Fair weather cometh out of the north From the northern winds, which scatter the clouds and clear the sky. Elihu concludes with some short, but great sayings, concerning the glory of God. He speaks abruptly and in haste, because, it should seem, he perceived God was approaching, and presumed he was about to take the work into his own hands. With God is terrible majesty Those glorious works of his, which I have described, are testimonies of that great and terrible majesty which is in him; which should cause us to fear and adore him, and not to behave ourselves so irreverently and insolently toward him as Job hath done. We cannot find high out Namely, to perfection, as it is expressed Job 11:7. We cannot comprehend him; his power, wisdom, justice, and his counsels proceeding from them, are past our finding out. He is excellent in power Therefore as he doth not need any unrighteous action to advance himself, so he cannot do any, because all such things are acts and evidences of weakness. And in judgment In the just administration of judgment, he never did nor can exercise that power unjustly, as Job seemed to insinuate. And in plenty of justice In great and perfect justice, such as no man can justly reproach. He will not afflict Namely, without just cause, or above measure. He doth not afflict willingly, or from his heart, Lamentations 3:33. He takes no pleasure in doing it. It is his work, indeed, but a strange work, as Isaiah elegantly terms it, Job 28:21. Men do therefore fear him Hebrew, לכן, lachen, for this cause, namely, because of God's infinite and excellent perfections, and especially those mentioned in the foregoing verse, men do, or should, fear, or reverence him, and humbly submit to him, and not presume to quarrel or dispute with him. He respecteth not Hebrew, לא יראה, lo jireh, he doth not, or will not, behold, namely, with respect or approbation; any that are wise of heart That is, such as are wise in their own eyes, that lean to their own understanding, and despise other men in comparison of themselves, and reject their counsels; or, that are so puffed up with the opinion of their own wisdom, that they dare contend with their Maker, and presume to censure his counsels and actions: which he hereby intimates to be Job's fault, and to be the true reason why God did not respect nor regard him, nor his prayers and tears, as Job complained. And so this is also a tacit advice and exhortation to Job to be humble and little in his own eyes, if ever he expected any favour from God.
Thus Elihu, having set forth God's omnipotence in the strongest colours he was able, concludes with an observation very applicable to the subject of dispute before them. “As this speaker,” says Dr. Dodd, “performs the part of a moderator, he seems to have observed the errors on both sides, and to have hit upon the point where the controversy ought to rest, namely, the unsearchable depth of the divine wisdom; with a persuasion that God, who is acknowledged on all hands to be infinitely powerful and just, will certainly find a way to clear up all the irregularities, as they now appear to us, in the methods of his providence, and bring this intricate and perplexed scene, at last, to a beautiful and regular close. The great fault of the speech seems to be this; that he bears too hard upon Job; and his reproofs, though there were some grounds for them, are nevertheless too harsh and severe. Nay, where he endeavours to repeat what Job had said, he gives it, for the most part, a wrong turn, or sets it in some very disadvantageous light. The silence of this good man, therefore, during this long speech of Elihu, may be considered as none of the least instances of his patience; but as he was convinced that one part of the charge brought against him was but too true, namely, that he had been now and then too hasty and intemperate in his expressions, he was resolved not to increase the fault by entering anew into the controversy; but by his silence and attention here, and suffering his passions to subside, he was the better prepared to receive the following speech from Jehovah with that profound humility, and that absolute submission, which became him.”