The Pulpit Commentary — Job — Section 56

CHAPTER III. their feelings. All that such cursing mean11 is that one wishes one had never been born. The " Historical Introduction" ended, we Vere. 2, 3.-And Job spe.ke, and said, Let come upon a long colloquy, in which the the day perish wherein I we.a born. An eever11.l dramatis personai speak for them- idle wi8h, doubtless ; the vague utterance of extreme despair. Days cannot perish, or, selves, the writer, or compiler, only prefac- o.t any rate, one day cannot perish more ing each speech with a very few neoessa.ry than another. They all come, and then a.re words. The speeches are, one and all of gone; but no clay can perish out of the vear them, mct1ical; and a.re well represented i.n which will always have its full complement the Revised Version. The first colloquy o_f three hundred and sixty-five days till extends from eh. iii. a to eh. xiv. 22. time shall be no more. But extreme despair does not reason. It simply gives utterance Ver. 1.-After this opened Job hie mouth· to the thoughts and wishes as they arise. The first to ta.ke the word is Job, as, indeed, Job knew that many of his thou 00 hts were etiquette made necessary, when the visit vain and foolish, and confesses it fnrther on paid was one of condolence. It can only be (see eh. vi. 3). And the night in which it conjectured what the feelings were which w:as said; rather, which said. Day and had kept him silent so long. We may, ntght are, both of them, personified, rui in perhaps, suggest that in the countenances Ps. xix. 2. There is a mu child conceived. and manner of his friends he saw something A f!W,n child was a.lwa.ys regarded in the which displeased him, something indica- anCJent world as a special blessino- since tive of their belief tha.t he had brought thus the fo.mi~y was maintained in'"being. his afflictions upon himself by secret sins of A girl passed mto another family. a heinous character. Phe.risl\ism finds it Ver. 4.-Let that de.y be darkness ; i.t!. very difficult to conceal itself; signs of it let a cloud rest upon it-let it be reo-arded are almost sure to escape ; often it manifests as a day of ill omen, "carbone nota~dus." itself, without e. word spoken, most offen- Job reco~izes that hi8_ wis~, that the day sively. The phrase," opened his month," is should perish utterly, 1s varn, and limits not to be dismissed merely as a Hebraism. himself now to the possible. Let not God It is one used only on solemn occasions regard it from above ; i.e. let not God, from and implies the utterance of deep thoughts: the heaven where he dwells, extend to it well considered beforehand (Ps. lxxviii. 21 : his_ protection and superintending ea.re. Mutt. v. 2), or of feelings long repressed, Neither let the light shine upon it. Pleo- and now at length allowed expression. And uastic, but having the sort of force which cursed his day ; '' cursed," i.e., the "duy belongs to rt>iteration. of his birth." Some critics think that Ver. 5.-Let darkness and the shadow ot "cursed" is too strong e. word, and suggest death. "The shadow of death" (mo 1n:) is "reviled;" but it cannot be denied that a favourite expression in the Book of Job, •• to curse" is e. frequent meaning, of S~R where it ooours no fewer than nine times. Elso where it is rare, except in the Psalms, e.nd it is difficult to see in Job's words (vers. where it occurs four times. It is thoua-bt 3-10} anything but o. "curse" of n very to be an e.rcho.io word. Stain it ; rather intense ch,uncter. To curse one's 1mlal day olai~ it, or olaim it for their own (Revised is not, perhaps, o. very wise act, since it 011n Vers10n). Let II cloud dwell upon it; let have no effect on the day or on anything the blackness of the day terrify it. The else; but so great o. prophet as Jeremi11h hot, stifling "blackness" of the khamsin imitate,! Job in this respeot (Jer. xx. 14-- wind is probably meant, which suddenly 18), eo tlmt before Christianity it would turns the day into night, spreading all Beem that men were 11llowed thus to roliove arounll a tbtok lurid darkn0lls- When such JQD, I .50. THE BOOK OF JOB. [oH. m. 1-26 .