time (i.e., in the manifold circumstances of life under which we are called to feel the dependence of our nature). Torn away from God, he cannot be heard, he cannot indeed pray and find any consolation in God. It is most clearly manifest here, since Job compares his condition of suffering with that of a חנף, what comfort, what power of endurance, yea, what spiritual joy in the midst of suffering (התענג, as Job 22:26; Psa 37:4, Psa 37:11; Isa 55:2; Isa 58:13), which must all remain unknown to the ungodly, he can draw from his fellowship with God; and seizing the very root of the distinction between the man who fears God and one who is utterly godless, his view of the outward appearance of the misfortune of both becomes changed; and after having allowed himself hitherto to be driven from one extreme to another by the friends, as the heat of the controversy gradually cools down, and as, regaining his independence, he stands before them as their teacher, he now experiences the truth of docendo discimus in rich abundance. I will instruct you, says he, in the hand, i.e., the mode of action, of God (בּ just as in Psa 25:8, Psa 25:12; Psa 32:8; Pro 4:11, of the province and subject of instruction); I will not conceal עם־שׁדּי אשׁר, i.e., according to the sense of the passage: what are the principles upon which He acts; for that which is with (אם) any one is the matter of his consciousness and volition (vid., on Job 23:10).Job 27:12 is of the greatest importance in the right interpretation of what follows from Job 27:13 onwards. The instruction which Job desires to impart to the friends has reference to the lot of the evil-doer; and when he says: Behold, ye yourselves have beheld (learnt) it all, - in connection with which it is to be observed that אתּם כּלּכם does not signify merely vos omnes, but vosmet ipsi omnes, - he grants to them what he appeared hitherto to deny, that the lot of the evil-doer, certainly in the rule, although not without
