Job 2:11

Now when Job's three friends heard of all this evil that was come upon him,.... Of the loss of his substance, servants, and children, and of his own health; the news of which soon spread in the adjacent countries, Job being a person of great note, and his calamity so very extraordinary and uncommon: who these three friends were is after observed; they living at some distance from him, held a correspondence with him, and he with them, being good men; and now act the friendly part in paying him a visit under such circumstances;

Proverbs 17:17;

they came everyone from his own place; from the country, city, town, or habitations where they lived; whether they walked or rode is not said, their names are as follow:

Eliphaz the Temanite, and Bildad the Shuhite, and Zophar the Naamathite; the first of these, Eliphaz, was either from Teman, a city in Edom, on the borders of Arabia Deserta, as the Targum; or a descendant of Teman, a grandson of Esau; not Eliphaz the son of Esau,

Genesis 36:11 as the Targum on that place says; for he was the father of Teman, from whom this Eliphaz sprang: the second, Bildad, was a descendant from Shuah, a son of Abraham, by Keturah, Genesis 25:2; whose posterity with geographers are called Sauchites, Sauchaeans, Sacceans, and settled in Arabia Deserta, from whence Bildad came: the third, Zophar the Naamathite, who he was, and why so called, is not certain; there is nothing but conjectures concerning him; it is most probable that he lived in Arabia Deserta, or on the borders of it, near to Job's country and that of his other two friends n; there was a Naamath in the land of Uz, which was Job's country according to Fretelius o: the Septuagint version calls Eliphaz the king of the Temanites, and Bildad the tyrannus, or governor, of the Sauchaens, and Zophar king of the Minaeans p:

for they had made an appointment together; upon hearing of Job's trouble, they got together, and fixed upon a time and place to meet together and proceed on in their journey to Job's house:

to come to mourn with him, and to comfort him; the first word signifies to "move to him" q not as Sephorno explains it, to go with him from place to place, that he might not lay hands on himself; but rather, as the Latin interpreter of the Targum, to move their heads at him; as persons, to show their concern for, and sympathy with, the afflicted, shake their heads at them: the meaning is, that they came to condole his misfortunes, and to speak a word of comfort to him under them; and no doubt but they came with a real and sincere intent to do this, though they proved miserable comforters of him; Job 16:2.

n Vid. Spanhem. Hist. Jobi, c. 11. sect. 3. c. o Apud Adrichom. Theatrum. T. S. p. 21. p So Aristeas, Philo and Polyhistor apud Euseb. Praepar. Evangel. l. 9. c. 25. p. 431. q לנוד לו "verbum" נוד "migrare, et sese movere significat", Mercerus, so Ben Melech.