---
title: "Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible -  Job 13"
description: "CHAPTER 13   :-. JOB"
image: "/images/missing.jpg"
url: "https://realbiblebelievers.com/commentaries/commentary-critical-and-explanatory-on-the-whole-bible/job/13"
---

CHAPTER 13

. JOB'S REPLY
TO ZOPHAR
CONTINUED.

**1. all this**—as to the dealings
of Providence ([Job 12:3](../../../kjv/job/12/3)).

**3.** Job wishes to plead his cause
before God ([Job 9:34](../../../kjv/job/9/34); [Job 9:35](../../../kjv/job/9/35)),
as he is more and more convinced of the valueless character of his
would-be "physicians" ([Job 9:35](../../../kjv/job/9/35)).

**4. forgers of lies**—literally,
"artful twisters of vain speeches" [UMBREIT].

**5.** (). The Arabs say, "The wise are dumb; silence is
wisdom."

**7. deceitfully**—use fallacies
to vindicate God in His dealings; as if the end justified the means.
Their "deceitfulness" for God, against Job, was that they
asserted he was a sinner, because he was a sufferer.

**8. accept his person**—God's;
that is, be partial for Him, as when a judge favors one party in a
trial, because of personal considerations.
**contend for God**—namely,
with fallacies and prepossessions against Job before judgment (). Partiality can never please the impartial God, nor the
goodness of the cause excuse the unfairness of the arguments.

**9.** Will the issue to you be
good, when He searches out you and your arguments? Will you be
regarded by Him as pure and disinterested?
**mock**— (). Rather, "Can you deceive Him as one man?" &c.

**10.** If ye do, though secretly,
act partially. (See on [Job 13:1](../../../kjv/job/13/1);
[Job 13:1](../../../kjv/job/13/1)). God can successfully
vindicate His acts, and needs no fallacious argument of man.

**11. make you afraid?**—namely,
of employing sophisms in His name ([Jeremiah 10:7](../../../kjv/jeremiah/10/7);
[Jeremiah 10:10](../../../kjv/jeremiah/10/10)).

**12. remembrances**—"proverbial
maxims," so called because well remembered.
**like unto ashes**—or,
"parables of ashes"; the image of lightness and nothingness
([Isaiah 44:20](../../../kjv/isaiah/44/20)).
**bodies**—rather,
"entrenchments"; those of clay, as opposed to those of
stone, are easy to be destroyed; so the proverbs, behind which they
entrench themselves, will not shelter them when God shall appear to
reprove them for their injustice to Job.

**13.** Job would wish to be spared
their speeches, so as to speak out all his mind as to his
wretchedness ([Job 13:14](../../../kjv/job/13/14)),
happen what will.

**14.** A proverb for, "Why
should I anxiously desire to save my life?" [EICHORN].
The image in the first clause is that of a wild beast, which in order
to preserve his prey, carries it in his teeth. That in the second
refers to men who hold in the hand what they want to keep secure.

**15. in him**—So the *margin*
or *keri,* reads. But the textual reading or *chetib* is
"not," which agrees best with the context, and other
passages wherein he says he has no hope ([Job 6:11](../../../kjv/job/6/11);
[Job 7:21](../../../kjv/job/7/21); [Job 10:20](../../../kjv/job/10/20);
[Job 19:10](../../../kjv/job/19/10)). "Though He slay
me, and I dare no more hope, yet I will maintain," &c., that
is, "I desire to vindicate myself before Him," as not a
hypocrite [UMBREIT and
NOYES].

**16. He**—rather, "*This*
also already speaks in my behalf (literally, 'for my saving
acquittal') for an hypocrite would not wish to come before Him"
(as I do) [UMBREIT]. (See
last clause of [Job 13:15](../../../kjv/job/13/15)).

**17. my declaration**—namely,
that I wish to be permitted to justify myself immediately before God.
**with your ears**—that is,
attentively.

**18. ordered**—implying a
constant preparation for defense in his confidence of innocence.

**19. if,** c.—Rather, "*Then*
would I hold my tongue and give up the ghost" that is, if any
one can contend with me and prove me false, I have no more to say. "I
will be silent and die." Like our "I would stake my life on
it" [UMBREIT].

**20.** Address to God.
**not hide**—stand forth
boldly to maintain my cause.

**21.** (See on and see [Psalms 39:10](../../../kjv/psalms/39/10)).

**22. call**—a challenge to the
defendant to answer to the charges.
**answer**—the defense
begun.
**speak**—as plaintiff.
**answer**—to the plea of
the plaintiff. Expressions from a trial.

**23.** The catalogue of my sins
ought to be great, to judge from the severity with which God ever
anew crushes one already bowed down. Would that He would reckon them
up! He then would see how much my calamities outnumber them.
**sin?**—singular, "I
am unconscious of a *single* particular sin, much less many"
[UMBREIT].

**24. hidest . . . face**—a figure
from the gloomy impression caused by the sudden clouding over of the
sun.
**enemy**—God treated Job
as an enemy who must be robbed of power by ceaseless sufferings
([Job 7:17](../../../kjv/job/7/17); [Job 7:21](../../../kjv/job/7/21)).

**25.** ([Leviticus 26:36](../../../kjv/leviticus/26/36);
[Psalms 1:4](../../../kjv/psalms/1/4)). Job compares himself to
a leaf already fallen, which the storm still chases hither and
thither.
**break**—literally, "shake
with (Thy) terrors." Jesus Christ does not "break the
bruised reed" ([Isaiah 42:3](../../../kjv/isaiah/42/3);
[Isaiah 27:8](../../../kjv/isaiah/27/8)).

**26. writest**—a judicial phrase,
to note down the determined punishment. The sentence of the condemned
used to be *written down* ([Isaiah 10:1](../../../kjv/isaiah/10/1);
[Jeremiah 22:30](../../../kjv/jeremiah/22/30); [Psalms 149:9](../../../kjv/psalms/149/9))
[UMBREIT].
**bitter things**—bitter
punishments.
**makest me to possess**—or
"inherit." In old age he receives possession of the
inheritance of sin thoughtlessly acquired in youth. "To inherit
*sins*" is to inherit the *punishments* inseparably
connected with them in *Hebrew* ideas ([Psalms 149:9](../../../kjv/psalms/149/9)).

**27. stocks**—in which the
prisoner's feet were made fast until the time of execution ().
**lookest narrowly**—as an
overseer would watch a prisoner.
**print**—Either the
stocks, or his disease, *marked* his *soles* (*Hebrew,*
"roots") as the bastinado would. Better, thou drawest (or
diggest) [GESENIUS] a line
(or trench) [GESENIUS]
round my soles, beyond which I must not move [UMBREIT].

**28.** Job speaks of himself in the
third person, thus forming the transition to the *general* lot
of man ([Job 14:1](../../../kjv/job/14/1); [Psalms 39:11](../../../kjv/psalms/39/11);
[Hosea 5:12](../../../kjv/hosea/5/12)).

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