Expositor's Bible: The Book of Job Part 21

Coral and crystal tell in vain, Pearls of the deep for wisdom's gain.

Topaz of Cush avails thee nought, Nor with gold of glory is it bought._"

While wisdom is thus of value incommensurate with all else men count precious and rare, it is equally beyond the reach of all other forms of mundane life. The birds that soar high into the atmosphere see nothing of it, nor does any creature that wanders far into uninhabitable wilds. Abaddon and Death indeed, the devouring abyss and that silent world which seems to gather and keep all secrets, have heard a rumour of it. Beyond the range of mortal sense some hint there may be of a Divine plan governing the mutations of existence, the fulfilment of which will throw light on the underworld where the spirits of the departed wait in age-long night. But death has no knowledge any more than life. Wisdom is G.o.d's prerogative, His activities are His own to order and fulfil.

"_G.o.d understandeth the way thereof, And He knoweth the place thereof.

For He looketh to the ends of the earth, And seeth under the whole heaven, Making weight for the winds; And He meteth out the waters by measure.

When He made a decree for the rain, And a way for the lightning of thunder, Then did He see it and number it, He established it, yea, and searched it out._"

The evolution, as we should say, of the order of nature gives fixed and visible embodiment to the wisdom of G.o.d. We must conclude, therefore, that the poet indicates the complete idea of the world as a cosmos governed by subtle all-pervading law for moral ends. The creation of the visible universe is a.s.sumed to begin, and with the created before Him G.o.d sees its capacities, determines the use to which its forces are to be put, the relation all things are to have to each other, to the life of man and to His own glory. But the hokhma or understanding of this remains for ever beyond the discovery of the human intellect. Man knoweth not the way thereof. The forces of earth and air and sea and the deep that lieth under do not reveal the secret of their working; they are but instruments. And the end of all is not to be found in Sheol, in the silent world of the dead. G.o.d Himself is the Alpha and Omega, the First and the Last.

Yet man has his life and his law. Though intellectual understanding of his world and destiny may fail however earnestly he pursues the quest, he should obtain the knowledge that comes by reverence and obedience.

He can adore G.o.d, he can distinguish good from evil and seek what is right and true. There lies his hokhma, there, says the poet, it must continue to lie.

"_And unto man He said, Behold the fear of the Lord, that is wisdom, And to depart from evil is understanding._"

The conclusion lays a hush upon man's thought--but leaves it with a doctrine of G.o.d and faith reaching above the limitations of time and sense. Reverence for the Divine will not fully known, the pursuit of holiness, fear of the Unseen G.o.d are no agnosticism, they are the true springs of religious life.

XXIV.

_AS A PRINCE BEFORE THE KING._

JOB SPEAKS. CHAPS. xxix.-x.x.xi.

From the pain and desolation to which he has become inured as a pitiable second state of existence, Job looks back to the years of prosperity and health which in long succession he once enjoyed. This parable or review of the past ends his contention. Honour and blessedness are apparently denied him for ever. With what has been he compares his present misery and proceeds to a bold and n.o.ble vindication of his character alike from secret and from flagrant sins.

In the whole circle of Job's lamentations this chant is perhaps the most affecting. The language is very beautiful, in the finest style of the poet, and the minor cadences of the music are such as many of us can sympathise with. When the years of youth go by and strength wanes, the Eden we once dwelt in seems pa.s.sing fair. Of those beyond middle life there are few who do not set their early memories in sharp contrast to the ways they now travel, looking back to a happy valley and long bright summers that are left behind. And even in opening manhood and womanhood the troubles of life often fall, as we may think, prematurely, coming between the mind and the remembered joy of burdenless existence.

"How changed are they!--how changed am I!

The early spring of life is gone, Gone is each youthful vanity,-- But what with years, oh what is won?

"I know not--but while standing now Where opened first the heart of youth, I recollect how high would glow Its thoughts of Glory, Faith, and Truth--

"How full it was of good and great, How true to heaven, how warm to men.

Alas! I scarce forbear to hate The colder breast I bring again."

First in the years past Job sees by the light of memory the blessedness he had when the Almighty was felt to be his preserver and his strength. Though now G.o.d appears to have become an enemy he will not deny that once he had a very different experience. Then nature was friendly, no harm came to him; he was not afraid of the pestilence that walketh in darkness nor the destruction that wasteth at noon-day, for the Almighty was his refuge and fortress. To refuse this tribute of grat.i.tude is far from the mind of Job, and the expression of it is a sign that now at length he is come to a better mind. He seems on the way fully to recover his trust.

The elements of his former happiness are recounted in detail. G.o.d watched over him with constant care, the lamp of Divine love shone on high and lighted up the darkness, so that even in the night he could travel by a way he knew not and feel secure. Days of strength and pleasure were those when the secret of G.o.d, the sense of intimate fellowship with G.o.d, was on his tent, when his children were about him, that beautiful band of sons and daughters who were his pride.

Then his steps were bathed in abundance, b.u.t.ter provided by innumerable kine, rivers of oil which seemed to flow from the rock, where terrace above terrace the olives grew luxuriantly and yielded their fruit without fail.

Chiefly Job remembers with grat.i.tude to G.o.d the esteem in which he was held by all about him. Nature was friendly and not less friendly were men. When he went into the city and took his seat in the "broad place"

within the gate, he was acknowledged chief of the council and court of judgment. The young men withdrew and stood aside, yea the elders, already seated in the place of a.s.sembly, stood up to receive him as their superior in position and wisdom. Discussion was suspended that he might hear and decide. And the reasons for this respect are given.

In the society thus with idyllic touches represented, two qualities were highly esteemed--regard for the poor and wisdom in counsel. Then, as now, the problem of poverty caused great concern to the elders of cities. Though the population of an Arabian town could not be great, there were many widows and fatherless children, families reduced to beggary by disease or the failure of their poor means of livelihood, blind and lame persons utterly dependent on charity, besides wandering strangers and the vagrants of the desert. By his princely munificence to these Job had earned the grat.i.tude of the whole region. Need was met, poverty relieved, justice done in every case. He recounts what he did, not in boastfulness, but as one who rejoiced in the ability G.o.d had given him to aid suffering fellow-creatures. Those were indeed royal times for the generous-hearted man. Full of public spirit, his ear and hand always open, giving freely out of his abundance, he commended himself to the affectionate regard of the whole valley. The ready way of almsgiving was that alone by which relief was provided for the dest.i.tute, and Job was never appealed to in vain.

"_The ear that heard me blessed me, The eye that saw bare witness to me, Because I delivered the poor that cried, And the fatherless who had no helper.

The blessing of him that was ready to die came upon me, And I caused the widow's heart to sing with joy._"

So far Job rejoices in the recollection of what he had been able to do for the distressed and needy in those days when the lamp of G.o.d shone over him. He proceeds to speak of his service as magistrate or judge.

"_I put on righteousness and it indued itself with me, My justice was as a robe and a diadem; I was eyes to the blind, And feet was I to the lame._"

With righteousness in his heart so that all he said and did revealed it and wearing judgment as a turban, he sat and administered justice among the people. Those who had lost their sight and were unable to find the men that had wronged them came to him and he was as eyes to them, following up every clue to the crime that had been committed.

The lame who could not pursue their enemies appealed to him and he took up their cause. The poor, suffering under oppression, found him a protector, a father. Yea, "_the cause of him that I knew not I searched out_." On behalf of total strangers as well as of neighbours he set in motion the machinery of justice.

"_And I brake the jaws of the wicked And plucked the spoil from his teeth._"

None were so formidable, so daring and lion-like, but he faced them, brought them to judgment and compelled them to give up what they had taken by fraud and violence.

In those days, Job confesses, he had the dream that as he was prosperous, powerful, helpful to others by the grace of G.o.d, so he would continue. Why should any trouble fall on one who used power conscientiously for his neighbours? Would not Eloah sustain the man who was as a G.o.d to others?

"_Then I said, I shall die in my nest, And I shall multiply my days as the Phnix; My root shall spread out by the waters, And the dew shall be all night on my branch; My glory shall be fresh in me, And my bow shall be renewed in my hand._"

A fine touch of the dream-life which ran on from year to year, bright and blessed as if it would flow for ever. Death and disaster were far away. He would renew his life like the Phnix, attain to the age of the antediluvian fathers, and have his glory or life strong in him for uncounted years. So illusion flattered him, the very image he uses pointing to the futility of the hope.

The closing strophe of the chapter proceeds with even stronger touch and more abundant colour to represent his dignity. Men listened to him and waited. Like a refreshing rain upon thirsty ground--and how thirsty the desert could be!--his counsel fell on their ears. He smiled upon them when they had no confidence, laughed away their trouble, the light of his countenance never dimmed by their apprehensions. Even when all about him were in dismay his hearty hopeful outlook was unclouded. Trusting G.o.d, he knew his own strength and gave freely of it.

"_I chose out their way, and sat as a chief, And dwelt as a king in the crowd, As one that comforteth the mourners._"

Looked up to with this great esteem, acknowledged leader in virtue of his overflowing goodness and cheerfulness, he seemed to make sunshine for the whole community. Such was the past. All that had been, is gone apparently for ever.

How inexpressibly strange that power so splendid, mental, physical and moral strength used in the service of less favoured men should be destroyed by Eloah! It is like blotting out the sun from heaven and leaving a world in darkness. And most strange of all is the way in which low men a.s.sist the ruin that has been wrought.

The thirtieth chapter begins with this. Job is derided by the miserable and base whose fathers he would have disdained to set with the dogs of his flock. He paints these people, gaunt with hunger and vice, herding in the wilderness where alone they are suffered to exist, plucking mallows or salt-wort among the bushes and digging up the roots of broom for food. Men hunted them into the desert, crying after them as thieves, and they dwelt in the clefts of the wadies, in caves and amongst rocks.

Like wild a.s.ses they brayed in the scrub and flung themselves down among the nettles. Children they were of fools, base-born, men who had dishonoured their humanity and been whipped out of the land. Such are they whose song and by-word Job is now become. These, even these abhor him and spit in his face. He makes the contrast deep and dreadful as to his own experience and the moral confusion that has followed Eloah's strange work. For good there is evil, for light and order there is darkness. Does G.o.d desire this, ordain it?

One is inclined to ask whether the abounding compa.s.sion and humaneness of the Book of Job fails at this point. These wretched creatures who make their lair like wild beasts among the nettles, outcasts, branded as thieves, a wandering base-born race, are still men. Their fathers may have fallen into the vices of abject poverty. But why should Job say that he would have disdained to set them with the dogs of his flock? In a previous speech (chap. xxiv.) he described victims of oppression who had no covering in the cold and were drenched with the rain of the mountains, clinging to the rock for shelter; and of them he spoke gently, sympathetically. But here he seems to go beyond compa.s.sion.

Perhaps one might say the tone he takes now is pardonable, or almost pardonable, because these wretched beings, whom he may have treated kindly once, have seized the occasion of his misery and disease to insult him to his face. While the words appear hard, the uselessness of the pariah may be the main point. Yet a little of the pride of birth clings to Job. In this respect he is not perfect; here his prosperous life needs a check. The Almighty must speak to him out of the tempest that he may feel himself and find "the blessedness of being little."

These outcasts throw off all restraint and behave with disgraceful rudeness in his presence.

"_Upon my right hand rise the low brood, They push away my feet, And cast up against me their ways of destruction; They mar my path, And force on my calamity-- They who have no helper.

They come in as through a wide breach, In the desolation they roll themselves upon me._"

The various images, of a besieging army, of those who wantonly break up paths made with difficulty, of a breach in the embankment of a river, are to show that Job is now accounted one of the meanest, whom any man may treat with indignity. He was once the idol of the populace; "now none so poor to do him reverence." And this persecution by base men is only a sign of deeper abas.e.m.e.nt. As a horde of terrors sent by G.o.d he feels the reproaches and sorrows of his state.

"_Terrors are turned upon me; They chase away mine honour as the wind, And my welfare pa.s.seth as a cloud.

And now my soul is poured out in me The days of affliction have taken hold upon me._"

Thought shifts naturally to the awful disease which has caused his body to swell and to become black as with dust and ashes. And this leads him to his final vehement complaint against Eloah. How can He so abase and destroy His servant?

"_I cry unto Thee and Thou dost not hear me; I stand up, and Thou lookest at me.

Thou art turned to be cruel unto me: With the might of Thine hand Thou persecutest me.