JFB : Job 23

      @Job 23:1-17. JOB'S ANSWER.

      2. to-day--implying, perhaps, that the debate was carried on through more days than one (see Introduction).
      bitter--(@Job 7:11 10:1).
      my stroke--the hand of God on me (Margin, @Job 19:21 Ps 32:4).
      heavier than--is so heavy that I cannot relieve myself adequately by groaning.

      3. The same wish as in @Job 13:3 (compare @Heb 10:19-22).
      Seat--The idea in the Hebrew is a well-prepared throne (@Ps 9:7).

      4. order--state methodically (@Job 13:18 Isa 43:26).
      fill, &c.--I would have abundance of arguments to adduce.

      5. he--emphatic: it little matters what man may say of me, if only I know what God judges of me.

      6. An objection suggests itself, while he utters the wish (@Job 23:5). Do I hereby wish that He should plead against me with His omnipotence? Far from it! (@Job 9:19,34 13:21 30:18).
      strength--so as to prevail with Him: as in Jacob's case (@Ho 12:3,4). UMBREIT and MAURER better translate as in @Job 4:20 (I only wish that He) "would attend to me," that is, give me a patient hearing as an ordinary judge, not using His omnipotence, but only His divine knowledge of my innocence.

      7. There--rather, "Then": if God would "attend" to me (@Job 23:6).
      righteous--that is, the result of my dispute would be, He would acknowledge me as righteous.
      delivered--from suspicion of guilt on the part of my Judge.

      8. But I wish in vain. For "behold," &c.
      forward . . . backward--rather, "to the east--to the west." The Hebrew geographers faced the east, that is, sunrise: not the north, as we do. So "before" means east: "behind," west (so the Hindus). Para, "before"--east: Apara, "behind"--west: Daschina, "the right hand"--south: Bama, "left"--north. A similar reference to sunrise appears in the name Asia, "sunrise," Europe, "sunset"; pure Babylonian names, as RAWLINSON shows.

      9. Rather, "To the north."
      work--God's glorious works are especially seen towards the north region of the sky by one in the northern hemisphere. The antithesis is between God working and yet not being beheld: as in @Job 9:11, between "He goeth by," and "I see Him not." If the Hebrew bears it, the parallelism to the second clause is better suited by translating, as UMBREIT, "doth hide himself"; but then the antithesis to "behold" would be lost.
      right hand--"in the south."
      hideth--appropriately, of the unexplored south, then regarded as uninhabitable because of its heat (see @Job 34:29).

      10. But--correcting himself for the wish that his cause should be known before God. The omniscient One already knoweth the way in me (my inward principles: His outward way or course of acts is mentioned in @Job 23:11. So in me, @Job 4:21); though for some inscrutable cause He as yet hides Himself (@Job 23:8,9).
      when--let Him only but try my cause, I shall, &c.

      11. held--fast by His steps. The law is in Old Testament poetry regarded as a way, God going before us as our guide, in whose footsteps we must tread (@Ps 17:5).
      declined--(@Ps 125:5).

      12. esteemed--rather, "laid up," namely, as a treasure found (@Mt 13:44 Ps 119:11); alluding to the words of Eliphaz (@Job 22:22). There was no need to tell me so; I have done so already (@Jer 15:16).
      necessary--"Appointed portion" (of food; as in @Pr 30:8). UMBREIT and MAURER translate, "More than my law," my own will, in antithesis to "the words of His mouth" (@Joh 6:38). Probably under the general term, "what is appointed to me" (the same Hebrew is in @Job 23:14), all that ministers to the appetites of the body and carnal will is included.

      13. in one mind--notwithstanding my innocence. He is unaltered in His purpose of proving me guilty (@Job 9:12).
      soul--His will (@Ps 115:3). God's sovereignty. He has one great purpose; nothing is haphazard; everything has its proper place with a view to His purpose.

      14. many such--He has yet many more such ills in store for me, though hidden in His breast (@Job 10:13).

      15. God's decrees, impossible to be resisted, and leaving us in the dark as to what may come next, are calculated to fill the mind with holy awe [BARNES].

      16. soft--faint; hath melted my courage. Here again Job's language is that of Jesus Christ (@Ps 22:14).

      17. Because I was not taken away by death from the evil to come (literally, "from before the face of the darkness," @Isa 57:1). Alluding to the words of Eliphaz (@Job 22:11), "darkness," that is, calamity.
      cut off--rather, in the Arabic sense, brought to the land of silence; my sad complaint hushed in death [UMBREIT]. "Darkness" in the second clause, not the same Hebrew wor as in the first, "cloud," "obscurity." Instead of "covering the cloud (of evil) from my face," He "covers" me with it (@Job 22:11).