Job 31:40

31:33-40 Job clears himself from the charge of hypocrisy. We are loth to confess our faults, willing to excuse them, and to lay the blame upon others. But he that thus covers his sins, shall not prosper, Pr 28:13. He speaks of his courage in what is good, as an evidence of his sincerity in it. When men get estates unjustly, they are justly deprived of comfort from them; it was sown wheat, but shall come up thistles. What men do not come honestly by, will never do them any good. The words of Job are ended. They end with a bold assertion, that, with respect to accusation against his moral and religious character as the cause for his sufferings, he could appeal to God. But, however confident Job was, we shall see he was mistaken, chap. 40:4,5; 1Jo 1:8. Let us all judge ourselves; wherein we are guilty, let us seek forgiveness in that blood which cleanseth from all sin; and may the Lord have mercy upon us, and write his laws in our hearts!

Let thistles grow instead of wheat, and cockle instead of barley,.... This is an imprecation of Job's, in which he wishes that if what he had said was not true, or if he was guilty of the crimes he denied, that when and where he sowed wheat, thorns or thistles might come up instead of it, or tares, as some Jewish writers (d) interpret it; and that when and where he should sow barley, cockle, or darnel, or any "stinking" or "harmful" weed (e), as the word signifies, might spring up in room of it; respect seems to be had to the original curse upon the earth, and by the judgment of God is sometimes the case, that a fruitful land is turned into barrenness for the wickedness of them that dwell in it, Genesis 3:18 ; the words of Job are ended; which is either said by himself, at the close of his speech; thus far says Job, and no farther, having said enough in his own defence, and for the confutation of his antagonists, and so closes in a way of triumph: or else this was added by Moses, supposed to have written this book; or by some other hand, as Ezra, upon the revision of it, and other books of the Old Testament, when put in order by him: and these were the last words of Job to his friends, and in vindication of himself; for though there is somewhat more said afterwards by him, and but little, yet to God, and by way of humiliation, acknowledging his sin, and repentance for it with shame and abhorrence; see Job 40:3.

Jarchi, and so the Midrash, understand this concluding clause as all imprecation of Job's; that if he had done otherwise than he had declared, he wishes that these might be his last words, and he become dumb, and never open his mouth more; but, as Bar Tzemach observes, the simple sense is, that his words were now completed and finished, just as the prayers of David, the son of Jesse, are said to be, Psalm 72:20. (d) Bar Tzemach, et alii. (e) "herba foetens", Montanus, Bolducius; "spina foetida", Drusius; "vitium frugum", Junius & Tremellius, Piscator; "labrusca", Cocceius, Schultens.

40 . For “thistles” perhaps thorns is more accurate. The word translated “cockle” means perhaps any noisome weed. The concrete expressions, however, add to the vigour of the passage. Some have thought that these last verses (38–40) have been misplaced, and ought to be introduced at some other point in the chapter, allowing Job’s challenge Job 31:35-37 to be the last words which he utters. To modern feeling the passage would thus gain in rhetorical effect; but it is not certain that the Author’s taste would have coincided with modern feeling in this instance. And it is difficult to find in the chapter a suitable place where the verses could be inserted. If the verses belong to the passage at all, which there is no reason to doubt, they seem to stand in the only place suitable for them. The concluding statement “the words of Job are ended” hardly belongs to the Author of the Book. It is the remark of some editor or copyist, who drew attention to the fact that Job’s connected discourses here come to an end. It is rather hazardous to draw any critical conclusion from it in reference to the immediately following speeches of Elihu.

Verse 40. - Let thistles grow instead of wheat, and cockles instead of barley . Then let me be appropriately punished by finding the land, whereof I have wrongfully become possessed, produce nothing but thistles (or thorns) and noxious weeds, such as cockles (Authorized Version) or hemlock (Professor Lee). The words of Job are ended . This may be regarded either as Job's own conclusion of his long speech, or as a remark of the author's. On the whole, the former view is to be preferred. Job 31:40

40. thistles—or brambles, thorns. cockle—literally, "noxious weeds." The words … ended—that is, in the controversy with the friends. He spoke in the book afterwards, but not to them. At Job 31:37 would be the regular conclusion in strict art. But Job 31:38-40 are naturally added by one whose mind in agitation recurs to its sense of innocence, even after it has come to the usual stopping point; this takes away the appearance of rhetorical artifice. Hence the transposition by Eichorn of Job 31:38-40 to follow Job 31:25 is quite unwarranted.

Let thistles grow; - Genesis 3:18 . Thistles are valueless; and Job is so confident of entire innocence in regard to this, that he says he would be willing, if he were guilty, to have his whole land overrun with noxious weeds. And cockle - Cockle is a well known herb that gets into wheat or other grain. It has a bluish flower, and small black seed, and is injurious because it tends to discolor the flour. It is not certain by any means, however, that this is intended here. The margin is, noisome weeds. The Hebrew word באשׁה bo'shâh is from באשׁ bâ'ash, "to have a bad smell, to stink," and was given to the weed here referred to on that account, compare Isaiah 34:3. The cockle however, has no unpleasant odor, and the word here probably means noxious weeds. So it is rendered by Herder and by Noyes. The Septuagint has βάτος batos, bramble; the Vulgate, spina, thorn; Prof. Lee, prunus sylvestris, "a bramble resembling the hawthorn;" Schultens, labrusca, wild vine. The words of Job are ended - That is, in the present speech or argument; his discussions with his friends are closed. He spoke afterward, as recorded in the subsequent chapters, but not in controversy with them. He had vindicated his character, sustained his positions, and they had nothing to reply. The remainder of the book is occupied mainly with the speech of Elihu, and with the solemn and sublime address which God himself makes.

38 If my field cry out against me, And all together its furrows weep; 39 If I have devoured its strength without payment, And caused the soul of its possessor to expire: 40 May thistles spring up instead of wheat, And darnel instead of barley. The field which he tills has no reason to cry out on account of violent treatment, nor its furrows to weep over wrong done to them by their lord. (Note: In a similar figure a Rabbinic proverb says (with reference to Malachi 2:13), that the altar of God weeps over him who separates himself from the wife of his youth.) אדמה, according to its radical signification, is the covering of earth which fits close upon the body of the earth as its skin, and is drawn flat over it, and therefore especially the arable land; תּלם (Arab. telem, not however directly referable to an Arab. root, but as also other words used in agriculture, probably borrowed from the North Semitic, first of all the Aramaic or Nabataic), according to the explanation of the Turkish Kamus, the "ditch-like crack which the iron of the ploughman tears in the field," not the ridge thrown up between every two furrows (vid., on Psalm 65:11). He has not unlawfully used (which would be the reason of the crying and weeping) the usufruct of the field (כּח meton., as Genesis 4:12, of the produce, proportioned to its capability of production) without having paid its value, by causing the life to expire from the rightful owner, whether slowly or all at once (Jeremiah 15:9).

The wish in Job 31:40 is still stronger than in Job 31:8, Job 31:12 : there the loss and rooting out of the produce of the field is desired, here the change of the nature of the land itself; the curse shall and must come upon it, if its present possessor has been guilty of the sin of unmerciful covetousness, which Eliphaz lays to his charge in Job 22:6-9. According to the view of the Capuchin Bolducius (1637), this last strophe, Job 31:38, stood originally after Job 31:8, according to Kennicott and Eichhorn after Job 31:25, according to Stuhlmann after Job 31:34. The modern expositors retain it in its present position. Hirzel maintains the counter arguments: (1) that none of the texts preserved to us favour the change of position; (2) that it lay in the plan of the poet not to allow the speeches of Job to be rounded off, as would be the case by Job 31:35 being the concluding strophe, but to break off suddenly without a rhetorical conclusion. If now we imagine the speeches of Elihu as removed, God interrupts Job, and he must cease without having come to an end with what he had to say.