If I wash myself with snow water,

And make my hands never so clean :

Yet wilt thou plunge me in the ditch,

And mine own clothes shall abhor me.

For he is not a man, as I am, that I should answer him,

That we should come together in judgement;

There is no daysman betwixt us,

That might lay his hand upon us both.

And Job appeals to God himself against this oppression of his own handiwork.

Thine hands have framed me

And fashioned me together round about ;.

Yet thou dost destroy me.

Remember, I beseech thee, that thou hast fashioned me as clay;

And wilt thou bring me into dust again?

Hast thou not poured me out as milk,

And curdled me like cheese?

Thou hast clothed me with skin and flesh,

And knit me together with bones and sinews.

It is but a small boon that the creature asks of his Creator: that he may be let alone for a brief space

Before I go whence I shall not return:

Even to the land of darkness and of the shadow of death:

A land of thick darkness, as darkness itself;

A land of the shadow of death, without any order,

And where the light is as darkness.

Zophar is deeply shocked at a spectacle he has never beheld in all his long life, a good man questioning a visible judgment of God.

Canst thou by searching find out God?

Canst thou find out the Almighty unto perfection?

It is high as heaven;

What canst thou do?

Deeper than Sheol;

What canst thou know?

The measure thereof is longer than the earth,

And broader than the sea,

There is no course for Job but to set his heart aright, and put iniquity far away; then shall he again lift up a spotless countenance before God.

For thou shalt forget thy misery;

Thou shalt remember it as waters that are passed away :

And thy life shall be clearer than the noonday;

Though there be darkness, it shall be as the morning.

Before the persistent dogmatism of the three Friends Job loses more and more the patience which had stood the shocks of the Adversary.

:

No doubt but ye are the people,

And wisdom shall die with you.

But I have understanding as well as you;

I am not inferior to you:

Yea, who knoweth not such things as these?

The just man is made a laughing-stock, and the tents of robbers prosper and yet the very beasts of the field can tell the inquirer that the hand of the Lord is responsible for every breath of every living thing. What, do the Friends stand forth as representatives of Wisdom? Nay,

With HIM is wisdom and might;

He hath counsel and understanding.

Priests and counsellors spoiled, kings bound and unbound, the mighty overthrown, speech reft from the trusty, and understanding from the elders, contempt poured upon princes, and the belt of the strong loosed these declare the Wisdom to which alone Job will appeal. Will the Friends lie on God's behalf? Will they be partial advocates in his cause?

Though he slay me, yet will I wait for him:

Nevertheless I will maintain my ways before him.

Job appeals to God against God's own dealings, and never doubts the issue of his appeal. And yet he is so feeble to plead his cause : a driven leaf, a fettered prisoner, a moth-eaten rag! And the time left for his vindication is so short!

Man that is born of a woman

Is of few days, and full of trouble;

He cometh forth like a flower, and is cut down,
He fleeth also as a shadow and continueth not.

For there is hope of a tree, if it be cut down,
That it will sprout again,

And that the tender branch thereof will not cease;

Though the root thereof wax old in the earth,
And the stock thereof die in the ground,

Yet through the scent of water it will bud,
And put forth boughs like a plant.

But man dieth, and wasteth away :

Yea, man giveth up the ghost, and where is he?

As the waters fail from the sea,

And the river decayeth and drieth up,

So man lieth down and riseth not;

Till the heavens be no more, they shall not awake,

Nor be roused out of their sleep.

A strange fancy plays for a moment with the emotions of the

sufferer,

a fancy that the Grave itself might be sweet, if only

there might come the vindication beyond it.

Oh that thou wouldest hide me in Sheol,

That thou wouldest keep me secret, until thy wrath be past,

That thou wouldest appoint me a set time, and remember me!

- If a man die, shall he live again?—

All the days of my warfare would I wait, till my release should come;
Thou shouldest call, and I would answer thee:

Thou wouldest have a desire to the work of thine hands.

But Job dismisses the thought as vain.

Surely the mountain falling cometh to nought,

And the rock is removed out of its place,

The waters wear the stones,

The overflowings thereof wash away the dust of the earth:

And thou destroyest the hope of man:

Thou prevailest for ever against him, and he passeth;
Thou changest his countenance, and sendest him away;
His sons come to honour, and he knoweth it not;

And they are brought low, but he perceiveth it not of them;
Only for himself his flesh hath pain,

And for himself his soul mourneth.

It has come to the turn of Eliphaz again to speak: he is shocked that Job should resist the united appeals Second Cycle

On his side, Eliphaz says, and perhaps as he speaks he lays his hand upon the shoulder of Zophar, are the aged and greyheaded, men much older than Job's father. Then he proceeds to formulate again the doctrine of the unfailing judgment upon sin, a judgment never so certain as when it appears for the time to be delayed.

The wicked man travaileth with pain all his days,

Even the number of years that are laid up for the oppressor.

A sound of terrors is in his ears;

In prosperity the spoiler shall come upon him :

He believeth not that he shall return out of darkness,

And he is waited for of the sword.

Job cries out against such miserable consolation as this: for his comfort he will go to a very different source.

O earth, cover not thou my blood,

And let my cry have no resting-place.

Even now, behold, my Witness is in heaven,

And He that voucheth for me is on high.

But once more the certainty of an ultimate vindication is overshadowed by the thought of the rapidly flitting life.

If I look for Sheol as mine house;

If I have spread my couch in the darkness;
If I have said to corruption, Thou art my father;
To the worm, Thou art my mother, and my sister;
Where then is my hope?

Bildad rebukes Job's discomposure of manner.

Thou that tearest thyself in thine anger,

Shall the earth be forsaken for thee?

Or shall the rock be removed out of its place?

He sternly reiterates the doctrine of judgment, and images of doom flow freely. Nets and toils are under the feet of the sinner, gins and snares are all about him; his strength is hungerbitten and the firstborn of death devours his members; brimstone is scattered upon his habitation; he is driven from light into darkness and chased out of the world.

Such reiteration simply drives Job to stronger and stronger selfassertion in set terms he declares that God subverteth him in his cause, and denies him the judgment for which he calls. And God has removed all other succour from him: his kinsfolk have failed him, his acquaintance are estranged, his very household look upon him as an alien.

Have pity upon me, have pity upon me, O ye my frien 's,

For the hand of God hath touched me!

But the weakness of a moment is transformed into a burst of strength, as he proceeds to lay his hopes upon a help from above.

Oh that my words were now written!
Oh that they were inscribed in a book!

That with an iron pen and lead

They were graven in the rock for ever!

For I know that MY VINDICATOR LIVETH,

And that he shall stand up at the last upon the earth;

And after my skin hath been thus destroyed,

Yet without my flesh shall I see God!

Whom I shall see on my side,

And mine eyes shall behold, and not another!