Job
Changes this passage only. Set your default for every passage.
Job 3
Job 3
Commentary · verses 1-26
1After this opened Job his mouth, and cursed his day.
1After this opened Job his mouth, and cursed his day.
Commentary · verse 1
Job cursed the day he was born. Job did not curse God.
2And Job answered and said: 3Let the day perish wherein I was born, And the night which said, There is a man-child conceived.
4Let that day be darkness; Let not God from above seek for it, Neither let the light shine upon it.
5Let darkness and the shadow of death claim it for their own; Let a cloud dwell upon it; Let all that maketh black the day terrify it.
2And Job spake, and said,
3Let the day perish wherein I was born, and the night in which it was said, There is a man child conceived.
4Let that day be darkness; let not God regard it from above, neither let the light shine upon it.
5Let darkness and the shadow of death stain it; let a cloud dwell upon it; let the blackness of the day terrify it.
Commentary · verses 2-5
Remember, this was a man who was in an extreme amount of pain. Not only physically (which would have been terrible by itself) but also mental, emotional, and spiritual anguish! It was not wrong of Job to exclaim his affliction.
6As for that night, let thick darkness seize upon it: Let it not rejoice among the days of the year; Let it not come into the number of the months.
7Lo, let that night be barren; Let no joyful voice come therein.
8Let them curse it that curse the day, Who are ready to rouse up leviathan.
9Let the stars of the twilight thereof be dark: Let it look for light, but have none; Neither let it behold the eyelids of the morning: 10Because it shut not up the doors of my mother’s womb, Nor hid trouble from mine eyes.
11Why died I not from the womb? Why did I not give up the ghost when my mother bare me?
12Why did the knees receive me? Or why the breasts, that I should suck?
6As for that night, let darkness seize upon it; let it not be joined unto the days of the year, let it not come into the number of the months.
7Lo, let that night be solitary, let no joyful voice come therein.
8Let them curse it that curse the day, who are ready to raise up their mourning.
9Let the stars of the twilight thereof be dark; let it look for light, but have none; neither let it see the dawning of the day:
10Because it shut not up the doors of my mother’s womb, nor hid sorrow from mine eyes.
11Why died I not from the womb? why did I not give up the ghost when I came out of the belly?
12Why did the knees prevent me? or why the breasts that I should suck?
Commentary · verses 6-12
Major Story Conflict: Job began asking WHY. Job wanted understanding of WHY he received evil/destruction. This was the Conflict for the rest of this book.
13For now should I have lain down and been quiet; I should have slept; then had I been at rest, 14With kings and counsellors of the earth, Who built up waste places for themselves; 15Or with princes that had gold, Who filled their houses with silver: 16Or as a hidden untimely birth I had not been, As infants that never saw light.
17There the wicked cease from troubling; And there the weary are at rest.
18There the prisoners are at ease together; They hear not the voice of the taskmaster.
19The small and the great are there: And the servant is free from his master.
20Wherefore is light given to him that is in misery, And life unto the bitter in soul; 21Who long for death, but it cometh not, And dig for it more than for hid treasures; 22Who rejoice exceedingly, And are glad, when they can find the grave?
23Why is light given to a man whose way is hid, And whom God hath hedged in?
13For now should I have lain still and been quiet, I should have slept: then had I been at rest,
14With kings and counsellors of the earth, which built desolate places for themselves;
15Or with princes that had gold, who filled their houses with silver:
16Or as an hidden untimely birth I had not been; as infants which never saw light.
17There the wicked cease from troubling; and there the weary be at rest.
18There the prisoners rest together; they hear not the voice of the oppressor.
19The small and great are there; and the servant is free from his master.
20Wherefore is light given to him that is in misery, and life unto the bitter in soul;
21Which long for death, but it cometh not; and dig for it more than for hid treasures;
22Which rejoice exceedingly, and are glad, when they can find the grave?
23Why is light given to a man whose way is hid, and whom God hath hedged in?
Commentary · verses 13-23
Job struggled with this question: "Why are we given the ability to understand and then prevented from understanding?"
24For my sighing cometh before I eat, And my groanings are poured out like water.
25For the thing which I fear cometh upon me, And that which I am afraid of cometh unto me.
24For my sighing cometh before I eat, and my roarings are poured out like the waters.
25For the thing which I greatly feared is come upon me, and that which I was afraid of is come unto me.
Commentary · verses 24-25
Some teachers use verse 25 to state this as the reason why Job was destroyed, as if "he had sinned because he feared destruction." Again, God and the author said Job did not deserve the destruction, so these teachers are, by implication, calling God a liar. Second, "feared" in this verse meant "to be startled," like from an alarm. It would be like hearing a police siren, then getting into fear, and then finding out the police siren was for you. This siren/alarm that he heard came upon him. This "fear" happened after the destruction.
26I am not at ease, neither am I quiet, neither have I rest; But trouble cometh.
26I was not in safety, neither had I rest, neither was I quiet; yet trouble came.
Commentary · verse 26
Job concluded his opening statement. Job asked why the destruction happened.
Job 1-3 covered the causes for Job's suffering (God handled a causal disagreement with Satan in a contrastive fashion) and Job's initial statement to his three comforters.
Everyone was created uniquely. I call this who you ARE. A person's ARE ought to be the cause of what they DO and what they HAVE.
The question everyone is asking themselves and each other is "Who are you?" The typical answers to this question sound something like this: mother, student, Christian, etc. Do these responses explain who you ARE? Or are they focused on what you DO and HAVE?
One of the tools needed to answer this question better is causality. The law of causality says that for every effect there is a cause. When applied to people, it translates as: what we ARE is a cause and the effect is what we DO. However, there is a second part to this cause-and-effect process that is equally important: what we DO is a cause, and the effect is what we HAVE.
The world tells us the opposite. The world tells us that what we HAVE will determine what we DO, and what we DO determines who we ARE. This is one of the equations behind advertising: "You need to HAVE this product so you can DO this thing and then people (or yourself) will believe you ARE a certain type of person." Think of any pickup truck commercial: "If you HAVE this truck, you can DO this job, and then BE (ARE) this type of man."
This worldview is extremely short-term because it is trying to take the shortcut of believing that effects prove causes. We see this when people mourn their lack of money or possessions because they are not able to be the person they were meant to be.
Job's DO and HAVE were now gone and all that was left was his ARE. For the rest of this story, we are looking at a man who was solely in his ARE...