Fathers

Job 17

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“My spirit is consumed. My days are extinct, and the grave is ready for me. Surely there are mockers with me. My eye dwells on their provocation. “Now give a pledge. Be collateral for me with yourself. Who is there who will strike hands with me? For you have hidden their heart from understanding, Therefore you will not exalt them. He who denounces his friends for plunder, Even the eyes of his children will fail. “But he has made me a byword of the people. They spit in my face. My eye also is dim by reason of sorrow. All my members are as a shadow. Upright men will be astonished at this. The innocent will stir himself up against the godless. Yet the righteous will hold to his way. He who has clean hands will grow stronger and stronger. But as for you all, come back. I will not find a wise man among you. My days are past. My plans are broken off, as are the thoughts of my heart. They change the night into day, saying ‘The light is near’ in the presence of darkness. If I look for Sheol as my house, if I have spread my couch in the darkness, if I have said to corruption, ‘You are my father;’ to the worm, ‘My mother,’ and ‘My sister,’ where then is my hope? as for my hope, who will see it? Shall it go down with me to the gates of Sheol, or descend together into the dust?”

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What the Fathers say

Job 17:3

Western Saints

Gregory the Dialogist

Ver. 3. Set me free, and put me beside thee, and let the hand of anyone fight against me. For He did not sin either in thought or deed: He was made to 'abide in bitterness' by His Passion, He was 'set free' by the Resurrection, He was 'put beside' the Father by His Ascension; in that having gone up into heaven He sitteth on the right hand of God. And because, after the glory of His Ascension, Judaea was stirred up in the persecuting of His Disciples, it is rightly said here, Let the hand of anyone fight against me. …

Morals on the Book of Job, Book XIII ↗

Thomas Aquinas

For Job understood that he alone could free him who placed him in the power of the evil one. (16:12) Truly he was not praying to be freed from adversity like those who would procure earthly prosperity after the adversity, but he prayed to be led to high-mindedness, and so he then says, "and place me near you." For since God is the very essence of good, it is necessary that he who is placed close to God, be freed from evil. …

Commentary on Job ↗