Charles Ellicott Commentary Job 25

Then answered Bildad. —Bildad attempts no formal reply to Job’s statements; he merely falls back upon the position twice assumed by Eliphaz before (Job 4:17–21; Job 15:14–16), and twice allowed also by Job (Job 14:4)—the impossibility of man being just with God—and therefore implies the impiety of Job in maintaining his righteousness before God. God, he says, is almighty, infinite, and absolute. How can any man contend with Him, or claim to be pure in His sight? This is the final speech of the friends.

Bildad no longer accuses Job; he practically admits that he and his companions were defeated in argument, since he attempts no reply, but reiterates truisms that are independent of the specific matter at hand. Job, in Job 23:3-12, had spoken of his longing for the Divine judgment; so Bildad labours to deprive him of that confidence, as though he would say, “I have nothing to do with your facts, nor can I explain them; but be that as it may, I am certain that you, or any mortal man, cannot be pure in the sight of God.”

Dominion and fear are with him. — He is absolute in sovereignty and awesome in power, so that even in His high places, and among His celestial hosts, He maintains peace and harmony.

Is there any number of His armies? —He is also so glorious that He dispenses His glory to His innumerable hosts of angels. Glorious as they are, they only reflect His glory; and what, then, must His own glory be? But if so, how utterly hopeless it is for man to think he can have any purity to compete with His, or that He will acknowledge it as such. Man is also by nature and birth unclean .

Even to the moon and stars, pure and chaste as their light is, they are not clean before Him , for the stars rise and set, and once in every month the moon hides her face.

How much less man ... — Compare Psalms 8:4; Psalms 22:6; Isaiah 41:14, and others.