Expositor's Bible: The Book of Job Part 12

What is it? One must a.s.sume, for the reasoner is no fool, that the settled temper and habit of a life are meant. Revolt against G.o.d, proud opposition to His will and law, these are the wickedness. It is no mere stagnant pool of corruption, but a force running against the Almighty. Very well: Eliphaz has not only made a true distinction, but apparently stated for once a true conclusion. Such a man will indeed be likely to suffer for his arrogance in this life, although it does not hold that he will be haunted by fears of coming doom. But a.n.a.lysing the details of the wicked life in vers. 25-28, we find incoherency. The question is why he suffers and is afraid.

"_Because he stretched out his hand against G.o.d, And bade defiance to the Almighty; He ran upon Him with a neck Upon the thick bosses of His bucklers; Because he covered his face with his fatness And made collops of fat on his flanks; And he dwelt in tabooed cities, In houses which no man ought to inhabit, Destined to become heaps._"

Eliphaz has narrowed down the whole contention, so that he may carry it triumphantly and bring Job to admit, at least in this case, the law of sin and retribution. It is fair to suppose that he is not presenting Job's case, but an argument, rather, in abstract theology, designed to strengthen his own general position. The author, however, by side lights on the reasoning shows where it fails. The account of calamity and judgment, true as it might be in the main of G.o.d-defiant lives running headlong against the laws of heaven and earth, is confused by the other element of wickedness--"Because he hath covered his face with his fatness," etc. The recoil of a refined man of pure race from one of gross sensual appet.i.te is scarcely a fit parallel to the aversion of G.o.d from man stubbornly and insolently rebellious. Further, the superst.i.tious belief that one was unpardonable who made his dwelling in cities under the curse of G.o.d (literally, cities _cut off_ or _tabooed_), while it might be sincerely put forward by Eliphaz, made another flaw in his reasoning. Any one in constant terror of judgment would have been the last to take up his abode in such accursed habitations. The argument is strong only in picturesque a.s.sertion.

The latter end of the wicked man and his futile attempts to found a family or clan are presented at the close of the address. He shall not become rich; that felicity is reserved for the servants of G.o.d. No plentiful produce shall weigh down the branches of his olives and vines, nor shall he ever rid himself of misfortune. As by a flame or hot breath from the mouth of G.o.d his harvest and himself shall be carried away. The vanity or mischief he sows shall return to him in vanity or trouble; and before his time, while life should be still fresh, the full measure of his reward shall be paid to him. The branch withered and dry, unripe grapes and the infertile flowers of the olive falling to the ground point to the want of children or their early death; for "the company of the G.o.dless shall be barren." The tents of injustice or bribery, left desolate, shall be burned. The only fruit of the doomed life shall be iniquity.

One hesitates to accuse Eliphaz of inaccuracy. Yet the shedding of the petals of the olive is not in itself a sign of infertility; and although this tree, like others, often blossoms without producing fruit, yet it is the constant emblem of productiveness. The vine, again, may have shed its unripe grapes in Teman; but usually they wither. It may be feared that Eliphaz has fallen into the popular speaker's trick of s.n.a.t.c.hing at ill.u.s.trations from "something supposed to be science." His contention is partly sound in its foundation, but fails like his a.n.a.logies; and the controversy, when he leaves off, is advanced not a single step.

XIV.

'_MY WITNESS IN HEAVEN._'

JOB SPEAKS. CHAPS. xvi., xvii.

If it were comforting to be told of misery and misfortune, to hear the doom of insolent evil-doers described again and again in varying terms, then Job should have been comforted. But his friends had lost sight of their errand, and he had to recall them to it.

"_I have heard many such things: Afflictive comforters are ye all.

Shall vain words have an end?_"

He would have them consider that perpetual harping on one string is but a sober accomplishment! Returning one after another to the wicked man, the G.o.dless sinner, crafty, froward, sensual, overbearing, and his certain fate of disaster and extinction, they are at once obstinately ungracious and to Job's mind pitifully inept. He is indisposed to argue afresh with them, but he cannot refrain from expressing his sorrow and indeed his indignation that they have offered him a stone for bread.

Excusing themselves they had blamed him for his indifference to the "consolations of G.o.d." All he had been aware of was their "joining words together" against him with much shaking of the head. Was that Divine consolation? Anything, it seemed, was good enough for him, a man under the stroke of G.o.d. Perhaps he is a little unfair to his comforters. They cannot drop their creed in order to a.s.suage his grief. In a sense it would have been easy to murmur soothing inanities.

"One writes that 'Other friends remain,'

That 'Loss is common to the race'-- And common is the commonplace, And vacant chaff well meant for grain.

"That loss is common would not make My own less bitter, rather more: Too common! Never morning wore To evening, but some heart did break."

Even so: the courteous superficial talk of men who said, Friend, you are only accidentally afflicted; there is no stroke of G.o.d in this: wait a little till the shadows pa.s.s, and meanwhile let us cheer you by stories of old times:--such talk would have served Job even less than the serious attempt of the friends to settle the problem. It is therefore with somewhat inconsiderate irony he blames them for not giving what, if they had offered it, he would have rejected with scorn.

"_I also could speak like you; If your soul were in my soul's stead, I could join words together against you, And shake my head at you; I could strengthen you with my mouth, And the solace of my lips should a.s.suage your grief._"

The pa.s.sage is throughout ironical. No change of tone occurs in verse 5, as the opening word _But_ in the English version is intended to imply.

Job means, of course, that such consolation as they were offering he never would have offered them. It would be easy, but abhorrent.

So far in sad sarcasm; and then, the sense of desolation falling too heavily on his mind for banter or remonstrance, he returns to his complaint. What is he among men? What is he in himself? What is he before G.o.d? Alone, stricken, the object of fierce a.s.sault and galling reproach. After a pause of sorrowful thought he resumes the attempt to express his woes, a final protest before his lips are silent in death.

He cannot hope that speaking will relieve his sorrow or mitigate his pain. He would prefer to bear on

"In all the silent manliness of grief."

But as yet the appeal he has made to G.o.d remains unanswered, for aught he knows unheard. It appears therefore his duty to his own reputation and his faith that he endeavour yet again to break the obstinate doubts of his integrity which still estrange from him those who were his friends. He uses indeed language that will not commend his case but tend to confirm every suspicion. Were he wise in the world's way he would refrain from repeating his complaint against G.o.d. Rather would he speak of his misery as a simple fact of experience and strive to argue himself into submission. This line he has not taken and never takes. It is present to his own mind that the hand of G.o.d is against him. Whether men will join him by-and-by in an appeal from G.o.d to G.o.d he cannot tell. But once more all that he sees or seems to see he will declare. Every step may bring him into more painful isolation, yet he will proclaim his wrong.

"_Certainly, now, He hath wearied me out.

Thou hast made desolate my company; Thou hast taken hold of me, And it is a witness against me; And my leanness riseth up against me Bearing witness to my face._"

He is exhausted; he has come to the last stage. The circle of his family and friends in which he once stood enjoying the love and esteem of all--where is it now? That hold of life is gone. Then, as if in sheer malice, G.o.d has plucked health from him, and doing so, left a charge of unworthiness. By the sore disease the Divine hand grasps him, keeps him down. The emaciation of his body bears witness against him as an object of wrath. Yes; G.o.d is his enemy, and how terrible an enemy! He is like a savage lion that tears with his teeth and glares as if in act to devour. With G.o.d, men also, in their degree, persecute and a.s.sail him. People from the city have come out to gaze upon him.

Word has gone round that he is being crushed by the Almighty for proud defiance and blasphemy. Men who once trembled before him have smitten him upon the cheek reproachfully. They gather in groups to jeer at him. He is delivered into their hands.

But it is G.o.d, not men, of whose strange work he has most bitterly to speak. Words almost fail him to express what his Almighty Foe has done.

"_I was at ease, and He brake me asunder; Yea he hath taken me by the neck And dashed me to pieces: He hath also set me as His b.u.t.t, His arrows compa.s.s me round about, He cleaveth my reins asunder and spareth not, He poureth my gall on the ground; He breaketh me with breach upon breach, He runneth upon me like a giant._"

Figure after figure expresses the sense of persecution by one full of resource who cannot be resisted. Job declares himself to be physically bruised and broken. The stings and sores of his disease are like arrows shot from every side that rankle in his flesh. He is like a fortress beleaguered and stormed by some irresistible enemy. His strength humbled to the dust, his eyes foul with weeping, the eyelids swollen so that he cannot see, he lies abased and helpless, stricken to the very heart. But not in the chastened mood of one who has done evil and is now brought to contrite submission. That is as far from him as ever. The whole account is of persecution, undeserved. He suffers, but protests still that there is no violence in his hands, also his prayer is pure. Let neither G.o.d nor man think he is concealing sin and making appeal craftily. Sincere he is in every word.

At this point, where Job's impa.s.sioned language might be expected to lead to a fresh outburst against heaven and earth, one of the most dramatic turns in the thought of the sufferer brings it suddenly to a minor harmony with the creation and the Creator. His excitement is intense. Spiritual eagerness approaches the highest point. He invokes the earth to help him and the mountain echoes. He protests that his claim of integrity has its witness and must be acknowledged.

For this new and most pathetic effort to reach a benignant fidelity in G.o.d which all his cries have not yet stirred, the former speeches have made preparation. Rising from the thought that it was all one to G.o.d whether he lived or died since the perfect and the wicked are alike destroyed, bewailing the want of a daysman between him and the Most High, Job in the tenth chapter touched the thought that his Maker could not despise the work of His own hands. Again, in chapter xiv., the possibility of redemption from Sheol gladdened him for a little.

Now, under the shadow of imminent death, he abandons the hope of deliverance from the under-world. Immediately, if at all, his vindication must come. And it exists, written on the breast of earth, open to the heavens, somewhere in clear words before the Highest. Not vainly did the speaker in his days of past felicity serve G.o.d with all his heart. The G.o.d he then worshipped heard his prayers, accepted his offerings, made him glad with a friendship that was no empty dream.

Somewhere his Divine Friend lives still, observes still his tears and agonies and cries. Those enemies about him taunting him with sins he never committed, this horrible malady bearing him down into death;--G.o.d knows of these, knows them to be cruel and undeserved. He cries to that G.o.d, Eloah of the Elohim, Higher than the highest.

"_O Earth, cover not my blood, And let my cry have no resting-place!

Even now, lo! my witness is in heaven, And He that voucheth for me is on high.

My friends scorn me: Mine eye sheds tears unto G.o.d-- That he would right a man against G.o.d, And a son of man against his friend._"

Now--in the present stage of being, before those years expire that lead him to the grave--Job entreats the vindication which exists in the records of heaven. As a son of man he pleads, not as one who has any peculiar claim, but simply as a creature of the Almighty; and he pleads for the first time with tears. The fact that earth, too, is besought to help him must not be overlooked. There is a touch of wide and wistful emotion, a sense that Eloah must regard the witness of His world. The thought has its colour from a very old feeling; it takes us back to primaeval faith, and the dumb longing before faith.

Is there in any sense a deeper depth in the faithfulness of G.o.d, a higher heaven, more difficult to penetrate, of Divine benignity? Job is making a bold effort to break that barrier we have already found to exist in Hebrew thought between G.o.d as revealed by nature and providence and G.o.d as vindicator of the individual life. The man has that in his own heart which vouches for his life, though calamity and disease impeach him. And in the heart of G.o.d also there must be a witness to His faithful servant, although, meanwhile, something interferes with the testimony G.o.d could bear. Job's appeal is to the sun beyond the rolling clouds to shine. It is there; G.o.d is faithful and true. It will shine. But let it shine _now_! Human life is brief and delay will be disastrous. Pathetic cry--a struggle against what in ordinary life is the inexorable. How many have gone the way whence they shall not return, unheard apparently, unvindicated, hidden in calumny and shame! And yet Job was right. The Maker has regard to the work of His hands.

The philosophy of Job's appeal is this, that beneath all seeming discord there is one clear note. The universe is one and belongs to One, from the highest heaven to the deepest pit. Nature, providence,--what are they but the veil behind which the One Supreme is hidden, the veil G.o.d's own hands have wrought? We see the Divine in the folds of the veil, the marvellous pictures of the arras. Yet behind is He who weaves the changing forms, iridescent with colours of heaven, dark with unutterable mystery. Man is now in the shadow of the veil, now in the light of it, self-pitying, exultant, in despair, in ecstasy. He would pa.s.s the barrier. It will not yield at his will. It is no veil now, but a wall of adamant. Yet faith on this side answers to truth beyond; of this the soul is a.s.sured. The cry is for G.o.d to unravel the enigmas of His own providence, to unfold the principle of His discipline, to make clear what is perplexing to the mind and conscience of His thinking, suffering creature. None but He who weaves the web can withdraw it, and let the light of eternity shine on the tangles of time. From G.o.d the Concealer to G.o.d the Revealer, from G.o.d who hides Himself to G.o.d who is Light, in whom is no darkness at all, we appeal. To pray on--that is man's high privilege, man's spiritual life.

So the pa.s.sage we have read is a splendid utterance of the wayworn travelling soul conscious of sublime possibilities,--shall we not say, certainties? Job is G.o.d-inspired in his cry, not profane, not mad, but prophetic. For G.o.d is a bold dealer with men, and He likes bold sons.

The impeachment we almost shuddered to hear is not abominable to Him because it is the truth of a soul. The claim that G.o.d is man's witness is the true courage of faith: it is sincere, and it is justified.

The demand for immediate vindication still urged is inseparable from the circ.u.mstances.

"_For when a few years are come I shall go the way whence I shall not return.

My spirit is consumed, my days extinct; The grave is ready for me.

Surely there are mockeries with me And mine eyes lodgeth in their provocation.

Provide a pledge now; be surely for me with Thyself.

Who is there that will strike hands with me?_"

Moving towards the under-world, the fire of his spirit burning low because of his disease, his body preparing its own grave, the bystanders flouting him with mockeries under a sense of which his eyes remain closed in weary endurance, he has need for one to undertake for him, to give him a pledge of redemption. But who is there excepting G.o.d to whom he can appeal? What other friend is left? Who else would be surety for one so forlorn? Against disease and fate, against the seeming wreck of hope and life, will not G.o.d Himself stand up for His servant? As for the men his friends, his enemies, the Divine suretyship for Job will recoil upon them and their cruel taunts. Their hearts are "hid from understanding," unable to grasp the truth of the case; "Therefore Thou shalt not exalt them"--that is, Thou shalt bring them low. Yes, when G.o.d redeems His pledge, declares openly that He has undertaken for His servant, the proverb shall be fulfilled--"He that giveth his fellows for a prey, even the eyes of his children shall fail." It is a proverb of the old way of thinking and carries a kind of imprecation. Job forgets himself in using it. Yet how, otherwise, is the justice of G.o.d to be invoked against those who pervert judgment and will not receive the sincere defence of a dying man?

"_I am even made a byeword of the populace; I am become one in whose face they spit: Mine eye also fails by reason of sorrow._"

This is apparently parenthetical--and then Job returns to the result of the intervention of his Divine Friend. One reason why G.o.d should become his surety is the pitiable state he is in. But another reason is the new impetus that will be given to religion, the awakening of good men out of their despondency, the rea.s.surance of those who are pure in heart, the growth of spiritual strength in the faithful and true. A fresh light thrown on providence shall indeed startle and revive the world.

"_Upright men shall be amazed at this, And the innocent shall rouse himself against the G.o.dless.

And the righteous shall keep his way, And he that hath clean hands wax stronger and stronger._"

With this hope, that his life is to be rescued from darkness and the faith of the good re-established by the fulfilment of G.o.d's suretyship, Job comforts himself for a little--but only for a little, a moment of strength, during which he has courage to dismiss his friends:--