Then answered Zophar the Naamathite.
The attitude of Job’s friends
In this chapter Zophar gives his first speech, and it is sharper toned than those which went before. The three friends have now all spoken. Your sympathies perhaps are not wholly on their side. Yet do not let us misjudge them, or assail them with the invectives which Christian writers hurled against them for centuries. Do not say, as has been said by the great Gregory, that these three men are types of God’s worst enemies, or that they scarcely speak a word of good, except what they have learned from Job. Is it not rather true that their words, taken by themselves, are far more devout, far more fit for the lips of pious, we may even say, of Christian men, than those of Job? Do they not represent that large number of good and God-fearing men and women, who do not feel moved or disturbed by the perplexities of life; and who resent as shallow, or as mischievous, the doubts to which those perplexities give rise in the minds of others, of the much afflicted, or the perplexed, or of persons reared in another school than their own, or touched by influences which have never reached themselves? So Job’s friends try in their own way to “justify the ways of God to man”--a noble endeavour, and in doing this, they have already said much which is not only true, but also most valuable. They have pleaded on their behalf the teaching, if I may so speak, of their Church, the teaching handed down from antiquity, and the experiences of God’s people. They have a firm belief, not only in God’s power, but in His unerring righteousness. They hold also the precious truth that He is a God who will forgive the sinner, and take back to His favour him who bears rightly the teaching of affliction. Surely, so far, a very grand and simple creed. We shall watch their language narrowly, and we shall still find in it much to admire, much with which to sympathise, much to treasure and use as a storehouse of Christian thought. We shall see also where and how it is that they misapplied the most precious of truths, and the most edifying of doctrines; turned wholesome food to poison; pressed upon their friend half truths, which are sometimes the worst of untruths. We shall note also no less that want of true sympathy, of the faculty of entering into the feelings of men unlike themselves, and of the power of facing new views or new truths, which has so often in the history of the Church marred the character and impaired the usefulness of some of God’s truest servants. We shall see them, lastly, in the true spirit of the controversialist, grow more and more embittered by the persistency in error, as they hold it, of him who opposes them. The true subject of this sacred drama is unveiling itself before our eyes. Has he who serves God a right to claim exemption from pain and suffering? Is such pain a mark of God’s displeasure, or may it be something exceedingly different? Must God’s children in their hour of trial have their thoughts turned to the judgment that fell on Sodom and Gomorrah, or shall they fix them on “the agony and bloody sweat” of Him whose coming in the flesh we so soon commemorate? (Dean Bradley.)
Questionable reproving and necessary teaching
I. Questionable reproof. Reproof is often an urgent duty. It is the hardest act of friendship, for whilst there are but few men who do not at times merit reprehension, there are fewer still who will graciously receive, or even patiently endure a reproving word, and “Considering,” as John Foster has it, “how many difficulties a friend has to surmount before he can bring, himself to reprove me, I ought to be much obliged to him for his chiding words.” The reproof which Zophar, in the first four verses, addressed to Job suggests two remarks.
1. The charges he brings against Job, if true, justly deserve reproof. What does he charge him with?
(1) Loquacity. “Should not the multitude of words be answered? and should not a man full of talk be justified?” As the tree with the most luxuriant leafage is generally least fruitful, so the man “full of talk” is, as a rule, most empty. It is ever true that in the “multitude of words there wanteth not sin,” and “every man should be swift to hear and slow” to speak. He charges him
(2) With falsehood. “Should thy lies make men hold their peace?” For “lies,” in the margin we have “devices.” Zophar means to say that much of what Job said was not according to truth, not fact, but the ungrounded inventions or fancies of his own mind. He charges him
(3) With irreverence. “And when thou mockest, shall no man make thee ashamed?”
(4) With hypocrisy. “But thou hast said, My doctrine is pure, and I am clean in mine eyes.”
2. The charges, if true, could not justify the spirit and style of the reproof. Considering the high character and the trying circumstances of Job, and the professions of Zophar as his friend, there is a heartlessness and an insolence in his reproof most reprehensible and revolting. There is no real religion in rudeness; there is no Divine inspiration in insolence. Reproof, to be of any worth, should not merely be deserved, but should be given in a right spirit, a spirit of meekness, tenderness, and love. “Reprehension is not an act of butchery, but an act of surgery,” says Seeker. There are those who confound bluntness with honesty, insolence with straightforwardness. The true reprover is of a different metal, and his words fall, not like the rushing hailstorm, but like the gentle dew.
II. Necessary teaching. These words suggest that kind of teaching which is essential to the well-being of every man.
1. It is intercourse with the mind of God. “Oh that God would speak, and open His lips against thee.” The great need of the soul is direct communication with God. All teachers are utterly worthless unless they bring God in contact with the soul of the student. If this globe is to be warmed into life the sun must do it.
2. It is instruction in the wisdom of God. “And that He would show thee the secrets of wisdom, that they are double to that which is!” God’s wisdom is profound; it has its “secrets.” God’s wisdom is “double,” it is many folded; fold within fold, without end.
3. It is faith in the forbearing love of God. “Know therefore that God exacteth of thee less than thine iniquity deserveth.” (Homilist.)
Multitudinous words
I have always a suspicion of sonorous sentences. The full shell sounds little, but shows by that little what is within. A bladder swells out more with wind than with oil. (J. Landor.)