The Book of Job

Word Study

"vile," Hebrew qalloti (קַלֹּתִי) from qalal, to be light, of small account, insignificant. Job, who had demanded to argue his case before God, now confesses, "Behold, I am vile." The word qalal means small, light, of no account. Job sees himself, for the first time in the debate, in his true smallness before God.

"answer," ashivekha (אֲשִׁיבֶךָּ). "What shall I answer thee?" is a striking reversal, for Job had wanted nothing more than to fill his mouth with arguments before God (Job 23:4). Now, given the very hearing he asked for, he finds he has nothing to say.

"lay mine hand upon my mouth," yadi samti lemo-fi (יָדִי שַׂמְתִּי לְמוֹ־פִי), the gesture of reverent silence. The gesture is the ancient sign of reverent, submissive silence: I will not argue anymore. This is the first fruit of encountering God directly. Job's questions were not answered, yet meeting God has done what no answer could: it has silenced his complaint and humbled his heart. So often we imagine that what we need in suffering is an explanation; but what Job needed, and received, was a fresh vision of God, and it brought him not to bitterness but to reverent silence. "Be still, and know that I am God" (Psalm 46:10). There is a place where the soul, having truly beheld God, stops arguing and lays its hand upon its mouth. This silence is not sullen defeat but the beginning of worship and peace.

Explanation

Job, who had demanded to argue his case before God, now falls silent: "Behold, I am vile; what shall I answer thee? I will lay mine hand upon my mouth." He sees himself in his true smallness, and the hand on the mouth is the ancient sign of reverent submission. This is the first fruit of encountering God directly: his questions were not answered, yet meeting God has silenced his complaint and humbled his heart. What Job needed was not an explanation but a fresh vision of God. There is a place where the soul, having truly beheld God, stops arguing, and it is the beginning of peace.

Gospel Focus

"Behold, I am vile... I will lay mine hand upon my mouth", this humbling before God is the necessary road to grace, for the Gospel is received not by those who argue their own righteousness but by those who are silenced before God. "Now we know that what things soever the law saith... that every mouth may be stopped, and all the world may become guilty before God" (Romans 3:19). Before we can be justified freely by grace, our mouths must be stopped, our self-justifying arguments laid to rest. Job's "I am vile" is the confession of every soul truly awakened before the holy God: "God be merciful to me a sinner" (Luke 18:13). And precisely there, in the place of the stopped mouth and the humbled heart, grace flows. "God resisteth the proud, but giveth grace unto the humble" (James 4:6). The publican who would not lift his eyes "went down to his house justified" (Luke 18:14), while the self-confident Pharisee did not. So the silencing of Job is not his destruction but the doorway to his blessing, for the God who humbles the proud lifts up the lowly. And the wonder of the Gospel is that the One before whom our mouths are stopped opened His own to plead for us, "he was oppressed, and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth" (Isaiah 53:7), the silent Lamb who bore our guilt. Lay your hand upon your mouth, cease your self-justifying, and in that humble silence receive the grace that God gives freely to all who bow before Him in Christ.

Word Study

"disannul," Hebrew tafer (תָּפֵר) from parar, to break, annul, make void. God puts His finger on the deepest error in Job's complaint: "Wilt thou also disannul my judgment?" The verb is used of breaking a covenant, voiding something that stands. God asks whether Job is willing to cancel a divine verdict outright.

"judgment," mishpat (מִשְׁפָּט), justice. What would be made void is God's own justice. In his suffering, Job had drifted toward a subtle but serious mistake: in order to maintain his own innocence, he had implied that God had dealt unjustly with him. He justified himself at the expense of God's justice.

"condemn," tarshi'eni (תַּרְשִׁיעֵנִי), declare me wrong, in the wrong. God states the trade plainly: "wilt thou condemn me, that thou mayest be righteous?" Are you willing to declare Me guilty just so that you can be declared innocent? This is a temptation for every sufferer. When we cannot reconcile our pain with God's goodness, we are tempted to preserve our sense of our own rightness by quietly charging God with wrong. But this is a grave error, for it puts the creature in the judgment seat over the Creator. God does not deny that Job was, in the matter the friends accused him of, innocent; but Job went too far when he made his innocence require God's guilt. The truth Job needed to grasp is that a man may be genuinely upright and still suffering, without God being unjust, because God's purposes are higher than we can see. We do not have to choose between our integrity and God's justice; both can stand, in the wisdom of God. To be righteous, we need not condemn God; we need only trust Him.

Explanation

God exposes the deepest error in Job's complaint: "wilt thou condemn me, that thou mayest be righteous?" To maintain his own innocence, Job had implied God was in the wrong, justifying himself at the expense of God's justice. This is a temptation for every sufferer: to preserve our sense of being right by quietly charging God with wrong. But it puts the creature in the judgment seat over the Creator. A man may be genuinely upright and still suffering without God being unjust, for God's purposes are higher than we see. We need not condemn God to be righteous; we need only trust Him.

Gospel Focus

"Wilt thou condemn me, that thou mayest be righteous?", the false choice between our righteousness and God's justice is resolved gloriously in the Gospel, where God is proven both just and the justifier. At the cross, we never have to condemn God to be counted righteous; instead, God condemned sin in His own Son, "that he might be just, and the justifier of him which believeth in Jesus" (Romans 3:26). Job wrongly felt he had to choose between his innocence and God's justice; the Gospel shows that God's justice and our justification meet at Calvary, where Christ bore our condemnation so that we might receive His righteousness. We are declared righteous not by impugning God's justice but by resting in the righteousness of Christ, and God's justice is not annulled but satisfied. Furthermore, the Gospel teaches us how to suffer without charging God with wrong: we look to Jesus, the truly innocent Sufferer, who never once accused His Father of injustice, but "committed himself to him that judgeth righteously" (1 Peter 2:23). If the sinless Son could suffer the greatest injustice of all and still trust His Father's justice, then we, in our lesser trials, can hold both our integrity and God's justice together, trusting that His purposes are wise and good even when hidden. Do not condemn God to justify yourself; trust the God who justifies the ungodly in Christ, and who never does wrong, even when His ways are past finding out.

Word Study

"behemoth," Hebrew behemoth (בְּהֵמוֹת), a great beast, possibly the hippopotamus or a huge creature, the plural form intensifying its greatness. God turns to describe an enormous, powerful land creature. Whatever the exact animal (many take it as the hippopotamus, though the description is grand), the point is its overwhelming strength: "his strength is in his loins" (v16); "his bones are as strong pieces of brass" (v18); he drinks up a river without haste (v23). God calls him "the chief of the ways of God" (v19), the foremost of God's creatures in power, which only God who made him can master, "he that made him can make his sword to approach unto him."

"I made with thee," asiti immakh (עָשִׂיתִי עִמָּךְ), made along with you, a fellow creature. Note the phrase: behemoth and Job are fellow creatures, both made by God. The lesson presses on Job: you cannot tame or control this beast that I made alongside you; you are as much My creature as it is; how then will you contend with Me, the Maker of you both? If the creature is beyond your power, how much more the Creator. This is not cruelty but a mercy, driving Job from the folly of contending with God to the peace of trusting Him. The God who made and masters behemoth is infinitely greater than the mightiest thing He has made, and He is to be trusted, not challenged.

Explanation

God turns to behemoth, an enormous, powerful creature "which I made with thee." Its overwhelming strength, bones like brass, drinking up a river, makes it "the chief of the ways of God," which only its Maker can master. The phrase "made with thee" reminds Job that he and behemoth are fellow creatures. The lesson: you cannot tame this beast I made alongside you; you are as much My creature as it is; how then will you contend with Me, your Maker? If the creature is beyond your power, how much more the Creator, who is to be trusted, not challenged.

Gospel Focus

"Behold now behemoth... he is the chief of the ways of God", the God who made and masters the mightiest of creatures is the God who has power over everything that threatens us, and who came in Christ to conquer the greatest foes of all. If God alone can master behemoth, then no power in creation is beyond His control, no force too strong for Him. And in the Gospel, this almighty God turned His power to save us, conquering enemies far greater than any beast: sin, death, and the devil. "Forasmuch then as the children are partakers of flesh and blood, he also himself likewise took part of the same; that through death he might destroy him that had the power of death, that is, the devil" (Hebrews 2:14). The Creator who tames behemoth crushed the serpent's head (Genesis 3:15) and "spoiled principalities and powers... triumphing over them" in the cross (Colossians 2:15). So the believer need fear no power, for the God who masters the chief of His creatures is our Redeemer and Friend. And the humbling reminder that we are creatures, made by God like behemoth, is met by the astonishing grace that our Maker became one of us to save us. "It is he that hath made us, and not we ourselves" (Psalm 100:3), yet He who made us loved us enough to be made in our likeness and die for us. Behold behemoth, and be humbled; then behold the cross, and be saved. The God whose power no creature can withstand has bent that power to redeem you in Jesus Christ.