Albert Barnes Commentary Job 9:21

"I am perfect; I regard not myself; I despise my life." — Job 9:21 (ASV)

Though I were perfect - The same mode of expression occurs here again. “Were I perfect! I would not know it or recognize it. If this were my view, and God judged otherwise, I would seem to be ignorant of it. I would not mention it.”

Yet would I not know my soul - Or, “I could not know my soul. If I should advance such a claim, it must be from my ignorance of myself.” Is this not true of all the claims to perfection that humans have ever made? Do they not demonstrate that the one making such a claim is ignorant of their own nature and character? This seems so clear to me that I have no doubt Job expressed, more than three thousand years ago, what will be found true to the end of time: that if a person advances the claim to absolute perfection, it is conclusive proof that they do not know their own heart.

A superficial view of ourselves, mingled with pride and vanity, may lead us to think that we are wholly free from sin. But who can tell what a person would be if placed in other circumstances? Who knows what latent depravity would be developed if they were thrown into temptations?

I would despise my life - Dr. Good, I think, has well expressed the sense of this. According to his interpretation, it means that the claim of perfection would, in fact, be disowning all the consciousness a person had of sinfulness, all the arguments and convictions pressed upon them by their reason and conscience that they were a guilty person. Schultens, however, has given an interpretation that differs slightly from this, and one that Rosenmuller prefers: “Although I should be wholly conscious of innocence, yet that clear consciousness could not sustain me against the infinite splendor of the divine glory and majesty; but I should be compelled to appear ignorant of my own soul, and to reprobate, condemn, and despise my life passed with integrity and virtue.” This interpretation is in accordance with the connection and may be sustained by the Hebrew.