Job 2:3 - Joseph Benson’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

Hast thou considered, &c. Hebrew, השׁמת לבךְ, hashamta libbecha, Hast thou set thy heart on my servant? &c. And still he holdeth fast his integrity Notwithstanding all his trials and tribulations, and thy malicious suggestion to the contrary, he continues to be the same perfect and upright man he was before; and all thy efforts to wrest from him his integrity, and draw him into sin, have been fruitless. Although thou movedst me, &c. It is justly observed by a late writer, that the translation of this verse will be more agreeable to the Hebrew, if, with the vulgar Latin, we place the interrogation after the word integrity; namely, Timens Deum, et recedens a malo, et adhuc retinens innocentiam? Fearing God, departing from evil, and still holding fast his integrity? For thus do the three participles in Hebrew follow one another. Instead then of rendering the next word, although thou movedst me; he proposes reading, And yet thou movest me; or, to continue the interrogation, namely, And dost thou, or, wilt thou, move me against him to destroy him without cause? This, and the rest of this representation, respecting Satan's moving, that is, persuading and prevailing with God, to bring, or to suffer this his enemy to bring, these grievous calamities upon Job, is not to be understood literally; as if God could be moved by any of his creatures, especially by Satan, to alter or depart from his own wise and holy purposes, which are all eternal and unchangeable, to gratify that evil spirit by granting his desires: but the design is simply to signify the devil's restless malice, in promoting man's misery, and God's permission of it, for his own glory. To destroy him without cause Without any signal guilt or special provocation, whereby he, more than others, deserved to be chastised by such heavy calamities; not but that there might be other very weighty causes for them: for the divine wisdom, we may be sure, neither does nor suffers any thing without cause; that is, without a sufficient reason. That good men are sometimes extremely afflicted, and that not only in their outward estate, but in their persons, as Job was, is too plain to be denied; (see John 9:3;) and, whether God permits wicked spirits, or wicked men, or any thing else, to be the immediate instrument of a good man's sufferings, makes no alteration as to the nature or degree of his sufferings. But the word חנם chinnam, here rendered, without cause, may, with equal propriety, be translated, as it is Proverbs 1:17; Ezekiel 6:10, and elsewhere, in vain; and be referred, not to God's destroying him, but to Satan's moving God so to do. And then the reading will be, Thou hast in vain moved, or dost, or wilt, in vain move me to destroy him; that is, without effect, or to no purpose; for thou art not able to take away his integrity, which, in spite of all thy art and malice, he still holds fast. Thus Junius and Tremellius translate the words: Hast thou considered my servant Job that he still retains his integrity? and, in vain hast thou excited me to destroy him: and Houbigant, He still retains his integrity, after thou hast excited me against him, that I might trouble him, in vain.