Job 28:12 - Meaning and Application

Job has been speaking about the wealth of the world, which people value so highly and work so hard to get. Now he turns to something far more precious: wisdom and understanding, that is, knowing God and knowing ourselves rightly. People who discover new ways to make themselves rich may think they are very wise, but Job does not call that true wisdom. Even if they succeed and bring hidden things to light, as Job 28:11 says, Job still asks, “Where is wisdom?” because it is not found there.

Their way is really foolish. So we must look elsewhere, and wisdom is found only in the truths and practice of religion. There is more real knowledge, satisfaction, and happiness in sound teaching about God, which shows us the way to heaven’s joys, than in natural philosophy or mathematics, which only helps us find our way into the earth’s depths. Job says two things about this wisdom cannot be found out.

First, its price cannot be measured, because it is worth more than all the riches in the world. “Man knows not the price thereof” (Job 28:13). Few people give wisdom its proper value. They do not see its true worth, their deep need for it, or the great good it would do them. So even when they have many means to gain wisdom, they do not care enough to pursue it, as Proverbs 17:16 says. Like the rooster in the old story who found a precious stone in a dung heap but preferred a grain of barley, people do not know the value of grace, so they make no effort to get it.

No one can pay a worthy price for it, even with all the wealth this world can provide. Job expands on this in Job 28:15 and following, listing the most prized treasures of the world. Gold is mentioned five times, along with silver, onyx, sapphire, pearls, rubies, and the topaz of Ethiopia. These are the things the world values most. But if a person gave all of these, even all the wealth in his house, for wisdom, it would still be despised. Riches may help a person seek wisdom, as they helped Solomon, but wisdom cannot be bought with them. It is a gift from the Holy Spirit, God’s own Spirit, and money cannot purchase it (Acts 8:20).

Wisdom does more than riches ever can. It makes the one who has it richer and happier than gold or jewels can. It is better to gain wisdom than gold. Gold belongs to another, but wisdom becomes our own. Gold serves the body and this life, but wisdom serves the soul and eternity. We should value as precious what God values as precious. See Proverbs 3:14 and following.

Second, its place cannot be found out, because it is hidden from human discovery. “Where shall wisdom be found?” Job 28:12. Job asks this, first, as one who truly wanted to find it. This is a question all of us should ask. Most people are asking, “Where can money be found?” We should be asking, “Where can wisdom be found?” so that we may seek it and find it. He does not mean vain philosophy or worldly cleverness, but true religion, because that is the only true wisdom. It makes our powers of mind better and secures our spiritual and eternal good. This is what we should cry out for and dig for, as Proverbs 2:3 and Proverbs 2:4 teach.

Job also asks this as one who had given up hope of finding wisdom anywhere except in God, and by God’s own revelation. It is not found in this land of the living, Job 28:13. We cannot gain a right understanding of God and his will, or of ourselves, our duty, and our true good, by reading books or listening to human teachers alone. We must read God’s book and hear the men of God. Human nature is so fallen that no true wisdom is found except in those who are born again and, by grace, share in God’s nature. Others, even the most skilled and hardworking, can give us no real news of this lost wisdom.

Ask the miners, and the deep places will say, “It is not in me” (Job 28:14). Those who dig into the earth to search for treasure cannot find this rare jewel in those dark places, no matter how skilled they are. Ask the sailors, and the sea will say, “It is not in me.” Wisdom cannot be gained by trading on the waters or diving into them. It cannot be drawn out of the sea’s riches or found in the sand. There may be a vein for silver, but there is no vein for wisdom, and no vein for grace.

People can work harder to get worldly wealth than to get heavenly wisdom. They will take more trouble to learn how to live in this world than how to live forever in the next. Human beings have become so blind and foolish that it is useless to ask them where wisdom lives or what road leads to it.