.
Job 5:24, 2 voices
Job 5:24
“And thou shalt know that thy tabernacle shall be in peace. And thou shalt visit thy likeness, and shalt not sin. In holy Scripture full peace is described in one way, and peace in its beginning in another. For 'Truth' gave to His Disciples peace in its beginning, when He said, Peace I leave with you; My peace I give unto you. And Simeon desired to have perfect peace, when he besought saying, Now lettest Thou Thy servant depart in peace, according to Thy word.”
Gregory the Dialogist· written before 604· Morals on the Book of Job, Book VIpatristic
Job 5:24
"Sin" does not agree with the context. The Hebrew word--"to miss" a mark, said of archers (Jud 20:16). The Hebrew for "habitation" primarily means "the fold for cattle"; and for "visit," often to "take an account of, to number." "Peace" is the common Eastern salutation; including inward and outward prosperity.
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown· Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)reformed
Job 5:25, 1 voice
Job 5:25
“Thou shalt know also that thy seed shall be great - Margin, “much.” That is, thy posterity shall be numerous. This was one of the blessings supposed to be connected with the favor of God; see the notes at Isa 53:10. And thine offspring as the grass of the earth - On the meaning of the word here rendered offspring, see the notes at Isa 48:19. Nothing is more common in the Scriptures, than to compare a prosperous and a happy man to a green and flourishing tree; see Psa 1:3; Psa 92:12-”
Job 5:26, 3 voices
Job 5:26
“Thou shalt come to thy grave in fulness, like as a shock of corn cometh in in his season. For what is denoted by the name of the grave, saving a life of contemplation? which as it were buries us, dead to this world, in that it hides us in the interior world away from all earthly desires. For they being dead to the exterior life, were also buried by contemplation, to whom Paul said, For ye are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God.”
Gregory the Dialogist· written before 604· Morals on the Book of Job, Book VIpatristic
Job 5:26
“WE DO NOT BELIEVE all that Job’s friends said. They spoke very often as uninspired men, for we find them saying many things that are not true; and if we read the book of Job through, we might say with regard to them, “miserable comforters are ye all,” for they did not speak concerning God’s servant, Job, the thing that was right.”
Job 5:26
“Eliphaz speaks from the Old Testament point of view, which made full years a reward of the righteous (Ps 91:16; Ex 20:12), and premature death the lot of the wicked (Ps 55:23). The righteous are immortal till their work is done.”
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown· Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)reformed
4. (v. 27)
a.Lo this, we have searched it, so it is: Eliphaz closes with a claim of collective authority, lo this, we have searched it, so it is, hear it, and know thou it for thy good, presenting his speech as tested wisdom rather than personal opinion. Gill notes the plural we as Eliphaz speaking for the received wisdom of his own tradition, the accumulated observation he takes as settled fact. Delitzsch reads the closing exhortation as typical of the sage's rhetoric of the age, appealing to tradition's weight where argument alone might not persuade.
Job 5:27, 1 voice
Job 5:27
“THUS closed a forcible speech by Eliphaz the Temanite—it may be called his "summing up." He virtually says, "What I have testified in the name of my friends is no dream of theirs. Upon this matter we are specialists and bear witness to truth which we have made the subject of research and experience. Lo this, we have searched it, so it is; hear it, and know you it for your good." By this declaration he sets forth his teaching with authority and presses it home.”
The text of this chapter
This page carries no textual note on Job 5. 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 12 works. Open for the list.
This page draws on A. B. Davidson, The Book of Job, Cambridge Bible; Adam Clarke; Albert Barnes; Charles Spurgeon; Didymus the Blind, COMMENTARY ON JOB 5:9-10; Franz Delitzsch, Biblical Commentary on the Book of Job; Gregory the Dialogist; Jamieson, Fausset & Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871); Jamieson, Fausset and Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible; John Gill, Exposition of the Old Testament; John Wesley and Matthew Henry.
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