Job 4

QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION 4:1-21

Give the facts about Eliphaz. He is shocked. Why?

John the ninth chapter relates Eliphaz’s attitude. How?

The scriptures sit in judgment upon Freud’s theory. Show how.

Why remind Job of his counsel to others?

Read Job 29:18-20 and show how these verses relate here.

Job was very helpful to others in trouble. Why remember this?

Is Eliphaz sarcastic in Job 4:5? Discuss.

Job has confidence. From what source?

Is Job an exception to the rule stated in Job 4:7? Discuss.

There is a strong principle of truth stated in Job 4:8. How does it apply to Job?

What teaching is at the heart of America’s Success Syndrome?

Jesus repudiates a blasphemous and heretical instruction. How? Cf. Luke 13:1-5.

Why are some people separated to be the objects of much suffering?

Eliphaz is going to tell Job of a night vision. Why?

Under what special condition did he receive his vision?

Job 4:15 discusses another communication from God. What was it?

Why this ghost story? What was the message?

What is Eliphaz suggesting by these stories? or testimonies?

Even angels sin. Cf. Job 4:18. Who are his servants?

The temporary nature of man’s body is well described in Job 4:19. Discuss.

Man lives but one day. What is the meaning of Job 4:20?

How is the expression tent-cord used in Job 4:21?

TODAY’S ENGLISH VERSION

The First Dialogue

Eliphaz

1-2 Job, will you be upset if I speak?

I can-’t keep quiet any longer.

3 You have taught many people

and given strength to feeble hands.

4 When someone stumbled, weak and tired,

your words encouraged him to stand.

5 Now your turn has come for trouble,

and you are too stunned to face it.

6 You worshipped God, and your life was blameless;

you should have confidence and hope.

7 Think back now. Name a single case

when a righteous man met with disaster.

8 I have seen people plow fields of evil

and plant wickedness like seed; now they harvest wickedness and evil.

9 In his anger, God destroys them like a storm. 10 The wicked roar and growl like lions,

but God silences them and breaks their teeth.

11** **Like lions with nothing to kill and eat,

they die and their children are all scattered.

12 Once a message came quietly,

so quietly I could hardly hear it.

13 It was like a nightmare which disturbed my sleep. 14 I trembled and shuddered;

my whole body shook with fear.

15 A light breeze touched my face,

and my skin crawled with fright.

16 I could see something standing there;

I stared, but couldn-’t tell what it was.

Then I heard a voice out of the silence, 17 Can a man be right in the sight of God?

Can anyone be pure before his Creator?

18 God does not trust his heavenly servants;

he finds fault with his angels.

19 Do you think he will trust a creature of clay,

a thing of dust that can be crushed like a moth?

20 A man may be alive in the morning,

but die unnoticed before evening comes.

21 All that he has is taken away;

he dies, still lacking wisdom.

Job 4:1-11

TEXT 4:1-11

4** Then answered Eliphaz the Temanite, and said,

2 If one assay to commune with thee, wilt thou be grieved? But who can withhold himself from speaking?

3 Behold, thou hast instructed many,

And thou hast strengthened the weak hands.

4 Thy words have upholden him that was falling,

And thou hast made firm the feeble knees.

5 But now it is come unto thee, and thou faintest;

It toucheth thee, and thou art troubled.

6 Is not thy fear **of God thy confidence,

And **the integrity of thy ways thy hope?

7 Remember, I pray thee, who **ever **perished, being innocent?

Or where were the upright cut off?

8 According as I have seen, they that plow iniquity,

And sow trouble, reap the same.

9 By the breath of God they perish,

And by the blast of his anger are they consumed.

10 The roaring of the lion, and the voice of the fierce lion,

And the teeth of the young lions, are broken.

11 The old lion perisheth for lack of prey,

And the whelps of the lioness are scattered abroad.**

COMMENT 4:1-11

**Job 4:1**Enters Eliphaz! Since Job has broken his silence, Eliphaz is now free to speak. He is presumably the oldest, thus the wisest, thus first speaker. He is also the most gracious and most eloquent. His deep esteem and profound sorrow for Job leaps from each phrase he utters. Eliphaz has been shocked at the fact that Job had wished death and has uttered no prayer for the recovery of prosperity and joi de vie (joy of life). Eliphaz asks Job, Could you bear it? (literally would you be weary?), i.e., Are you physically and psychologically able to hear my analysis of your condition? To Job, his misfortune was an enigmatic mystery; to Eliphaz the calamities have been sent to punish Job for some sin or sins (see John 9 and Jesus-’ rejection of this standard Jewish, but not Old Testament, concept). Eliphaz has come to help Job examine his conscience.[61]

[61] Note this powerful insight into the relationship of truth, integrity, guilt, and healing, long before Freud’s theory of repression was ever conceived. The scriptures sit in judgment on Freud’s theory that all guilt is socially caused.

**Job 4:2**Eliphaz declares that if only Job would repent of his sins he could regain God’s favor.[62] The speech regularly starts with a question and reference to Job’s words. Eliphaz introduces the Doctrine of Retribution, i.e., Retributive Justice.

[62] See K. Fullerton, Journal Biblical Literature 49, 1930, 320-74; Psalms 32, 51 and see Chamberlain’S, Repentance (Joplin, MO: College Press reprint, 1972) with my bibliographical essay on repentance.

**Job 4:3**First he gently appeals to Job’s own good advice to others in the past. But this type of counseling was already beside the point, because Job had already accepted the standard doctrine of retribution (Job 29:18-20), but now is beginning to challenge its adequacy simply because it does not explain his present existential situation. With great delicacy and consideration Eliphaz has now opened the first cycle of speeches.[63] The root of the word translated instructed (ysr) means discipline and in Job 5:17 the noun from this root means discipline by suffering (see Hebrews 12:3 ff). Job has instructed many. His instruction has strengthened them, i.e., from weak hands which hang down in helpless despair (Isaiah 35:3; Hebrews 12:12).[64]

[63] For relationship of Job and Wisdom Literature, see H. Ranston, The Old Testament Wisdom Books and Their Teaching, 1930, p. 139; S. Rankin, Israel’s Wisdom Literature (T & T Clark, 1936); and G. van Rad’s Wisdom in Israel (Nashville: Abingdon E. T., 1972).

[64] See the penetrating analysis by M. Dahood, Biblica, 48,1967, 425.

**Job 4:4**His words have also strengthened feeble knees (see same scriptures as above for imagery).

**Job 4:5**It is easy for a well man to give sound advice. Some commentators see sarcasm in Eliphaz’s word; but the psychoanalysis of a dead author should capture only the absolute minimum of everyone’s time, both authors and readers.

**Job 4:6**Literally, your fear of God should sustain you. He should have confidence in his past faithfulness to God. After all, Job’s piety and integrity are not being questionedyet. Job is blamelessJob 1:1has confidence (keselconfidence, here the form is kislahJob 8:4; Ecclesiastes 7:25. This root has polarized meaning, i.e., opposite, eg. confidencefolly), and thus has integrity or consistency.

**Job 4:7**Is Job an exception to the rule? It is only casuistry to reply that Job is not in the category with the wicked because God has spared his life (Psalms 37:25; Proverbs 12:21; Ecclesiastes 2:10). Yet each of us can appreciate the dilemma of Job’s comforters. Each comforter, in his own way, sought recovery for Job. There is still hope, since he is alive. If Job will only confess his guilt and seek God’s grace, recovery would follow. Many of the modern specialists in healing are not radically different in their method than Job’s friends. The power of confession (e.g. Jung, Modern Man in Search of a Soul) has long since been clinically proved. But the problem of theodicy is not thereby overcome. Why are some individuals signaled out for unbearably severe physical and spiritual torture? Suffering Servantwe turn to you! Help us to participate in the suffering of your fallen creation. Is suffering for discipline or destruction?[65]

[65] Concerning the problem of evil: For those philosophically inclined see the indispensable, though technical work, Alvin Plantinga, God and Other Minds (New York: Cornell University Press); C. S. Lewis, Problem of Pain for beginners; for those hostile to Christian theism, see E. H. Madden and P. H. Hare, Evil and the Concept of God (Springfield, IL: Charles C. Thomas, Publ.; for best single survey see John Hick, Evil and the God of Love (New York: Harper & Row), now also in paperback.

**Job 4:8**Those who plough iniquity are those persons who are wicked. They who cultivate sin and perform it with intentional glee, also reap the resultsHos 10:13 and Galatians 6:7.

**Job 4:9**The wicked perish. This doctrine says that misfortune is divine retribution. This teaching is at the heart of America’s Success Syndrome, i.e., if you are prospering, you are being blessed; if you are in destitute circumstances, it is God’s way of expressing retributive justice. God’s justice is likened to a scorching hot wind. Thanks be to God Jesus repudiates this blasphemous and heretical instruction, Luke 13:1-5. The cross, the ten official Roman persecutions, the martyrdom of thousands of the faithful, if not millions, both in the classical church history and in the twentieth century, all speak against this doctrine.

**Job 4:10-11**The image of the lion is common in Near Eastern Wisdom LiteraturePsa 17:12; Psalms 22:14; Proverbs 28:15; and Isaiah 30:6. When the roar dies down and the teeth of the lion are broken, it is powerless and can no longer hold the prey.

Job 4:12-21

2. The Visionno mortal can question God’s just acts. (Job 4:12-21)

TEXT 4:12-21

**12 Now a thing was secretly brought to me,

And mine ear received a whisper thereof.

13 In thoughts from the visions of the night,

When deep sleep falleth on men,

14 Fear came upon me, and trembling,

Which made all my bones to shake.

15 Then a spirit passed before my face;

The hair of my flesh stood up.

16 It stood still, but I could not discern the appearance thereof;

A form was before mine eyes:**

There was **silence, and I heard a **voice, saying,

**17 Shall mortal man be more just than God?

Shall a man be more pure than his Maker?

18 Behold, he putteth no trust in his servants;

And his angels he chargeth with folly:

19 How much more them that dwell in houses of clay,

Whose foundation is in the dust, Who are crushed before the moth!

20 Betwixt morning and evening they are destroyed:

They perish for ever without any regarding it.

21 Is not their tent-cord plucked up within them?

They die, and that without wisdom.**

COMMENT 4:12-21

**Job 4:12**Eliphaz now relates the content of a night’s vision to Job (Job 33:15). The description is of the terrifying psychological effects of a nightmare.[66]

[66] E. Robertson, Bulletin of John Rylands Library, 42, (1960), 417. Note the powerful therapeutic effect of expressionlong before Freud developed his theory of dream analysis. Elihu regards dreams as warningsJob 33:15.

**Job 4:13**The Hebrew word seippim occurs only here and Job 20:2. Its root meaning is probably be disquieted or deeply troubled. The deep sleep is the same that fell on Adam in Genesis 2:21.

**Job 4:14**The extreme form of pathological behavior manifested here reveals the terrible consequences of the nightmare long after the experience.

**Job 4:15**Besides experience (Job 4:8; Job 5:3), Eliphaz brings a proof from a private revelation (headJob 4:16). He powerfully describes a mysterious audition. In Job 4:12 he calls it a dabar or word and semes or a whisper which produced dread. He may be claiming supernatural authority for the wisdom that he is dispensing to Job. The word translated spirit can mean mind or breath. Nowhere else does the Old Testament use this word of disembodied spirits. The shades in Sheol are called repa-im. When the witch of Endor raised Samuel, he is called elohim. The word translated in A.V. is passed literally means glided, and is in the imperfect form, which means that he is still passing through the experience, or is again passing through it. The hair (sa-a-rat means a single hair) of my flesh creeped.[67]

[67] M. Dahood, Biblica, XLVIII, 1967, 544ff, repoints the text to read tempest or storm. This is not necessary, and stood up is used only here (in intensive form) and Psalms 119:120, and means that the flesh creeped. Experience effected his whole body. See also Dhorme, Job, p. 50.

**Job 4:16**It stood still! The object is unnamed. The Hebrew consists of but a single word. It is as though Eliphaz is attempting to catch his breath as the horror of that moment returns to Eliphaz (Rowley, Job, p. 55). The awe-inspiring voice of silence is now contrasted with the voice of thunder.

**Job 4:17**the A.V. translates more just than God, and this is grammatically possible, but Job has never suggested that he was. Better, I think, is the translation righteous before God. Eliphaz has received this vision sometime in the past and is not connected with Job’s soliloquy, and Job had not yet attacked God’s holiness and righteousness. The meaning is that no man can be considered just and pure in comparison with God. No one is blameless or innocent before our holy God. Eliphaz is emphasizing that Job should accept God’s verdict.

**Job 4:18**The servants are the angels in the next line. Old Testament angelology does not make a distinction between good and evil angels. Satan appears among the angels in Job 1:6.[68] The angels are charged with (toh-o-lah) error. The word is used only here and the A.V. is probably correct in rendering it folly.

[68] See Paul Heinisch, Theology of the Old Testament (The Liturgical Press, 1955), pp. 138ff; L. Kohler, Old Testament Theology (Philadelphia: Westminster, E. T., 1957), pp. 166ff; see entire range of Kittel articles on vocabulary discussed above.

**Job 4:19**If angels are impure, how much more (the Hebrew can also mean how much less, i.e., Job 4:18 a) is man whose body is dust. The houses are figures for bodies (2 Corinthians 5:1; 2 Peter 1:14). The same argument is repeated in Job 15:15-16. Paul argues in 1 Corinthians 15:42-54 that resurrection is necessary to ultimately modify man’s corruptible body, though the corruption is death and not unrighteousness as here. Man is compared to the moth. Man is crushed by God like man crushes a moth. The moth is one of the easiest insects to catch and crush (Pope, Job, p. 38).

**Job 4:20**Man’s life is quickly over between morning and evening.[69]

[69] M. Dahood, The Bible in Current Catholic Thought, ed. by J. L. McKenzie, 1962, esp. p. 55 regarding the phrase without regarding it. Dahood repoints the Hebrew to mean without name or unimportant. The extra m he regards as an enclitic ending and gives Ugaritic grammar evidence in support.

**Job 4:21**Some commentators object to the Hebrew textstent cord, but this makes perfectly good sense. The verb (ns-’) used in three passages in Isaiah (Job 40:24; Job 33:20; and Job 38:12), and is a technical term for pulling stakes and ropes and moving on. The context of Eliphaz’s speech is the contrast between men and angels, vis-a-vis God, and not the fate of the wicked. In essence, he says that man does not live long enough to acquire adequate wisdom to understand.