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Job 1 - Nisbet James - Church Pulpit Commentary

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Job 1

1 There was a man in the land of Uz, whose name was Job; and that man was perfect and upright, and one that feared God, and eschewed evil.

2 And there were born unto him seven sons and three daughters.

3 His substance also was seven thousand sheep, and three thousand camels, and five hundred yoke of oxen, and five hundred she asses, and a very great household; so that this man was the greatest of all the men of the east.

4 And his sons went and feasted in their houses, every one his day; and sent and called for their three sisters to eat and to drink with them.

5 And it was so, when the days of their feasting were gone about, that Job sent and sanctified them, and rose up early in the morning, and offered burnt offerings according to the number of them all: for Job said, It may be that my sons have sinned, and cursed God in their hearts. Thus did Job continually.

Job's Character

6 Now there was a day when the sons of God came to present themselves before the LORD, and Satan came also among them.

7 And the LORD said unto Satan, Whence comest thou? Then Satan answered the LORD, and said, From going to and fro in the earth, and from walking up and down in it.

8 And the LORD said unto Satan, Hast thou considered my servant Job, that there is none like him in the earth, a perfect and an upright man, one that feareth God, and escheweth evil?

9 Then Satan answered the LORD, and said, Doth Job fear God for nought?

10 Hast not thou made an hedge about him, and about his house, and about all that he hath on every side? thou hast blessed the work of his hands, and his substance is increased in the land.

11 But put forth thine hand now, and touch all that he hath, and he will curse thee to thy face.

12 And the LORD said unto Satan, Behold, all that he hath is in thy power; only upon himself put not forth thine hand. So Satan went forth from the presence of the LORD.

His Afflictions

13 And there was a day when his sons and his daughters were eating and drinking wine in their eldest brother's house:

14 and there came a messenger unto Job, and said, The oxen were plowing, and the asses feeding beside them:

15 and the Sabeans fell upon them, and took them away; yea, they have slain the servants with the edge of the sword; and I only am escaped alone to tell thee.

16 While he was yet speaking, there came also another, and said, The fire of God is fallen from heaven, and hath burned up the sheep, and the servants, and consumed them; and I only am escaped alone to tell thee.

17 While he was yet speaking, there came also another, and said, The Chaldeans made out three bands, and fell upon the camels, and have carried them away, yea, and slain the servants with the edge of the sword; and I only am escaped alone to tell thee.

18 While he was yet speaking, there came also another, and said, Thy sons and thy daughters were eating and drinking wine in their eldest brother's house:

19 and, behold, there came a great wind from the wilderness, and smote the four corners of the house, and it fell upon the young men, and they are dead; and I only am escaped alone to tell thee.

20 Then Job arose, and rent his mantle, and shaved his head, and fell down upon the ground, and worshipped,

21 and said, Naked came I out of my mother's womb, and naked shall I return thither: the LORD gave, and the LORD hath taken away; blessed be the name of the LORD.

22 In all this Job sinned not, nor charged God foolishly.

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Job 1

THE BOOK OF JOB

‘A man in the land of Uz, whose name was Job.’

Job 1:1 The authorship and date of the book of Job are problems yet unsolved. This only is certain, that it presents a picture of a very early civilisation. It is not Jewish. Its teaching is unlocalised, and is of all time, because it seems to be of no special time.

I. Hence it is that portions of this ancient book sound to us so strangely modern: and the first verse of the book is one in point. It is a height of spirituality for which we are not prepared in a civilisation so remote. There is a ring of enthusiasm in the words, the spirit of a mind possessed with the reality of a Divine world above and beyond this.

II. The moral of the book of Job is that there are lessons in suffering or loss as true and precious as those which are learnt from regarding it as punishment, and this truth is one which we are still far from having mastered.—In the problem presented here to Job was the dawn of that light which burst in all its fulness upon mankind in the Son of God. We have here a true foreshadowing of the Man of Sorrows, and acquainted with grief, of Him Who was made perfect by sufferings, not because of the Father’s hate, but because of His great love.

III. The instinct of sonship which was so strong in Job we, blessed with the great heritage of Christianity, are often slow to attain to.—For, however much the reason is convinced that suffering and sacrifice are necessary ministers of the kingdom of heaven, we, each for himself, have to make it our own by another path.

—Canon Ainger

Illustration

‘Apart from all theories about its origin, “It is,” says Carlyle, “one of the grandest things ever written with pen. One feels, indeed, as if it were not Hebrew; such a noble universality, different from noble patriotism or sectarianism, reigns in it. A noble book—all men’s book.” For Tennyson it was “the greatest poem, whether of ancient or modern times,” and Luther deemed it “magnificent and sublime as no other book of Scripture.” “It,” says Froude, “hovers like a meteor over the old Hebrew literature.” It has been likened to Dante’s Divine Comedy. No doubt its scope is as great. It spans heaven and earth. Again, it has been compared with Goethe’s Faust. Faust has his Satan, his Mephistopheles, his temptation, his question, and his fall. But there is a difference. Faust has his problem, his greed of knowledge. And the tempter comes and weans him from the love of knowledge to the lust of flesh. But in Job Satan moves, as it were, on another plane. He does not corrupt man through lust; he threatens him through disaster and suffering. It is not for knowledge Job pants; it is for God Himself, Who only can give his restless soul rest.




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Rights in the Authorized (King James) Version in the United Kingdom are vested in the Crown. Published by permission of the Crown’s patentee, Cambridge University Press.
Cambridge Univ. Press & BFBS
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