Job 20:1 - Meaning and Application

Zophar speaks here with strong feeling. He is plainly upset by what Job has said. Because he has already decided that Job is a wicked man, he is offended that Job has spoken like an innocent man. So he cuts in sharply and says, “Therefore my thoughts make me answer” (Job 20:2).

He ignores Job’s appeal for pity and his claim of honesty. Instead, he seizes on the warning Job gave them at the end of his speech and treats it as a personal insult. Job had told them to be afraid of the sword, and Zophar seems determined not to look afraid. Often, people reject good advice most when it comes from an opponent.

Zophar was too quick to speak for a wise man, but he tries to defend his haste in two ways. First, he says Job has deeply offended him: “I have heard the rebuke that puts me to shame, and I cannot keep silent” (Job 20:3). Job’s friends, it seems, had too much pride to deal gently with a man in such pain. Proud people do not like being corrected, and they often call correction an insult.

Second, Zophar says his own thoughts pushed him to answer. In one sense, that is true, because what fills the heart comes out in speech. But he says this came from “the spirit of my understanding” (Job 20:3), as if reason itself had driven him. We should think carefully before we speak, and then answer with good judgment. Here, though, it is fair to wonder whether passion was speaking louder than wisdom. People often mistake anger for sound thinking.

Zophar then sets out to prove the ruin of wicked people, and he quietly suggests that Job’s suffering proves he is wicked and a hypocrite. He begins by appealing to Job’s own knowledge. “Do you not know this?” he asks (Job 20:4). In other words, can Job really be ignorant of something so plain, or doubt what all people have long agreed on? Anyone who does not know that sin leads to death knows very little.

He also appeals to the experience of all ages. This truth has been known since man was first placed on the earth. From the beginning, people have seen that sin brings punishment. Adam was driven out, and Cain was marked and cursed. Once sin entered the world, death entered with it. Everyone can see that trouble follows sinners, and that judgment does not let them go free (Acts 28:4; Isaiah 3:11).

Zophar states the rule very sharply: “The triumphing of the wicked is short, and the joy of the hypocrite is but for a moment” (Job 20:5). He is speaking not only about openly wicked people, but also about hypocrites, people who hide sin behind a show of religion. He assumes Job is one of them. A form of religion used as a cover for evil only makes guilt worse. Pretended holiness is double sin, and its punishment will be severe.

Still, Zophar admits that wicked people may prosper for a while. They may seem secure, calm, and full of joy. They may rejoice in wealth, power, and success, and even oppress their honest neighbors while feeling no danger themselves. Job’s friends had once been reluctant to admit that the wicked could prosper at all, but Job had pressed the issue until they could not deny it. Zophar now yields that point, but only to add that their good times will not last.

Their joy, he says, is only for a moment. It will soon end in lasting sorrow. No matter how great, rich, and cheerful a sinner may be, the hypocrite will be brought low, humbled, and made miserable.

Zophar then pictures this sinner at the highest possible point of success. He is not thinking of wisdom or goodness, but of worldly wealth and power. He imagines a man whose success reaches to the heavens, whose head touches the clouds, and who seems advanced in every way. The world has done all it can for him. He looks down on others with scorn, while they look up at him with envy, fear, or admiration. He may even seem fit for rule over many nations. And though he has made many enemies on the way up, he feels as safe as if he were beyond all danger.

But Zophar says such a man will fall terribly. “He shall perish forever” (Job 20:7). His pride and false security are clear signs of coming ruin. This is certainly true of all unrepentant sinners in the life to come, for they will be lost forever. Zophar is speaking mainly about this world, though, and he says that even here, some notorious sinners are suddenly cut off by judgment.

He describes that destruction in several ways. It will be shameful, like refuse thrown out and forgotten. The world will be glad to be rid of him (Psalm 119:119; Isaiah 66:24). It will also be sudden. He will be brought to ruin in a moment, and those who saw him only a moment before will ask, “Where is he?” (Psalm 73:19). How can someone so powerful vanish so quickly?

His destruction will also be swift. He will flee away, driven by his own terrors, and chased off by the curses of those around him, who are glad to see him gone (Job 20:8). And it will be complete. He will disappear like a dream, or like a night vision, something that seemed real for a moment but leaves nothing behind. Whatever once pleased the mind is gone, and only the memory of its foolishness remains.

At last, Zophar says the ruin will be final. “The eye that saw him will see him no more” (Job 20:9). The place where he stood will no longer look on him. He will be gone for good, as one who has received an eternal farewell when he goes to his own place, like Judas Iscariot (Acts 1:25).