Job 13:4

13:1-12 With self-preference, Job declared that he needed not to be taught by them. Those who dispute are tempted to magnify themselves, and lower their brethren, more than is fit. When dismayed or distressed with the fear of wrath, the force of temptation, or the weight of affliction, we should apply to the Physician of our souls, who never rejects any, never prescribes amiss, and never leaves any case uncured. To Him we may speak at all times. To broken hearts and wounded consciences, all creatures, without Christ, are physicians of no value. Job evidently speaks with a very angry spirit against his friends. They had advanced some truths which nearly concerned Job, but the heart unhumbled before God, never meekly receives the reproofs of men.

(4) Ye are forgers of lies. —He now retorts upon his friends in terms not more deferential than their own, and calls them scrapers together, or patchers up, of falsehood, and physicians who are powerless to heal, or even to understand the case. He feels that they have failed miserably and utterly to understand him.

Job 13:4-5 . Ye are forgers of lies — That is, authors of false doctrine, namely, that great afflictions are peculiar to hypocrites and wicked men. All physicians of no value — Unfaithful and unskilful; prescribing bad remedies: and misapplying good ones. O that ye would altogether hold your peace — The best proof of your wisdom would be never to say a word more of these matters; for then your ignorance and folly would be concealed, which are now made manifest by your speaking concerning what you do not understand. Thus Solomon, Proverbs 17:28 , “Even a fool, when he holdeth his peace, is counted wise: and he that shutteth his lips is esteemed a man of understanding.”

Verse 4. - But ye are forgers of lies . A harsh expression, indicating that Job was thoroughly exasperated. The lies which his friends had forged were, partly, misrepresentations of what he had said, as for example Job 11:4 , but mainly statements, more or less covert, which implied that he had brought all his calamities on himself by a course of evil-doing (see Job 4:7, 8 ; Job 8:13, 14 ; Job 11:11, 14, 20 ). Ye are all physicians of no value . Job's friends had come to him to "comfort" him ( Job 2:11 ), and act as physicians of his soul. But they had entirely failed to be of the least service. They had not even understood his case. Job 13:4

4 . but ye are forgers of lies ] The but in Job 13:3 had for its background the knowledge of the Divine wisdom ( Job 13:1-2 ); Job knows this well, but for all his knowledge of it he desires to plead his cause before God, he will speak unto the Almighty. This desire and purpose, however, are crossed by the thought of the use which his friends make of the Divine wisdom against him, and he is diverted from his great object to administer a rebuke to them— but ye are forgers of lies. Job 13:4-12 are therefore a digression, the main object being resumed in Job 13:13 ; the digression, however, is profoundly interesting. In clause one Job tells his friends that their assumptions of his guilt and the application which they made to his case of the Divine omniscience are false; in the second he compares them to ignorant physicians, who take in hand a disease which they are incompetent to treat.

But ye are forgers of lies - The word lies here seems to be used in a large sense, to denote sophisms, false accusations, errors. They maintained false positions; they did not see the exact truth in respect to the divine dealings, and to the character of Job. They maintained strenuously that Job was a hypocrite, and that God was punishing him for his sins. They maintained that God deals with people in exact accordance with their charactor in this world, all of which Job regarded as false doctrine, and asserted that they defended it with sophistical arguments invented for the purpose, and thus they could be spoken of as "forgers of lies." Physicians of no value - The meaning is, that they had come to give him consolation, but nothing that they had said had imparted comfort. They were like physicians sent for to visit the sick, who could do nothing when they came; compare Job 16:2.

3 But I would speak to the Almighty, And I long to reason with God. 4 And ye however are forgers of lies, Physicians of no value are ye all. 5 Oh that ye would altogether hold your peace, It would be accounted to you as wisdom. 6 Hear now my instruction, Ando hearken to the answers of my lips! He will no longer dispute with the friends; the more they oppose him, the more earnestly he desires to be able to argue his cause before God. אוּלם (Job 13:3) is disjunctive, like ἀλλά, and introduces a new range of thoughts; lxx ου ̓ μήν δὲ ἀλλά, verum enim vero. True, he has said in Job 9 that no one can maintain his cause before God; but his confidence in God grows in proportion as his distrust of the friends increases; and at the same time, the hope is begotten that God will grant him that softening of the terror of His majesty which he has reserved to himself in connection with this declaration (Job 9:34, comp. Job 13:20.). The infin. absol. הוכח, which in Job 6:25 is used almost as a substantive, and indeed as the subject, is here in the place of the object, as e.g., Isaiah 5:5; Isaiah 58:6 : to prove, i.e., my cause, to God (אל־אל, like Job 13:15, אל־פּניו) I long. With ואוּלם (Job 13:4) the antithesis is introduced anew: I will turn to God, you on the contrary (καὶ ὑμεῖς δὲ).

Since the verb טפל, from its primary meaning to spread on, smear on (whence e.g., Talmudic טפלה, the act of throwing on, as when plastering up the cracks of an oven), cogn. תּפל (whence תּפל, plaster, and perhaps also in the signification tasteless, Job 6:6 equals sticky, greasy, slimy), does not signify, at least not at first, consuere, but assuere (without any relation of root with תּפר), we explain, not with Olshausen and others, concinnatores mendacii, such as sew together lies as patchwork; but with Hirzel and others, assutores mendacii, such as patch on lies, i.e., charge falsely, since they desire throughout to make him out to be a sinner punished according to his desert. This explanation is also confirmed by Job 14:17. Another explanation is given by Hupfeld: sarcinatores false equals inanes, inutiles, so that שׁקר signifies what lies equals what deceives, as in the parallel member of the verse אלל, (Note: In the Talmudic, the jugular vein, the cutting of which produces death, is called אלל (later עצב, Arab. ‛ṣb), according to which (b. Chullin 121a) it is explained: healer of the jugular artery, i.e., those who try to heal what is incurable, therefore charlatans, - a strange idea, which has arisen from the defective form of writing אלל. The lxx translates ἰαταὶ κακῶν.) nothingness, and also עמל (Job 16:2) in a similar connection, is not an objective but attributive genitive; but Psalm 119:69 is decisive against this interpretation of שׁקר טפלי.