The Pulpit Commentary on Job 42:1-17

The Pulpit Commentary · Joseph S. Exell and contributors · Public domain

This concluding chapter divides into two parts. In the first part (Job 42:1-6) Job makes his final submission, humbling himself in the dust before God. In the second (verses 7-17) the historical framework, in which the general dialogue is set, is resumed and brought to a close. God's approval of Job is declared, and his anger denounced against the three friends, who are required to expiate their guilt by a sacrifice, and only promised forgiveness if Job will intercede on their behalf (verse 8). The sacrifice takes place (verse 9); and then a brief account is appended of Job's after life—his prosperity, his reconciliation with his family and friends, his wealth, his sons and daughters, and his death in a good old age, when he was "full of days" (verses 10-17.). The poetic structure, begun in Job 3:3, is continued to the end of Job 3:6, when the style changes into prose of the same character as that employed in Job 1:1-22; Job 2:1-13; and in Job 32:1-5.

Job 42:1, Job 42:2

Then Job answered the Lord, and said, I know that thou caner do every thing; i.e. I know and acknowledge thy omnipotence, which thou hast set forth so magnificently before me in ch. 38-41. It is brought home to me by the grand review of thy works which thou hast made, and the details into which thou hast condescended to enter. I know also and acknowledge that no thought can be with-holden from thee; i.e. I confess also thy omniscience—that thou knowest even the thoughts of all created beings (comp. Psalms 44:21; Psalms 139:2; Hebrews 4:13, etc.).

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