Fathers

Job 22

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Then Eliphaz the Temanite answered, “Can a man be profitable to God? Surely he who is wise is profitable to himself. Is it any pleasure to the Almighty that you are righteous? Or does it benefit him that you make your ways perfect? Is it for your piety that he reproves you, that he enters with you into judgment? Isn’t your wickedness great? Neither is there any end to your iniquities. For you have taken pledges from your brother for nothing, and stripped the naked of their clothing. You haven’t given water to the weary to drink, and you have withheld bread from the hungry. But as for the mighty man, he had the earth. The honorable man, he lived in it. You have sent widows away empty, and the arms of the fatherless have been broken. Therefore snares are around you. Sudden fear troubles you, or darkness, so that you can not see, and floods of waters cover you. “Isn’t God in the heights of heaven? See the height of the stars, how high they are! You say, ‘What does God know? Can he judge through the thick darkness? Thick clouds are a covering to him, so that he doesn’t see. He walks on the vault of the sky.’ Will you keep the old way, which wicked men have trodden, who were snatched away before their time, whose foundation was poured out as a stream, who said to God, ‘Depart from us;’ and, ‘What can the Almighty do for us?’ Yet he filled their houses with good things, but the counsel of the wicked is far from me. The righteous see it, and are glad. The innocent ridicule them, saying, ‘Surely those who rose up against us are cut off. The fire has consumed their remnant.’ “Acquaint yourself with him, now, and be at peace. By it, good will come to you. Please receive instruction from his mouth, and lay up his words in your heart. If you return to the Almighty, you will be built up, if you put away unrighteousness far from your tents. Lay your treasure in the dust, the gold of Ophir among the stones of the brooks. The Almighty will be your treasure, and precious silver to you. For then you will delight yourself in the Almighty, and will lift up your face to God. You will make your prayer to him, and he will hear you. You will pay your vows. You will also decree a thing, and it will be established to you. Light will shine on your ways. When they cast down, you will say, ‘be lifted up.’ He will save the humble person. He will even deliver him who is not innocent. Yes, he will be delivered through the cleanness of your hands.”

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What the Fathers say

Job 22:5

Western Saints

Gregory the Dialogist

Is it not for thy wickedness that is great, and thine iniquities that are infinite? Observe how from a deadened heart he came to idle words, and from idle words in the heinousness of lying he blazed out into insults. For these are the descents of increasing sin, that the tongue when not restrained should never there where it has fallen lie still, but be always descending to what is worse; but these things that are subjoined, because they are very plain taken after the history, do not need to be set forth after the letter. …

Morals on the Book of Job, Book XVI ↗

Thomas Aquinas

Then, since Job had said that the opinions of those who had said that his house had perished like "the tents of the wicked" (21:28) were unjust, Eliphaz intends to show that his opinion is right when he says, "Is it not because of your great malice and your infinite iniquities?", as if to say: God accuses you by afflicting punishments, not because of fear, but because of the love of justice, to punish your sins. …

Commentary on Job ↗