If I covered my transgressions as Adam, by hiding mine iniquity in my bosom:
Ver. 33. If I covered my transgression as Adam] A transgressor then Job yieldeth himself; the lives of the best alive are fuller of sins than the firmament is of stars, or the furnace of sparks. But he did not act like Adam, or after the manner of men, cover or conceal them, extenuate or excuse them, denying them, as Cain did, Genesis 4:9, and Gehazi, 2 Kings 5:25, and Ananias, Acts 5:8, or at least, dealing with them as the unjust steward did, who for a hundred set down fifty. Adam went about to hide his sin, alleging, non causam pro causa, that for the cause of his flight that was not the true cause thereof, viz. the voice of God, his fear thereupon, his nakedness, &c.: thus sin and shifting came into the world together. Secondly, when that would not do, but that he was driven from that κρησφυγετον, then he seeks to excuse it, by accusing God, and transferring the blame upon him, for giving him a woman to tempt him, Genesis 3:12. The like thereunto do they that plead predestination, or constellations, or natural inclination, &c., that put God to his proofs, as they did, Jeremiah 2:35. Job was none such; but made it his daily practice to acknowledge his iniquities against himself, Psalms 32:5, and with utmost aggravation from all the circumstances; laying open how many transgressions were wrapped up in each sin, as it is Leviticus 16:21, lest, as Samuel once said to Jesse, Are here all thy sons? so God should say to Job, Are these all thy sins? and, there being but one only uncovered, that one should prove destructive to his soul, as that bastard Abimelech did to all his brethren. But now that he freely and fully confesseth his offences, he is sure to find mercy, Proverbs 28:18. No man was ever kept out of heaven for his confessed badness; many are for their supposed goodness.
By hiding mine iniquity in my bosom] As silly men think to do, 1. From God, who is all eye, and every man before God is all window, so that he needs not a window in his bosom (as the heathen Momus wished) for God to look in at, Job 34:22 Job 34:2. From the world; which yet they cannot always do; for God, that descrieth, will also discover all, sooner or later; else how should that be fulfilled, The name of the wicked shall rot? Broughton rendereth it, By hiding mine iniquity of self love. So Kimchi also readeth it. Tremellius to the same sense, Ex dilectione mei. And surely it is this sinful self love that closeth up men's lips, and keepeth them from poaring out their souls as water before the Lord. Some deal with their souls as others do with their bodies; when their beauty is decayed, they desire to hide it from themselves by false glosses, and from others by painting; so their sins from themselves by false glosses, and from others by excuses. But this was not Job's practice; for though he were a great man, and able enough to have crushed those that should accuse him of any miscarriage, yet he was far from it; as he sets forth in the next verse.