1Then Eliphaz the Temanite answered and said: 2Should a wise man answer with windy knowledge, and fill his belly with the east wind? 3Should he reason with speech that is not useful, or with words which do not profit? 4Yea, you cast off fear, and restrain meditation before the Mighty God. 5For your iniquity teaches your mouth, and you choose the tongue of the crafty. 6Your own mouth condemns you, and not I; yea, your own lips testify against you. 7Are you the first man who was born? Or were you made before the hills? 8Have you heard the counsel of God? Do you limit wisdom to yourself? 9What do you know that we do not know? What do you understand that is not in us? 10Both the grayheaded and the aged are among us, much older than your father. 11Are the consolations of the Mighty God of little worth to you? Do you have secret words? 12Why does your heart carry you away, and what do your eyes wink at, 13that you turn your spirit against the Mighty God, and let such words go out of your mouth? 14What is man, that he should be pure? And he who is born of a woman, that he should be righteous? 15If God puts no trust in His saints, and the heavens are not pure in His sight; 16how much more abhorrent and corrupt is man, who drinks injustice like water! 17I will tell you; hear me, and what I have seen I will declare, 18what wise men have told, not hiding anything received from their fathers, 19to whom alone the earth was given, and no stranger passed among them: 20The wicked man writhes with pain all his days, and the number of years is stored up for the ruthless. 21Dreadful sounds are in his ears; during peace, devastation comes upon him. 22He does not believe that he will return from darkness, for a sword watches for him. 23He wanders about for bread, saying, where is it? He knows that the day of darkness is ready at hand. 24Adversity and distress terrify him; they overpower him, like a king ready for the attack. 25For he stretches out his hand against the Mighty God, and acts defiantly against the Almighty, 26running with stiff neck against Him with his thick, embossed shield. 27He has covered his face with his fatness, and made his waist heavy with fat. 28He dwells in desolate cities, in houses which no one inhabits, which are ready to become heaps. 29He will not be rich, nor will his wealth endure, nor shall his possessions overspread the earth. 30He shall not depart from darkness; the flame shall dry out his branches, and by the breath of His mouth he shall be removed. 31Let not him who wanders about trust in vanity, for vanity shall be his recompense. 32It shall be accomplished before his time, and his branch shall not be green. 33He will shake off his unripe grape like the vine, and cast off his blossom like the olive. 34For the company of hypocrites shall be barren, and fire will consume the tents of bribery. 35They conceive trouble and bring forth iniquity; their womb prepares deceit.
Jamieson Fausset Brown Bible Commentary 2 SECOND SPEECH OF ELIPHAZ. (Job 15:1-35)
a wise man--which Job claims to be.
vain knowledge--Hebrew, "windy knowledge"; literally, "of wind" (
Job 8:2). In
Eccl 1:14, Hebrew, "to catch wind," expresses to strive for what is vain.
east wind--stronger than the previous "wind," for in that region the east wind is the most destructive of winds (
Isa 27:8). Thus here,--empty violence.
belly--the inward parts, the breast (
Pro 18:8).
4 fear--reverence for God (
Job 4:6;
Ps 2:11).
prayer--meditation, in
Ps 104:34; so devotion. If thy views were right, reasons Eliphaz, that God disregards the afflictions of the righteous and makes the wicked to prosper, all devotion would be at an end.
5 The sophistry of thine own speeches proves thy guilt.
6 No pious man would utter such sentiments.
7 That is, Art thou wisdom personified? Wisdom existed before the hills; that is, the eternal Son of God (
Pro 8:25;
Ps 90:2). Wast thou in existence before Adam? The farther back one existed, the nearer he was to the Eternal Wisdom.
8 secret--rather, "Wast thou a listener in the secret council of God?" The Hebrew means properly the cushions of a divan on which counsellors in the East usually sit. God's servants are admitted to God's secrets (
Ps 25:14;
Gen 18:17;
John 15:15).
restrain--Rather, didst thou take away, or borrow, thence (namely, from the divine secret council) thy wisdom? Eliphaz in this (
Job 15:8-
Job 15:9) retorts Job's words upon himself (
Job 12:2-
Job 12:3;
Job 13:2).
9 in us--or, "with us," Hebraism for "we are aware of."
10 On our side, thinking with us are the aged. Job had admitted that wisdom is with them (
Job 12:12). Eliphaz seems to have been himself older than Job; perhaps the other two were also (
Job 32:6). Job, in
Job 30:1, does not refer to his three friends; it therefore forms no objection. The Arabs are proud of fulness of years.
11 consolations--namely, the revelation which Eliphaz had stated as a consolatory reproof to Job, and which he repeats in
Job 15:14.
secret--Hast thou some secret wisdom and source of consolation, which makes thee disregard those suggested by me? (
Job 15:8). Rather, from a different Hebrew root, Is the word of kindness or gentleness addressed by me treated by thee as valueless? [UMBREIT].
12 wink--that is, why do thy eyes evince pride? (
Pro 6:13;
Ps 35:19).
13 That is, frettest against God and lettest fall rash words.
14 Eliphaz repeats the revelation (
Job 4:17) in substance, but using Job's own words (see on
Job 14:1, on "born of a woman") to strike him with his own weapons.
15 Repeated from
Job 4:18; "servants" there are "saints" here; namely, holy angels.
heavens--literally, or else answering to "angels" (see on
Job 4:18, and
Job 25:5).
16 filthy--in Arabic "sour" (
Ps 14:3;
Ps 53:3), corrupted from his original purity.
drinketh-- (
Pro 19:28).
17 In direct contradiction of Job's position (
Job 12:6, &c.), that the lot of the wicked was the most prosperous here, Eliphaz appeals (1) to his own experience, (2) to the wisdom of the ancients.
18 Rather, "and which as handed down from their fathers, they have not concealed."
19 Eliphaz speaks like a genuine Arab when he boasts that his ancestors had ever possessed the land unmixed with foreigners [UMBREIT]. His words are intended to oppose Job's (
Job 9:24); "the earth" in their case was not "given into the hand of the wicked." He refers to the division of the earth by divine appointment (
Gen 10:5;
Gen 25:32). Also he may insinuate that Job's sentiments had been corrupted from original purity by his vicinity to the Sabeans and Chaldeans [ROSENMULLER].
20 travaileth--rather, "trembleth of himself," though there is no real danger [UMBREIT].
and the number of his years, &c.--This gives the reason why the wicked man trembles continually; namely, because he knows not the moment when his life must end.
21 An evil conscience conceives alarm at every sudden sound, though it be in a time of peace ("prosperity"), when there is no real danger (
Lev 26:36;
Pro 28:1;
2Kgs 7:6).
22 darkness--namely, danger or calamity. Glancing at Job, who despaired of restoration: in contrast to good men when in darkness (
Mic 7:8-
Mic 7:9).
waited for of--that is, He is destined for the sword [GESENIUS]. Rather (in the night of danger), "he looks anxiously towards the sword," as if every sword was drawn against him [UMBREIT].
23 Wandereth in anxious search for bread. Famine in Old Testament depicts sore need (
Isa 5:13). Contrast the pious man's lot (
Job 5:20-
Job 5:22).
knoweth--has the firm conviction. Contrast the same word applied to the pious (
Job 5:24-
Job 5:25).
ready at his hand--an Arabic phrase to denote a thing's complete readiness and full presence, as if in the hand.
24 prevail--break upon him suddenly and terribly, as a king, &c. (
Pro 6:11).
25 stretcheth . . . hand--wielding the spear, as a bold rebel against God (
Job 9:4;
Isa 27:4).
26 on his neck--rather, "with outstretched neck," namely, that of the rebel [UMBREIT] (
Ps 75:5).
upon . . . bucklers--rather, "with--his (the rebel's, not God's) bucklers." The rebel and his fellows are depicted as joining shields together, to form a compact covering over their heads against the weapons hurled on them from a fortress [UMBREIT and GESENIUS].
27 The well-nourished body of the rebel is the sign of his prosperity.
collops--masses of fat. He pampers and fattens himself with sensual indulgences; hence his rebellion against God (
Deut 32:15;
1Sam 2:29).
28 The class of wicked here described is that of robbers who plunder "cities," and seize on the houses of the banished citizens (
Isa 13:20). Eliphaz chooses this class because Job had chosen the same (
Job 12:6).
heaps--of ruins.
29 Rather, he shall not increase his riches; he has reached his highest point; his prosperity shall not continue.
perfection--rather, "His acquired wealth--what he possesses--shall not be extended," &c.
30 depart--that is, escape (
Job 15:22-
Job 15:23).
branches--namely, his offspring (
Job 1:18-
Job 1:19;
Ps 37:35).
dry up--The "flame" is the sultry wind in the East by which plants most full of sap are suddenly shrivelled.
his mouth--that is, God's wrath (
Isa 11:4).
31 Rather, "let him not trust in vanity or he will be deceived," &c.
vanity--that which is unsubstantial. Sin is its own punishment (
Pro 1:31;
Jer 2:19).
32 Literally, "it (the tree to which he is compared,
Job 15:30, or else his life) shall not be filled up in its time"; that is, "he shall be ended before his time."
shall not be green--image from a withered tree; the childless extinction of the wicked.
33 Images of incompleteness. The loss of the unripe grapes is poetically made the vine tree's own act, in order to express more pointedly that the sinner's ruin is the fruit of his own conduct (
Isa 3:11;
Jer 6:19).
34 Rather, The binding together of the hypocrites (wicked) shall be fruitless [UMBREIT].
tabernacles of bribery--namely, dwellings of unjust judges, often reprobated in the Old Testament (
Isa 1:23). The "fire of God" that consumed Job's possessions (
Job 1:16) Eliphaz insinuates may have been on account of Job's bribery as an Arab sheik or emir.
35 Bitter irony, illustrating the "unfruitfulness" (
Job 15:34) of the wicked. Their conceptions and birthgivings consist solely in mischief, &c. (
Isa 33:11).
prepareth--hatcheth.
