11 Scatter abroad the wrath of thine anger, And see every proud one, and make him low.
`Now, I, Nebuchadnezzar, am praising and exalting and honouring the King of the heavens, for all His works `are' truth, and His paths judgment, and those walking in pride He is able to humble.'
And bowed down hath been the haughtiness of man, And humbled the loftiness of men, And set on high hath Jehovah alone been in that day.
Before His indignation who doth stand? And who riseth up in the heat of His anger? His fury hath been poured out like fire, And the rocks have been broken by Him.
and when his heart was high, and his spirit was strong to act proudly, he hath been caused to come down from the throne of his kingdom, and his glory they have caused to pass away from him, and from the sons of men he is driven, and his heart with the beasts hath been like, and with the wild asses `is' his dwelling; the herb like oxen they cause him to eat, and by the dew of the heavens is his body wet, till that he hath known that God Most High is ruler in the kingdom of men, and whom He willeth He raiseth up over it. `And thou, his son, Belshazzar, hast not humbled thy heart, though all this thou hast known; and against the Lord of the heavens thou hast lifted up thyself; and the vessels of His house they have brought in before thee, and thou, and thy great men, thy wives, and thy concubines, are drinking wine with them, and gods of silver, and of gold, of brass, of iron, of wood, and of stone, that are not seeing, nor hearing, nor knowing, thou hast praised: and the God in whose hand `is' thy breath, and all thy ways, Him thou hast not honoured.
In like manner, ye younger, be subject to elders, and all to one another subjecting yourselves; with humble-mindedness clothe yourselves, because God the proud doth resist, but to the humble He doth give grace; be humbled, then, under the powerful hand of God, that you He may exalt in good time,
and greater grace he doth give, wherefore he saith, `God against proud ones doth set Himself up, and to lowly ones He doth give grace?'
and to those contentious, and disobedient, indeed, to the truth, and obeying the unrighteousness -- indignation and wrath, tribulation and distress, upon every soul of man that is working the evil, both of Jew first, and of Greek;
I say to you, this one went down declared righteous, to his house, rather than that one: for every one who is exalting himself shall be humbled, and he who is humbling himself shall be exalted.'
For, lo, the day hath come, burning as a furnace, And all the proud, and every wicked doer, have been stubble, And burnt them hath the day that came, Said Jehovah of Hosts, That there is not left to them root or branch,
The pride of thy heart hath lifted thee up, O dweller in clifts of a rock, (A high place `is' his habitation, He is saying in his heart, `Who doth bring me down `to' earth?') If thou dost go up high as an eagle, And if between stars thou dost set thy nest, From thence I bring thee down, An affirmation of Jehovah.
`And yet for this I have caused thee to stand, so as to show thee My power, and for the sake of declaring My Name in all the earth; still thou art exalting thyself against My people -- so as not to send them away;
`Son of man, say to the leader of Tyre: Thus said the Lord Jehovah: Because thy heart hath been high, And thou dost say: A god I `am', The habitation of God I have inhabited, In the heart of the seas, And thou `art' man, and not God, And thou givest out thy heart as the heart of God,
And it hath come to pass, When the Lord doth fulfil all His work In mount Zion and in Jerusalem, I see concerning the fruit of the greatness Of the heart of the king of Asshur. And concerning the glory of the height of his eyes. For he hath said, `By the power of my hand I have wrought, And by my wisdom, for I have been intelligent, And I remove borders of the peoples, And their chief ones I have spoiled, And I put down as a mighty one the inhabitants, And my hand as to a nest Getteth to the wealth of the peoples, And as a gathering of forsaken eggs All the earth I -- I have gathered, And there hath not been one moving wing, Or opening mouth, or whispering.' -- Doth the axe glorify itself Against him who is hewing with it? Doth the saw magnify itself Against him who is shaking it? As a rod waving those lifting it up! As a staff lifting up that which is not wood! Therefore doth the Lord, the Lord of Hosts, Send among his fat ones leanness, And under his honour He kindleth a burning As the burning of a fire. And the light of Israel hath been for a fire, And his Holy One for a flame, And it hath burned, and devoured his thorn And his brier in one day. And the honour of his forest, and his fruitful field, From soul even unto flesh He doth consume, And it hath been as the fainting of a standard-bearer. And the rest of the trees of his forest `are' few, And a youth doth write them.
Send forth lightning, and scatter them, Send forth Thine arrows, and trouble them,
And it casteth at him, and doth not spare, From its hand he diligently fleeth.
It cometh to pass, at the filling of his belly, He sendeth forth against him The fierceness of His anger, Yea, He raineth on him in his eating.
now I have known that Jehovah `is' greater than all the gods, for in the thing they have acted proudly -- `He is' above them!'
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Matthew Henry Commentary » Commentary on Job 40
Commentary on Job 40 Matthew Henry Commentary
Chapter 40
Many humbling confounding questions God had put to Job, in the foregoing chapter; now, in this chapter,
Job 40:1-5
Here is,
Job 40:6-14
Job was greatly humbled for what God had already said, but not sufficiently; he was brought low, but not low enough; and therefore God here proceeds to reason with him in the same manner and to the same purport as before, v. 6. Observe,
God begins with a challenge (v. 7), as before (ch. 38:3): "Gird up thy loins now like a man; if thou hast the courage and confidence thou hast pretended to, show them now; but thou wilt soon be made to see and own thyself no match for me.' This is that which every proud heart must be brought to at last, either by its repentance or by its ruin; and thus low must every mountain and hill be, sooner or later, brought. We must acknowledge,
Job 40:15-24
God, for the further proving of his own power and disproving of Job's pretensions, concludes his discourse with the description of two vast and mighty animals, far exceeding man in bulk and strength, one he calls behemoth, the other leviathan. In these verses we have the former described. "Behold now behemoth, and consider whether thou art able to contend with him who made that beast and gave him all the power he has, and whether it is not thy wisdom rather to submit to him and make thy peace with him.' Behemoth signifies beasts in general, but must here be meant of some one particular species. Some understand it of the bull; others of an amphibious animal, well known (they say) in Egypt, called the river-horse (hippopotamus), living among the fish in the river Nile, but coming out to feed upon the earth. But I confess I see no reason to depart from the ancient and most generally received opinion, that it is the elephant that is here described, which is a very strong stately creature, of very large stature above any other, of wonderful sagacity, and of so great a reputation in the animal kingdom that among so many four-footed beasts as we have had the natural history of (ch. 38 and 39) we can scarcely suppose this should be omitted. Observe,