Thomas Aquinas Commentary Job 11

In the preceding speech (Job 10:16), Job had remarked with wonder that among the evils he was suffering, he was being tormented by his friends, who rose against him like witnesses speaking for God. Zophar, who was provoked by this argument, answers. The text says, “Then Zophar the Naamathite answered, ‘Should not a man of many words be answered?’” He means: You have spoken many things in a disordered way, so it is not surprising that you are censured by your friends. For if a man who speaks many things were not censured, it would follow that men would be considered righteous simply because they talked a lot. So the text continues, “Or will a glib man be justified?” that is, will he be considered just? Since Job could have argued that he should be shown deference because of his dignity, Zophar preempts this objection, saying, “Will men keep silent for you alone? When you have mocked others, will no one answer you?” He understood Job had mocked the others because he called them witnesses for God (Job 10:17) and had said earlier, “Why do you slander true ideas?” (Job 6:25). So he says Job should not be surprised if the others also speak against him.

Job might have replied that they had no reason to reproach him or his words. To reject this, Zophar continues, “For you have said: My speech is pure.” He interprets Job's words this way based on what he had already said, “You will find no evil on my tongue, nor will stupidity resound on my lips” (Job 6:30); and “I am clean in your sight.” Job had not said this explicitly, but Zophar chose to interpret his words as an argument that he was not being punished for sin (Job 10:14). He also infers the same interpretation from Job's statement, “Know that I have done nothing wicked” (Job 10:7), and from “Have I not dissembled? Was I not silent?” (Job 3:26).

However, one should be careful to note that since sin is a turning away from the law of God, one cannot know if something is a sin, or the magnitude of that sin, without knowing the law of God, for “the straight line is the measure of both itself and the crooked.” Therefore, since Job said he was free from sin, or at least had not sinned as gravely as his punishment suggested, Zophar concluded that Job did not perfectly understand the law of God. Therefore he says, “Would that God would speak with you and open His lips to you!” He seems to want to insult Job, who had asked, “Tell me why You judge me so” (Job 10:2). God is said to speak to a person simply when He inspires something of His wisdom in that person's heart, according to the Psalm, “I will hear what my God says to me” (Psalms 85:8). However, God opens His lips when He reveals something to people through His works. For words are formed externally with the lips to express the internal concepts of the heart.

Take note that we fail to understand divine things in two ways. First, since we can only know the invisible things of God through the things that have been made (Romans 1:20), and since created things express the Creator's power very weakly, many things about the Creator must remain hidden from us. These are called the secrets of the wisdom of God. He speaks about these, saying, “to show you the secrets of His wisdom.”

Second, we are not even able to completely understand the very order of creatures in itself, in the way it is governed by divine providence. For divine government functions very differently from human government. Among humans, a ruler is considered superior to the extent that his ordering extends only to more universal considerations, leaving the particular details of government to his subordinates. Thus, the law under a higher ruler is universal and simple. But God's rule is superior precisely because His ordering power extends even to the most insignificant matters. Thus, the law of His rule is secret not only because of the supreme nature of the Ruler, which completely exceeds any proportion to a creature, but also because of the complexity with which He governs every single thing, even the most isolated and insignificant, according to a fixed order. So he continues, “His law is versatile.”

One must reflect on this not only in natural things, in that they are subject to the rule of God, but also in human affairs. Human laws address certain universal things that happen in the majority of cases because those who frame them cannot consider every single case. The manner in which universal human statutes should be applied to individual deeds is left to the prudence of the administrator. Therefore, a person can fall short of righteousness in many ways that are still not contrary to positive human law. But divine law extends to all particulars, even to the most insignificant things, because it exists in the wisdom of God. Thus, a person cannot be at odds with righteousness in some matter and not be in violation of the divine law.

Since a person cannot attain the divine law itself as if investigating things hidden in the wisdom of God, and consequently cannot understand its complexity, he sometimes does not think he is acting against the law of God when in fact he is, or he thinks he is sinning a little when he is sinning a lot. So Zophar then says, “Then you would understand”—that is, if the secrets of God’s wisdom and the complex character of His law had been revealed to you—“that He is punishing you much less,” in the punishments you are sustaining, “than your evil deserves,” an evil of which you are either unaware or which you think is small. In this, Zophar seems to be criticizing what Job had said earlier: “Would that my sins for which I merit Your anger were weighed in a balance, and the calamity I suffer were weighed in the scales. They would be heavier than the sand of the sea” (Job 6:2–3).

Because Zophar believed there was some hidden secret in God's wisdom not yet revealed to Job, he strengthens this opinion in what follows, trying to make it so certain that Job cannot deny it. He says, “Will you perhaps understand the footprints of God?” Footprints are signs of someone walking on a road. Thus, the works of God are called His road, and the creation of creatures by God is understood as a kind of procession of God into His creation. This is because the divine good—which exists simply and supremely in God—proceeds from Him by degrees into His effects, with higher creatures understood as being better than lower ones. Therefore, the footprints of God are certain signs found in creatures by which God can be known in a certain sense. But since the human mind cannot fully and perfectly understand creatures in themselves, much less can it have perfect knowledge of the Creator Himself. Therefore, he then asks, “and will you perfectly discover the Almighty?” as if to say: If you cannot know creatures perfectly, you can know the Creator even less. He specifically says “discover” because reason proceeds by a process of investigation from effects to their cause. As soon as reason knows the causes through the effects, we are said to have “discovered” them.

One should also not be surprised if the Creator is not known when creatures are not perfectly understood, because even if creatures were perfectly known, the Creator would still not be. For a cause can be perfectly known through its effects only when the effects are equal in power to the cause. This is not true of God. So he continues, “He is higher than heaven—what can you do? He is deeper than Sheol—what can you know? His measure is longer than the earth and broader than the sea.” He says these things metaphorically. He does not mean that God, who is incorporeal, is divided into physical dimensions. Instead, he describes the greatness of God's power using the metaphor of immense physical size. This is because no matter how great the dimensions of bodies may seem—in height, depth, length, or breadth—they are still insufficient when compared to the greatness of God's power, for He can always make greater things. This is why he plainly attributed “omnipotence” to God earlier (Job 11:7). From this, he shows that God cannot be discovered perfectly through His creatures. Even if all creatures were perfectly known, one could not adequately know from them a power equal to God's. How can one measure the power of God, which exceeds every creature? He highlights this difficulty when he asks, what can you do? and what can you know?

Divine power not only exceeds every being in producing them, but also in preserving them in being. For the preservation of a creature comes from God alone, and there is no power in the creature that could resist the divine will if He no longer willed to preserve it. So he continues, “If He wills to sweep them all away,” by reducing them to nothing, that is, by taking away their being, “or draw them together into a mass,” by confusing them when He takes away the order that distinguishes things, “who will contradict Him?” What power of the creature will be able to oppose His will? To prevent the argument that God is somehow duty-bound to preserve things in being, Zophar next rejects this, adding, “Or who can say to Him: ‘Why did You do this?’” as if trying to demand an explanation from Him for some duty He had overlooked.

After Zophar has shown that there is something hidden in divine wisdom that is incomprehensible to people, he proceeds to clarify something he had only supposed before: namely, that God exacts punishment for sin. He concludes with certainty that God knows the deeds of humanity.

So he says, "I am right in saying that God is exacting smaller penalties from you than your evil deserves," because "He knows the vanity of man"—that is, the vain deeds of men. Things are commonly called "vain" when they are unstable because they have not been fixed on their proper ends. The vanity of man, then, comes from the fact that his heart is not fixed on the truth, by which alone it can be securely founded. Because he withdraws from the truth, he does evil when he desires what is an apparent good in place of what is truly good.

So he then asks, "When God sees something wicked"—produced by the vanity of men—"should He not consider it" as worthy of punishment? For a judge who sees a sin seems to pass over it without consideration when he keeps it secret and chooses not to punish it. This cannot be said about God. When He sees the vanity of men, He exacts punishment for their evil.

Just as a man turns to evil from vanity, so from that same vanity he does not think he is subject to divine judgment. He therefore continues, "The vain man puffs himself up with pride," so that he does not believe he is subject to a superior. So he continues, "He thinks he is born as free as the foal of a wild ass." The foal of a wild ass is born free from human domestication. However, the foals of donkeys born in human possession are born to serve human needs. Thus, people who do not think they are subject to divine judgment think they are like the foals of wild donkeys, even though they see other people in the same condition being compelled by divine judgment.

He seemed to say this to insult blessed Job, taking Job’s words as an argument with God as if with an equal, when Job said, May he withdraw his rod from me, let terror of him not frighten me. I will speak and not be afraid of him (Job 9:34). So Zophar continues, "But you have hardened your heart," and so you defend your evil. "Yet, you have stretched out your hands to God" in prayer in this state of hard-heartedness, when you said, I will say to God: Do not condemn me (Job 9:34). Therefore, your prayer is useless. For prayer is useful only when a person first puts evil aside and then asks God to stop the punishment.

He speaks to this theme, saying, "If you will take away the evil which is on your hands"—that is, if you desist from the evil work you still have on your hands—"and if wickedness will not remain in your tent"—that is, if you make restitution for what you have unjustly taken and stored away. This also means you must correct the members of your household, for masters are sometimes punished for the delinquencies of their household because of their negligence in correcting them.

"Then you will lift up your head" in prayer to God, "free from stain"—that is, free from fault. In this way, your condemnation will end. First, regarding the future, he says, "and you will be stable," so that you are not shaken by later trials. Also, "you will not fear" future dangers. For sometimes, although a person does not fear the future, he is still afflicted by what he has lost or suffered. He continues, "Your misery also," which you have suffered until now, "you will forget" because of the superabundance of goods that will come to you. He strengthens this with an example, saying, "and you will not remember them, like floods that have passed." He says this either because a person forgets the floods that happened during the rainy season once calm returns, or because the floodwaters rush swiftly away, and after they are gone, no memory of them remains.

But since Job had proposed two arguments against the promise of prosperity in this life—the devastation of his own body, when he said, Decay clothes my flesh (Job 7:5), and the passing of his days, when he said, My days have passed more quickly... (Job 7:6)—Zophar now answers both objections. He says, "The radiance of noon will come to you in the evening." This is to say: Although it seems to you that your days have passed and your life is almost over, like the twilight, such great prosperity can still come to you that it will nearly lead you back to the joy of your youth. For just as old age is understood by "twilight," so youth is understood by "noon." He calls the clarity of earthly prosperity "radiance."

Then, against what Job had said about the wasting away of his body, Zophar says, "although you thought that you have been consumed" by the weakness you have suffered, "you will arise like the morning star," because your body will return to its youthful beauty.

Since Job had also said above that his days were used up without any hope (Job 7:6), Zophar then says, "You will have confidence when hope has been offered to you." Because Job had also rejected the opinion of those who said that a person returns to this same kind of life after death, after many centuries have passed (see Job 7:16 and following), Zophar does not propose that kind of hope to him. Instead, he proposes the kind of hope in which people live on after death in the memories of others.

This happens in two ways:

• First, in the graves where the bodies of the dead are placed, so that their memory is preserved. This is why they are even called monuments. To show this, Zophar says, "When you have been buried, you will sleep safe in the grave," as if to say: No one will violate your tomb, nor should you fear that anyone might try. He then adds, "You will rest, and there will be no one to frighten you."
• Second, the dead live on in the memories of people because of the good deeds they did while alive, which made their lives desirable. Addressing this, he says, "many will intercede in longing for your face"—that is, many will earnestly desire your presence or show reverence for your tomb, remembering your good deeds.

Having promised these rewards if Job is willing to depart from evil, Zophar consequently shows that these rewards are not given to the wicked. So he continues, "The eyes of the wicked will fail," because they will not obtain the good they desire. For someone's eyes are said to fail when he looks to obtain something but is not strong enough to get it. Just as the wicked cannot obtain the goods they desire, so too they cannot avoid the evils they suffer or fear. So he continues, "they will lose every means of flight," because they will not be able to flee from evil.

After death, however, they will not be held in veneration or missed. Instead, they will be held in abomination because of the evils they have done. He addresses this theme by saying, "and their hope is the loathing of the soul," which means that what they can hope for after death is to be an object of abomination.