Job 16:10 Commentary and Bible Study

We see Job’s state of mind: God is against him and so are the people. He believes that all hold him in contempt. He speaks of being struck physically on the cheek; there is no record of anyone doing this literally, and the language may be figurative. We would say, ‘People are smashing me down.’ We wouldn’t mean it literally. ‘They are completely united against me. None defend me’, he says, ‘or remember my good deeds.’ Does he include the three comforters when he says this? Barnes believes that he undoubtedly does, and if so, this verse is important because it provides a clear statement of Job’s assessment of the character of the three comforters: he regards them as the ungodly, unconverted men. His assessment was that there was not a single sympathetic person among them all. All of them had reached the same conclusion: that he was a worthless man and deserved only the reproach of God and of man. Seeing that God was against him, they did not hesitate to pass the same judgment. They gathered together against him in the sense that they formed an alliance and agreed together that he was an evil man, deserving to be rejected by all. Job felt very alone and abandoned. It is not clear how he would know this. He has convinced himself of what is not necessarily true. He is not altogether rational. He is so low that he is ready to think the worst about everything. But are we really saying he is not rational? His speech still makes sense. We might wish that we spoke as lucidly as he does, even now. There is no sign he is mentally deranged, but his views are not wholly reliable. He is in a depressed state of mind, and we can learn about depression. We are not thinking about extreme depression, but there are very few who don’t have some time of depression when they shouldn’t trust their own minds. What does he mean? You discover later on in the book. His land and estates are still there, but others have taken them over and vandalised them. But Job blames it on God. This is the gracious, the faithful Job. He is not doubting God, but he is complaining bitterly.The godly and the ungodly inhabit the same world. The Lord warns his disciples, ‘If ye were of the world, the world would love his own: but because ye are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you’ (John 15:19). In this situation the believer takes refuge in the Lord seeking his protection from the malice of unbelieving men, and the Lord is often pleased to answer this prayer. But Job had found himself exposed to their hatred so that their evil words were no longer restrained and they had no inhibitions about slandering him to his face. He felt the danger of being handed over to those who were incapable of judging correctly and who did not have it in them to show mercy.