The Book of Job will not require a long examination-not that it fails in interest, but because, when the general idea is once laid hold of, it is the detail which is interesting, and detail, is not our present object.
OB 1{In the Book of Job we have one portion of those exercises of heart which this division of the Holy Book supplies. These are not joyful exercises, but those of a heart that, journeying through a world in which the power of evil is found, and not being dead to the flesh, not having that divine knowledge which the Gospel furnishes, not possessing Christ in resurrection, is not capable of enjoying in peace the fruit of God's perfect love, whatever its own conflicts may be; but which struggles with the evil or with the non-enjoyment of the only real good, even while desiring to possess it.
This division contains the Books of Job, the Psalms, Ecclesiastes, the Song of Songs. The Proverbs have a peculiar character; they guide us through this evil by the wise man's experience. These books differ very much from each other. We shall examine each in its place.
In Job we have man put to the test. We might say, with our present knowledge, man renewed by grace, an upright man, and righteous in his ways, in order to show whether he can stand before God in presence of the power of evil, whether he can be righteous in his own person before God. On the other hand we find the dealings of God, by which He searches the heart, and gives it the consciousness of its true state before Him.
All this is so much the more instructive from its being set before us outside of all economy, all especial revelation on God's part. It is the godly man, such as one of Noah's descendants would be, who had not lost the knowledge of the true God, when sin was again spreading in the world, and idolatry was setting in. But the Judge was there to punish it. Job was encompassed with blessings, and possessed real piety. Satan, the accuser of the servants of God, goes to and fro in the earth seeking occasion for evil, and presents himself before the Lord among His mighty angels, the "bene-Elohim;".and God states the case of Job, the subject of His government in blessing, faithful in his walk. Satan attributes the piety of Job to this manifest favor, and to his prosperity. God gives all this into the hands of Satan, who speedily excites the cupidity of Job's enemies; and they attack him and carry off all his possessions. His children perish through the effects of a storm which Satan is allowed to raise. But Job, dwelling neither on the instruments employed, nor on Satan, receives this bitter cup from the hand of God without murmuring. Satan suggests again that man will, in fact, give up everything if he can preserve himself. God leaves everything to Satan, except the life of His servant. Satan smites Job with a dreadful disease; but Job submits himself under the hand of God, fully recognizing His sovereignty. Satan had exhausted his means of injuring Job, and we hear nothing more of him. But the depths of Job's heart were not yet reached, and to do this was the purpose of God, whatever Satan's thoughts may have been. Job did not know himself, and up to this time, with all his piety, he had never been in the presence of God. How often it is the case that even throughout a long life of piety, the conscience has never been really set before God.—Peace -such as can never be shaken-and real liberty are not known as yet. There is a desire after God, there is the new nature, the attraction of His grace has been felt; nevertheless, God and His love are not known. If Satan is foiled-the grace of God having kept Job's heart from murmuring-God has yet His own work to accomplish. That, which the tempest that Satan had raised against Job failed in doing, is brought about by the sympathy of his friends. Poor heart of man! The uprightness, and even the patience of Job had been manifested, and Satan had no more to say. But God alone can search out what the heart really is before Him; and the absence of all self-will, perfect agreement with the will of God, absolute submission like that of Christ, these things God alone could test, and thus lay bare the nothingness of man's heart before Him. God did this with Job; revealing at the same time that He acted in grace in these cases for the good of the soul which He loved.
If we compare the language of the Spirit of Christ in the Psalms we shall often find the appreciation of circumstances expressed in almost identical terms; but instead of bitter complaints, and reproaches addressed to God, we find the submission of a heart which acknowledges that God is perfect in all His ways. Job was upright, but he made this his righteousness; which evidently proves that he, had never been really in the presence of God. The consequence of this was that, although he reasoned more correctly than his friends, he attributed injustice to God and a desire to harass him without cause. See chap. 19, 23:10, 13; 13:15-18; 16:12. We find also in 29 that his heart had dwelt upon his upright and benevolent walk with complacency, commending himself, and feeding his self-love with it. "When the eye saw me it gave witness to me." And therefore God brings him to say, "Now mine eye seeth Thee and I abhor myself." It is with these chapters 29-31, which express his good opinion of himself, that Job ends his discourse; he had told his whole heart out. He was self-satisfied: he used the grace of God to make himself lovely in his own eyes. If (chap. 9) he confesses man's iniquity, it is because it is useless to attempt being just with such a God. The Sixth chapter, as well as the whole of his discourse, proves that it was the presence and, the language of his friends that were the means of bringing out all that was in his heart. We see also in chap. 30 that the pride of his heart was detected. As to the friends of Job, they do not call for any extended remarks. They urge the doctrine that God's earthly government is a full measure and manifestation of His righteousness, and of the righteousness of man, which should correspond with it. A doctrine which proves a total ignorance of what God's righteousness is, and of His ways; as well as the absence of all real knowledge of what God is. We do not see either that the feelings of their hearts were influenced by communion with God. Their argument is a false and cold estimate of the exact justice of His government as an adequate manifestation of His relation with man. Although Job was not before God in his estimate of himself, he judges rightly in these respects. He shows that although God shows His disapprobation of the wicked yet that their circumstances overthrow the argument of his friends. We see in Job a heart which, although rebellious, depends upon God, and would rejoice to find Him. We see too that when he can extricate himself by a few words from his friends, who, he is quite sensible, understand nothing of his case, nor of the dealings of God, he turns to God although he does not find Him, and although lie complains that His hand is heavy upon him. That is to say, we see one who has tasted that God is gracious, whose heart, wounded indeed and unsubdued, yet claims those qualities for God-because it knows Him-which the cold reasonings of his friends could not ascribe to Him; a heart which complains bitterly of God, but which knows that could it once come near Him, it would find Him all that it had declared Him to be, and not such as they had declared Him to be; a heart which repelled indignantly the accusation of hypocrisy-for Job was conscious that he looked to God, and that he had known God and acted with reference to Him.
But these spiritual affections of Job did not prevent his turning this consciousness of integrity into a robe of self-righteousness which hid God from Him, and even hid him from himself. He declares himself to be more righteous than God. Chapter 10:7; 16:14-17; 27:2-6. Elihu reproves him for this, and on the other hand explains the ways of God. He shows that God visits man and chastises him, in order that when subdued and broken down-if there is one who can show him the point of moral contact between his soul and God in which his soul would stand in truth before Him-God, May act in grace and blessing, and deliver him from the evil that oppresses him. Elihu goes on to show him that if God chastises, it is becoming in man to set himself before God to learn wherein he has done wrong. In short, that the ways of God are right, and He with draweth not His eyes from the righteous, but if they are in affliction He shows them their transgressions, and if they return to Him in obedience when He openeth their ear to discipline, He will give them prosperity; but that the hypocrites shall perish. The first case which Elihu brings forward is the pride and self-will of man. God chastises and humbles him. The second is that of positive transgression; but in the first case he was in the path of destruction. It was this case which needed the interpreter to place him in uprightness before God. Finally, he insists upon the incomprehensible power of God Almighty. The Lord then speaks, and addressing Job, carries on the subject. He makes Job sensible of his nothingness. Job confesses himself to be vile, and declares that he will be silent before God. The Lord resumes the discourse, and Job acknowledges that he has darkened counsel by speaking of that which he understood not. But now still more submissively, he declares openly his real condition. Formerly he had heard of God by the hearing of the ear; now his eye had seen Him, wherefore he abhors himself and repents in dust and ashes. This is the effect of having seen God, and of finding himself in His presence. The work of God was accomplished-the work of his perfect goodness, which would not leave Job without causing him to know himself, without bringing him into God's own presence. The object of discipline was attained, and Job is surrounded with more blessings than before.
We learn two things here, first that man cannot stand in the presence of God; and secondly, the ways of God for the instruction of the inner man.
It is also a picture of God's dealings with the Jews on the earth.
The book of Job plainly sets before us also the teaching of the Spirit as to the place which Satan occupies in the dealings of God and His government, with respect to man on the earth. We may also remark the perfect and faithful care of God, from whom (whatever may have been the malice of Satan), all this proceeded, because He saw that Job needed it. We observe that it is God who sets the case of Job before Satan, and that the latter disappears from the scene; because here it is a question of his doings on the earth and not of his inward temptations. Now, if God had stopped short in the outward afflictions, Job would have had fresh cause for self-complacency: Man might have judged that those afflictions were ample. But the evil of Job's heart consisted in his resting on the fruits of grace in himself, and this would only have increased the good opinion he already entertained of himself; God, therefore, carries on His work.
Either the sympathy of his friends (for we can bear alone and from God in His presence, that which we cannot bear when we have the opportunity of making out complaint before man), or the pride which is not roused while we are alone, but which is wounded when others witness our misery, or perhaps the two together, upset the mind of Job, and he curses the day of his birth. The depths of his heart are displayed. It was this that he needed.