Job 22:1

The third stage of the controversy.

Chaps. 22-26.

THIRD ADDRESS OF ELIPHAZ.

1. Then Eliphaz… answered God is all-sufficient, and if he punish, it is not for his own profit, much less for the sake of human piety, but on account of the sins of men. It is therefore plain that an infinite sufferer must have been an infinite sinner, (2-5.) Job’s exaggerated description of the prosperity of the wicked seems to Eliphaz a denial of Divine Providence.

He now proceeds to refute Job by indirectly arguing the doctrine of such Providence, and carries the war into Africa by an assault upon Job himself. He charges upon him the guilt of oppression and cruelty to the weak and defenceless. Under his emirship might and violence prospered. Moreover, he was a sceptic, well skilled to make “the worse appear the better reason,” (12-15.) That Job should suffer was due to sins such as these, and demonstrated that the wicked are punished in this life. The antediluvians lived just such lives as those of the happy wicked, and their foundation of bliss and security was poured forth like a stream. The triumphant song of the survivors furnishes a text from which Eliphaz confidently urges Job to return to God, with the assurance of returning prosperity, which will manifest itself not so much in worldly good as in joy in God, the consciousness of spiritual uprightness, and the bliss of doing good to others.