The Pulpit Commentary — Job — Section 25

HOMILIES BY VARIOUS AUTHORS. Introductory. On the general teaching of the book. For all earnest readers ; for all who can think seriously, feel deeply; all who have in their own persons loved and lost; who have known life in its brightest and its darkest moods; all, again, who have that fine gift of sympathy which makes the pain and woe of humanity their own ;-this book has a most powerful attraction, a profound charm. Here we have suffering through all the scale of human being; suffering tuned to music most plaintive, which strikes some response from the chords of every human heart. Here, too, we have reflection upon suffering, intense thought bent without fear and without reserve upon the great questions of life. Who has not, in some weary, desponding hour, at some time or other, sighed forth, "What is the meaning of it all?" It is a question which seems to answer itself joyously, or rather to require no asking, in the brighter days of life. Nature and the heart of man smile upon one another with the reflection of the gladness of the Creative Mind when he saw that all his works were very good. But in many a midnight hour of mental darkness the question that we thought answered and set at rest forces its presence upon us, and demands an answer of our reason. And Reason," from wave to 1vave of fancied misery driven," loses her bearings; igno!'allt of  u the 111.titude, sbe knows not whither to steer for n port. This ia the mood of Job. And relief comes e.t length, in an unexpected way, from the Source 'l\'henca alone it Mn' come. We are taught the great 1esson ot suffering-to wait and to hope. He who tarries in patience until he beholds the "end of the Lord 1' shall find an abundant reward ,,f his faith and constancy. I. THE ENIGMAS o'.F LIFE. Pain, loss, disease, exchanged for pleaenre, gain, health, and riclies. Man cannot understand this process. And he cannot \Villingly submit to what he does not understand. 1. He bas an instinct for happiness, which he ee.nrio't deuy without denying himself. He and all nature, he feels, and truly ·feels, were con- structed for happiness. He is bound to work for this end, both in himself and others, 'l'he Creator (he is thus naturally taught to reason) must be n happy and happiness- lo,·in.c: Being, ever blessed, ever blessing. Thus, when a rebuff is given to these powerful aud cle..r instincts, ,md their truth is suddenly extinguished, as it were, in the man's own bosom; when all the springs of natural joy are in a moment dried up like the summer torrent of the East ;-whe.t wonder that he should complain? Is he the victim of some radical deception? Are all his thoughts illusions? Whence came those instincts for ' happiness, which one ,lay appe,1r to be an infallible guide, and which the next day's· calamity mocks and baffies? The mechanism of the mind itself is loosened, the col limn of reason totters. This train of thought calls to our memory.• King Lear,' a work of art that in many points may remind us of Job, only that tber~ is wanting_ iri Lear that: constant, unshakable faith in eternal justice and goodness which brings at last solu,tion to every perplexity, rest from ever.v struggle with the inevitable. 2. It is no enigma of life that suffering should be oonnec'-ed with guilt. This connection is and ought to. be,' Such is another intuitive perception of the human heart. We can understand and approve this relation, even when we are the subjects of it. Tho horrible mystery of pain does not exist, or at least is not felt to be intolerable, when the man can ·say; "I indeed suffer justly the reward of my deeds!" Had Job felt that he had brought these woes upon himself by disobedience to the .Almighty will, he would, as an awakened man, have been consoled by the reflection; for, in that case, repentance was open to him, and, with repentance, the removal of the worst part of suffering-:-its curse. But it was just the absence of this clear connection which made the burden of calamity so oppressive, which deprived his sorrow of its only alleviation. Especially was this so in that ancient time in which Job lived. It is evident, from the whole tenor of the dis- course of the friends, that the only authorized explanation of personal suffering was personal guilt. So much was this so, that the very words in Hebrew seem to confu83: the two notions. " The dictionary even opposed the prevalence of another doctrine, Crime, punishment, pa.in, suffering, injustice, misfortune, are in Hebrew almost indis- cernible. He who has struggled with the difficulties presented by these words under-. stands better than any the impossibility of the Hebrew mind arriving, with words so confused, at a distinction that we regard as the principle of all morality" (Renan). 3. But Joh, on the other hand, dares, with all the independence of the just thinker, of the man who cannot be untrue to the clearest light of bis self-consciousness, to deny the appli- cation of this jud!!Illent to hie case. He denies that his present sufferings point back to previous sins. Whatever be the solution of the problem, that, he knows, cannot be the_ true one. No deluge of religiolll! commonplace shall move him from his fixed position, his conscious integrity of soul. No agony can wring from him an echo to the shallow cant of men who prate about suffering without really having eufi'ered. Despite all that wife and friends can urge, he will not, cannot, desert the side of truth, or what he feels to be tLe truth. And in this experience truth does not condemn him; on the whole it acquits him. This is one of the most instructive lessons the entire poem yields us-to be true to onrselves, to follow the light within, let others scold and rebuke as they will. More frequently, no doubt, we need to apply this lesson in an humiliating way. If we. are true to olll'Belves, we shall have to admit that we have brought our troubles upon ourselves by our own faults. But sometimes it ruay be otherwise. The link may be wanting which unites the effect to its cause. If we feol this to be so, we must have the courage to say so; and on the same ground upon which we ought to have_ the honesty to acknowledge the sinful origin when we have detected it. Job is an example of that manly simplicity of heart, that faithfulness to i;elf, without which we cannot be genuine men, nor fair and tolerant to other1. It does not follow, because· e. man  '1'It'E B()OB.'. OF JO'B. 15