Job 31:1-40
1 I made a covenant with mine eyes; why then should I think upon a maid?
2 For what portion of God is there from above? and what inheritance of the Almighty from on high?
3 Is not destruction to the wicked? and a strange punishment to the workers of iniquity?
4 Doth not he see my ways, and count all my steps?
5 If I have walked with vanity, or if my foot hath hasted to deceit;
6 Let me be weighed in an even balance, that God may know mine integrity.
7 If my step hath turned out of the way, and mine heart walked after mine eyes, and if any blot hath cleaved to mine hands;
8 Then let me sow, and let another eat; yea, let my offspring be rooted out.
9 If mine heart have been deceived by a woman, or if I have laid wait at my neighbour's door;
10 Then let my wife grind unto another, and let others bow down upon her.
11 For this is an heinous crime; yea, it is an iniquity to be punished by the judges.
12 For it is a fire that consumeth to destruction, and would root out all mine increase.
13 If I did despise the cause of my manservant or of my maidservant, when they contended with me;
14 What then shall I do when God riseth up? and when he visiteth, what shall I answer him?
15 Did not he that made me in the womb make him? and did not onea fashion us in the womb?
16 If I have withheld the poor from their desire, or have caused the eyes of the widow to fail;
17 Or have eaten my morsel myself alone, and the fatherless hath not eaten thereof;
18 (For from my youth he was brought up with me, as with a father, and I have guided her from my mother's womb;)
19 If I have seen any perish for want of clothing, or any poor without covering;
20 If his loins have not blessed me, and if he were not warmed with the fleece of my sheep;
21 If I have lifted up my hand against the fatherless, when I saw my help in the gate:
22 Then let mine arm fall from my shoulder blade, and mine arm be broken from the bone.b
23 For destruction from God was a terror to me, and by reason of his highness I could not endure.
24 If I have made gold my hope, or have said to the fine gold, Thou art my confidence;
25 If I rejoiced because my wealth was great, and because mine hand had gottenc much;
26 If I beheld the sund when it shined, or the moon walking in brightness;
27 And my heart hath been secretly enticed, or my mouthe hath kissed my hand:
28 This also were an iniquity to be punished by the judge: for I should have denied the God that is above.
29 If I rejoiced at the destruction of him that hated me, or lifted up myself when evil found him:
30 Neither have I suffered my mouthf to sin by wishing a curse to his soul.
31 If the men of my tabernacle said not, Oh that we had of his flesh! we cannot be satisfied.
32 The stranger did not lodge in the street: but I opened my doors to the traveller.g
33 If I covered my transgressions as Adam,h by hiding mine iniquity in my bosom:
34 Did I fear a great multitude, or did the contempt of families terrify me, that I kept silence, and went not out of the door?
35 Oh that one would hear me! behold, my desire is, that the Almighty would answer me, and that mine adversary had written a book.
36 Surely I would take it upon my shoulder, and bind it as a crown to me.
37 I would declare unto him the number of my steps; as a prince would I go near unto him.
38 If my land cry against me, or that the furrows likewise thereof complain;i
39 If I have eaten the fruitsj thereof without money, or have caused the owners thereof to lose their life:
40 Let thistles grow instead of wheat, and cocklek instead of barley. The words of Job are ended.
Job 31:1. A maid. The LXX, followed by the Chaldaic, read virgin; but our English version has the most ancient support. Job was pure and spotless in conversation with women. He abhorred seduction, and all its associate crimes. Genesis 34.
Job 31:28. I should have denied the God that is above. Job here describes the manner in which the ancient Sabian idolaters worshipped the sun, moon, and stars, by kissing the hand; and his abhorrence of it shows that he was himself educated in the faith of Abraham. A French traveller in Louisiana describes the manner in which the Indians on certain mornings go to the top of a hill to see the rising sun, and blow towards him a full quiff of tobacco. The names of the planets are confirmations of this idolatry; and if ascribing the omnipresence of the Deity to an idol be the very essence of idolatry, let that idol be what it may; what a condition must the poor papists be in, who everywhere pray to the Virgin Mary, as though she was more merciful than her Son!
Job 31:30. Neither have I suffered my mouth to sin. Hebrews “I have not permitted my palace [or household] to sin, in wishing his death with a curse.”
Job 31:33. As Adam; a name in Hebrew common for man. It is the moderns only who translate it as the name of our first father. The LXX read, If when I offended inadvertently, I had concealed my sin. Jerome reads, concealed it after the manner of men. The readings in ancient versions make no reference to Adam. He hid himself, not his sin. The wide variations of the versions, mark obscurity in the original, through the latter part of this chapter.
REFLECTIONS.
Job, still continuing his defence against the sharp and pointed words of his friends, avers that his life, which in the patriarchal age was one of great licence, had been clothed with the glory of chastity; that he stood clear of seduction, and of the great sin of waiting at his neighbour's door.
Job regards the punishment of those crimes as only capable of partial remission, even where repentance may follow. If those sins be mine, let me sow, and let another reap. Yea, let me die, and let my widow grind as a servant at the mill, and let another bow down to her; for adultery is a heinous crime.
The chaste and holy patriarch rises next, above all the lower clouds of darkness and obloquy: his charities were wider than the wants of indigence. He had not eaten his morsel alone; the hungry had been fed by his bounty, the naked had been clothed with the wool of his flocks, and the stranger lodged in his bourne.
He had not, like the blind and griping sons of earth, made gold his hope; nor joined the sabian idolatry, in raising his hand to the hosts of heaven.
Inspired of God with a noble mind, he had never rejoiced when his neighbour fell into poverty and ruin; that would to him be unhallowed joy; he would rather rejoice in all the fruits of grace which adorned his character, as the husbandman rejoices over his laughing field. Such was the triumph, and such the joy of holy Job. Oh believer, may this also be thy happy lot in the time of affliction.