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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.comKeil and Delitzsch Commentary - Job 35:1 - 35:1
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This Chapter Verse Commentaries:
1 Then began Elihu, and said:
2 Dost thou consider this to be right,
Sayest thou: my righteousness exceedeth God's,
3 That thou sayest, what advantage is it to thee,
What doth it profit me more than my sin?
4 I will answer thee words,
And thy companions with thee.
The neutral זֹאת, Job 35:2, refers prospectively to כִּי־תֹאמַר, Job 35:3: this that thou sayest. חָשַׁב with acc. of the obj. and לְ of the predicate, as Job 33:10, comp. Job 13:24, and freq. The second interrogative clause, Job 35:2, is co-ordinate with the first, and the collective thought of this ponderous construction, Job 35:2, Job 35:3, is this: Considerest thou this to be right, and thinkest thou on this account to be able to put thy righteousness above the divine, that, as thou maintainest, no righteousness on the side of God corresponds to this thy righteousness, because God makes no distinction between righteousness and the sin of man, and allows the former to go unrewarded? צִדְקִי (for which Olsh. wishes to read צַדַקְתִּי, as Job 9:27 אמרתי for אָמְרִי) forms with מֵאֵל a substantival clause: justitia mea est prae Deo (prae divina); מִן comparative as Job 32:2, comp. on the matter Job 34:5, not equivalent to ἀπό as Job 4:17. כי־תאמר is first followed by the oratio obliqua: what it (viz., צדקך) advantageth thee, then by the or. directa (on this change vid., Ew. §338, a): what profit have I (viz., בצדקי), prae peccato meo; this מִן is also comparative; the constantly ambiguous combination would be allowable from the fact that, according to the usage of the language, “to obtain profit from anything” is expressed by הֹועִיל בְּ, not by הועיל מִן. Moreover, prae peccato meo is equivalent to plus quam inde quod pecco, comp. Psa 18:24, מֵעֲוֹנִי, Hos 4:8 אֶל־עֲוֹנָם. We have already on Job 34:9 observed that Job has not directly said (he cites it, Job 21:15, as the saying of the ungodly) what Elihu in Job 35:3 puts into his mouth, but as an inference it certainly is implied in such utterances as Job 9:22. Elihu's polemic against Job and his companions (רֵעֶיךָ are not the three, as lxx and Jer. translate, but the אַנְשֵׁי אָוֶן, to whom Job is likened by such words as Job 34:8, Job 34:36) is therefore not unauthorized; especially since he assails the conclusion together with its premises. In the second strophe the vindication of the conclusion is now refuted.