Job 27:23

_I WILL TEACH YOU BY THE HAND OF GOD: THAT WHICH IS WITH THE ALMIGHTY WILL I NOT CONCEAL._ These words are contrary to Job's previous sentiments (notes, Job 21:22; Job 24:22). They therefore seem to be Job's statement, not so much of his own sentiments, as of what Zophar would have said, had he spoken when his turn came, (end of Job 26:1.) So Job stated the friends' opinion (Job 21:17; Job 24:18). The objection is, Why, if so, does not Job answer Zophar's opinion, as stated by himself? The fact is, it is probable that Job tacitly, by giving, in...

11-23 Job's friends, on the same subject, spoke of the misery of wicked men before death as proportioned to their crimes; Job considered that if it were not so, still the consequences of their death would be dreadful. Job undertook to set this matter in a true light. Death to a godly man, is like a fair gale of wind to convey him to the heavenly country; but, to a wicked man, it is like a storm, that hurries him away to destruction. While he lived, he had the benefit of sparing mercy; but now the day of God's patience is over, and he will pour out upon him his wrath. When God casts down a man, there is no flying from, nor bearing up under his anger. Those who will not now flee to the arms of Divine grace, which are stretched out to receive them, will not be able to flee from the arms of Divine wrath, which will shortly be stretched out to destroy them. And what is a man profited if he ga...

Verse Job 27:23. MEN _SHALL CLAP THEIR HANDS AT HIM_] These two verses refer to the storm, which is to sweep away the ungodly; therefore the word _God_, in Job 27:22, and _men_ in this verse, should be omitted. Ver. Job 27:22: "For it shall fall upon him, and not spare: flying from its power he shall continue to fly. Ver. Job 27:23. It shall clap its hands against him, and _hiss_, וישרק veyishrok, shriek, him out of his place." Here the storm is personified and the wicked actor is _hissed_ and driven by it from off the stage. It seems it was an ancient method to _clap_ _the hands_ against and...

MEN SHALL CLAP THEIR HANDS AT HIM - That is, they shall combine to drive him out of the world, and rejoice when he is gone. The same sentiment was also expressed by Bildad, Job 18:18 : “He shall be driven fromm light into darkness, And chased out of the world.” There can be no doubt, I think, that Job alludes to that sentiment, and that his object in quoting it is to show its incorrectness. He does not indeed go into a formal reply to it in the following chapters, but he seems to consider that he had already replied to it by the statements which he had made, and which showed the incorrectness of the views which his friends had taken. He had demonstrated in the previous chapters that their main position was incorrect,

EXPOSITION JOB 27:1 This chapter divides itself into three distinct portions. In the first, which extends to the end of Job 27:6, Job is engaged in maintaining, with the utmost possible solemnity (verse 2), both his actual integrity (verse 6) and his determination to hold fast his integrity as long as he lives (verses 4-6). In the second (verses 7-10) he implicates a curse upon his enemies. In the third (verses 11-23) he returns to the consideration of God's treatment of the wicked, and retracts the view which he had maintained controversially in Job 24:2, with respect to their prosperity, impunity, and equalization with the righteous in death. The retractation is so complete, the concessions are so large

[MEN] SHALL CLAP THEIR HANDS AT HIM,.... In a way of joy and triumph, scorn and derision, see Lamentations 2:15; either at the time of his death, being glad they are rid of him, Psalms 52:5; or rather hereafter, to all eternity, while the wrath and vengeance of God is pouring on him; and this will be done by all righteous men evermore; not pleasing themselves with the shocking scene, nor indulging any evil passion in them, from which they will be entirely free; but rejoicing in the glory of divine justice, which will be displayed in the everlasting destruction of wicked men, see Revelation 18:20; and this need not be restrained to good men only, but ascribed to angels also; for it may be rendered impersonally

Remember that Job's friends had accused him of having committed some great sin; which would account for his great sorrows. The good man is naturally very indignant, and he uses the strongest possible language to cast away front himself with horror the charges which they brought against him in the day of his grief. Job 27:1. _Moreover Job continued his parable, and said, As God liveth, who hath taken away my judgment; and the Almighty, who hath vexed my soul; all the while my breath is in me, and the spirit of God is in my nostrils, my tips shall not speak wickedness, nor my tongue utter deceit._ He felt that; it would be wicked for him to confess to what he had never done; it would be deceit for him to acknowledge crimes which he had never committed. Therefore he most solemnly asseverates, by the living God, that he never will permit the falsehood to pass his lips. He had no

CHAPTER 27 JOB'S CLOSING WORDS IN SELF-VINDICATION _ 1. My righteousness I hold fast (Job 27:1)_ 2. The contrast between himself and the wicked (Job 27:7) Job 27:1. Zophar, the third friend, no longer speaks. Perhaps Job paused after his remarks in answer to Bildad and waited for Zophar's criticism. Perhaps that young hot-head hid his inability of advancing another argument under an assumed disgust. Critics have assigned Job 27:7 and Job 27:13 to Zophar and claim that Job did not speak them at all. But other critics, like Wellhausen, Kuenen and Dillman say th

THIRD SPEECH OF ZOPHAR. He once more reiterates, in spite of all Job has said, that the wicked shall perish. He bursts out Let mine enemy be as God's enemy. I can wish him no worse doom. In Job 27:8 translate as _mg._ Job 27:11 is quite in the vein of Zophar, who feels very much in the secrets of God (Job 11:5). The plurals you and ye have probably been substituted for singulars when Zophar's speech had become attributed to Job. (Peake, however, gives Job 27:11 and Job 27:12 to Job, taking them as the opening and closing verses of a suppressed description of the immoral

The disastrous fate of the wicked man at the hand of God. Job 27:7-10 drew a contrast between the internal state of the mind of the speaker and that of the sinner; in these verses the contrast is pursued in a terrible picture of the external history and fate of the sinner at the hand of God. From Job's hand such a picture can have no meaning, unless _either_he now anticipates for himself a happy issue out of his afflictions, and restoration to prosperity, while the calamities that befall the wicked are final; _or_regards his own afflictions, even though they should bring him unto death, as altogether different in their character and marks from those that bring the wicked man to destruction. Either side of the alternative sets Job in complete contradiction to his position in the Chapter s that precede and follow this one. On the former side see on...