Comentario sobre Job 23:20

The Fifteenth Speech - Job’s Reply to Eliphaz’s Third Speech

Elphaz's new approach had offered separate solutions to each of the issues being discussed.

1. To the suffering of a righteous person. That he had not worshiped with sincerity, for the sake of God alone, but had had other considerations in mind, such as the hope of reward and fear of punishment. Therefore, God refines him with suffering (Psalms 105:19), in order to humble him; to test him out; ultimately to benefit him (Deuteronomy 8:16) in the world to come.

2. To the prosperity of the wicked. That it obtains so that human beings should have free-will, to do good or to refrain from so doing. For if punishment was immediate, people would be terrified of doing evil and so would have no choice. Moreover, worship would not then be for the sake of Heaven.

Job now presents a vigorous rebuttal of these propositions, dealing with each separately....

• Regarding the first, Job asks how God could possibly have afflicted him with such terrible suffering because, when he prayed, the improper thought that he might thereby attain some advantage might have passed through his mind? However, he had at all times kept the charge of His commandments and laws (Deuteronomy 11:1) and nothing he had done was so wrong that it justified such a severe punishment (Ch.23:6-7).
Moreover, if he could converse with God, who knows the truth, the fact that his worship had not been motivated by any extraneous considerations, but had been for the sake of God alone, would become clear. For though, during his devotions, the thought of how much he depended on God for the procurement of his needs and all his other concerns had sometimes entered his mind, momentarily, he would immediately take hold of himself and return to them, without expectation and just for His sake. And from this he proves that his righteousness had been apportioned and foreordained from the very first, by Paramount foreknowledge. And so he had received no reward for it, but had been left to the happenstance of the stars and to the suffering that the fortune of his nativity prescribed (Ch.23:10-17).

• As regards the second proposition, he dismisses Eliphaz's ideas about the prosperity of the wicked. He points to the existence of those evil-doers who destroy civilized society, disrupting the tranquillity of mankind, but whom God does not have it in mind (Job 4:18) to destroy in order to be rid of their evil, thus preventing them from devastating the world. For if there was Divine Governance, it would be proper for it to protect the general public from such scourges and destroyers of civilization. Furthermore, these wild-men live in remote deserts or on islands in the sea and it is from there they make sorties from time to time to plunder, to murder and to destroy many souls. And if God were to exterminate them in their hide-outs, no-one would know about it and so no damage would be done to the concept of worship or free-will. Therefore, they should be wiped out from under God’s heaven (Lamentations 3:66), by reason of the Divine Governance of man.

And so he returns to his original argument that God does not govern individuals and everything depends on the stars. He cries out bitterly against this (Genesis 27:34): Why was he not cut off by darkness (Job 23:17), his non-existence being preferable to his existence (Ch.26:16-17)?¹Since he considers himself to be blameless, Job does not see why he has to repent as suggested by Eliphaz. He wishes to approach God as he is. Eliphaz is convinced that the answer to Job's affliction is to be found in an understanding of the workings of Governance. In his opinion, Job is not a special case but just another person who is not quite as righteous as his own estimate of himself. But Job insists that he is a special case. He really is righteous and wants God to explain why he has been picked out for such harsh and undeserved treatment.

Job’s Reply
Even today after all these consolations.

my speech is bitter [The bitterness of my speech] remains in its place, for there is no consolation in your words.

my wound is heavier The wound of my plague is stronger than my sigh, for I do not complain and cry about my wound.

and I would find Him My Judge.

Job is convinced that if he could only contact God and communicate with Him, he would be exonerated. For he knows that God would be fair: He cannot be otherwise. And in all fairness, there is no way that Job deserves the suffering he is enduring

the place prepared for Him The place prepared for His throne.

case [i.e., my] argument.

I would know the words that He would answer me Even if He stops me from speaking before Him, perhaps He would speak with me and I would know the words He would answer me.

with much power of words and rebukes for His sins [other editions read: my sins] will He contend with me?

not...coercion smiting and coercion. He will not cast His coercion and His awe upon me. (It may also be interpreted:) Nothing but [this] will He cast on me, for He will not cast on me anything but the contest of the rebukes for my sins; [that,] but not false accusations.

There in the place of our contest.

integrity The propriety of my deeds will be proven, revealed, and it will appear with Him, i.e., before Him.

proven and there I will extricate [myself] forever because He will find no iniquity in me.

Behold...east it refers to the above (verse 3), “Would that I knew etc.”

Job complains that God is avoiding him though he had faithfully kept His commandments.²The Hebrew text has קדם - forward and אחור - backwards, but like the medieval commentators Rashi and Ibn Ezra, Malbim understands them, respectively, as east and west. Malbim adds:
The ancients imagined that the Divine Presence was in the west and that the host of the heavens all journeyed from east to west, on their way to giving homage before His Throne of Glory, which is situated there.

east as it is stated (Exod. 27: 13): “on the east side (קדמה), eastward.”

and to the west Heb. ואחור. Since the east is the front of the world (קדמה), the west is found to be the back of the world (אחור).

north Heb. שמאוֹל, lit. left.

When He made the north, He did not roof it over;³Malbim takes the word אחז as meaning to roof as it does in 1Kings 6:10.
but the south He covered, so I cannot see through it.⁴The Hebrew text has שמאול - left, and ימין - right. However, Malbim interprets them as referring, respectively, to north and south, thus completing the four points of the compass. Malbim adds that the ancients imagined the north as being open; that God had not completed Creation in this direction. This notion appears in Bamidbar Rabbah 2:19 and Pirkei de Rabbi Eliezer 3 where the reason He left the northern quarter unfinished was so that anyone who claims to be God could prove he was by completing it. Expanding on this theme, Malbim writes:
He had left this side [the north] uncovered, without ramparts and walls. Like someone who builds a house without cedar-beam supports and without enclosing it with wooden planks or walls. Taking up this metaphor, Job says that he cannot see God there even though that direction is wide open. However, though the north may have been left exposed, the southern side was enclosed. The upshot is that he cannot perceive God in any direction.
Malbim continues: Perception of God by reason of Himself is designated 'Frontal Perception.' No human being can perceive this or have any conception of it. Humans can only perceive Him from behind, namely, by virtue of the Creation that ensues from Him. That through His Creations we can appreciate the Creator; and through the effects, the Prime Cause. As is written: 'You will see My back, but My face shall not be seen.' (Exodus 33:23). Accordingly, Job states that looking east, i.e., looking for the truth of God's Self as He really is, He appears not to exist, for this view is hidden from human intelligence and so the Creator is never found there. He can only be detected from the reverse side, where His existence is manifest and can be perceived; yet He remains inscrutable, His ways being beyond human understanding. Now, in the Holy Texts [Scripture], governance of the world by Nature is designated 'Governance of the Left' and governance by means of wonders and miracles is designated 'Governance of the Right,' as is written everywhere. Accordingly, he [Job] states that if he investigates Nature's governance, he finds it to be an unroofed and unfinished structure, for there is no proper order to its governance, there being righteous persons who have a hard time of it and wicked ones who have it good. And if he looks right, i.e., towards His miraculous Governance, where governance is perfect, he sees nothing for all he is capable of perceiving is the natural governance ordained from the six days of Creation, that decreed by the stars - 'incoherent shadows of death'.

when He made it When He created it, He did not make the place of His throne there, that I should see it there.

see Heb. אחז, the Aramaic translation of אֶרְאֶה, I will see. Proof of this is that the accent is under the “aleph.” Now, if it were an expression of holding (אחיזה), the accent would be at the end of the word, under the “cheth.”

He wraps up the south He covers the face of the south before me in order that I should not see Him.

Because He knows the way that is with me therefore, He does not come to contend with me.

He has tested me that I will emerge like gold if He contends with me.

to His path Heb. באשרו, to His path, like (below 31:7), “If my foot (אשרי) has turned away from the road”; (Ps. 40:3), “He has established my paths (אשרי).”

and do not turn away I am not accustomed to turn away.

more than my daily bread I kept the words of His mouth More than my daily food I was eager to keep the words of His mouth. [The expression חקי] is like (Prov. 30:8), “my daily bread (לחם חקי),” my food.

But He Since He is One in the world and knows the knowledge and the thoughts of the creatures, and what they have to reply to Him, therefore replies are prepared before Him.

Job maintains that everything that has happened to him was preordained by reason of God’s foreknowledge. And since His Knowledge is immutable, whatever He foreknows must happen; there is no free-will. For the existence of free-will would require that God’s Knowledge change as man makes his choices or changes his mind. But that cannot be, for He is His Knowledge and He is beyond change.

and who will answer Him Therefore, what His soul desires, He does.

For He will complete my sentence I know that He will not draw back His hand until He completes the sentence of His decrees, the retribution that He has decreed against me.

As regards the integrity of his worship, Job protests that though the thought had sometimes entered his mind, momentarily, of just how much he depends on God for obtaining his needs, whenever this happened he would immediately take hold of himself and return to his prayers, minding them just for His sake and free of any special requests.

and there are many such things with Him For He did many such things.

Therefore Since He does not requite man according to his ways.

I am startled by Him and when I ponder His ways, I am frightened of Him.

And if I have now failed the test; and if, as a result of the suffering, I have turned away from worshipping God and from the fear of Him; and if it now appears that my worship was motivated by expectation of benefit, know that this is only because God has broken me. He left me alive to suffer instead of mercifully putting an end to me.⁵To illustrate the idea that extreme suffering may be worse than death itself, Malbim quotes from TB Ketuboth 33b: Whence do we know that the penalty of death is more severe? Perhaps punishment with lashes is more severe? As Rab said: If they had lashed Hananiah, Mishael and Azariah, they would have worshipped the golden image (Daniel 3).

Because I was not cut off from before the darkness Because of this I am startled; because I was not completely cut off and laid permanently in the grave before this darkness that has come upon me, and because He did not cover this thick darkness from before me until my death.

and [because He did not] cover the thick darkness from before me This refers back to “because not” at the beginning of the verse.