And when they lifted up their eyes afar off, and knew him not, they lifted up their voice, and wept; and they rent every one his mantle, and sprinkled dust upon their heads toward heaven.
Ver. 12. And when they lift up their eyes afar off] Hence some conclude that Job lay abroad, as lepers used.
And knew him not] For they had never seen him before but in a splendidious fashion; now then to see him in such a pickle, that he had lost all form and fashion, more like a dead beast than a living man; this amazed and amused them; they might also by this, so sad a spectacle, be admonished of their own mutable and miserable condition (Aut sumus, aut fuimus, aut possumus esse quod hic est either we are, or will be or are able to be because this is), and have the same thoughts as the psalmist afterwards had, Man, being in honour, abideth not, Psalms 45:1,2; he is like the beasts that perish, pecoribus morticinis, dead hearts, saith Tremellius, the beasts that die of the murrain, and so become carrion, and are good for nothing. Job was now no otherwise to be seen than as a stinking carcase full of sores, more like than a living man, as he painteth out himself in most lively colours.
They lifted up their voice and wept] Good men are apt to do so, saith the poet, et faciles motus mens generosa capit; we are bound to weep with those that weep, and to be both pitiful and courteous, 1 Peter 3:8. To him that is in misery pity should be showed from his friend (it was so to Job here at first), but he forsaketh the fear of the Lord, Job 6:14. Job's friends did so, when, amazed with the greatness of his calamity, they there hence concluded him an arrant hypocrite, unworthy of any one word of comfort.
And they rent every one his mantle] His stately mantle, his robe of state, such as men of great honour used to wear, Stolam regiam. royal garment. Some Hebrews and Jesuits will have these three friends of Job to have been kings; such I believe they were, as the three kings of Collen; so the Papists call those wise men, Matthew 2:1, be they what they will; they rent every man his mantle in token of greatest sorrow at their friend's calamity, a ceremony not unusual among other nations than those of the East. Suetonius telleth us that Julius Caesar, when he had passed his army to river Rubicon, and was marching toward Rome, he made a speech to his soldiers, weeping and rending his garment, that thereby he might testify to them what a grief it was to him to fight against his country; which he would never have done had there not been a necessity.
And sprinkled dust upon their heads toward heaven] They so threw it up into the air that it might fall upon their heads; to import, 1. That all things were full of sorrowful confusion, as here earth and air were mingled. 2. That themselves and all mortals were but dust, Genesis 18:27, a little dirt neatly made up, and to dust they should return, Genesis 3:19, little deserving in the mean while to tread upon the earth, or to be above ground, Joshua 7:6. See Job 1:16 .