Job 33:16

sealeth their instruction The instruction is that communicated when the ear is opened, and a revelation given (comp. ch. Job 36:10; Job 36:15; 1 Samuel 9:15; Psalms 40:6); and "to seal" it is to confirm it and give it abiding efficacy. This is done partly by the impressive circumstances and manner of the dream; compare the impression produced on Eliphaz, after the model of whose vision the passage seems moulded. Perhaps the figure of "sealing" the instruction arises from the idea of closing up again the opened ear over the divine communication.

Others understand by "instruction" here the chastisement of affliction, assuming that the person to whom the vision was sent was one under trouble. "Instruction" is possibly used in this sense by Elihu, ch. Job 36:10; but in this chap. the case of affliction seems introduced first in Job 33:19.