Job 19

1 Then Job replied [to his friends],

2 "How long will you torment me and depress me with words?

3 You have insulted me ten times now. You're not even ashamed of mistreating me.

4 Even if it were true that I've made a mistake without realizing it, my mistake would affect only me.

5 If you are trying to make yourselves look better than me by using my disgrace as an argument against me,

6 then I want you to know that God has wronged me and surrounded me with his net.

7 Indeed, I cry, 'Help! I'm being attacked!' but I get no response. I call for help, but there is no justice.

8 "God has blocked my path so that I can't go on. He has made my paths dark.

9 He has stripped me of my honor. He has taken the crown off my head.

10 He beats me down on every side until I'm gone. He uproots my hope like a tree.

11 He is very angry at me. He considers me to be his enemy.

12 His troops assemble against me. They build a ramp to attack me and camp around my tent.

13 "My brothers stay far away from me. My friends are complete strangers to me.

14 My relatives and my closest friends have stopped coming. My house guests have forgotten me.

15 My female slaves consider me to be a stranger. I am like a foreigner to them.

16 I call my slave, but he doesn't answer, though I beg him.

17 My breath offends my wife. I stink to my own children.

18 Even young children despise me. If I stand up, they make fun of me.

19 All my closest friends are disgusted with me. Those I love have turned against me.

20 I am skin and bones, and I have escaped only by the skin of my teeth.

21 "Have pity on me, my friends! Have pity on me because God's hand has struck me down.

22 Why do you pursue me as God does? Why are you never satisfied with my flesh?

23 "I wish now my words were written. I wish they were inscribed on a scroll.

24 I wish they were forever engraved on a rock with an iron stylus and lead.

25 But I know that my defender lives, and afterwards, he will rise on the earth.

26 Even after my skin has been stripped off my body, I will see God in my own flesh.

27 I will see him with my own eyes, not with someone else's. My heart fails inside me!

28 "You say, 'We will persecute him! The root of the problem is found in him.'

29 Fear death, because [your anger] is punishable by death. Then you will know there is a judge."

Job 19 Commentary

Chapter 19

Job complains of unkind usage. (1-7) God was the Author of his afflictions. (8-22) Job's belief in the resurrection. (23-29)

Verses 1-7 Job's friends blamed him as a wicked man, because he was so afflicted; here he describes their unkindness, showing that what they condemned was capable of excuse. Harsh language from friends, greatly adds to the weight of afflictions: yet it is best not to lay it to heart, lest we harbour resentment. Rather let us look to Him who endured the contradiction of sinners against himself, and was treated with far more cruelty than Job was, or we can be.

Verses 8-22 How doleful are Job's complaints! What is the fire of hell but the wrath of God! Seared consciences will feel it hereafter, but do not fear it now: enlightened consciences fear it now, but shall not feel it hereafter. It is a very common mistake to think that those whom God afflicts he treats as his enemies. Every creature is that to us which God makes it to be; yet this does not excuse Job's relations and friends. How uncertain is the friendship of men! but if God be our Friend, he will not fail us in time of need. What little reason we have to indulge the body, which, after all our care, is consumed by diseases it has in itself. Job recommends himself to the compassion of his friends, and justly blames their harshness. It is very distressing to one who loves God, to be bereaved at once of outward comfort and of inward consolation; yet if this, and more, come upon a believer, it does not weaken the proof of his being a child of God and heir of glory.

Verses 23-29 The Spirit of God, at this time, seems to have powerfully wrought on the mind of Job. Here he witnessed a good confession; declared the soundness of his faith, and the assurance of his hope. Here is much of Christ and heaven; and he that said such things are these, declared plainly that he sought the better country, that is, the heavenly. Job was taught of God to believe in a living Redeemer; to look for the resurrection of the dead, and the life of the world to come; he comforted himself with the expectation of these. Job was assured, that this Redeemer of sinners from the yoke of Satan and the condemnation of sin, was his Redeemer, and expected salvation through him; and that he was a living Redeemer, though not yet come in the flesh; and that at the last day he would appear as the Judge of the world, to raise the dead, and complete the redemption of his people. With what pleasure holy Job enlarges upon this! May these faithful sayings be engraved by the Holy Spirit upon our hearts. We are all concerned to see that the root of the matter be in us. A living, quickening, commanding principle of grace in the heart, is the root of the matter; as necessary to our religion as the root of the tree, to which it owes both its fixedness and its fruitfulness. Job and his friends differed concerning the methods of Providence, but they agreed in the root of the matter, the belief of another world.

Chapter Summary

INTRODUCTION TO JOB 19

This chapter contains Job's reply to Bildad's second speech, in which he complains of the ill usage of his friends, of their continuing to vex him, and to beat, and bruise, and break him in pieces with their hard words, and to reproach him, and carry it strange to him, Job 19:1-3; which he thought was very cruel, since, if he was mistaken, the mistake lay with himself, Job 19:4; and if they were determined to go on at this rate, he would have them observe, that his afflictions were of God, and therefore should take care to what they imputed them, since he could not get the reasons of them, or his cause to be heard, though he vehemently and importunately sought it, Job 19:5-7; and then gives an enumeration of the several particulars of his distress, all which he ascribes to God, Job 19:8-12; and he enlarges upon that part of his unhappy case, respecting the alienation of his nearest relations, most intimate acquaintance and friends, from him, and their contempt of him, and the like treatment he met with from his servants, and even young children, Job 19:13-19; all which, with other troubles, had such an effect upon him as to reduce him to a mere skeleton, and which he mentions to move the pity of these his friends, now conversing with him, Job 19:20-22; and yet after all, and in the midst of it, and which was his great support under his trials, he expresses his strong faith in his living Redeemer, who should appear on the earth in the latter day, and be his Saviour, and in the resurrection of the dead through him, which he believed he should share in, and in all the happiness consequent on it; and he wishes this confession of his faith might be written and engraven, and be preserved on a rock for ever for the good of posterity, Job 19:23-27; and closes the chapter with an expostulation with his friends, dissuading them from persecuting him any longer, since there was no reason for it in himself, and it might be attended with bad consequences to them, Job 19:28,29.