Neither have I gone back from the commandment of his
lips,
&c.] From any of the commandments his lips had uttered;
meaning not the ten commandments given to Israel, which perhaps
as yet were not given, or had not come to the knowledge of Job;
some speak of the seven commandments, given to the sons of Noah;
(See Gill on Genesis
9:4). It seems to design any and every commandment that
God had given to Noah or Abraham, or any of the patriarchs,
before the times of Job, and which he had knowledge of, and which
he carefully observed, kept close to, and did not deviate from;
but made it the rule of his walk and practice:
I have esteemed the words of his mouth more than my
necessary [food];
the words of the Lord, the doctrines of grace that came from his
mouth, are food for faith; there are in them milk for babes, and
meat for strong men; they are savoury, salutary, and wholesome
words, by which the people of God are nourished up unto eternal
life; and they are esteemed by them more than the food that is
necessary and convenient for their bodies; see ( Proverbs
30:8 ) ; for as the soul is preferable to the body, so the
food of the one is preferable to the food of the other, and is
sweeter, as the words of God are, to the taste of a believer,
than honey, or the honeycomb: or "I have hid or laid up, the
words of his mouth" F2; he had laid them up in his heart,
in order to meditate upon them, and receive comfort and spiritual
nourishment from them when he should want it, as men lay up their
food in a proper place against the time they want it for their
support and refreshment; and Job was more careful to lay up the
one than the other; see ( Psalms
119:11 ) ; here Job meets with, and has respect unto, the
advice of Eliphaz, ( Job 22:22 ) ; and
signifies that he had no need to have given him it, he had done
this already.