I also could speak as ye [do]: if your soul were in my soul's stead, I could heap up words against you, and shake mine head at you.
Ver. 4. I also could speak as you do, &c.] Every whit as curiously, as furiously. I could scold and scoff as freely as you do, but I know no warrant so to retort and retaliate; "being reviled, we bless; being defamed, we entreat," 1 Corinthians 4:12,13. To render railing for railing is to think to wash off dirt with dirt.
If your soul were in my soul's stead] Some read it optatively, as Isaiah 64:1, Would to God your soul were in my soul's stead; for then I would heap up words against you, and act your part upon you; but Job was not so malicious or vindictive as to think that tallying of injuries is but justice. Hypocritis nihil est crudelius, impatientius, et vindictae cupidius, saith Luther. Hypocrites are cruel, spiteful, and revengeful; but Job was none such. He, therefore, telleth his friends that if they were in his condition he would deal much more mildly with them.
I could heap up words against you] I could, but would not. Posse et nolle, nobile est (Sen.). Or thus, Would I heap up, &c., and handle you thus discourteously, by speeches and gestures, as you do me? It were easy to wag a wicked tongue, and to shake my head at you in despite and mockery; but were this religion? Doth not moral philosophy say, If a wise man speak evil of thee, endure him; if a fool, pardon him? Vincit qui patitar, as David did Saul, overcoming evil with good, though, when he marched against Nabal, how rough and rash was he in a resolution of revenge! 1 Samuel 25:32 .