Homilist Job 22:5-14 Is not your wickedness great? and your iniquities infinite?… I. Wrong in relation to MAN. In regard to the charge which he here brings against Job, it is worthy of note that whilst most expositors regard Eliphaz as speaking in his own name, others, amongst whom Dr. Bernard, regard him as indicating merely the charges which the Almighty might bring against him. What is the charge that he brings? It is Job's flagrant inhumanity. 1. He was rapacious. 2. He was inhospitable. 3. He was tyrannical. II. Wrong in relation to GOD. "Is not God in the height of heaven? And behold the height of the stars, how high they are! And thou sayest, How doth God know? Can He judge through the thick cloud? Thick clouds are a covering to Him, that He seeth not; and He walketh in the circuit of heaven." His charge here against Job in relation to God, is a denial of the Divine inspection and superintendence of individual man. This error, which he falsely charges on Job, was the leading error of the old Epicureans, and the leading error of deists in all ages. If all men felt God to be in conscious contact with them, idolatry, immorality, dormancy of soul, could not exist. Many causes have been assigned for man's tendency to regard God as remote, such as — (1) The mediatory method of Divine operation. He does not deal directly with man. (2) Man's power of spontaneous action. He is left free, he does not feel the hand of God on the springs of his being. (3) The unbroken regularity of natural laws. Nature shows no changes, indicates no interruption. (4) The disorders of the moral world. But the grand cause is dread of God. Men have sinned, and their guilty consciences invest the Almighty with such attributes of vengeance that they turn away in horror from Him. The language of each man is, "Depart from me, for I desire not a knowledge of Thee." Learn — 1. That in natural religion the ill-treatment of our fellow men is regarded as a great crime. There is no reason to believe that Eliphaz had any revelation from God but that which nature supplies; and yet in his language to Job he expresses in a strong and unmistakable manner his conviction, that to be, not only cruel, but even inhospitable to our fellow men is wicked. The obligation to be socially sympathetic, loving, and kind, the God of love has written on the human soul. 2. That men often denounce evils in others of which they themselves are guilty. Strong as was the implied denunciation of Eliphaz against unkindness in Job, was he not himself unkind in tantalising him now when he was overwhelmed with suffering, by charges that were utterly false? (Homilist.) Parallel Verses KJV: Is not thy wickedness great? and thine iniquities infinite?WEB: Isn't your wickedness great? Neither is there any end to your iniquities. |
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