Job 15:1-13

Eliphaz

1 Then Eliphaz the Temanite replied:
2 “Would a wise person answer with empty notions or fill their belly with the hot east wind?
3 Would they argue with useless words, with speeches that have no value?
4 But you even undermine piety and hinder devotion to God.
5 Your sin prompts your mouth; you adopt the tongue of the crafty.
6 Your own mouth condemns you, not mine; your own lips testify against you.
7 “Are you the first man ever born? Were you brought forth before the hills?
8 Do you listen in on God’s council? Do you have a monopoly on wisdom?
9 What do you know that we do not know? What insights do you have that we do not have?
10 The gray-haired and the aged are on our side, men even older than your father.
11 Are God’s consolations not enough for you, words spoken gently to you?
12 Why has your heart carried you away, and why do your eyes flash,
13 so that you vent your rage against God and pour out such words from your mouth?

Job 15:1-13 Meaning and Commentary

INTRODUCTION TO JOB 15

Job's three friends having in their turns attacked him, and he having given answer respectively to them, Eliphaz, who began the attack, first enters the debate with him again, and proceeds upon the same plan as before, and endeavours to defend his former sentiments, falling upon Job with greater vehemence and severity; he charges him with vanity, imprudence, and unprofitableness in his talk, and acting a part unbecoming his character as a wise man; yea, with impiety and a neglect of religion, or at least as a discourager of it by his words and doctrines, of which his mouth and lips were witnesses against him, Job 15:1-6; he charges him with arrogance and a high conceit of himself, as if he was the first man that was made, nay, as if he was the eternal wisdom of God, and had been in his council; and, to check his vanity, retorts his own words upon him, or however the sense of them, Job 15:7-10; and also with slighting the consolations of God; upon which he warmly expostulates with him, Job 15:11-13; and in order to convince him of his self-righteousness, which he thought he was full of, he argues from the angels, the heavens, and the general case of man, Job 15:14-16; and then he declares from his own knowledge, and from the relation of wise and ancient men in former times, who made it their observation, that wicked men are afflicted all their days, attended with terror and despair, and liable to various calamities, Job 15:17-24; the reasons of which are their insolence to God, and hostilities committed against him, which they are encouraged in by their prosperous circumstances, Job 15:25-27; notwithstanding all, their estates, riches, and wealth, will come to nothing, Job 15:28-30; and the chapter is closed with an exhortation to such, not to feed themselves up with vain hopes, or trust in uncertain riches, since their destruction would be sure, sudden, and terrible, Job 15:31-35.

Cross References 22

  • 1. S Job 4:1
  • 2. S Genesis 41:6; Job 6:26
  • 3. S Nehemiah 4:2-3; S Job 6:26
  • 4. Job 25:6
  • 5. Job 11:6; Job 22:5
  • 6. Proverbs 16:23
  • 7. S Job 5:13
  • 8. S Job 9:15; Job 18:7; Psalms 10:2; S Matthew 12:37; Luke 19:22
  • 9. Job 38:21
  • 10. S 1 Samuel 2:8; Psalms 90:2; Proverbs 8:25
  • 11. Job 29:4; Isaiah 9:6; Isaiah 40:13; Isaiah 41:28; Jeremiah 23:18; Romans 11:34; 1 Corinthians 2:11
  • 12. S Job 12:2
  • 13. S Job 12:3; Job 13:2
  • 14. S Job 12:12; Job 32:6-7
  • 15. S 2 Chronicles 10:6
  • 16. S Genesis 37:35; S Job 6:10; 2 Corinthians 1:3-4
  • 17. Zechariah 1:13
  • 18. S Deuteronomy 8:3; S Deuteronomy 32:39; S Job 5:17; Job 22:22; Job 23:12; Job 36:16; Psalms 119:11,72; Jeremiah 15:16
  • 19. Job 11:13; Job 36:13
  • 20. Proverbs 29:11; Daniel 11:30
  • 21. Psalms 94:4
  • 22. S Job 11:8; Job 22:5; Job 32:3
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