Thomas Aquinas Commentary Job 7

Since Eliphaz previously spoke (Job 5:17–27) to move blessed Job from despair, he promised him earthly happiness if he would not reject the Lord’s rebuke. Here, after blessed Job has demonstrated the rational causes of his sorrow, he wants to further show that Eliphaz’s consolation—based on the promise of recovering earthly happiness—is unfitting. He first demonstrates this from the condition of the present life and then, later (in verse 5), from his own individual condition.

People’s opinions have differed about the condition of this present life. Some have held that ultimate happiness is experienced in this life, and the words of Eliphaz seem to follow this opinion.

The ultimate end of a person is in that place where he expects the final retribution for good or evil. Therefore, if a person is rewarded by God for good deeds and punished for evil deeds in this life, as Eliphaz is eager to prove, it seems necessary to conclude that a person’s ultimate end is in this life.

However, Job intends to disprove this opinion. He wants to show that our present life does not contain the ultimate end, but is related to this end as motion is to rest, or as a journey is to its destination. He therefore compares this life to states that are directed toward an end, namely, the state of soldiers who strive for victory in a military campaign. Thus, he says, Man’s life on earth is combat, as if to say: The present life we live on earth is not a state of victory, but a state of warfare. He also compares it to the state of a hired worker, adding, and his day like the day of the hireling—that is, the time of a person living on earth.

Job compares the present life to these two states because of two things that threaten a person in this life. First, one must resist hindrances and harmful things, and for this reason, life is compared to warfare. Second, one must also do work that is useful for the final end, and for this reason, life is compared to the work of a hired man.

From both images, we are given to understand that the present life is subject to divine providence, for soldiers fight under a general and hired men wait for their pay from an employer. The falsity of the opinion Eliphaz defended is also clear enough from these examples. It is obvious that an army’s general does not spare his strong soldiers from dangers or toils. Instead, the very nature of warfare sometimes demands that he expose them to both great dangers and difficult tasks. After the victory is won, the general honors more highly those who proved to be the strongest.

In the same way, the head of a household entrusts the more difficult tasks to the better hired hands, but on payday, he gives them higher wages. So too, divine providence does not arrange things so that the good are freed from the adversities and labors of this present life; rather, it rewards them more fully at the end.

Therefore, since Eliphaz’s entire position is undermined by these arguments, Job intends to strengthen his own points and demonstrate them effectively through reason. For clearly, everything comes to rest when it attains its ultimate end. So, once the human will has attained its ultimate end, it must rest in it and no longer be moved to desire anything else.

Our experience in this present life is contrary to this, for a person always desires the future, as if never content with what he has in the present. Clearly, then, the ultimate end is not in this life. Instead, this life is ordered toward another end, just as warfare is ordered toward victory and a hired man’s day is ordered toward his pay.

Note, however, that our desire tends toward the future for two reasons, because what we have now in this present life is not sufficient. First, because of the afflictions of this life, he introduces the example of the slave desiring shade, saying, Like the slave, worn out from the heat, he sighs for the shade, which refreshes him. Second, because of the lack of the perfect and final good that one does not possess here, he uses the example of the hired man, saying, or the workman for the end of his work. For the perfect good is the end of humanity.

Job then applies this, saying, So I have passed empty months, for he considered the past months empty because he did not obtain final perfection in them. He adds, and nights—that is, when he should have been resting from his afflictions—I have counted sleepless, meaning he considered them sleepless because he was delayed in attaining his end.

He next explains how his months have been empty and his nights sleepless, adding, If I sleep—that is, when it was time for sleeping at night—I say, ‘When will I arise?’ longing for the day. And again, when day has come, I wait for the evening, as he is always tending toward the future in his desire.

This desire is indeed the common experience of all people living on earth, but they feel it more or less according to the measure in which they are affected by either sorrows or joys. For one who lives in joy desires the future less, but one who lives in sorrow desires it more. So Job passionately shows this desire for the future is in him as he continues, I will be filled with pain until dark. Because of these pains, the present time is tedious for him, and he desires the future all the more.

The blessed Job has previously demonstrated that the comfort Eliphaz offered, which promised happiness in this earthly life, was unsuitable. He first showed this based on the general condition of human life on earth. Now, he intends to demonstrate that this same comfort is unsuitable for his own individual condition.

He presents two points that prevent him from hoping for prosperity on earth. The first is the severe physical weakness he was suffering. When someone is afflicted by such weakness, nothing can happen to make them happy in this life. Thus, he says, Decay clothes my flesh, as if to say, “My body is covered on all sides with infectious sores, just as a body is covered by a garment.” Since wounds that are tended to from the beginning usually heal, he shows that his sores were neglected when he says, and the filth of dust. This is because they were not cared for properly, as he was literally sitting on a dung heap, as the text has already shown (Job 2:8).

A person might sometimes hope for health even if their sores are neglected, provided they have a strong constitution. But Job lacked this natural strength, and so he says, my skin is dried up and wrinkled, because its natural moisture had been exhausted, either by old age or by his weakness. Therefore, there seems to be no opportunity left in this life for him to expect any happiness.

The second point is that the greater part of his life was already past. Therefore, with so little time remaining, he could not hope for much happiness. For this reason, he says, My days have passed swifter than a warp is cut off by a weaver. Human life is, in a sense, like something woven. Just as a weaver joins thread to thread to produce a cloth, and then cuts it from the loom when it is finished, so days are added to days to complete a person's life. When a life is complete, it is taken away. Yet he says that a person's days pass more swiftly than the cloth is cut away, because while the weaver rests from time to time, the time of a person's life slips away continuously, without interruption.

But one might object that even though the greater part of his life has passed, Job could still hope to return to his former state. Some have advanced the theory that after death, once many years have passed, a person returns to the same stages of life they had lived before. For example, a future Plato will lecture in Athens and do the same things he did before. Therefore, even if a person has lived most of their life, they could hope to be restored to happiness in this earthly life.

To eliminate this possibility, Job continues, and they have vanished, leaving no hope behind—that is, no hope of returning to his former days. He had already seemed to address God when he said, The life of man on earth is combat (Job 7:1). Now, to prove his point, he adds, Remember that my life is but a breath, like the wind. For just as the wind passes by and does not return, so a person's life does not return once it has passed. He continues in this vein: and my eye will not turn back to look on good things—that is, the good things of the earth which he once possessed but has now lost.

Just as he will not return to see earthly goods after his life has passed, so too he will not be seen by any eyes on earth. Thus, he continues, Nor will the eye of man look on me. He presents these two points to show that he will not return to human society, which consists chiefly in seeing and being seen. Since sight is the most acute of the senses, it holds a primary position in our sensory life. Although he says that after death he will not be seen by human eyes, he confesses that he will be seen by God's eye, saying, Your eyes will be on me. For the dead are seen by God, who observes spiritual things, because the dead live according to the spirit, not according to the flesh, which is what humans can see with their eyes.

One could interpret this to mean that God's eyes consider the dead not in their present state, but with regard to future things, as if a dead person were going to return to the life they lost. Therefore, to exclude this possibility, he continues, and I shall not endure, as if to say, “I say that Your eyes will be on me after death, but I will not be present again in this earthly state.” He proves this with a comparison, adding, As a cloud dissolves and is gone, so he who goes down below, will not ascend. The dead are said to go down to the underworld either because, before the death of Christ, all souls descended to Sheol, or because their bodies are buried under the earth. The specific interpretation here does not change the meaning of the present text, for he only wants to say that the dead do not return to their past life, and he proves this with a sufficient comparison.

As Aristotle says in On Generation, a kind of circular motion appears in both corruptible and incorruptible bodies. But there is a difference. In heavenly bodies, the very same object returns in the circular motion; for example, the same sun that sets returns at dawn. This is because the substance is not corrupted in such a change; only its location changes. However, in the motion of generation and corruption, the same individual does not return, but only the same species. It is clear that corresponding to the sun's annual circular motion, a type of circulation occurs in the atmosphere. For instance, in winter there are clouds, which are later dispersed in the summer. When winter returns, clouds return—yet not the identical clouds, but only clouds of the same kind, because the previous clouds perished completely. The same is true of humans. The same individuals who formerly existed do not return through generation, but only others of the same species.

From this, the solution to the argument of those who proposed a return to the same life and the same actions becomes clear. They believed that earthly matters are arranged according to the motion of the heavenly spheres; therefore, they thought that when the same constellation returned after a very long time, the same individual things would also return. But, as has been said, it is not necessary that the same individuals return, but only things of the same kind. Those thinkers believed that after a certain span of time, a dead person not only returned to life but also possessed the same belongings and houses as before. To disprove this, Job says, He will never return home again. They also held that he would perform the same works he had done before and hold the same offices and dignities. To exclude this position, he adds, and his place will know him no more, meaning he will not return to his former position. Here, the term “place” refers to a person's status, in the same way we might say, “He has a great place in this community.”

It is clear from these verses that Job is not denying the resurrection that our faith affirms, but rather a return to this carnal life—a view held by some Jews and certain philosophers. Nor does this contradict the scriptural accounts that state some people were brought back to this present life. For the one is done miraculously, while the other occurs according to the natural course of things, and it is the latter that Job is addressing here. Consider also that in saying, Remember that my life is but a breath, he was not suggesting that God could forget. Instead, he was speaking hypothetically, putting himself in the position of his adversaries. For if God were to promise the good things of this earthly life to a man whose life has, so to speak, already passed, it would almost seem as if God had forgotten that human life passes away like the wind, never to return.

After demonstrating through arguments that Eliphaz's consolation of earthly prosperity was inconsistent, Job now shows the same thing by arguing for its unsuitability. He argues that if he were to rely on the hope of earthly prosperity offered by Eliphaz, he would necessarily remain in sadness, speak words of sorrow, and fall into complete despair. This is because Eliphaz’s hope is worthless.

Job therefore concludes, as if arguing against Eliphaz’s proposition, that because the hope of earthly prosperity is vain and his friends have nothing else to console him with, he, as if lacking any true consolation, declares, I will not refrain from speaking. Instead, he will speak the words of lament that his mind suggests.

He continues, in the anguish of my spirit, I will speak, meaning that the trouble he suffers compels his spirit to speak. He suffers not only outward trouble but also the inward sadness born from it. So he adds, I will talk in the bitterness of my soul, for he will speak the desperate and almost unbelievable words that the bitterness of his soul provides.

Among other things, embittered people are especially accustomed to search for the causes of their bitterness, for there is hardly an embittered person who does not feel they have been afflicted either unjustly or more than is just. So Job, taking on the role of an embittered man, inquires about the cause of his affliction, saying, Am I the sea, or a whale that you surround me to lock me up?

Note here that God's providence works in one way for rational creatures and in another way for irrational creatures. Because of free will, rational creatures can merit or demerit, and because of this, rewards and punishments are due to them.

Irrational creatures, however, neither merit rewards nor incur punishments, since they do not have free will. Instead, God acts concerning them to increase or restrict them based on what is necessary for the good of the universe. According to this divine arrangement, God restrains the sea so that it does not cover the whole surface of the earth, making the earth a place for animals and land-based life. In a similar way, He confines the whale to the oceans, because if it were in other seas, it could harm someone. Job, therefore, seeks to know if there is a similar explanation for his affliction as there is for the confining of the sea and the whale—namely, whether he is afflicted not because of some fault, but for the benefit of others.

Job says he has been "surrounded to be locked up" in the sense that he is so burdened by his trial that no liberation or consolation is available to him. Consequently, he next proves that he is deprived of the remedies that ordinarily console the afflicted. One is sleep, for sorrow is lessened after sleep. To show this, he says, If I say: ‘My bed will comfort me,’ during the time of sleep.

Another remedy is the consolation wise people find for themselves through reasoned thought. He alludes to this cure when he says he hoped to be relieved from the oppression of sadness by talking to myself—that is, through rational deliberation—on my couch. For when wise people are alone, removed from the distractions of others and their interactions, they can better commune with themselves, thinking things through rationally.

But these cures could not help him, because when he should have used these remedies, other obstacles were present: terrible dreams and horrible visions that disturbed him. To express this, he continues, Then you will frighten me with dreams, which appear to someone sleeping, and with visions... will terrify me, which appear to someone who is awake but has lost the use of their outward senses.

Images at night are usually formed by thoughts experienced during the day. Because Job thought about sad things during the day, he was disturbed at night by similar images. The weakness of the body also contributes to people experiencing disturbing images while sleeping.

So then, when consolation is refused from every side and no way remains to escape so much anguish but death, Job therefore prefers even a miserable death to such a painful life. He expresses this by saying, This is why my soul has chosen hanging. So that no one would think this decision comes from a thought opposed by stronger ones, he insists that nothing in him is so strong that it does not desire death. So he says, My bones have chosen death. In Scripture, bones usually signify a person's strength.

He shows why he chooses this, saying, I have despaired, meaning, "I have lost the hope you gave me that I might enjoy earthly prosperity." He shows why he despaired, adding, I will not live longer to any purpose. Two things can be understood from this statement, which he had stated earlier (Job 7:6): that the greater part of his life had already passed, and that he will not return after this life to the same life he lived on earth.

This unsuitable conclusion—that Job would be led to despair, choose death, and have no way to restrain his sorrow—is the direct result of Eliphaz's consolation.

After Job has shown that the consolation of Eliphaz, which was based on the promise of earthly happiness, was leading him to despair and the desire for death, he then shows what hope remains for him from God: namely, that the trial placed upon him would cease.

He expresses this by saying, “Spare me, O Lord,” as if to say: I have abandoned the hope of earthly prosperity; it is enough for You to spare me and cease to afflict me. Since a person’s unhappiness and weakness usually lead others to spare them, he continues, “for my days are nothing.” This seems to refer to both human weakness and the brevity of life, applying to all people in general and to him in a special way, because his days were almost at an end.

Consequently, he pursues both points. First, regarding his weakness, he asks, “What is man”—that is, how small and frail a thing in body—“that you lift him up” by honoring him above other creatures, or “that you turn your heart toward him” by guarding and protecting him with special care?

Here, note that although all things are subject to divine providence and receive their greatness from God, some receive it in one way and others in another. For since all particular goods in the universe seem ordered toward the common good of the universe—just as a part is ordered to the whole and the imperfect to the perfect—they are arranged by divine providence according to this order. Note that insofar as some things share in perpetuity, they pertain essentially to the order of the universe. However, insofar as they lack perpetuity, they pertain only accidentally to the perfection of the universe, and not for their own sakes.

Therefore, things that are perpetual are ordered by God for their own sake, but things that are corruptible are ordered for the sake of other things. Things that are perpetual, either as individuals or as a species, are governed by God for their own sakes. But things that are corruptible as individuals and perpetual only as a species are ordered by God for the sake of the species, not the individual. This explains the good and evil that happens to irrational animals. For example, the fact that a lamb is killed by a wolf is not arranged by God because of the merit or demerit of that wolf or lamb, but for the good of the species, since food has been divinely ordained for the good of each species.

He expresses this by saying, “or because you turn your heart toward him,” when you provide for him for his own good. God does not turn His heart to the good of individual animals, but rather to the good of the species, which can exist perpetually.

He shows how God turns His heart toward humanity when he says, “You visit him at dawn”—that is, from the day of his birth, You help him by Your providence with things necessary for his life and glorification, whether they are physical or spiritual. “And immediately test him” through adversities, in which a person’s virtuous disposition is clearly revealed. As Sirach says, The oven proves the pot of the potter and the trial of trouble proves the just man . God is said to test a person not so that He may learn what kind of person he is, but to inform others and so that the person may know himself.

These words of Job are not to be understood as expressing contempt for God’s concern for humanity, but as investigating and wondering. For if a person is considered only outwardly, he seems small, fragile, and perishable. It would therefore be astonishing for God to have such great care for humanity unless there were something hidden within that makes us capable of perpetual existence. Thus, through inquiry and wonder, the opinion of Eliphaz is refuted. If there were no other life for humanity besides life on earth, we would not seem worth the great care God has for us. Therefore, the very care that God has especially for humanity demonstrates that there is another life after the death of the body.

Then he adds another reason God should spare him, taken from the brevity of life. He puts it in the form of a question, saying, “How long do you not spare me?” This is like saying: A person’s lifespan is short, and the greater part of my life is already past. Therefore, what end can be expected before You spare me? If You do not spare me now, I will not have even a brief time in which to rest. He shows his meaning when he says, “Won’t you leave me in peace to swallow my spittle?” For one cannot swallow saliva while speaking; it is necessary to pause briefly. He compares the time remaining in his life to this brief instant, as if to say: If You delay in sparing me, no rest will remain for me—not even the time it takes to swallow. This line of reasoning refutes Eliphaz's opinion, because if there is no other life for humanity besides this one on earth, there will be no time left for God to spare Job if He does not do so in this life.

Someone could object that Job was unworthy to be spared by God because his sins merited even greater affliction. This also follows from the opinion of Eliphaz, who thought that Job was being scourged because of his sins. So Job continues, “I have sinned,” as if to say: Granted that I have sinned and therefore deserved to be afflicted, there is still a reason why You should spare me. He adds three reasons for this, all related to human frailty. The first is taken from our powerlessness to make satisfaction. A person can do nothing by his own power worthy of compensating for the offense he has committed against God. This is what he means when he says, “What will I do for you, O guardian of men?” It is as if to say: If You have such great care for humanity, like a watchman requiring an account of our individual acts, my own powers are not sufficient to perform some act for which You will remit my sins. If this is what is expected, You would never spare me; therefore, please spare me despite this powerlessness.

The second reason is taken from humanity’s powerlessness to persevere. A person cannot persevere after the corruption of human nature without the grace of God. Thus, it is customary even in Sacred Scripture to say that God hardens or blinds someone, in the sense that He does not bestow on him the grace by which he might be softened and might see. Job speaks in this way, saying, “Why do you pit me against you?” That is, why did You not give me the grace of perseverance in this matter, so that I might not be opposed to You through sin? For whoever sins is opposed to God, since he spurns the divine commandments, which are either handed down in the written Law or naturally inscribed in human reason.

Note that reason is the strongest of all the powers of the soul. A sign of this strength is that reason commands the other powers and uses them for its own end. Yet it happens that reason is sometimes absorbed by concupiscence, anger, or the other passions of the lower part of the soul, and so a person sins. Nevertheless, the lower passions cannot hold reason bound; rather, reason always returns to its nature, by which it tends toward spiritual goods as its own proper end. Therefore, a kind of internal struggle occurs when reason resists the person who has sinned, having been absorbed by concupiscence or anger. Since a tendency toward similar acts has been added to the lower powers from past sins as a result of habit, reason cannot freely use the lower powers to order them to higher goods or withdraw them from lower ones.

Thus, a person becomes a burden even to himself in being opposed to God through sin. He shows this by saying, “Why have I become a burden to myself?” One sees in this that sin brings its own immediate punishment. Therefore, after this punishment, it seems a person should be spared more easily.

The third reason is taken from a person’s powerlessness to cleanse himself from sin. For a person sinks into sin by himself, but it is God’s role alone to remit sin. So Job asks, if his punishment will not cease as long as his sin remains, and since God alone can take away sin: “Why do you not take away my sin,” which I have committed against God or against myself? “Why do you not take away my iniquity,” if any has been committed against my neighbor?

Remember, Job does not ask these kinds of questions as a rash questioner of divine judgments, but to destroy the falsehood his adversaries were eager to assert—namely, that one should hope for good and evil from God based on human deeds in this life alone. If this view is asserted, the entire basis for divine judgments—by which He punishes people in this life for sin and remits sins in the next, foreordaining them to either predestination or reprobation—is thrown into confusion. If there is no future life, but only the present one, there would be no reason for God to delay sparing, justifying, or rewarding those whom He intends to.

So Job shows his own intention clearly, continuing, “Look! Now I will sleep in the dust,” as if to say, “The end of my life is almost here, when I will die and decay to dust.” One cannot hope to see tomorrow with certainty because of the uncertainty of death. So he says, “If you will look for me in the morning, I will no longer exist.” This means: I cannot promise myself life even until morning, much less a long span of life in which I could hope for You to spare me, if there is no other life.

Consider that Job proceeds in the manner of a debater, for whom it is sufficient at the beginning to disprove a false opinion and afterward to explain what he himself thinks is true. Note, too, that in these opening words, Job touched on three reasons why someone might be afflicted by God in this life:

1. That his malice may be restrained so he cannot harm others. He touched on this reason in the text, Am I the sea or a whale that you should surround me to lock me up? (Job 7:14).
2. To test a person in order to manifest his virtue. He touched on this in the text, You visit him at dawn and immediately test him (Job 7:18).
3. To punish sinners. He touched on this when he said, I have sinned, what will I do for you, you guardian of men.