And in all the land were no women found [so] fair as the daughters of Job: and their father gave them inheritance among their brethren.
Ver. 15. And in all the land there were no women found so fair, &c.] Beauty, though but a bonum fragile, and one of the gifts of God's left hand, Proverbs 3:16, yet is it the flower of virtue, as Chrysippus called it; one of the greatest excellencies of nature, and singular degree of God's image in man, as another (Plato). And although virtue is Proprio contenta theatro, yet to others
Gratior est pulchro veniens in corpore virtus.
That virtue hath a better grace
That shineth from a beauteous face.
Such probably were Job's daughters, not fair and foolish, as those daughters of Jerusalem, Isaiah 3:16, but adorned with all variety of moral virtues, as a clear sky is with stars, as a princely diadem with jewels. Hence their good father so affected them, that he
Gave them inheritance among their brethren] Making them heiresses with them in his estate; which, as it was an extraordinary expression of his love to his daughters, so it importeth, as some think, a desire in him to have his daughters live still with him among the rest of his family; either for that he was loth to part with them (the like whereof is reported of Charles the Great, who, being asked why he did not bestow his daughters in marriage, answered, That he could not be at all without their company, Val. Max. Christian. p. 308), or else as fearing lest they should be defiled with idolaters, which, peradventure, out of Job's family, were ordinary in that country.