Job 19 Job’s answer: his friends’ strangeness and reproaches vex him, Job 19:1–3. He layeth before them his great misery to provoke their pity, Job 19:6–22; wisheth his words might be recorded, Job 19:23–24. His hope in his Redeemer and the resurrection, Job 19:25–27.

With mere empty words, void of sense or argument; with your impertinent and unedifying discourses, and bitter reproaches, as it followeth.

These ten times, i.e. many times. A certain number for an uncertain. So this phrase is oft used, as Gen. 31:7, Num. 14:22;c. That ye make yourselves strange to me; that you carry yourselves like strangers to me, and are not concerned nor affected with my calamities, and condemn me as if you had…

If my opinion in this point be faulty and erroneous, as you pretend it is. Or, if I have sinned, (for sin is oft called error in Scripture,) and am therefore punished. Mine error remaineth with myself; either, 1. It is likely to continue, I see no cause from your reasons to change my judgment.

Magnify yourselves against me, i.e. use lofty, and imperious, and contemptuous speeches against me; or seek praise and honour from others, by your conquering or outreasoning of me. My reproach; either, 1.

Know now; consider what I am now saying. Hath overthrown me; hath grievously afflicted me in all kinds; therefore it ill becomes you to aggravate my miseries; and if my passions, hereby raised, have broken forth into some extravagant and unmeet expressions, I might expect your pity and favourable…

I cry out, to wit, unto God by prayer or appeal. Of wrong; that I am oppressed, either, 1. By my friends; or rather, 2. By God, who deals with me according to his sovereign power and exact and rigorous justice, and not with that equity and benignity which he showeth to the generality of men, and…

That I cannot pass, i.e. so that I know not what to say or do, and can see no means nor possibility of getting out of my troubles. He hath set darkness in my paths; so that I cannot discern my way, or what course I should take.

Of my glory, i.e. of my estate, and children, and authority, and all my comforts. The crown, i.e. all my ornaments.

On every side, i.e. in all respects, and to all intents and purposes; my person, and family, and estate. I am gone, i.e. I am a lost and dead man. Going is oft put for dying, as Gen. 15:2, Ps. 39:13. Mine hope, i.e.

He hath stirred up his wrath against me of his own accord, without any provocation of mine, human infirmity excepted. He counteth me unto him as one of his enemies, i.e.

His troops, i.e. my afflictions, which are but God’s instruments and soldiers marching under his conduct. Raise up their way; either, 1. Cast a bank or trench round about me, as an army doth when they go to besiege a place. Or rather, 2.

My brethren, i.e. my kindred and friends, who might and should have supported and comforted me in my distress. Far from me; either, 1. In place; because they feared or disdained, or at least neglected, to visit or succour me. Or, 2.

My kinsfolk have failed, to wit, to perform the offices of humanity and friendship which they owe to me. Have forgotten me, i.e. neglect and disregard me as much as if they had quite forgotten me.

They that dwell in mine house, Heb. the sojourners of my house, i.e. such as had formerly sojourned with me, whether strangers. widows, and fatherless, whom by the law of charity and hospitality he entertained; or hired servants, who had for a good while their habitation and subsistence in his…

I called my servant, to do some servile office about me, for my case or relief, and he passed by as if he had been deaf, because he loathed and feared to come near to me; although to my commands I added humble and earnest desires. With my mouth: either, 1.

To my wife; who by reason of the stink of my breath and sores denied me her company. For the children’s sake of mine own body; by these pledges of our mutual and matrimonial tie and affection, the children which came out of my loins, and were begotten by me upon her body.

Young children; or, fools; the most contemptible persons. I arose, to wit, from my seat, to show my respect to them, though they were my inferiors; to show my readiness to comply with that mean and low condition, into which God had now brought me.

My inward friends, Heb. the men of my secret; my intimates and confidants, to whom I imparted all my thoughts, and counsels, and concerns. Whom I loved sincerely and fervently, which they so ill requite.

My bone, i.e. my bones; the singular collectively put for the plural, as Job 2:5, Prov. 15:30. Cleaveth to my skin, to wit, immediately, the fat and flesh next to the skin being consumed. The sense is, I am worn to skin and bone: see the same phrase Ps. 102:5.

O ye my friends; for such you have been, and still pretend to be; and therefore fulfil that relation; and if you will not help me, yet at least pity me. Hath touched me, i.e. smitten or afflicted me sorely, as this word is oft used; as Job 1:11, Ps. 104:32.

As God; either, 1. As God doth; or rather, 2. As if you were gods, and not men; as if you had the same infinite knowledge which God hath, whereby you can search my heart, and know my hypocrisy; and the same sovereign and absolute authority, to say and do what you please with me, without giving any…

My words; either, 1. The following and famous confession of his faith, Job 19:25;c. Or rather, 2. All his foregoing discourses with his friends, which he was so far from disowning or being ashamed of, that he was desirous that all ages should know, that they might judge between him and them, whose…

An iron pen; of which also there is mention Jer. 17:1. And lead; or, or lead; or, with lead; the particle and being oft so used, as Gen. 4:20, Ex. 1:6, Jer. 22:7. For this lead may be either, 1.

This is the reason of his great confidence in the goodness of his cause, and his willingness to have the matter depending between him and his friends published and submitted to any trial, because he had a living and powerful Redeemer to plead his cause, and vindicate his person from all their…

The style of this and other poetical books is concise and short, and therefore many words are to be understood in some places to complete the sense. The meaning of the place is this, Though my skin is now in a great measure consumed by sores, and the rest of it, together with this body, shall be…

Whom I shall see, in manner before and after expressed. No wonder that he repeats it again, because the meditation of it was most sweet to him. For myself, i.e. for my own comfort and benefit, as that phrase is oft used.

But; or, therefore; because this is my case, and my faith and hope in God. Ye should say: so the future is used potentially, as it is Obad. 12; and the sense is, it would become you; or, it is your duty upon this account to say. Or, you will say, i.e. either, 1.

Of the sword, i.e. of some considerable judgment to be inflicted on you, which is called the sword; as Deut. 32:41, and oft elsewhere. Do not please yourselves with such pretences and crafty evasions, as if the blame were wholly in me, not in you: God will not be mocked by you; he sees and will…