Job 13:16

He also [shall be] my salvation,.... Job, though he asserted the integrity of his heart and life, yet did not depend on his ways and works for salvation, but only on the Lord himself; this is to be

He also shall be my salvation: for an hypocrite shall not come before him.

I rest assured that he will save me out of these miseries sooner or later, one way or other, if not with a temporal, yet with an eternal salvation after death; of which he speaks , &c. For; or but, as this particle commonly signifies; for this clause is put by way of opposition to the former, and the sense is, But if I were a hypocrite, as you allege, I durst not present myself before him to plead my cause with him, as now I desire to do, nor could I hope for any salvation from or with him in heaven.

Job 13:16 He also [shall be] my salvation: for an hypocrite shall not come before him.Ver. 16. He also shall be my salvation] So long as I judge myself God will not judge me, 1 Corinthians 11:32; nay, he will surely save me: for God will save the humble person, Job 22:29. What is humiliation but humility exercised? (Merlin in loc.) Non est igitur inanis electorum fides res evanida nec infirma, saith an interpreter here; Therefore the faith of God’ s elect is no empty or vain thing, but a light shining from the Spirit of God, and such as overcometh the very darkness of death. It is a sure testimony of God’ s good will toward us, and an infallible persuasion of our salvation, such as slighteth the world’ s false censures, overcometh temptations of all sorts, laugheth at death, and through the thickest darkness of affliction beholdeth the pleased face of God in Christ, through whom we have boldness and access with confidence by the faith of him, Ephesians 2:12. For an hypocrite shall not come before him] No, that is a privilege proper to the communion of saints; therefore I am no hypocrite, as you have charged me to be, Job 4:6; Job 8:13; for I dare both offer to maintain my ways before him to be upright for the main, and I doubt not but he will be my salvation, and that I shall appear before him in heaven: this no hypocrite shall ever do. Coram Deo dolus non ingreditur. How should he (say), when as he is an unclean wretch, as the Hebrew word signifieth; flagitious (so Vatablus rendereth it); a flagitious, impious person, a very fraud (so the Septuagint); a fair professor indeed, but a foul sinner, moiled all over, and even buried in a bog of wickedness. He is a wicked man in a godly man’ s clothes, saith one. He doth but assume religion, saith another, as the devils do dead bodies without a soul to animate them. He is like the painted grapes that deceived the living birds; or the golden apples with this motto, No further than colours; touch them, and they vanish. He knows that he is naught, and that God knows it too; how then should he approach him, or appear before his throne? No, he dare not, for the very show of his face doth testify against him, as the prophet speaks in another case; or if he do, he shall not be able to subsist there, Psalms 5:5; he shall not stand in judgment, Psalms 1:5, but shall run away with these or the like words in his mouth, "Who among us shall dwell with the devouring fire? who among us shall dwell with everlasting burnings?" Isaiah 33:14. "Woe unto us! who shall deliver us out of the hands of this mighty God?" 1 Samuel 4:8.

(16) He also shall be my salvation.—Comp. Psalms 27:1, &c. It is characteristic of Job that, living, as he probably did, outside the pale of Israel, he nevertheless shared the faith and knowledge of God’s chosen people; and this cannot be said of any other nation, nor docs any literature give evidence of it. Indeed, it is this which most markedly distinguishes Job from his friends, in that he can and does trust God unreservedly, in spite of all adverse circumstances, overwhelming as they were; while his friends are ignorant of the great central fact that He is Himself the sinner’s hope, and are content to rest only upon vague and bald generalities. It is because, therefore, he has said, and can say, “He is and will be my salvation,” that he can also say, “I know that I shall be justified, that I am righteous, because I trust in Him” (Genesis 15:6). We do not, in thus speaking, import the Gospel into Job, but exhibit that in Job which had already been manifest in Abraham, and probably recorded of him.

Verse 16. He also shall be my salvation] He will save me, because I trust in him. A hypocrite] A wicked man shall never be able to stand before him. I am conscious of this, and were I, as you suppose, a secret sinner, I should not dare to make this appeal.

16. He also shall be] Rather, this also. for a hypocrite shall not] Rather, that a godless man will not; see on ch. Job 8:13. A godless man will not dare to go before God; but Job dares and desires; and this courage, sweet evidence to himself of his innocence, he says will be his salvation, that is, will secure him victory in his plea with God. He hardly distinguishes between his own consciousness of innocence and his innocence itself and the proof of it. He is so conscious of it that he is sure it will appear before God, cf. Job 13:18 and the passage ch. Job 27:8 foll.

He also shalt be my salvation - See the notes at Isaiah 12:2. Literally, “He is unto me for salvation,” that is, “I put my trust in him, and he will save me.

16. He… my salvation — He, God, not this, as some read. “Job reassures himself with the thought that God cannot reveal himself to the wicked.” — Renan.