Job 6:1-30
1 But Job answered and said,
2 Oh that my grief were throughly weighed, and my calamity laida in the balances together!
3 For now it would be heavier than the sand of the sea: therefore my wordsb are swallowed up.
4 For the arrows of the Almighty are within me, the poison whereof drinketh up my spirit: the terrors of God do set themselves in array against me.
5 Doth the wild ass bray when he hath grass? or loweth the ox over his fodder?
6 Can that which is unsavoury be eaten without salt? or is there any taste in the white of an egg?
7 The things that my soul refused to touch are as my sorrowful meat.
8 Oh that I might have my request; and that God would grant me the thing that I long for!
9 Even that it would please God to destroy me; that he would let loose his hand, and cut me off!
10 Then should I yet have comfort; yea, I would harden myself in sorrow: let him not spare; for I have not concealed the words of the Holy One.
11 What is my strength, that I should hope? and what is mine end, that I should prolong my life?
12 Is my strength the strength of stones? or is my flesh of brass?
13 Is not my help in me? and is wisdom driven quite from me?
14 To him that is afflictedc pity should be shewed from his friend; but he forsaketh the fear of the Almighty.
15 My brethren have dealt deceitfully as a brook, and as the stream of brooks they pass away;
16 Which are blackish by reason of the ice, and wherein the snow is hid:
17 What time they wax warm, they vanish:d when it is hot, they are consumed out of their place.
18 The paths of their way are turned aside; they go to nothing, and perish.
19 The troops of Tema looked, the companies of Sheba waited for them.
20 They were confounded because they had hoped; they came thither, and were ashamed.
21 For now ye are nothing; ye see my casting down, and are afraid.
22 Did I say, Bring unto me? or, Give a reward for me of your substance?
23 Or, Deliver me from the enemy's hand? or, Redeem me from the hand of the mighty?
24 Teach me, and I will hold my tongue: and cause me to understand wherein I have erred.
25 How forcible are right words! but what doth your arguing reprove?
26 Do ye imagine to reprove words, and the speeches of one that is desperate, which are as wind?
27 Yea, ye overwhelme the fatherless, and ye dig a pit for your friend.
28 Now therefore be content, look upon me; for it is evident unto you if I lie.
29 Return, I pray you, let it not be iniquity; yea, return again, my righteousness is in it.f
30 Is there iniquity in my tongue? cannot my tasteg discern perverse things?
Job's answer is a magnificent and terrible outcry. First, he speaks of his pain as a protest against the method of Eliphaz. His reply is not to the deduction which Eliphaz' argument suggested, but rather to the charge it made, of unreasonableness and folly manifest in his lamentation. Eliphaz had used terms of strong condemnation. Job declared, in effect, that he did not understand the cry because he did not know the pain. His vexation and calamity should be set over against each other, poised in fair balances. If this were done, the calamity would be found to be so heavy as to excuse even the rashness of speech. The wail is always evidence of a want. The wild ass does not bray when he has grass, nor the ox low over his fodder. Having declared this, his sorrow seemed to surge on his soul anew, and he cried out for death because his strength was not equal to the strain thus placed upon him. His strength was not "the strength of stones," nor was his "flesh of brass."
Job then turned on his friends with reproaches of fine satire. He had expected kindness, but was disappointed. Here there would seem to be reference not merely to the attitude of Eliphaz, but to that attitude as a culminating cruelty. His eyes were wandering back to olden days, and he spoke of "my brethren," likening them to a brook in the desert to which the traveling caravans turned, only to find them consumed and passed. He declared that his friends were nothing. Reproach merged into a fierce demand that instead of generalization and allusion,
there should be definiteness in the charges they made against him. "What," says he, "doth your arguing reprove?" There is a majesty in this impatience with men who philosophize in the presence of agony, and it is impossible to read it without a consciousness of profound sympathy with the suffering man.