The Pulpit Commentary — Job — Section 458

mesengoa for them, going 011 their errands, my hand. My strength did not fo.il. When and the like. He wne ki11d nnd helpful to it seomecl on the point of failin:,;, it wail hie fellow-men, not only in grant, but nlso secretly anrl mysteriously" renewed." Some in little mnttere. commentators regard vers. 19 a.nd 20 as n. Ver. 16.-I wnsa father to the poor ( omnp. portion of the speech begun in ver. 18, a.nd vor. 12, and see below, eh. x.ui. 16-22): view the verbs, not as past tenses, hut aa and the oause which I knew not I eearohed futures ( compare the translation of the out; ro.ther, the cause of him that I knew not Revised Version). The general mea.ning is I searched out (see tho Revised Version). much the so.me, whichever of the two views When men wore quite unknown to him, Job we take. still go.veto their co.uses the utmost possible Ver. 21.-Unto me men gave ear, and attention, "seo.rching them out," or inves- waited, and kept silence at my oouneel tigBting them, as diligently 11s if they had (comp. vers. 9, 10). Job, however, does not been the onuses of bis own friends. repeat himself, sinco in the previous passago Ver. 17.-And I brake the jaws of the he is speaking of his work and office as wioked ( comp. Ps. !viii. 6). It is scarcely judge, whereas now he declares the position meant, ns Canon Cook supposes, th11t Job which he had occupied among his country- was himself the executioner. " Quod fa.cit men as statesman and counsellor. per nlium facit per so." Job would regard Ver. 22.-After my words they spake not ns his doing what he ordered to be done. again. When Job had spoken, the debate And plucked the spoil out of his teeth. commonly came ~ an end. It was felt Either by disappointing him of a prey which that all had been said, and that further he was on the verge of making his own, or remark would be superfluous. And my by compelling him to make restitution of a speech dropped upon them (comp. Deut. prey tho.t he hod actually laid hold ~- xxxii. 2, "My doctrine shall drop as the Ver. 18.-Then Isa.id, Ishall die in. my neet. rain, my speech shall distil as the di,w "). The metaphor of" nest•• for" dwelling-place" The silent, penetrating influence of wise occurs in Numb. xxiv. 21 ; Jer. xlix. 16; counsel is glanced at. Obad. 4; and Hab. ii. 9. It is also employed Ver. 23.-They waited for me as for the by Hesiod (' Op. et Di.,' i. 301). And I shall rain. ; i.e. " they were as eager to hear me multiply my days as the eand. Some trans- speak as the parched ground is to receive late, "I shall multiply my days as ihe the winter re.ill, which it expects a11d waits phcenix," the fabulous bird which was sup- for and absorbs greedily." And they opened posed to live for five hundredyears(Herod., ii. their mouth wide e.s for the latter rain.. 72), to burn itself on a funeral pile of spices, They drank in my disconrse as the spring and then to rise again from its ashes. But vegetation drinks in the spring showers, the view seems to be a mere rabbinical known in the East generally as "the latter tradition, and is unsupported by etymology. rains." KMl (,'In) means "sand " in Gen. xxii. 17; Ver. 24:.-If I laughed on them, they Jer. xxtiii. 22; and elsewhere. It is taken believed it not; rather, if I trmi7.ed on them. in this sense by Rosenmiiller, Schultens, If, as a mark of favour, I smiled on any, Professor Lee, Ca.non Cook, e.nd our Revisers. they thought it such graciousness and con- Ver. 19.-My root was spread out by the descension that they could scarcely believe wa.ters (comp. Ps. i. 3; Jer. xvii. 8); rather, it possible. And the light of my coUJJ.tenance to the waters-so that •the waters rea.ched it they cast not down. They never put me and nourished it. And the dew le.y all out of countonance, or made me sad e.nd night upon my branch. Job compares him- gloomy, by opposing my views o.nd ranging self, in his former prosperous sto.te, to a tree themselves against me. growing by a river-side, which receives o. Ver. 25.-I ohose out their way, and sat double nonrishment-from the actual wo.ter chief. Though not an absolute monarch, of the stream, which reaches its roots, o.nd but only r,, patriarchal head, I practically from the moisture ernporated from the determined the course which the tribe took, stream, which hangs in tho air, o.nd desconds since my nclvice was always followed. I thus in the shape of dew upon its leaves nnd "sat chief" -nay, dwelt as a king in. the branches. Both sources of refreshment army (or, in the host, i.e. among the people), represent the grace and favour of God. as one that comforteth the mourners; i.e. Ver. 20.-My glory was fresh in. me; i.e. as one to whom all looked for comfort in "my glory remained fresh "-received no times of distress o.nd calamity, o.s much as tarnish, continued o.e bright o.s it ho.d been for counsel and guid1Wce at other times at the first. And my bow was renewed in (vers. 21-23).  THE BOOK OF JOB.