Job 21:7

Main division THE DIVINE ADMINISTRATION OF AWARDS IN THIS WORLD TENDS TO CONFOUND MORAL DISTINCTIONS, Job 21:7-26.

First half THE WICKED DEFY GOD, AND YET GOD PROSPERS THEM EVEN UNTO SHEOL, Job 21:7-16.

First strophe Instead of suffering punishment, as Zophar maintained, the wicked live, grow old surrounded by their families, and safe from the discipline of Heaven, Job 21:7-11.

7. Wherefore do the wicked live Zophar’s assertion (Job 20:5,) calls forth the counter thesis of this verse. The existence of evil is a mystery, among the first to perplex and the last to leave the mind. The question why the wicked live is but one of its phases, and is of personal interest, for it concerns ourselves. The question does not so often assume the form why we should live, as why others should, whom we suppose to be much more depraved than ourselves. Its solution is much simplified if we confine the thought to ourselves, for extreme wickedness is but the outgrowth of a nature that we share in common with the wicked. In such case of reflection upon ourselves and others there will readily be suggested: 1. The possibilities for good in all moral existence; 2. That the freedom of the will devolves upon the human agent the responsibility of perverted life; and, 3. Perfection of being can seemingly be secured only amid the most adverse influences of trial, for Christ himself was made “perfect through suffering,” one large element of which was meted out at the hand of the wicked. Science resolves its nebulae; but this cloud of mystery defies all resolution, and may continue so to do forever. Goethe has said profoundly, “Man is not born to solve the mystery of existence, but he must nevertheless attempt it, that he may learn to keep within the limits of the knowable.” For Plutarch’s views on the protracted life of the wicked, see Meth. Quar. Revelation, 1852, pp. 399-401; or Bib. Sacra, 1856, pp. 616-619.