They abhor me, they flee far from me, and spare not to spit in my face.
Ver. 10. They abhor me, they flee far from me] As if I were a leper or a bugbear, or that my breath were infectious; like that maid spoken of by Avicen, who, feeding upon poison, was herself healthy, yet infected others with her venomous breath. Job was wont to be honoured; now he is as much abhorred. People were used to hanging upon his lips for learned counsel, but they stand aloof, and keep at a distance. They looked upon that face of his as the face of an angel, which now, with utmost despite and detestation, they spit upon and spare not. At virtutes evertere non possunt, as Demetrius Phalereus said, when the Athenians threw down the many statues they had once erected in honour of him, But they cannot throw down my virtues and valiant acts, whereby I deserved those statues. Job was not without his cordial in this sad and sudden change of his condition. For, first, the bird in his own bosom sang sweetly still, as birds in the spring tune most melodiously when it rains most sadly. And, secondly, what if these miscreants prate against Job with malicious words, as Diotrephes did against Demetrius, 3 John 1:9,13, yet it is enough for Job or Demetrius that they have a good report of all men; that is, of all good men, who indeed are the only men (because a good name only is a name, Ecclesiastes 7:1, and a good wife only a wife, Pro 18:22) to be reckoned on; and of the truth itself, that is more, Job 30:12 .
And spare not to spit in my face] In signum videlicet maximi contemptus et indignationis (Junius), In token of greatest contempt and indignation, as Num 12:14 Isa 50:6 Deuteronomy 25:9. The face is the table of beauty or comeliness; and when it is spit upon it is made the seat of shame. Their words were, likely, such as the English barons here said of the popes that excommunicated them, Fie on such rascal ribalds, &c., Marcidi ribauldi (Mat. Paris,). Our Lord Christ also was spit upon in like manner, that he might cleanse our faces from the filth of sin, and make them shine with his beams, 1 John 3:2 .