Job36
New Living Translation
1Elihu continued speaking:
2“Let me go on, and I will show you the truth. For I have not finished defending God!
3I will present profound arguments for the righteousness of my Creator.
4I am telling you nothing but the truth, for I am a man of great knowledge.
5“God is mighty, but he does not despise anyone! He is mighty in both power and understanding.
6He does not let the wicked live but gives justice to the afflicted.
7He never takes his eyes off the innocent, but he sets them on thrones with kings and exalts them forever.
8If they are bound in chains and caught up in a web of trouble,
9he shows them the reason. He shows them their sins of pride.
10He gets their attention and commands that they turn from evil.
11“If they listen and obey God, they will be blessed with prosperity throughout their lives. All their years will be pleasant.
12But if they refuse to listen to him, they will cross over the river of death, dying from lack of understanding.
13For the godless are full of resentment. Even when he punishes them, they refuse to cry out to him for help.
14They die when they are young, after wasting their lives in immoral living.
15But by means of their suffering, he rescues those who suffer. For he gets their attention through adversity.
16“God is leading you away from danger, Job, to a place free from distress. He is setting your table with the best food.
17But you are obsessed with whether the godless will be judged. Don’t worry, judgment and justice will be upheld.
18But watch out, or you may be seduced by wealth. Don’t let yourself be bribed into sin.
19Could all your wealth or all your mighty efforts keep you from distress?
20Do not long for the cover of night, for that is when people will be destroyed.
21Be on guard! Turn back from evil, for God sent this suffering to keep you from a life of evil.
22“Look, God is all-powerful. Who is a teacher like him?
23No one can tell him what to do, or say to him, ‘You have done wrong.’
24Instead, glorify his mighty works, singing songs of praise.
25Everyone has seen these things, though only from a distance.
26“Look, God is greater than we can understand. His years cannot be counted.
27He draws up the water vapor and then distills it into rain.
28The rain pours down from the clouds, and everyone benefits.
29Who can understand the spreading of the clouds and the thunder that rolls forth from heaven?
30See how he spreads the lightning around him and how it lights up the depths of the sea.
31By these mighty acts he nourishes the people, giving them food in abundance.
32He fills his hands with lightning bolts and hurls each at its target.
33The thunder announces his presence; the storm announces his indignant anger.
Study Guide
Public-domain commentary and original-language notes for Job 36.
Chapter Summary
In this chapter: Elihu desires Job's attention. (1–4). The methods in which God deals with men. (5–14). Elihu counsels Job. (15–23). The wonders in the works of creation. (24–33).
vv1-4
Elihu only maintained that the affliction was sent for his trial; and lengthened because Job was not yet thoroughly humbled under it. He sought to ascribe righteousness to his Maker; to clear this truth, that God is righteous in all his ways. Such knowledge must be learned from the word and Spirit of God, for naturally we are estranged from it. The fitness of Elihu's discourse to the dispute between Job and his friends is plain. It pointed out to Job the true reason of those trials with which he had been pointed out to Job the true reason of those trials with which he had been visited. It taught that God had acted in mercy towards him, and the spiritual benefit he was to derive from them. It corrected the mistake of his friends, and showed that Job's calamities were for good.
vv5-14
Elihu here shows that God acts as righteous Governor. He is always ready to defend those that are injured. If our eye is ever toward God in duty, his eye will be ever upon us in mercy, and, when we are at the lowest, will not overlook us. God intends, when he afflicts us, to discover past sins to us, and to bring them to our remembrance. Also, to dispose our hearts to be taught: affliction makes people willing to learn, through the grace of God working with and by it. And further, to deter us from sinning for the future. It is a command, to have no more to do with sin. If we faithfully serve God, we have the promise of the life that now is, and the comforts of it, as far as is for God's glory and our good: and who would desire them any further? We have the possession of inward pleasures, the great peace which those have that love God's law. If the affliction fail in its work, let men expect the furnace to be heated till they are consumed. Those that die without knowledge, die without grace, and are undone for ever. See the nature of hypocrisy; it lies in the heart: that is for the world and the flesh, while perhaps the outside seems to be for God and religion. Whether sinners die in youth, or live long to heap up wrath, their case is dreadful. The souls of the wicked live after death, but it is in everlasting misery.
vv15-23
Elihu shows that Job caused the continuance of his own trouble. He cautions him not to persist in frowardness. Even good men need to be kept to their duty by the fear of God's wrath; the wisest and best have enough in them to deserve his stroke. Let not Job continue his unjust quarrel with God and his providence. And let us never dare to think favourably of sin, never indulge it, nor allow ourselves in it. Elihu thinks Job needed this caution, he having chosen rather to gratify his pride and humour by contending with God, than to mortify them by submitting, and accepting the punishment. It is absurd for us to think to teach Him who is himself the Fountain of light, truth, knowledge, and instruction. He teaches by the Bible, and that is the best book; teaches by his Son, and he is the best Master. He is just in all proceedings.
Key Words
אֱלִיהוּ: Elihu, the name of one of Job's friends, and of three Israelites
יָסַף: to add or augment (often adverbial, to continue to do a thing)
אָמַר: to say (used with great latitude)
כָּתַר: to enclose; hence (in a friendly sense) to crown, (in a hostile one) to besiege; also to wait (as restraining oneself)
זְעֵיר: small
חָוָה: properly, to live; by implication (intensively) to declare or show
כִּי: (by implication) very widely used as a relative conjunction or adverb (as below); often largely modified by other particles annexed
עוֹד: properly, iteration or continuance; used only adverbially (with or without preposition), again, repeatedly, still, more
מִלָּה: a word; collectively, a discourse; figuratively, a topic
אֱלוֹהַּ: a deity or the Deity
Cross References
Job 36Afflicted righteous are set with kings on the throne, echoing Hannah's song of divine reversal.
Supported by Matthew Poole, JFB
God raises the poor out of the dust to inherit the throne of glory.
Supported by Matthew Poole, JFB
New Testament confirmation that the eyes of the Lord are continuously over the righteous.
Supported by JFB
Elihu repeats his core thesis that God opens ears to instruction through disciplinary affliction.
Supported by JFB
Verbal echo of impenitent sinners who 'heap up wrath' against themselves for the day of judgment.
Supported by JFB
Sodomitic uncleanness; Elihu warns that the life of the unclean/hypocrites ends in early dishonor.
Supported by JFB
The dramatic rescue of being brought out of a strait place into a broad, free space.
Supported by JFB
Ascribing righteousness to the Creator, who has sovereign rights over the clay as Maker.
Supported by Matthew Poole
Elihu promises true and sincere words, unlike the deceitful and false arguments of the friends.
Supported by Matthew Poole, JFB
Contrasts Job's charge that God despises the work of His hands with Elihu's vindication.
Supported by Matthew Poole
Parallel description of hypocrites who do not cry out to God when trouble comes.
Supported by JFB
A well-supplied table of fatness representing the abundance of the restored and prosperous believer.
Supported by JFB
The sovereign teaching of God; none can direct His path or prescribe His way.
Supported by Matthew Poole
No material wealth or human ransom can deliver a soul from the stroke of God.
Supported by JFB