Job 21:27 Commentary - Dr Peter Masters

Navigator

Job 21:27

Comments

Job understood exactly what the comforters meant when they spoke to him about the wicked and insinuated all sorts of things about him. They had not come out clearly and said to his face that he was a hypocrite, but by their sideways glances at him while they discoursed on the character and life of the wicked, it was only too obvious what they meant. Some see Job as saying that he knows what they intend to do next, as if it was too obvious a point that they had intended to speak against him when they describe the fate of the wicked, but he summarises what they have said, not what they will say.The friends have said, where is the house of the prince, that is, the corrupt man who has been elevated to a high position of leadership, but who has attained his position through intrigue and violence; he cannot keep what he has seized. A judgment will surely come from heaven to strike him down so that the world learns that wickedness does not prosper. Where is the tent of the wicked? Though you see it for a time, it is removed without trace at last. This is their contention.But Job complains that they are like those who live in a little world of their own, and who are unfamiliar the world at large, the real world. They speak as if they had an understanding of life, but they basis their ideas on severely limited experience. Have they never asked those who have travelled outside their little sphere of life and found out what really goes on? These travellers were men who had a reputation for having a much wider view of life. They had witnessed other cultures, other ways of living, governing, trading, educating, healing; they were able to grasp the full breadth of human experience. Do you not know their signs? The word means sign, signal, but here proof, token, evidences – the things they bring forward in support of their testimony about what goes on in other lands, among other peoples. When he says this, he does not mean to suggest the comforters are really ignorant of these things, but that they are speaking to him as if they were ignorant, for they discount what they cannot help but know. They were of course older man who had talked to all sorts of people and learnt about all manner of matters in the world. And yet they formed their views, not by consulting their own experience or listening to the accounts of others, but by taking up a doctrinaire approach to the subject of life. The conclusion of travellers is the same as Job’s conclusion: that the wicked are not all punished now, but that their judgment is held is store for the Day of Judgment, when each one will receive his reward. Although they often escape judgment in this life, they certainly do not escape altogether, for they will be called to account in the Day of Judgment. They will be brought forth from wherever they are hiding and stand before God. Job is not denying the ultimate judgment of God. This is what every man, both righteous and wicked ought to remember. The righteous should thank God for their forgiveness and justification, and the wicked should be restrained in their wickedness by the knowledge they cannot escape.

Application

Questions

The translators go two opposite directions with verse 30, the difference between them being in the translation of the preposition in front of the word ‘day’. The KJV is among those which stress the fact that the wicked cannot escape final judgment, for the wicked are reserved ‘to’ or ‘for’ the day of distress or calamity, that is, Day of Judgment. Others use the preposition ‘from’ – ‘from that day’, and therefore see the wicked preserved from evil. Those who take the second view translate the verb as ‘spared from’ instead of ‘reserved for’. The ‘day of destruction’ is then seen as the day in this life when trouble might have afflicted them and called them to account immediately. The second rendering is what we might expect given the context, for Job has been stressing that, contrary to the theories of the comforters, the wicked do not meet their just deserts in this life, but escape. The KJV however makes him switch tack at this point, and make clear that in spite of what he has said, he does not believe that the wicked will escape altogether. He would then be referring to a more ultimate judgment that they will not be able to avoid even though they get away with much during their lives. The words favour the KJV translation. It is true that the ‘day of doom’ or ‘day of destruction’ need not refer to the final judgment, and it is perfectly reasonable, given the topic under discussion, to refer it to the sort of calamity which the comforters insist inevitably catches up with the wicked before the end of life and which the world at large observes. But the verb which can be translated ‘spared’ is not easily so translated here. It could be ‘the wicked are spared from the day of doom’ but the preposition is ‘to’ or ‘for’ rather than ‘from’, which would not work with ‘spared’. If the KJV translation is correct then the thought is that the wicked do not suffer the kind of immediate judgment that you comforters say they suffer; they are reserved for a judgment that comes much later which is not observed by men in this life. Job says nothing to deny that there is a final judgment.

Outline

Purpose

Introduction

Job 21:27 Commentary and Bible Study