Will Anyone Teach God Knowledge?

Continuing a Bible study of Job, now Job speaks again:

(Job 21:1) But Job answered and said, (2) "Listen carefully to my speech, and let this be your consolation."

If his friends will just listen carefully to Job, in that way they can comfort and console him, because they surely have not done it with their own words.

(3) "Bear with me that I may speak, and after I have spoken, keep mocking. (4) As for me, is my complaint to man? And if it were, why shouldn't my spirit be troubled?"

The early commentaries show two different schools of thought on the meaning of verse 4. One, paraphrased, is: "Isn't my complaint to man? And if it is, why then may I not have the privilege of complaining to creatures like myself?" I think knowing what I have learned about Job thus far, I tend to agree with other commentators who believe something like the following. It's more of a facetious question, "Is my complaint to you?" And if it were to man only, then why wouldn't his spirit be troubled? But Job takes his grievances to a much higher power, and it is God's answer he seeks.

(5) "Look at me and be astonished; and lay your hand upon your mouth. (6) Even when I remember I am afraid, and trembling takes hold of my flesh."

Merely the remembrance of what has happened to him, fills Job with fear.

(7) "Why do the wicked live and become old, yes, are mighty in power? (8) Their descendants are established with them in their sight, and their offspring before their eyes. (9) Their houses are safe from fear; neither is the rod of God upon them. (10) Their bull breeds and does not fail; their cow calves and does not lose her calf. (11) They send forth their little ones like a flock, and their children dance. (12) They take the timbrel and harp, and rejoice at the sound of the organ. (13) They spend their days in wealth, and in a moment go down to the grave."

I believe Job means this last statement to be a good thing. It's not so much that they are suddenly taken away from their good life, but when that happens, they do not have a long and suffering death. After all, all men will eventually die.

(14) "Therefore they say to God, 'Depart from us, for we do not desire the knowledge of Your ways. (15) Who is the Almighty, that we should serve Him? And what profit do we have if we pray to Him?'"

Because of their prosperity, they don't believe they need God. What more profit could they have if they prayed to Him?

I can't help but feel a pang of emotion with this thought. I have found myself a little sad lately because of the state of our country. We are truly becoming a country that thinks she does not need God. We have always been a blessed country, the richest country, and the envy of the world. But now people want no part of God or religion in the public square. They want to do as they please and have their actions accepted and promoted to "rights", even those things which are abominations to our Lord. The poorest among us are among the richest in the world. Because of our prosperity, have we come to think we don't need God? Or is it we just don't want Him? God may get in the way of many of the "rights" to which many people want to cling.

It occurs to me what a blessing it may be from the merciful God when times are tough and we do have to rely on our heavenly Father. How easy it is for the rich to forget Him, but the poor desperately need Him. How sad that the rich don't realize how much they need Him, too.

(16) "Lo, their goodness is not in their hands; the counsel of the wicked is far from me."

Job makes a distinction between the wicked and himself.

(17) "How often is the lamp of the wicked put out? And how often comes their destruction on them? God distributes sorrows in His anger."

In asking these questions, I believe Job may be reinforcing his statement that often the wicked prosper. He is implying that it is not a universal fact that the wicked are always brought to ruin. Therefore, his friends are wrong in their assumption that the wicked are always snuffed out, and it follows that they are also wrong in their assumption that afflictions only come upon the wicked. I believe the last part of the passage above may be a continuation of the question, and asks, "How often does God distribute sorrows in his anger?" How often did God, in fact, give the wicked what they deserved? It was not true that He always did it in this world, so to make it a certain rule in judging character was erroneous.

(18) "They are as stubble before the wind, and as chaff that the storm carries away."

It is difficult to know exactly when Job stops asking questions and starts making statements, but at this point, I believe Job is continuing his pondering about how often the wicked actually get what they deserve in this lifetime. Maybe he is exclaiming it as a fact maintained by his friends, but he seeks to poke holes in that theory.

(19) "God lays up his iniquity for his children; He rewards him, and he will know it."

Once again, Job may be stating a fact maintained by his friends, or it could be his own statement used to poke holes in their theory that affliction only comes to the wicked. God visits the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, according to His word in Exodus 20:5; therefore Job may be describing a way in which his friends would err if they insisted that calamities only happen to the wicked. The word translated as "rewards" more completely means completes or finishes and reciprocates, so I believe the sense is that there will be a final just recompense of reward for their wicked ways. At that point, the wicked man will know the penalty for rejecting God, but it will be too late.

(20) "His eyes will see his destruction, and he shall drink of the wrath of the Almighty. (21) For what pleasure has he in his house after him, when the number of his months is cut off in the midst?"

These two verses could almost be a contradiction, but maybe that is Job's point. On the one hand, according to his friends, a wicked man's eyes will see his destruction, but then again he will know nothing of his household after he is cut off. Maybe Job's point is to show that it is not always as clear-cut as his friends seem to want to make it.

(22) "Shall anyone teach God knowledge, seeing He judges those that are high?"

I think Job is saying in essence that you can't put God in a box with the set of rules that his friends have tried to give Him, that He must not afflict righteous men and prosper the wicked, that He must always punish the wicked and reward the righteous in this world. Job realizes God is a sovereign God who judges beings and matters higher than the men who pretend to know His actions and motives with certainty.

(23) "One dies in his full strength, being wholly at ease and quiet. (24) His breasts are full of milk, and his bones are moistened with marrow. (25) And another dies in the bitterness of his soul, and never eats with pleasure. (26) They will lie down alike in the dust, and the worms will cover them."

These scriptures are pretty self-explanatory. Job describes the inequality of health and fortunes with which different people die; they all die alike and return to the dust, and no man can know with certainty the state of their eternal souls.

(27) "Behold, I know your thoughts, and the devices which you wrongfully imagine against me. (28) For you say, 'Where is the house of the prince? And where are the dwelling places of the wicked?'"

Paraphrased, "I know what you are thinking; you ask 'Where are the houses of the tyrants and oppressors?', to try to prove your point that God destroys them."

(29) "Have you not asked those who go by the road? And do you not know their signs? (30) That the wicked is reserved to the day of destruction? They shall be brought forth to the day of wrath."

Paraphrased, "But consult those who have traveled and seen more than you have, and they will tell you that there are some examples of wicked who have prospered in this life, but who will be judged in the end at the day of judgment."

(31) "Who shall declare his way to his face? And who shall repay him for what he has done?"

That is, who shall rise up and openly charge the wicked with his guilt? Who is able to make him pay for what he has done in this life?

(32) "Yet he will be brought to the grave, and will remain in the tomb. (33) The clods of the valley will be sweet to him; and every man will follow him, as have innumerable before him. (34) How then can you comfort me in vain, seeing there remains falsehood in your answers?"

Even though no one on this earth may be able to make the wicked pay for his deeds, he will be brought to death, like every other man, before and after him. When he is dead and buried, wherever he is buried is a sweet resting place to him, even the "clods" of the valley.

Job concludes by asking how his friends think they can comfort him with their empty words that hold no truth.