Job Chapter 24

From The Open Bible Project

24:1 "Why aren't times laid up by the Almighty? Why don't those who know him see his days?

• (a) Thus Job speaks in his passions, and after the judgment of the flesh: that is, that he does not see the things that are done at times, nor yet has a peculiar care over all, because he does not punish the wicked or avenge the godly.
• (b) When he punishes the wicked and rewards the good.

24:2 There are people who remove the landmarks. They violently take away flocks, and feed them.

24:3 They drive away the donkey of the fatherless, and they take the widow's ox for a pledge.

24:4 They turn the needy out of the way. The poor of the earth all hide themselves.

• (c) And for cruelty and oppression dare not show their faces.

24:5 Behold, as wild donkeys in the desert, they go forth to their work, seeking diligently for food. The wilderness yields them bread for their children.

• (d) That is, spares diligence.
• (e) He and his live by robbing and murdering.

24:6 They cut their provender in the field. They glean the vineyard of the wicked.

• (f) Meaning the poor man’s.
• (g) Signifying that one wicked man will not spoil another, but for necessity.

24:7 They lie all night naked without clothing, and have no covering in the cold.

24:8 They are wet with the showers of the mountains, and embrace the rock for lack of a shelter.

• (h) The poor are driven by the wicked into the rock and holes where they cannot lie dry for the rain.

24:9 There are those who pluck the fatherless from the breast, and take a pledge of the poor,

• (i) That is, they so pillage and plunder the poor widow that she cannot sustain herself that she may be able to nurse her baby.

24:10 So that they go around naked without clothing. Being hungry, they carry the sheaves.

24:11 They make oil within the walls of these men. They tread wine presses, and suffer thirst.

• (l) In such places which are appointed for that purpose; meaning, that those who labour for the wicked, are pined for hunger.

24:12 From out of the populous city, men groan. The soul of the wounded cries out, yet God doesn't regard the folly.

• (m) For the great oppression and extortion.
• (n) Cry out and call for vengeance.

24:13 "These are of those who rebel against the light. They don't know its ways, nor abide in its paths.

• (p) That is, God’s word, because they are reproved by it.

24:14 The murderer rises with the light. He kills the poor and needy. In the night he is like a thief.

24:15 The eye also of the adulterer waits for the twilight, saying, 'No eye shall see me.' He disguises his face.

• (q) By these particular vices and the licence of it, he would prove that God did not punish the wicked and reward the just.

24:16 In the dark they dig through houses. They shut themselves up in the daytime. They don't know the light.

24:17 For the morning is to all of them like thick darkness, for they know the terrors of the thick darkness.

24:18 "They are foam on the surface of the waters. Their portion is cursed in the earth. They don't turn into the way of the vineyards.

• (r) He flees to the waters for his succour.
• (s) They think that all the world is bent against them and dare not go by the highway.

24:19 Drought and heat consume the snow waters, so does [9] Sheol [See Job Footnotes 9] those who have sinned.

• (t) As the dry ground is never full with waters, so will they never cease sinning till they come to the grave.

24:20 The womb shall forget him. The worm shall feed sweetly on him. He shall be no more remembered. Unrighteousness shall be broken as a tree.

• (u) Though God tolerates the wicked for a time, yet their end will be vile destruction, and in this point Job commits to himself and shows his confidence.

24:21 He devours the barren who don't bear. He shows no kindness to the widow.

• (x) He shows why the wicked will not be lamented, because he did not pity others.

24:22 Yet God preserves the mighty by his power. He rises up who has no assurance of life.

• (y) He declares that after the wicked have destroyed the weakest, they will do the same to the stranger, and therefore are justly punished by God’s judgments.

24:23 God gives them security, and they rest in it. His eyes are on their ways.

24:24 They are exalted; yet a little while, and they are gone. Yes, they are brought low, they are taken out of the way as all others, and are cut off as the tops of the ears of grain.

24:25 If it isn't so now, who will prove me a liar, and make my speech worth nothing?"

• (z) That is, contrary to your reasoning no man can give perfect reasons for God’s judgments, let me be reproved.