Job 8:1 - Meaning and Application

Here Bildad rebukes Job for what he had said (Job 8:2). He checks Job’s anger, though he may do it with even more anger of his own. We might think Job had spoken plainly and sensibly, and that reason was on his side. But Bildad, like an impatient debater, dismisses it all with, “How long will you say these things?” He acts as if Eliphaz had already said enough to silence Job, and that anything Job added was out of place. As Caryl notes, rebukes are often built on mistakes, because people do not take one another’s meaning rightly.

Bildad compares Job’s words to a strong wind. Job had said his speeches were only wind (Job 6:26), meaning they should not be treated as a great threat. Bildad answers, in effect, “Yes, but this wind is strong, stormy, and dangerous, so we must guard against it.” What Job meant as a complaint about the weakness of his own words, Bildad turns into a charge against him.

Bildad then defends God in what he has done. In itself, that is true and proper, for God never twists justice or goes against any rule of right (Job 8:3). He never crushes the innocent or gives the guilty more than they deserve. He is the Judge of all the earth, and he always does right (Genesis 18:25). If there were wrong in God, how could he judge the world? (Romans 3:5-6). He is Almighty, meaning all-sufficient, needing nothing from anyone. People sometimes act unjustly because they fear others or want their favor, but God has no such weakness.

Yet Bildad is unfair in how he applies this truth. He assumes that Job’s children, whose deaths were a great part of Job’s suffering, must have been guilty of some serious sin. He thinks their awful death proves they were sinners above others, as he says in Job 8:4. Job could fully agree that God does not pervert justice, but that did not mean his children were rejected by God or died for some great offense. It is true that we and our children have sinned, and we should always justify God in what he brings on us. Even so, unusual suffering is not always punishment for unusual sin. Sometimes it is a test of unusual faith and patience. When we judge someone else’s case, unless clear evidence says otherwise, we should take the more charitable view, as Jesus teaches (Luke 13:2-4).

Bildad then holds out hope that, if Job is truly upright as he claims, he will still see a good end to his trouble (Job 8:5-7). He says that although Job’s children sinned and died in their sin, if Job himself is pure and upright, and if he now seeks God and submits to him, things will still turn out well. This can be taken in two ways. On one hand, Bildad may be trying to prove Job a hypocrite, arguing that the length of Job’s suffering, not just its severity, shows he is not righteous. On the other hand, he may be trying to urge Job not to fall into despair, but to take the right course and hope for better days. He likely meant to condemn Job, even while sounding as if he were counseling him.

He gives Job sound advice, whether or not he expected Job to follow it. It is the same counsel Eliphaz had given earlier, to seek God early, seriously, and without delay (Job 5:8). He tells Job not to spend himself in complaint, but to pray, to ask the Almighty with humility and faith. He also says there must be sincerity in Job’s heart, meaning true uprightness, and honesty in his house, so that his whole life would be a proper place for righteousness. God does not hear the prayer of one who holds on to evil (Psalm 66:18). The prayer God accepts and answers is the prayer of the upright (Proverbs 15:8).

Bildad also gives Job hope that he may yet see good days again, though he secretly doubts Job is fit for them. He says that if Job seeks God early, God will wake to help him, remember him, and return to him, even if it seems now as though God has forgotten him. If Job’s house is righteous, it will again be a place of prosperity. When we return to God in duty, we have good reason to hope that he will return to us in mercy.

Job should not object that he has so little left that prosperity seems impossible. Even if his beginning were very small, like a little meal in a barrel and a little oil in a jar, God’s blessing could still multiply it greatly. That is how God often enriches his people with grace and comfort, not all at once, but step by step. The start may be small, but the growth moves toward full maturity. Light begins at dawn and becomes noon. A mustard seed grows into a great tree. So we should not despise the day of small things, but look ahead with hope for greater things.