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Job having by his complaints in the foregoing chapter given vent to his passion, and thereby gained some ease, breaks them off abruptly, and now applies himself to a further discussion of the doctrinal controversy between him and his friends concerning the prosperity of wicked people. That many live at ease who yet are ungodly and profane, and despise all the exercises of devotion, he had shown, Job 21:1-34 Now here he goes further, and shows that many who are mischievous to mankind, and live in open defiance to all the laws of justice and common honesty, yet thrive and succeed in their unrighteous practices; and we do not see them reckoned with in this world. What he had said before (Job 12:6), "The tabernacles of robbers prosper," he here enlarges upon. He lays down his general proposition (Job 24:1), that the punishment of wicked people is not so visible and apparent as his friends supposed, and then proves it by an induction of particulars. I. Those that openly do wrong to their poor neighbours are not reckoned with, nor the injured righted (Job 24:2-12), though the former are very barbarous, Job 24:21,22. II. Those that secretly practise mischief often go undiscovered and unpunished, Job 24:13-17. III. That God punished such by secret judgments and reserves them for future judgments (Job 24:18-20,23-25), so that, upon the whole matter, we cannot say that all who are in trouble are wicked; for it is certain that all who are in prosperity are not righteous.

Job asserts that there are various transgressors whose wickedness is not visited on them in this life; and particularizes the adjust and oppressive, Job 24:1-6; those who are cruel to the poor, Job 24:7-13; the murderer, Job 24:14; the adulterer, Job 24:15; thieves and plunderers, Job 24:16, Job 24:17. Nevertheless they have an accursed portion, and shall die, and their memory perish, Job 24:18-20. He speaks of the abuse of power, and of the punishment of oppressors, Job 24:21-24; and asserts that what he has said on these subjects cannot be contradicted, Job 24:25.

INTRODUCTION TO Job 24

This chapter contains the second part of Job's answer to the last discourse of Eliphaz, in which he shows that wicked men, those of the worst characters, prosper in the world, and go through it with impunity; he lays down this as a certain truth, that though no time is hid from God, yet they that are most familiar with him, and know most of him, do not see, and cannot observe, any days of his for judging and punishing wicked men in, this life, Job 24:1; and instances in men guilty of injustice, violence, oppression, cruelty, and inhumanity, to their neighbours, and yet God lays not folly to them, or charges them with sin, and punishes them for it, Job 24:2; and in persons that commit the most atrocious crimes in secret, such as murderers, adulterers, and thieves, Job 24:13; he allows that there is a curse upon their portion, and that the grave shall consume them, and they shall be remembered no more, Job 24:18; and because of their ill treatment of others, though they may be in safety and prosperity, and be exalted for a while, they shall be brought low and cut off by death, but generally speaking are not punished in this life, Job 24:21; and concludes with the greatest assurance of being in the right, and having truth on his side, Job 24:25.

Ch. 24. The Divine Rectitude which Job misses in his own instance he equally misses on the broad field of the World

The same thought of the absence of any righteous rule of the world is carried through this chapter and illustrated by many examples. Job turns from his own history and surveys that of the people around him, and as his own instance illustrated the misery of the just, the instances about him illustrate the felicity, the long-continued power, the freedom from visitation by God, and the natural death of the wicked. Thus both sides of his thesis are supported, that God’s rule of the world is not retributive, and that the principles insisted on by his friends find no justification in the world as it is.

Job begins by asking, Why are not times (of assize) appointed by the Almighty? and, Why do they that know Him not see His days (of judgment)? This is Job’s complaint, that God the judge and ruler of the world fails to judge and rule it in righteousness. Men do not behold Him appointing times and holding days for doing judgment on wrong, and righting the oppressed. On the contrary, the powerful tyrants oppress and the miserable poor are oppressed (Job 24:3-11), and God regards not the wrong (Job 24:12).

Besides these public wrongdoers, there are other transgressors who shun the light. The murderer, the adulterer, and the robber ply their unhallowed trade in the darkness (Job 24:13-17). And all of them, instead of being visited by God with sudden judgments, as the Friends insisted and as the popular literature described (Job 24:18-21), are upheld in power by God, made to dwell in safety, and at last brought in peace to a natural death “like all others” (Job 24:22-24).

Finally Job, too sure of his facts, exclaims, Who will make me a liar? Who will disprove the things now advanced? (Job 24:25).

Job 24:1-25.

1. Why is it that, seeing that the times of punishment

(Eze 30:3;

"time" in the same sense) are not hidden from the Almighty, they who know Him (His true worshippers,

Job 18:21)

do not see His days (of vengeance;

Joe 1:15; 2Pe 3:10)?

Or, with UMBREIT less simply, making the parallel clauses more nicely balanced, Why are not times of punishment hoarded up ("laid up";

Job 21:19;

appointed) by the Almighty? that is, Why are they not so appointed as that man may now see them? as the second clause shows. Job does not doubt that they are appointed: nay, he asserts it

(Job 21:30);

what he wishes is that God would let all now see that it is so.

Why, seeing times are not hidden froth the Almighty - Dr. Good renders this,

"Wherefore are not doomdays kept by the Almighty.

So that his offenders may eye his periods?"

Dr. Noyes:

"Why are not times of punishment reserved by the Almighty.

And why do not they, who regard him, see his judgments?"

Jerome, "Times are not hidden from the Almighty; but they who know him are ignorant of his days." The Septuagint, "But why have set times - ὧραι hōrai, escaped the notice - ἔλαθον elathon - of the Almighty, and the wicked transgressed all bounds? The word עתים ‛êthı̂ym, here translated "times," is rendered by the Chaldee (עדניא), "set times," times appointed for an assembly or a trial, beforehand designated for any purpose. The Hebrew word properly means, set time, fit and proper times; and in the plural, as used here, means "seasons," Esther 1:13; 1 Chronicles 12:32; and then vicissitudes of things, fortunes, destinies; Psalm 31:16; 1 Chronicles 29:30. Here it means, probably, the vicissitudes of things, or what actually occurs. All changes are known to God. He sees good and bad times; he sees the changes that take place among people. And since he sees all this, Job asks, with concern, Why is it that God does not come forth to deal with people according to their true character? That this was the fact, he proceeds to show further in illustration of the position which he had maintained in Job 21 by specifying a number of additional cases where the wicked undeniably prospered. It was this which perplexed him so much, for he did not doubt that their conduct was clearly known to God. If their conduct had been unknown to God, it would not have been a matter of surprise that they should go unpunished. But since all their ways were clearly seen by him, it might well excite inquiry why they were permitted thus to prosper. "He" believed that they were reserved to a future day of wrath, Job 21:30; Job 24:23-24. They would be punished in due time, but it was not a fact as his friends alleged, that they were punished in this life according to their deeds.

Do they that know him? - His true friends; the pious.

Not see his days - The days of his wrath, or the day when he punishes the wicked. Why are they not permitted to see him come forth to take vengeance on his foes? The phrase "his days" means the days when God would come forth to punish his enemies. They are called "his days," because at that time God would be the prominent object that would excite attention. They would be days when he would manifest himself in a manner so remarkable as to characterize the period. Thus, the day of judgment is called the day "of the Son of Man," or "his day" Luke 17:24, because at that time the Lord Jesus will be the prominent and glorious object that shall give character to the day. The "question" here seems to have been asked by Job mainly to call attention to "the fact" which he proceeds to illustrate. The fact was undeniable. Job did "not" maintain, as Eliphaz had charged on him Job 22:12-14, that the reason why God did not punish them was, that he could not see their deeds. He admitted most fully that God did see them, and understood all that they did. In this they were agreed. Since this was so, the question was why the wicked were spared, and lived in prosperity. The fact that it was so, Job affirms. The "reason" why it was so, was the subject of inquiry now. This was perplexing, and Job could solve it only by referring to what was to come hereafter.

Why, seeing times are not hidden from the Almighty - Mr. Good translates: "Wherefore are not doomsdays kept by the Almighty, so that his offenders may eye their periods?" Doomsdays are here used in the same sense as term times; and the wish is, that God would appoint such times that the falsely accused might look forward to them with comfort; knowing that, on their arrival, they should have a fair hearing, and their innocence be publicly declared; and their detractors, and the unjust in general, meet with their deserts. But God reserves the knowledge of these things to himself. "The holy patriarch," says Mr. Good, "has uniformly admitted that in the aggregate scale of Providence the just are rewarded and the wicked punished for their respective deeds, in some period or other of their lives. But he has contended in various places, and especially in Job 21:7-13, that the exceptions to this general rule are numerous: so numerous, as to be sufficient to render the whole scheme of providential interposition perfectly mysterious and incomprehensible, Job 23:8-12; so in the passage before us: if the retribution ye speak of be universal, and which I am ready to admit to a certain extent to be true and unquestionable, I not only ask, Why do the just ever suffer in the midst of their righteousness? but, Why do not the wicked see such retribution displayed before their eyes by stated judgments, so that they may at one and the same time know and tremble?"

Why, seeing times are not hidden from the Almighty,.... Which seems to be an inference deduced from what he had said in Job 23:14; that since all things are appointed by God, and his appointments are punctually performed by him, the times of his carrying his purposes and decrees into execution cannot be hidden from him; for, as he has determined what shall be done, he has determined the time before appointed for the doing of them; as there is a purpose for everything under the heavens, there is a time set for the execution of that purpose, which must be known unto God that has fixed it; for as all his works are known to him from the beginning, or from eternity, the times when those works should be wrought must also be known to him. The Vulgate Latin, version reduces the words to a categorical proposition, "times are not hidden from the Almighty"; either temporal things, as Sephorno interprets it, things done in time, or the times of doing those things; no sort of time is hid from God; time respecting the world in general, its beginning, duration, and end; all seasons in it, day and night, summer and winter, seedtime and harvest, which are all fixed and settled by him; the several distinct ages and periods of time, into which it has been divided; the old and new world, the legal and Gospel dispensation, the various generations in it; the four great monarchies of the world, their rise, and duration, and end, with all other lesser kingdoms and states; time respecting the inhabitants of the world, their coming into and passing out of it in successive generations, the time of their birth, and of their death, and of adversity and prosperity, which interchangeably take place during their abode in it; and particularly the people of God, the time of their redemption by Christ, of their conversion by the grace of God, and all their times of darkness, desertion, temptation, and afflictions, and of peace, joy, and comfort; time, past and future, respecting the church of God, and the state of it, and all things relative thereunto; and the times of Israel's affliction in a land not theirs, four hundred years, and of their seventy years' captivity in Babylon, were not hidden from the Almighty, but foretold by him; the suffering times of the church under the New Testament; the ten persecutions of it by the Roman emperors; the flight and nourishment of it in the wilderness for a time, and times, and half a time; the treading down of the holy city forty two months; the witnesses prophesying: in sackcloth 1260 days; the killing of them, and their bodies lying unburied three days and a half, and then rising; the reign of antichrist forty two months, at the end of which antichristian time will be no more; the time of Christ's coming to judgment, which is a day appointed, though unknown to men and angels, and the reign of Christ on earth for a thousand years; all these times are not hidden from, but known to the Almighty, even all time, past, present, and to come, and all things that have been, are, or shall be done therein. Several Jewish commentators (c) interpret these words as an expostulation or wish, "why are not times hidden?" &c. if they were, I should not wonder at it that those that knew him do not know what shall be; but he knows the times and days in which wicked men will do wickedness, why is he silent? Mr. Broughton, and others (d), render them, "why are not", or "why should not times be hidden by the Almighty?" that is, be hidden in his own breast from men, as they are; for the times and seasons it is not for man to know, which God has put in his own power, Acts 1:6; as the times of future troubles, of a man's death, and the day of judgment; it is but right and fit, on many accounts, that they should be hid by him from them; but others of later date translate the words perhaps much better, "why are not certain stated times laid up", or "reserved by the Almighty" (e)? that is, for punishing wicked men in this, life, as would be the case, Job suggests, if it was true what his friends had asserted, that wicked men are always punished here: and then upon this another question follows, why

do they that know him not see his days? that know him not merely by the light of nature, but as revealed in Christ; and that have not a mere knowledge of him, but a spiritual and experimental one; who know him so as to love him, believe in him, fear, serve, and worship him; and who have a greater knowledge of him than others may have, and have an intimate acquaintance and familiarity with him, are his bosom friends; and if there are fixed times for punishing the wicked in this life, how comes it to pass that these friends of God, to whom he reveals his secrets, cannot see and observe any such days and times of his as these? but, on the contrary, observe, even to the stumbling of the greatest saints, that the wicked prosper and increase in riches. Job seems to refer to what Eliphaz had said, Job 22:19; which he here tacitly denies, and proves the contrary by various instances, as follows.

(c) Aben Ezra, Nachmanides, & Simeon Bar Tzemach. (d) "quinam ab omnipotente", Beza; so Junius & Tremellius. (e) "Quare ab omnipotente non sunt recondita in poenam stata tempora", Schultens.