Chú giải Kinh Thánh

Job 24:1. Why, &c. — 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 showed, chap. 21. Now he goes further, and shows that many who are mischievous to mankind, and live in open defiance of 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. He first lays down his general proposition, 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. Why — How comes it to pass; seeing times are not hidden from the Almighty — Seeing the fittest seasons for every action, and particularly for the punishment of wicked men, are not unknown to God: do they that know him — That love and obey him; not see his days? — The times and seasons which he takes for the punishment of ungodly men; which times are frequently called the days of the Lord, as Isaiah 2:12; Isaiah 13:6; Jeremiah 46:10; Acts 2:20. Surely, if they were constant and fixed in this life, they would not be unknown to good men, to whom God is wont to reveal his secrets. His words may be paraphrased a little more at large, thus: To answer a little what you have so often asserted: If punishments from God upon the wicked, in this world, are so certain as you say, why do not they who are truly pious see them openly inflicted? Surely it is most strange, that there are not some certain fixed times when God arises publicly, and in the face of the whole world inflicts these deserved punishments upon the wicked. Whereas, experience shows, that these visible judgments are very rarely inflicted, and many true worshippers of God pass through the world without ever seeing any thing of this kind. Heath renders the verse, Why are not stated seasons set apart by the Almighty? And why do not those who know him see his days? namely, of vengeance on the wicked.

Job 24:2. Some, &c. — In proof that wicked persons prosper, he instances in two sorts of unrighteous people, whom all the world saw thriving in their iniquity: 1st, Tyrants, and those that did wrong under pretence of law and authority; and, 2d, Robbers and plunderers, that did wrong by downright force, as the bands of the Sabeans and Chaldeans, who had lately plundered him. Remove the landmark — By which men’s lands are distinguished, and their properties secured, that so they may enlarge their own border by diminishing the estate of their neighbour — which is so great an act of injustice that it was not only very strictly forbidden by God in his law, but also declared execrable by the heathen, among some of whom it was permitted to any man to kill him that did it. Forging or destroying deeds is now a crime equivalent to this. They violently take away flocks, and feed thereof — They take away cattle by force, and use them as if they were their own. Or, they feed them; they do not hide, or kill them, but openly feed them in their pastures, without any remorse, or shame, or fear of punishment, either from God or man.

Job 24:3-4. They drive away the ass of the fatherless — Whose helpless condition required their pity and mercy. He says, the ass, to aggravate their sin, in that they robbed him who had but one ass. They take the widow’s ox — Thereby depriving her, not only of the ox itself, but of all the benefit of its labours, by which her life was sustained; for a pledge — Contrary to God’s law, first written in men’s hearts, and afterward in the Holy Scriptures, Exodus 22:26. They turn the needy out of the way — Out of the way of piety and virtue. They engage them to take evil courses by their examples, or promises, or threatenings. Or, out of their right, of which they deprive them, by subtlety or power. Or, rather, as the word מדרךְ, middarech, more properly signifies, and as the next clause explains it, out of the highway, out of the path or place in which these oppressors walk and range. These needy persons labour to keep out of their way for fear of their further injuries and oppressions. The poor of the earth hide themselves, &c. — For fear of these wicked tyrants and persecutors.

Job 24:5. Behold, as wild asses — Which are lawless and fierce, and greedy of prey; in the desert — Which is the proper habitation of wild asses, Jeremiah 2:24 : they go forth to their work — These oppressors go forth to spoil and rob, which is their constant work and trade: rising betimes for the prey — Beginning their work of plunder before the poor go to their daily labour. The wilderness yieldeth food for them — They are so diligent and industrious in their wicked work, that they fetch food for themselves and families even out of desert places, in which the owners can with difficulty subsist.

Job 24:6. They reap every one his corn in the field — The words, every one, are not in the original, and ought not to have been inserted here, as they alter the sense. The clause would be better translated without them. They reap his corn in the field; that is, these plunderers make incursions, reap and take away the corn of the honest, industrious husbandman, which he had sown for the support of his family. They gather the vintage of the wicked — Or, rather, the vintage of wickedness; that is, they plunder the vineyards of the honest, just man, as well as his corn-fields.

Job 24:7. They cause the naked — That is, those whom they have made naked, whom they have stripped of their garments and coverings; so far were they from exercising charity or even justice toward them; to lodge without clothing — To sleep in the night without bed-clothes to cover them; that they have no covering in the cold — Of the night, in the winter season. This verse perhaps would be better rendered thus, They cause men to lodge naked, because they have no clothing, (that is, because they leave them nothing wherewith they can clothe themselves,) and no covering in the cold; they leave them neither raiment to wear in the day, nor a covering in the night.

Job 24:8. They are wet — That is, the poor, being stripped of their raiment, and forced away from their houses; with the showers of the mountains — With the rain-water, which, in great showers, runs down from the rocks or mountains into the caves or holes in the sides of them, to which they have fled for shelter. And embrace the rock — That is, are glad when they can find a cavern, or cleft of a rock, in which they may have some protection against the injuries of the weather, and a hiding-place from the fury of their oppressors.

Job 24:9-10. They — The wicked oppressors; pluck the fatherless from the breast — Either out of cruelty, not sparing poor infants, or out of covetousness, not allowing the mother time for the suckling of her infant. They take away the sheaf from the hungry — That single sheaf, which the poor man had got with the sweat of his brow, to satisfy his hunger.