{"commentary":{"id":"jamieson-fausset-brown","name":"Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary","website":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jamieson-Fausset-Brown_Bible_Commentary","licenseUrl":"https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/","licenseNotes":null,"licenseNotice":null,"englishName":"Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary","language":"eng","textDirection":"rtl","sha256":"db3d4c8b3c1f32ef9d1430a57392e02bda3a17aac1f9bbe398461de021a3cb13","availableFormats":["json"],"listOfBooksApiLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/books.json","listOfProfilesApiLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/profiles.json","numberOfBooks":66,"totalNumberOfChapters":1187,"totalNumberOfVerses":17056,"totalNumberOfProfiles":0,"languageName":"English","languageEnglishName":"English"},"book":{"id":"JOB","commentaryId":"jamieson-fausset-brown","name":"Job","commonName":"Job","introduction":"JOB A REAL PERSON.--It has been supposed by some that the book of Job is an allegory, not a real narrative, on account of the artificial character of many of its statements. Thus the sacred numbers, three and seven, often occur. He had seven thousand sheep, seven sons, both before and after his trials; his three friends sit down with him seven days and seven nights; both before and after his trials he had three daughters. So also the number and form of the speeches of the several speakers seem to be artificial. The name of Job, too, is derived from an Arabic word signifying repentance.\n\nBut Eze 14:14 (compare Eze 14:16, Eze 14:20) speaks of \"Job\" in conjunction with \"Noah and Daniel,\" real persons. St. James (Jam 5:11) also refers to Job as an example of \"patience,\" which he would not have been likely to do had Job been only a fictitious person. Also the names of persons and places are specified with a particularity not to be looked for in an allegory. As to the exact doubling of his possessions after his restoration, no doubt the round number is given for the exact number, as the latter approached near the former; this is often done in undoubtedly historical books. As to the studied number and form of the speeches, it seems likely that the arguments were substantially those which appear in the book, but that the studied and poetic form was given by Job himself, guided by the Holy Spirit. He lived one hundred and forty years after his trials, and nothing would be more natural than that he should, at his leisure, mould into a perfect form the arguments used in the momentous debate, for the instruction of the Church in all ages. Probably, too, the debate itself occupied several sittings; and the number of speeches assigned to each was arranged by preconcerted agreement, and each was allowed the interval of a day or more to prepare carefully his speech and replies; this will account for the speakers bringing forward their arguments in regular series, no one speaking out of his turn. As to the name Job--repentance (supposing the derivation correct)--it was common in old times to give a name from circumstances which occurred at an advanced period of life, and this is no argument against the reality of the person.\n\nWHERE JOB LIVED.--\"Uz,\" according to GESENIUS, means a light, sandy soil, and was in the north of Arabia-Deserta, between Palestine and the Euphrates, called by PTOLEMY (Geography, 19) Ausitai or Aisitai. In Gen 10:23; Gen 22:21; Gen 36:28; and Ch1 1:17, Ch1 1:42, it is the name of a man. In Jer 25:20; Lam 4:21; and Job 1:1, it is a country. Uz, in Gen 22:21, is said to be the son of Nahor, brother of Abraham--a different person from the one mentioned (Gen 10:23), a grandson of Shem. The probability is that the country took its name from the latter of the two; for this one was the son of Aram, from whom the Arameans take their name, and these dwelt in Mesopotamia, between the rivers Euphrates and Tigris. Compare as to the dwelling of the sons of Shem in Gen 10:30, \"a mount of the East,\" answering to \"men of the East\" (Job 1:3). RAWLINSON, in his deciphering of the Assyrian inscriptions, states that \"Uz is the prevailing name of the country at the mouth of the Euphrates.\" It is probable that Eliphaz the Temanite and the Sabeans dwelt in that quarter; and we know that the Chaldeans resided there, and not near Idumea, which some identify with Uz. The tornado from \"the wilderness\" (Job 1:19) agrees with the view of it being Arabia-Deserta. Job (Job 1:3) is called \"the greatest of the men of the East\"; but Idumea was not east, but south of Palestine: therefore in Scripture language, the phrase cannot apply to that country, but probably refers to the north of Arabia-Deserta, between Palestine, Idumea, and the Euphrates. So the Arabs still show in the Houran a place called Uz as the residence of Job.\n\nTHE AGE WHEN JOB LIVED.--EUSEBIUS fixes it two ages before Moses, that is, about the time of Isaac: eighteen hundred years before Christ, and six hundred after the Deluge. Agreeing with this are the following considerations: 1. Job's length of life is patriarchal, two hundred years. 2. He alludes only to the earliest form of idolatry, namely, the worship of the sun, moon, and heavenly hosts (called Saba, whence arises the title \"Lord of Sabaoth,\" as opposed to Sabeanism) (Job 31:26-28). 3. The number of oxen and rams sacrificed, seven, as in the case of Balaam. God would not have sanctioned this after the giving of the Mosaic law, though He might graciously accommodate Himself to existing customs before the law. 4. The language of Job is Hebrew, interspersed occasionally with Syriac and Arabic expressions, implying a time when all the Shemitic tribes spoke one common tongue and had not branched into different dialects, Hebrew, Syriac, and Arabic. 5. He speaks of the most ancient kind of writing, namely, sculpture. Riches also are reckoned by cattle. The Hebrew word, translated \"a piece of money,\" ought rather be rendered \"a lamb.\" 6. There is no allusion to the exodus from Egypt and to the miracles that accompanied it; nor to the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah (PATRICK, however, thinks there is); though there is to the Flood (Job 22:17); and these events, happening in Job's vicinity, would have been striking illustrations of the argument for God's interposition in destroying the wicked and vindicating the righteous, had Job and his friends known of them. Nor is there any undoubted reference to the Jewish law, ritual, and priesthood. 7. The religion of Job is that which prevailed among the patriarchs previous to the law; sacrifices performed by the head of the family; no officiating priesthood, temple, or consecrated altar.\n\nTHE WRITER.--All the foregoing facts accord with Job himself having been the author. The style of thought, imagery, and manners, are such as we should look for in the work of an Arabian emir. There is precisely that degree of knowledge of primitive tradition (see Job 31:33, as to Adam) which was universally spread abroad in the days of Noah and Abraham, and which was subsequently embodied in the early chapters of Genesis. Job, in his speeches, shows that he was much more competent to compose the work than Elihu, to whom LIGHTFOOT attributes it. The style forbids its being attributed to Moses, to whom its composition is by some attributed, \"whilst he was among the Midianites, about 1520 B.C.\" But the fact, that it, though not a Jewish book, appears among the Hebrew sacred writings, makes it likely that it came to the knowledge of Moses during the forty years which he passed in parts of Arabia, chiefly near Horeb; and that he, by divine guidance, introduced it as a sacred writing to the Israelites, to whom, in their affliction, the patience and restoration of Job were calculated to be a lesson of especial utility. That it is inspired appears from the fact that Paul (Co1 3:19) quotes it (Job 5:13) with the formula, \"It is written.\" Our Savior, too Mat 24:28), plainly refers to Job 29:30. Compare also Jam 4:10 and Pe1 5:6 with Job 22:29; Rom 11:34-35 with Job 15:8. It is probably the oldest book in the world. It stands among the Hagiographa in the threefold division of Scripture into the Law, the Prophets, and the Hagiographa (\"Psalms,\" Luk 24:44).\n\nDESIGN OF THE BOOK.--It is a public debate in poetic form on an important question concerning the divine government; moreover the prologue and epilogue, which are in prose, shed the interest of a living history over the debate, which would otherwise be but a contest of abstract reasonings. To each speaker of the three friends three speeches are assigned. Job having no one to stand by him is allowed to reply to each speech of each of the three. Eliphaz, as the oldest, leads the way. Zophar, at his third turn, failed to speak, thus virtually owning himself overcome (Job 27:1-23). Therefore Job continued his reply, which forms three speeches (Job 26:1-14; Job 27:1-23; Job 28:1-28; Job 29:1-31:40). Elihu (Job 32:1-37:24) is allowed four speeches. Jehovah makes three addresses (Job 38:1-41:34). Thus, throughout there is a tripartite division. The whole is divided into three parts--the prologue, poem proper, and epilogue. The poem, into three--(1) The dispute of Job and his three friends; (2) The address of Elihu; (3) The address of God. There are three series in the controversy, and in the same order. The epilogue (Job 42:1-17) also is threefold; Job's justification, reconciliation with his friends, restoration. The speakers also in their successive speeches regularly advance from less to greater vehemence. With all this artificial composition, everything seems easy and natural.\n\nThe question to be solved, as exemplified in the case of Job, is, Why are the righteous afflicted consistently with God's justice? The doctrine of retribution after death, no doubt, is the great solution of the difficulty. And to it Job plainly refers in Job 14:14, and Job 19:25. The objection to this, that the explicitness of the language on the resurrection in Job is inconsistent with the obscurity on the subject in the early books of the Old Testament, is answered by the fact that Job enjoyed the divine vision (Job 38:1; Job 42:5), and therefore, by inspiration, foretold these truths. Next, the revelations made outside of Israel being few needed to be the more explicit; thus Balaam's prophecy (Num 24:17) was clear enough to lead the wise men of the East by the star (Mat 2:2); and in the age before the written law, it was the more needful for God not to leave Himself without witness of the truth. Still Job evidently did not fully realize the significance designed by the Spirit in his own words (compare Pe1 1:11-12). The doctrine, though existing, was not plainly revealed or at least understood. Hence he does not mainly refer to this solution. Yes, and even now, we need something in addition to this solution. David, who firmly believed in a future retribution (Psa 16:10; Psa 17:15), still felt the difficulty not entirely solved thereby (Psa. 83:1-18). The solution is not in Job's or in his three friends' speeches. It must, therefore, be in Elihu's. God will hold a final judgment, no doubt, to clear up all that seems dark in His present dealings; but He also now providentially and morally governs the world and all the events of human life. Even the comparatively righteous are not without sin which needs to be corrected. The justice and love of God administer the altogether deserved and merciful correction. Affliction to the godly is thus mercy and justice in disguise. The afflicted believer on repentance sees this. \"Via crucis, via salutis\" [\"The way of the cross, the way of deliverance\"]. Though afflicted, the godly are happier even now than the ungodly, and when affliction has attained its end, it is removed by the Lord. In the Old Testament the consolations are more temporal and outward; in the New Testament, more spiritual; but in neither to the entire exclusion of the other. \"Prosperity,\" says BACON, \"is the blessing of the Old Testament; adversity that of the New Testament, which is the mark of God's more especial favor. Yet even in the Old Testament, if you listen to David's harp, you shall hear as many hearse-like airs as carols; and the pencil of the Holy Ghost has labored more in describing the afflictions of Job than the felicities of Solomon. Prosperity is not without many fears and distastes; and adversity is not without comforts and hopes.\" This solution of Elihu is seconded by the addresses of God, in which it is shown God must be just (because He is God), as Elihu had shown how God can be just, and yet the righteous be afflicted. It is also acquiesced in by Job, who makes no reply. God reprimands the \"three\" friends, but not Elihu. Job's general course is approved; he is directed to intercede for his friends, and is restored to double his former prosperity.\n\nPOETRY.--In all countries poetry is the earliest form of composition as being best retained in the memory. In the East especially it was customary for sentiments to be preserved in a terse, proverbial, and poetic form (called maschal). Hebrew poetry is not constituted by the rhythm or meter, but in a form peculiar to itself: 1. In an alphabetical arrangement somewhat like our acrostic. For instance, Lam. 1:1-22. 2. The same verse repeated at intervals; as in Psa 42:1-11; Psa. 107:1-43. 3. Rhythm of gradation. Psalms of degrees, Psa. 120:1-134:3, in which the expression of the previous verse is resumed and carried forward in the next (Psa 121:1-8). 4. The chief characteristic of Hebrew poetry is parallelism, or the correspondence of the same ideas in the parallel clauses. The earliest instance is Enoch's prophecy (Jde 1:14), and Lamech's parody of it (Gen 4:23). Three kinds occur: (1) The synonymous parallelism, in which the second is a repetition of the first, with or without increase of force (Psa 22:27; Isa 15:1); sometimes with double parallelism (Isa 1:15). (2) The antithetic, in which the idea of the second clause is the converse of that in the first (Pro 10:1). (3) The synthetic, where there is a correspondence between different propositions, noun answering to noun, verb to verb, member to member, the sentiment, moreover, being not merely echoed, or put in contrast, but enforced by accessory ideas (Job 3:3-9). Also alternate (Isa 51:19). \"Desolation and destruction, famine and sword,\" that is, desolation by famine, and destruction by the sword. Introverted; where the fourth answers to the first, and the third to the second (Mat 7:6). Parallelism thus often affords a key to the interpretation. For fuller information, see LOWTH (Introduction to Isaiah, and Lecture on Hebrew Poetry) and HERDER (Spirit of Hebrew Poetry, translated by Marsh). The simpler and less artificial forms of parallelism prevail in Job--a mark of its early age. \n\n\n\nNext: Job Chapter 1\n\n","order":18,"numberOfChapters":42,"sha256":"e28c73d19b068ae7148f623bfa79b3c43dd6e60e7a803672cdd5f8a7d5080b3a","firstChapterNumber":1,"firstChapterApiLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/JOB/1.json","firstChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"jamieson-fausset-brown","book":"JOB","chapter":1},"lastChapterNumber":42,"lastChapterApiLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/JOB/42.json","lastChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"jamieson-fausset-brown","book":"JOB","chapter":42},"totalNumberOfVerses":954},"chapter":{"number":3,"content":[{"type":"verse","number":2,"content":["spake--Hebrew, \"answered,\" that is, not to any actual question that preceded, but to the question virtually involved in the case. His outburst is singularly wild and bold (Jer 20:14). To desire to die so as to be free from sin is a mark of grace; to desire to die so as to escape troubles is a mark of corruption. He was ill-fitted to die who was so unwilling to live. But his trials were greater, and his light less, than ours.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":3,"content":["the night in which--rather \"the night which said.\" The words in italics are not in the Hebrew. Night is personified and poetically made to speak. So in Job 3:7, and in Psa 19:2. The birth of a male in the East is a matter of joy; often not so of a female.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":4,"content":["let not God regard it--rather, more poetically, \"seek it out.\" \"Let not God stoop from His bright throne to raise it up from its dark hiding-place.\" The curse on the day in Job 3:3, is amplified in Job 3:4-5; that on the night, in Job 3:6-10.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":5,"content":["Let . . . the shadow of death--(\"deepest darkness,\" Isa 9:2). \n\nstain it--This is a later sense of the verb [GESENIUS]; better the old and more poetic idea, \"Let darkness (the ancient night of chaotic gloom) resume its rights over light (Gen 1:2), and claim that day as its own.\" \n\na cloud--collectively, a gathered mass of dark clouds. \n\nthe blackness of the day terrify it--literally, \"the obscurations\"; whatever darkens the day [GESENIUS]. The verb in Hebrew expresses sudden terrifying. May it be suddenly affrighted at its own darkness. UMBREIT explains it as \"magical incantations that darken the day,\" forming the climax to the previous clauses; Job 3:8 speaks of \"cursers of the day\" similarly. But the former view is simpler. Others refer it to the poisonous simoom wind.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":6,"content":["seize upon it--as its prey, that is, utterly dissolve it. \n\njoined unto the days of the year--rather, by poetic personification, \"Let it not rejoice in the circle of days and nights and months, which form the circle of years.\"\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":7,"content":["solitary--rather, \"unfruitful.\" \"Would that it had not given birth to me.\"\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":8,"content":["them . . . curse the day--If \"mourning\" be the right rendering in the latter clause of this verse, these words refer to the hired mourners of the dead (Jer 9:17). But the Hebrew for \"mourning\" elsewhere always denotes an animal, whether it be the crocodile or some huge serpent (Isa 27:1), such as is meant by \"leviathan.\" Therefore, the expression, \"cursers of day,\" refers to magicians, who were believed to be able by charms to make a day one of evil omen. (So Balaam, Num 22:5). This accords with UMBREIT'S view (Job 3:7); or to the Ethiopians and Atlantes, who \"used to curse the sun at his rising for burning up them and their country\" [HERODOTUS]. Necromancers claimed power to control or rouse wild beasts at will, as do the Indian serpent-charmers of our day (Psa 58:5). Job does not say they had the power they claimed; but, supposing they had, may they curse the day. SCHUTTENS renders it by supplying words as follows:--Let those that are ready for anything, call it (the day) the raiser up of leviathan, that is, of a host of evils.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":9,"content":["dawning of the day--literally, \"eyelashes of morning.\" The Arab poets call the sun the eye of day. His early rays, therefore, breaking forth before sunrise, are the opening eyelids or eyelashes of morning.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":12,"content":["Why did the knees prevent me?--Old English for \"anticipate my wants.\" The reference is to the solemn recognition of a new-born child by the father, who used to place it on his knees as his own, whom he was bound to rear (Gen 30:3; Gen 50:23; Isa 66:12).\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":13,"content":["lain . . . quiet . . . slept--a gradation. I should not only have lain, but been quiet, and not only been quiet, but slept. Death in Scripture is called \"sleep\" (Psa 13:3); especially in the New Testament, where the resurrection-awakening is more clearly set forth (Co1 15:51; Th1 4:14; Th1 5:10).\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":14,"content":["With kings . . . which built desolate places for themselves--who built up for themselves what proved to be (not palaces, but) ruins! The wounded spirit of Job, once a great emir himself, sick of the vain struggles of mortal great men, after grandeur, contemplates the palaces of kings, now desolate heaps of ruins. His regarding the repose of death the most desirable end of the great ones of earth, wearied with heaping up perishable treasures, marks the irony that breaks out from the black clouds of melancholy [UMBREIT]. The \"for themselves\" marks their selfishness. MICHAELIS explains it weakly of mausoleums, such as are found still, of stupendous proportions, in the ruins of Petra of Idumea.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":15,"content":["filled their houses with silver--Some take this to refer to the treasures which the ancients used to bury with their dead. But see Job 3:26.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":16,"content":["untimely birth-- (Psa 58:8); preferable to the life of the restless miser (Ecc 6:3-5).\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":17,"content":["the wicked--the original meaning, \"those ever restless,\" \"full of desires\" (Isa 57:20-21). \n\nthe weary--literally, \"those whose strength is wearied out\" (Rev 14:13).\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":18,"content":["There the prisoners rest--from their chains.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":19,"content":["servant--The slave is there manumitted from slavery.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":20,"content":["HE COMPLAINS OF LIFE BECAUSE OF HIS ANGUISH. (Job 3:20-26)\n\nWherefore giveth he light--namely, God; often omitted reverentially (Job 24:23; Ecc 9:9). Light, that is, life. The joyful light ill suits the mourners. The grave is most in unison with their feelings.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":23,"content":["whose way is hid--The picture of Job is drawn from a wanderer who has lost his way, and who is hedged in, so as to have no exit of escape (Hos 2:6; Lam 3:7, Lam 3:9).\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":24,"content":["my sighing cometh before I eat--that is, prevents my eating [UMBREIT]; or, conscious that the effort to eat brought on the disease, Job must sigh before eating [ROSENMULLER]; or, sighing takes the place of good (Psa 42:3) [GOOD]. But the first explanation accords best with the text. \n\nmy roarings are poured out like the waters--an image from the rushing sound of water streaming.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":25,"content":["the thing which I . . . feared is come upon me--In the beginning of his trials, when he heard of the loss of one blessing, he feared the loss of another; and when he heard of the loss of that, he feared the loss of a third. \n\nthat which I was afraid of is come unto me--namely, the ill opinion of his friends, as though he were a hypocrite on account of his trials.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":26,"content":["I was not in safety . . . yet trouble came--referring, not to his former state, but to the beginning of his troubles. From that time I had no rest, there was no intermission of sorrows. \"And\" (not, \"yet\") a fresh trouble is coming, namely, my friends' suspicion of my being a hypocrite. This gives the starting-point to the whole ensuing controversy.\n\n\n\n\nNext: Job Chapter 4\n\n"]}],"introduction":"JOB CURSES THE DAY OF HIS BIRTH AND WISHES FOR DEATH. (Job 3:1-19)\n\nopened his mouth--The Orientals speak seldom, and then sententiously; hence this formula expressing deliberation and gravity (Psa 78:2). He formally began. \n\ncursed his day--the strict Hebrew word for \"cursing:\" not the same as in Job 1:5. Job cursed his birthday, but not his God.\n\n"},"thisChapterLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/JOB/3.json","thisChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"jamieson-fausset-brown","book":"JOB","chapter":3},"nextChapterApiLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/JOB/4.json","nextChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"jamieson-fausset-brown","book":"JOB","chapter":4},"previousChapterApiLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/JOB/2.json","previousChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"jamieson-fausset-brown","book":"JOB","chapter":2},"numberOfVerses":21}