John Gill Bible Commentary

Know now that God hath overthrown me,.... He would have them take notice that all his afflictions were from the hand of God; and therefore should take care to what they imputed any acts of his, whose ways are unsearchable, and the reasons of them not to be found out; and therefore, if a wrong construction should be put upon them, which may be easily done by weak sighted men, it must be displeasing to him. Job had all along from the first ascribed his afflictions to God, and he still continued to do so; he saw his hand in them all; whoever were the instruments, it was God that had overthrown him, or cast him down from an high to a very low estate; that had taken away his substance, his children, and his wealth: or "hath perverted me" (l); not that God had made him perverse, or was the cause or occasion of any perverseness in him, either in his words or in his actions, or had perverted his cause, and the judgment of it; Job could readily answer to those questions of Bildad, "doth God pervert judgment? or doth the Almighty pervert justice?" and say, no, he doth not; but he is to be understood in the same sense as the church is, when she says, see Lam 3:9; "he hath made my path crooked"; where the same word is used as here; and both she and Job mean that God had brought them into cross, crooked, and afflictive dispensations: and hath compassed me with his net; and which also designs affliction, which is God's net, which he has made, ordained, and makes use of; which he lays for his people, and takes them in, and draws them to himself, and prevents them committing sin, and causes to issue in their good; see Lam 1:13. (l) "pervertit me", Montanus, Mercerus; so Vatablus, Drusius, Schultens.