Job 12 Job’s answer: his friends’ self-conceit: the miserable always despised, though upright; the wicked prosper, Job 12:1–6. God’s power and providence is seen in his works, Job 12:7–11.

Ye are the people; you three, and you only, are the people, i.e. people of all people for eminency of wisdom, the only company of reasonable creatures; all others are but fools or beasts: you have engrossed all the reason of mankind; and each of you have as much wisdom as a whole people put…

An understanding, Heb. a heart; which is oft put for the understanding, as Job 34:34, Jer. 5:21, Acts 8:22; i.e. God hath given me also the knowledge and ability to judge of these matters.

As one mocked of his neighbour, Heb. I am a derision (the infinitive being put for a noun, as is usual both in the Hebrew and other languages) to my neighbour, i.e.

i.e. The just man last mentioned, who is upon the brink of the pit or grave, ready to fall into mischief, so as never to rise again in this world, which is my case, and the occasion of their scorn and contempt. As a lamp despised, i.e.

The tabernacles of robbers prosper: thy opinion, delivered Job 11:14;c, is confuted by daily experience; which shows that the most wicked, and injurious, and impudent oppressors, tyrants, and robbers, are so far from meeting with those disappointments and miseries wherewith thou didst threaten…

They shall teach thee, to wit, objectively, i.e. if thou observest the beasts, and their properties, and actions, and events, from them thou mayst learn this lesson. What lesson? I answer, either, 1. That which was last mentioned, Job 12:5.

In all these, or, by all these, brute creatures, that God by his power and wisdom hath created and ordered all this which is in them, or is done by and among them.

In whose hand, i.e. at whose absolute disposal, it is to give it, or take it away, when and how it seemeth good to him. The soul; the life, or the soul the principle of life. Of every living thing, i.e. of all unreasonable creatures, of which he spoke Job 12:7, opposed to man in the last words.

As the mouth tasteth and thereby judgeth of meats, and as it liketh or disliketh, so it receiveth or rejecteth, what is put into it; so it is the office of the ear, or rather of the mind, which hears and receives the opinions and discourses of others by the ear, not rashly to approve or condemn…

These words contain a concession of what Bildad had said Job 8:8–9, and a joining with him in that appeal; but withal, an intimation that this wisdom was but finite, and imperfect, and liable to many mistakes; and indeed mere ignorance and folly, if compared with the Divine wisdom, of which he…

With him, i.e. with God; the relative being put for the antecedent, which is easily and necessarily understood out of the scope of the place, and all the following verses.

He breaketh down, to wit, houses, castles, cities, which God designeth to destroy utterly. He shutteth up; if he will shut up a man in prison, or in any straits or troubles. There can be no opening, without God’s permission and providence.

He withholdeth the waters; which are reserved in the clouds, that they may not fall upon the earth. They dry up, i.e. the waters upon the earth, ponds, and springs, and brooks, and rivers.

He doth the things here mentioned in the foregoing and succeeding verses, and that both powerfully, so as no creature can resist and hinder him, and wisely, so as none can prevent and overreach him.

The wise counsellors or statesmen, by whom the affairs of kings and kingdoms are ordered, he leadeth away as captives in triumph, being spoiled either of that wisdom which they had, or seemed or pretended to have; or of that power and dignity which they had enjoyed.

He looseth the bond of kings; either, 1. Passively, whereby they are bound. He freeth them from prison or restraint. Or rather, 2. Actively, that wherewith they bind their subjects to obedience, to wit, their power and authority, and that majesty which God stamps upon kings to keep their people in…

Princes; so this word, which usually signifies priests, is oft used, as Gen. 41:45, Gen. 47:22, Gen. 47:26, Ex. 2:16, 2 Sam. 8:18, compared with 1 Chron. 18:17.

Removeth away the speech; either, 1. By taking away or restraining the gift of utterance from them, that they should not be able to express their thoughts with such clearness and power as they used to do; which God oft doth to wise and eloquent men. Or, 2.

He poureth contempt upon princes, i.e. he makes them contemptible to their subjects and others. Weakeneth, Heb. he looseth the girdle; which phrase signifies weakness, as Isa. 5:27; as the girding of the girdle notes strength and power, as Isa. 22:21, Isa.

Deep things out of darkness, i.e. the most secret and crafty counsels of princes, which are contrived and carried on in the dark.

What hitherto he said of princes, he now applies to nations and people, whom God doth either increase or diminish as he pleaseth. He enlargeth the nations; he multiplies them, so that they are forced to send forth colonies into other lands.

The heart; which signifies either, 1. Their courage, as Ps. 76:12; or rather, 2. Their wisdom and counsel, as Job 5:13, Isa. 3:4, as the following words show. The chief; either for place and power, or for wisdom and conduct. Causeth them to wander in a wilderness, i.e.

They grope, like men that cannot see their way. In the dark without light; two phrases expressing the same thing, emphatically to express their profound darkness. Like a drunken man, who reels hither and thither without any certainty.