Job 22:1 Commentary - Dr Peter Masters | Metropolitan Tabernacle

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Job 22:1

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In this chapter Eliphaz cannot resist repeating his argument that God does not require perfection from men (Job 22.1-2) for what would God gain from that? Then he lapses into sarcasm, saying to Job, ‘Is it for your righteousness that God rebukes you?’ Job’s more gracious reply to Zophar in chapter 21 (arguing that, for many wicked people, judgment is delayed) does not stop Eliphaz from charging him with fraud, meanness, extortion, cruelty and oppression of his tenants, all without evidence or justification. If Job will only accept his judgment and turn to God, he will be restored. But note carefully that he is being urged not to plead for grace as a weak sinner, but to repent and then exercise his power to earn God’s favour, and the evidence of blessing will be earthly enrichment: ‘If thou shalt put away iniquity … Then shalt thou lay up gold as dust … and thou shalt have plenty of silver … and thou shalt pay thy vows (verses 23, 27).He begins with a series of questions, designed to point out truths about God’s nature which highlight the transcendence of God and the great insignificance of man by comparison. God is so transcendent that he is unaffected by either the evil or the good that men do. Dealing with God is not like dealing with your fellow man. We may truly add to ourselves or to each other. That is because we are finite creatures with real needs, but God is perfect and has everything already and cannot change. How can the creature who is totally dependent on him and has received everything from him, give him anything he does not have, or bring him any real gain?Where is Eliphaz going with this argument? What he says is not in itself wrong, but the conclusion he draws is completely false. It is a response to Job’s evangelical theology: his insistence that a man can have certainty that he is accepted by God, that his acceptance is not on the basis of good works which are only relatively righteous, that man has nothing to boast of before God, that nevertheless God looks for integrity in the hearts of his children and cares greatly whether it is there or not. Eliphaz opposes these ideas because he rejects Job’s claim to know God and to have a special relationship with him as one of his children. He wants to believe that he and the other two comforters are just as able to find favour with God on the basis of their good works. He has heard Job say that he has a redeemer who lives (19:25), that he will be raised from the dead and see his redeemer with his own eyes (19:26-27, that the root of the matter – trust in God and love for him – is in him (19:28). Eliphaz senses that Job is claiming to have what he, Eliphaz, cannot say that he has: a personal relationship with God as one of his children. He therefore wants to say that what Job claims to have, is not possible. Why not? Because God is so transcendent that no one can say they have his personal favour; that is a delusion. The only basis on which man can relate to God is that of the comforters: an attempt to commend themselves to Go by their own good conduct. It is a different tack that Eliphaz takes here, for up till now he has preferred to stress that Job is punished because he is a secret hypocrite. Now he says that even if Job was a righteous man, his righteousness would mean nothing to God because nothing that any human being does, affects God. Job’s claim that a man can find favour with God is foolish. ‘It is vain, Job, for you to think that you can do anything that makes any real difference to God or that profits him; we are all unprofitable servants. So stop speaking of how righteous you are, and stop expressing such indignation that God does not treat you as you deserve. He is so high above you that no righteousness of yours can ever affect him.’ Eliphaz wishes to cut off every grounds of hope from Job.

Application

This is strangely inconsistent with the idea that God pays such attention to the conduct of the wicked that he rewards them here and now and they invariably see the fruits of their evil ways during their life on earth. If God rewards the wicked, does he not also reward the righteous? Why should wickedness have any more attention paid to it than righteousness? If it is true that God is so high above the earth and all that takes place is insignificant to him and cannot affect him, then why should the wicked receive their due reward (as the friends have argued) and not the righteous?

In arguing like this Eliphaz argues as all those do who approach God on the basis of works. When they hear the evangelical claim to have acceptance with God, they cannot understand it, so they interpret it on their own terms. They assume that the evangelical is claiming to have superior works to them, and they hate them for it. They can conceive of no other way that God can be placated than by human works. They therefore want to do two things; they want to attack the believer as a hypocrite, and they want to put God out of reach. But Scripture consistently teaches that, even though God is transcendent and high above us, ‘the eyes of the LORD are upon the righteous, and his ears are open unto their cry. ¹⁶ The face of the LORD is against them that do evil, to cut off the remembrance of them from the earth’ (Psalm 34:15-16).

Questions

Is Eliphaz argument sound? Yes, it is true that God is so high above us that nothing that we do can dislodge his purposes or shake the heavens or disturb his plan in the least. All is already taken into account and yet the end is guaranteed by God and nothing can affect his eternal plan. Neither can human beings do anything to add to what God already has. No creature can ever add to him, and therefore our righteousness never puts him in our debt. But then this was not what Job was saying and God does not behave towards us in the remote sense that Eliphaz wanted to suggest. Job did not have the works-based mentality that Eliphaz attributes to him here. He did not expect the Lord to recognize his righteousness on the basis of merit and somehow be obliged to respond to it. Job believed in a gracious God. What he was saying was that God’s love and kindness towards man, coupled with his holiness and righteousness is such that although the righteous acts of a man cannot possibly affect God in his essential being, he takes pleasure in the obedience of his people, and he makes a distinction between those who serve him in integrity and those who harbour sin in their hearts. He has made the world for a purpose and that he condescends to the weakness of his creatures. He is not only a God of perfect power and sovereign control, he is also a Father who cares for his children and enters into an eternal covenant with them. Eliphaz’ remote concept of God left no room for a personal relationship. This false argument had the appearance of humility, but there was much deceit in it.

When we say that Job believed in evangelical theology, are we reading back into this oldest book of the Bible things which is not there? Are we making more of Job’s argumentation than it warrants? That can hardly be the case when we see what James says about the patriarch. He commends Job’s patience, but ii is certainly evangelical patience that he is speaking of. He is urging New Testament believers to practice the same patience, and making Job to be their model. That is a patience that does not simply wait for a reward later in time, but looks for a reward beyond death in the world to come, and is ready to lose the present world in exchange for that. Job is named alongside ‘the prophets, who spoke in the name of the Lord’ and were examples of suffering affliction and of patience (James 5:10). He is singled out as a premier example of such patience. He overcame all opposition and received the end which the Lord intended he should receive. He did so because the Lord is very pitiful, and of tender mercy. This was the basis of Job’s acceptance with God, and it was quite different to the way in which the friends approached God.

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Introduction

Job 22:1 Commentary and Bible Study