Job Chapter 5

From The Open Bible Project

5:1 "Call now; is there any who will answer you? To which of the holy ones will you turn?

• (a) He wills Job to consider the example of all who have lived or live godly, whether any of them are like him in raging against God as he does.

5:2 For resentment kills the foolish man, and jealousy kills the simple.

• (b) Murmuring against God in afflictions increases the pain, and uttered man’s folly.

5:3 I have seen the foolish taking root, but suddenly I cursed his habitation.

• (c) That is, the sinner that does not have the fear of God.
• (d) I was not moved by his prosperity but knew that God had cursed him and his.

5:4 His children are far from safety. They are crushed in the gate. Neither is there any to deliver them,

• (e) Though God sometimes allows the father’s to pass in this world, yet his judgments will light on their wicked children.
• (f) By public judgment they will be condemned and no one will pity them.

5:5 whose harvest the hungry eats up, and take it even out of the thorns. The snare gapes for their substance.

• (g) Though there are only two or three ears left in the hedges, yet these will be taken from him.

5:6 For affliction doesn't come forth from the dust, neither does trouble spring out of the ground;

• (h) That is, the earth is not the cause of barrenness and man’s misery, but his own sin.

5:7 but man is born to trouble, as the sparks fly upward.

• (i) Which declares that sin is always in our corrupt nature: for before sin it was not subject to pain and affliction.

5:8 "But as for me, I would seek God. I would commit my cause to God,

• (k) If I suffered as you do, I would seek God.

5:9 who does great things that can't be fathomed, marvelous things without number;

• (l) He counsels Job to humble himself to God to whom all creatures are subject and whose works declare that man is inexcusable unless he glorifies God in all his works.

5:10 who gives rain on the earth, and sends waters on the fields;

• (m) He shows by particular examples what the works of God are.

5:11 so that he sets up on high those who are low, those who mourn are exalted to safety.

5:12 He frustrates the devices of the crafty, So that their hands can't perform their enterprise.

5:13 He takes the wise in their own craftiness; the counsel of the cunning is carried headlong.

5:14 They meet with darkness in the day time, and grope at noonday as in the night.

• (n) In things plain and evident they show themselves fools instead of wise men.
• (o) This declares that God punishes the worldly wise as he threatened in (Deuteronomy 28:29).

5:15 But he saves from the sword of their mouth, even the needy from the hand of the mighty.

• (p) That is, he who humbles himself before God.
• (q) He compares the slander of the wicked to sharp swords.

5:16 So the poor has hope, and injustice shuts her mouth.

• (r) If the wicked are compelled by God’s works to shut their mouths, how much more they who profess God.

5:17 "Behold, happy is the man whom God corrects. Therefore do not despise the chastening of the Almighty.

5:18 For he wounds, and binds up. He injures, and his hands make whole.

5:19 He will deliver you in six troubles; yes, in seven there shall no evil touch you.

• (s) He will send trouble after trouble that his children may not for one time, but continually trust in him: but they sill have a comfortable issue, even in the greatest and the last, which is here called the seventh.

5:20 In famine he will redeem you from death; in war, from the power of the sword.

5:21 You shall be hidden from the scourge of the tongue, neither shall you be afraid of destruction when it comes.

5:22 At destruction and famine you shall laugh, neither shall you be afraid of the animals of the earth.

• (t) While the wicked lament in their troubles, you will have occasion to rejoice.

5:23 For you shall be in league with the stones of the field. The animals of the field shall be at peace with you.

• (u) When we are in God’s favour, all creatures will serve us.

5:24 You shall know that your tent is in peace. You shall visit your fold, and shall miss nothing.

• (x) God will so bless you that you will have opportunity to rejoice in all things, and not be offended.

5:25 You shall know also that your seed shall be great, Your offspring as the grass of the earth.

5:26 You shall come to your grave in a full age, like a shock of grain comes in its season.

• (y) Though the children of God have not always carried out this promise, yet God recompenses it otherwise to their advantage.

5:27 Look this, we have searched it, so it is. Hear it, and know it for your good."

• (z) We have learned these points by experience, that God does not punish the innocent, that man cannot compare in justice with him, that the hypocrites will not prosper for long, and that the affliction which man sustains comes for his own sin.