Job to Bildad: 1. Bildad's theology refuted.
I. AN IRONICAL CONCESSION. "I know that it is so of a truth." The doctrine propounded by Bildad (Job 8:3), that in God's dealings with mankind such a thing as either a perversion or miscarriage of justice was impossible, Job in a certain sense allows. Abstractly considered, the sentiment was one which Job cheerfully admitted. As expounded by Bildad, that the Divine government of the world was one of visible retributive justice, he expressly impugned its truth. Yet, in order to expose its fallacious character as well as to demonstrate its worthlessness, he is willing to proceed on the assumption of its truth-
II. A PERTINENT INTERROGATION. "How should man [literally, 'frail, perishable man'] be just," i.e. maintain his righteousness, establish his innocence, "with God?" Supposing, for the sake of argument, that such a sufferer possessed the inward, ineradicable conviction that he was innocent (i.e. free from notorious transgression): by what process could he vindicate his personal integrity so as to arrest the punitive hand of the Almighty? By none that would be availing, Job proceeds to show. In a profounder sense than is here employed, the question of the patriarch possesses a momentous significance for man. How shall man, the frail, sinful, and perishing, establish his righteousness before God? As in Job's case, so in every man's, the attempt to do so is a wild imagination, and can only result in failure, Not, however, because of the impossibility of establishing what really exists, as in Job's view, but because the thing, the righteousness, is not there to be maintained; all the world being in inward consciousness, as well as in outward fact, guilty before God.
III. AN EXTRAORDINARY SUPPOSITION. "If he will contend with him;" i.e. if the individual arraigned by Divine providence should propose to impeach the Divine equity, and even undertake to demonstrate his own innocence; or, as others interpret the pronouns, if God should be willing to enter into controversy with him, i.e. weak and imperfect man. According to the former explanation, the language is suggestive of sinful presumption; according to the latter, of gracious condescension; according to either, the subject of debate is not the question of man's sinfulness in general, but of man's guiltiness in respect of particular offences.
IV. A HOPELESS CONTENTION. On two grounds Job protests that any such litigation with the Almighty as to man's innocence of individual transgressions (much more, therefore, as to the question of man's sinful condition) would be unavailing.
1. Man's ignorance and frailty would disqualify him from replying to God's accusations. Infinite in subtlety and endless in succession, the charges that by such an assailant might be brought against him would simply confound and paralyze him. Overpowered by terror at the ineffable majesty of his Divine opponent, he would entirely lose command of his poor faculties, such as they were, and would be utterly unable to repel so much as one charge in a thousand, even were they all untrue (verse 3; cf. Psalms 130:3).
2. God's wisdom and strength would render it impossible for any one engaging in such an enterprise to escape unhurt. "Wise in heart, and.mighty in strength, who hath braved him and been successful?" (verse 4). The wisdom of the Almighty, which enables him to search the heart (1 Chronicles 28:9; Psalms 7:9), to understand the thoughts (Psalms 139:2), to know the works (Job 34:25), to consider the ways (Job 34:21), of men; and the power of the Omniscient, which secures that his counsel shall stand (Isaiah 46:10) and his purpose shall be fulfilled (Job 23:13, Job 23:14), clearly present a combination (Job 36:5; Job 37:23; Daniel 2:20), against which it is not only needless, but must for ever be positively ruinous, to strive.
Learn
1. It becomes good men to acknowledge and confide in the righteousness of God.
2. The higher man s ideas use of God s holiness and equity, the lower fall his thoughts concerning his own impurity and iniquity.
3. As them can be no unrighteousness with God, so neither can there be any righteousness with man.
4. Though it is hopeless to contend with God in argument, it is not so to wrestle with him in prayer.
5. The best attitude for a frail and sinful man to assume before God is that of self-abasement and penitence.
6. Man's ignorance and weakness are no match for God's wisdom and might.
7. God's wisdom and might have, for man's advantage, been deposited in Christ, who is the Power and the Wisdom of God.