Job 8

Job 8:1

4. Bildad’s First Speech (Chap. 8)The name Bildad may mean son of contention, which would be a very appropriate meaning, since this friend of Job seems to love controversy. Ridout compares Bildad to Eliphaz in style and knowledge as follows: There is perhaps less of the courtesy and dignity which marked the speech of Eliphaz, together with some harshness toward Job, caused apparently by the bitter charge of the latter against God. With all his ignorance of divine principles, Bildad is jealous of the honor of God, and cannot allow Him to be accused. In this he is surely right, but he fails to convince Job because of the root error in the thoughts, indeed, of them all: God must punish sin, and Job must be a sinner for he is being punished. 8:1-7 Accusing Job of irresponsible and blustery speech, Bildad defends the justice of God in punishing the wicked and rewarding the upright. He says unkindly that Job’s sons were destroyed because of their transgression. There is no indication of this, and even had there been, it was a cruel thing to say to a man in great sorrow and suffering. But if Job would earnestly turn to God, says Bildad, there was still hope for divine favor. 8:8-22 He next appeals to history to prove the link between evil and retribution. Just as reeds wither when there is no water, so is the doom of the irreligious and the hypocrite. (Verse 16a may be an allusion to the absorption of chlorophyll from sunlight.) God delights to replace the wicked with the blameless, whom He then proceeds to bless.