Job 32:1

So these three men ceased to answer Job,.... His three friends, Eliphaz the Temanite, Bildad the Shuhite, and Zophar the Naamathite, who came to visit and comfort him under his afflictions; but

So these three men ceased to answer Job, because he was righteous in his own eyes. Prose (poetry begins with "I am young," Job 32:6). Verse 1. Because ... - and because they could not proves to him that he was unrighteous.

JOB CHAPTER 32 Elihu, Job’ s fourth friend, speaketh: he is angry with Job for justifying himself, and with his three friends for not satisfying, and yet condemning him, . He excuseth his youth; but wisdom is from God, and not from age, ; therefore he speaketh, being full of matter, and his spirit constraining him, without accepting any man’ s person, . i.e. Was self-conceited, and obstinately resolved to justify himself both against God and men; therefore they give him over as incorrigible.

Job 32:1 So these three men ceased to answer Job, because he [was] righteous in his own eyes.Ver. 1. So these three men ceased to answer Job] They were as quiet as men are on a Sabbath, so the word importeth; they had tired themselves with talking, and now they were resolved to rest them, and the rather, because they judged there was little good to be done by aught that they should say; for Job was set. Because he was righteous in his own eyes] And so there was no more hope of a fool than of him. Pertinacious they held him and contentious, self-conceited and opinionated; which, indeed, was a right character of themselves, if they could have seen it. He was only constant to himself, and to the truth; whereof he showed himself a stout and resolute champion. Only, as every pomegranate hath some rotten kernels in it; so Job had his frailties, his outbursts, caused by extremity of pain and excess of passion; for the which these three did him wrong to give him up for deplored and desperate.

XXXII.(1) So these three men ceased.—The next six chapters are taken up with the reply of a fourth person not before mentioned, but who appears to have been present during the discussion, and who is described as Elihu, the son of Barachel the Buzite, of the kindred of Ram. The name appears to mean, He is my God. The person from whom he was descended seems to have been the son of Nahor, Abraham’s brother (Genesis 22:21); and a city of the like name is mentioned in Jeremiah 25:23. There is a Ram mentioned in Rth 4:19, who was the great grandson of Judah; but we can hardly suppose this was the Ram of whose kindred Elihu was. On the other hand, we have no clue to the identification; for even if, with some, we suppose him to have been the same as Aram, the son of Kemuel, and great nephew of Abraham, it is not easy to see how a descendant of Buz, his uncle, should have been described as of the kindred of Ram. One tradition identifies Ram with Abraham, but this is mere conjecture, and in this case highly improbable; the only inference we can draw is that this specification of Elihu serves to show that he was a real, and not an imaginary, personage. The Targum speaks of Elihu as a relative of Abraham. If we are right in putting the life of Elihu so far back, the whole position and surroundings of Job’s history become the more probable, because what is told us of Abraham and the patriarchs corresponds with the description and character of Job; and then, also, the traditional Mosaic origin of the Book of Job becomes the more probable. Because he was righteous in his own eyes.—This appears from Job 3:26; Job 6:10; Job 6:29; Job 10:7; Job 13:15; Job 19:6, &c., Job 23:7; Job 23:10-12; Job 27:6; Job 29:12, &c.

CHAPTER XXXII Elihu comes forward, and empresses his disapprobation both of Job and his three friends-with the one for justifying himself; and with the others for taking up the subject in a wrong point of view, and not answering satisfactorily-and makes a becoming apology for himself, 1-22. NOTES ON CHAP. XXXII Verse 1. These three men ceased to answer Job] They supposed that it was of no use to attempt to reason any longer with a man who justified himself before God. The truth is, they failed to convince Job of any point, because they argued from false principles; and, as we have seen, Job had the continual advantage of them. There were points on which he might have been successfully assailed; but they did not know them. Elihu, better acquainted both with human nature and the nature of the Divine law, and of God's moral government of the world, steps in, and makes the proper discriminations; acquits Job on the ground of their accusations, but condemns him for his too great self-confidence, and his trusting too much in his external righteousness; and, without duly considering his frailty and imperfections, his incautiously arraigning the providence of God of unkindness in its dealings with him. This was the point on which Job was particularly vulnerable, and which Elihu very properly clears up. Because he was righteous tn his own eyes] The Septuagint, Syriac, Arabic, and Chaldee, all read, "Because he was righteous in THEIR eyes;" intimating, that they were now convinced that he was a holy man, and that they had charged him foolishly. The reading of these ancient versions is supported by a MS. of the thirteenth century, in Dr. Kennicott's collections; which, instead of בעיניו beeinaiv, in His eyes, has בעיניהם beeineyhem, in THEIR eyes. This is a reading of considerable importance, but it is not noticed by De Rossi. Symmachus translates nearly in the same way: Διατοναυτονδικαιονφαινεσθαιεπ' αυτων; Because he appeared more righteous than themselves.

1. he was righteous] i. e. would admit no guilt, or, was in the right in his plea against God. Job’s friends abandoned further argument with him because they could not move him from his assertion that God afflicted him wrongly and unjustly; comp. ch. Job 27:2-6.

So these three men ceased to answer Job - Each had had three opportunities of replying to him, though in the last series of the controversy Zophar had been silent.

1. Righteous in his own eyes — The friends had failed to convince him of unrighteousness.