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Elihu continued his answer and said,2 📚“Listen to my words, you wise men, and give ear to me, you who have understanding.
3 📚For the ear tests words as the mouth tastes food.
4 📚Let us choose for ourselves what is just, let us find out among ourselves what is good.
34:1-4 Elihu believes his words to be so manifestly wise that if anyone has any discernment he will be forced to concede it (see Job 36:4).⚜
5 📚“For Job has said, ‘I am righteous, and God has taken away justice from me.
6 📚Should I lie about my right? My wound is incurable, though I am without transgression.’
7 📚What man is like Job, who drinks up scorn like water?
8 📚He goes in the company of evildoers, and walks with wicked men.
9 📚For he has said, ‘It profits a man nothing for him to delight in God.’
34:5-9 He now sets forth what he thinks Job’s position is. In v 5 he quotes some of Job’s words (Job 13:18; 27:2). In vs 6 and 9 he gives what he thinks is the essence of some of the things Job says. Job knew that when he claimed to live a righteous life his friends did not believe him, and that circumstances seemed to testify against him. Job never used the words of v 9, but Elihu thought he meant this from the words he did use (Job 9:21-24; 21:7-9; 24:12).
But Job also said things that indicate he sometimes thought the opposite of this (Job 21:14-16; 27:7-23; 28:28). Elihu is being most unfair to Job in his accusations in vs 7,8. The lover of justice (Job 37:23) can himself be unjust. Verse 7 suggests a constant thirst for mocking. Elihu is saying Job loves to use scornful language. Zophar accused him of the same thing (Job 11:3). Job did scorn some of his friends’ remarks, but this is because he saw that they were worthy of scorn. It is clear that Elihu with all his professed wisdom did not understand Job.⚜
10 📚“Therefore listen to me, you men of understanding. Far be it from God to act wickedly, and from the Almighty to commit iniquity!
11 📚For he will repay a man according to his deeds, and sees that everyone finds the reward for his ways.
12 📚Yes, certainly God will not act wickedly, nor will the Almighty pervert justice.
34:10-12 Elihu now begins to defend God’s justice against what he thinks are Job’s attacks. He has a very high view of God’s justice. Whatever may have happened to Job, however Job may question God’s justice, whatever may happen in the world, whatever suffering and calamities may come on men, one thing is absolutely certain – God can do no wrong. (How true this is – compare Gen 18:25; Deut 32:4; Ps 11:7; 89:14; Jer 9:24; Acts 7:31; Rev 16:7). In v 11 Elihu says that God gives to men according to their deeds. This indeed is the essence of justice and is often stated in the Bible (Ps 62:12; Prov 24:12; Jer 32:19; Ezek 33:20; Matt 16:27; Rom 2:6; Rev 22:12).
However, like the three friends, Elihu assumed that this reward or punishment of deeds was taking place now in this world. He knew nothing, of course, of the judgments revealed in the New Testament (Matt 25:33-36; Acts 17:31; 2 Cor 5:10; Rev 20:11-15). So Elihu is really saying just what the three friends said – Job is guilty and receiving the just punishment for his bad deeds. So Elihu has not been able to give a better reason for Job’s sufferings than they did.⚜
13 📚Who put him in charge of the earth? Or who has appointed him over the whole world?
14 📚If he sets his heart on it 📖, and gathers back to himself his Spirit and his breath,
15 📚All flesh would perish together, and man would turn again to dust.
34:13-15 God is the absolute sovereign of the universe and can do what He will. He does not need to give an answer to anyone.⚜
16 📚“Now if you have understanding hear this; listen to the sound of my words.
17 📚Should one who hates the right govern? And will you condemn the most just one?
34:17 Verse 5; Job 40:8.⚜
18 📚Is it proper to say to a king, ‘You are wicked?’ And to princes, ‘You are ungodly?’
19 📚How much less the One who does not show favouritism to princes, or regard the rich more than the poor! For they are all the work of his hands.
20 📚In a moment they die in the middle of the night, and the people are troubled and pass away, and the mighty are taken away without a hand touching them.
21 📚“For his eyes are on the ways of man, and he sees all his steps.
22 📚There is no darkness or shadow of death where evildoers can hide themselves.
23 📚For he does not need to lay more charges on man, that he should go before him in judgment.
34:23 The Hebrew of the first phrase is very obscure and so the meaning is doubtful.⚜
24 📚Without investigation he breaks in pieces mighty men and sets up others in their place.
25 📚For he knows their deeds, and he overturns them in the night, so that they are destroyed.
26 📚He strikes them down as the wicked men they are, openly, in the sight of others,
27 📚Because they turned back from him and would not consider any of his ways,
28 📚Causing the cry of the poor to come to him; and he heard the cry of the afflicted.
29 📚When he gives quietness, who then can make trouble? And when he hides his face, who then can see him, whether this is done against a nation or against an individual?
30 📚He does this so that the hypocrite does not reign and the people are not ensnared.
34:18-30 God is completely impartial in His judgments. He sees all, knows all, and rules over all with justice.⚜
31 📚“For it is right to say to God, ‘I have borne punishment. I will not offend again.
32 📚Teach me what I do not see. If I have committed iniquity, I will not do so again.’
33 📚Should he reward you according to your terms, even though you refuse his way? You must choose, and not I. Therefore tell what you know.
34:31-33 Elihu wants Job to speak like the man in vs 31 and 32. If Job will not, Elihu is sure he cannot hope for God’s mercy.⚜
34 📚Let men of understanding say to me, a wise man who listens to me,
35 📚‘Job has spoken without knowledge, and his words were without wisdom.’
36 📚My desire is that Job may be tested to the utmost, for giving answers like wicked men.
37 📚For he adds rebellion to his sin. He scornfully claps his hands together among us, and multiplies his words against God”.
34:34-37 Since Job refuses to be a humble penitent, confessing his sins and begging for mercy, Elihu, like the three friends, is certain that Job is a rebellious sinner. Notice v 36. Did Elihu not realize that Job had already been tried to the utmost? What more did he desire Job to suffer? Some “mediator” Elihu is proving to be! Oh, who is like Christ the Lord! (Heb 2:17-18; 4:15-16; 1 John 2:1).⚜