Job · Chapter 15

Explanation of the words of this response — 'Then Eliphaz the Temanite answered, and said.'

Introduction to the Eighth Speech — Eliphaz's Response Now that Job has raised his second question — why do the wicked prosper — since the answers his companions gave in debating the question of the righteous who suffer do not suffice to answer this one, the debaters return to open a second round, each stating his own view in reply to this question. Eliphaz's view is that the prosperity of the wicked is only an illusory success, not a true one. Even though to the eye he appears successful — amassing wealth, power, and possessions — his heart is always full of fear. He feels at all times as though pursued by the sword (Leviticus 26:37), as though poverty and want and every misfortune of the age had already overtaken him — so much so that his heart takes no joy from his wealth, and he is forever agitated, anxious, and terrified. For this is one of Hashem's punishments for doing evil in His eyes to provoke Him (Deuteronomy 4:25): He throws the wicked person's heart, thoughts, and imagination into fear and trembling. The essence of prosperity is peace of soul, tranquility of spirit, and joy of heart — 'better a dry crust with peace' (Proverbs 17:1). All this happened to Job, as he said, 'For the thing which I feared has come upon me' (Job 3:25). This constant fear that pursues [the wicked] is itself a sign of his end — that in the end he, his offspring, and all that he has will be cut off, just as happened to Job. This is the gist of Eliphaz's view. But at the start of his speech he takes issue with Job once more for denying that the soul is rewarded in the world to come: for even though Job denied bodily resurrection, he cannot deny the eternal survival of the soul, on which true happiness and lasting success depend (Job 15:11-13). Likewise regarding Job's denial of free will and his claim that man is compelled in his actions — a point Eliphaz had already argued in his first speech — he answers him again: that all the wise of heart (Exodus 28:3) feel within themselves that they are free in their choices, and that no other force is involved to compel their actions (Job 15:18-19). And since man is free in his actions, he is subject to judgment and reckoning, and it is impossible that he has not committed some sin for which the punishment is warranted; so Hashem punishes him with a temporary punishment of suffering in this world, so that his eternal soul not be lost. This is in fact the very answer he gave in his first speech — only there he had not explicitly stated that the punishment comes to save the soul from being cut off, but only that suffering comes upon him temporarily so that he not perish forever through the premature death of the body. Job had disputed this, showing that it makes no difference whether he dies now (since the time of suffering is itself reckoned as death) or dies later, as he argued at length in Chapter 7. Now Eliphaz explains to him that souls are rewarded, that the life of souls is eternal life, and that suffering — even temporary death — is better than eternal perdition (Job 15:14-17). Besides this, whereas at first he had attributed to Job only a minor sin — that he did not serve out of love — he now regards him as thoroughly wicked, since he opened his mouth wide (Isaiah 5:14) to deny every foundation of faith. Yet it is clear from his words that Job did not speak this way merely out of his suffering, for a person is not held accountable for what he says in his anguish (Bava Batra 16b): the way his words are so carefully arranged, and the learned language in which he laid out his approach, show that he had thought out and organized these ideas over a long time, while he was still at ease (Job 15:2, 7). Beyond this, he mocks Job's folly for complaining about the creation of man, as though he were the very first man ever created — when in fact countless generations have already passed who saw life and rejoiced in their labor, all of them giving thanks to Hashem for His kindness (Psalms 107:8, 15, 21, 31). Is he to override the judgment of the entire world? Shall the clay say to its potter, 'What are you making?' — or the potter's handiwork say, 'He has no hands' (Isaiah 45:9)? (Job 15:7-11)

Eliphaz’s Answer Shall a wise man raise his voice with opinions of wind It is puzzling. Should one who is wise answer and raise his voice with an opinion of wind and futility?

'Windy knowledge' — [that is,] the east wind.

"Should a wise man" — is it fitting for a wise man to answer with knowledge that is mere wind, and to fill his belly with thoughts of the east wind — words with no substance to them?

'Should a wise man' — a wise person's words must attend to two things: • (a) that they be spoken with wisdom and not with folly; • (b) that they be of benefit — not speaking words that serve no purpose, and all the more so not words that cause harm. Addressing the first point, he says, 'should a wise man make answer with windy knowledge' — is it fitting for him to answer with words of wind and folly? Not only is it improper to speak such windy words with his mouth, but even in his thinking he should not entertain empty wind. This is the meaning of 'and fill his belly with the east wind' — even if he does not utter it with his mouth.

To debate over a matter from which he derives no benefit Heb. יסכון. To debate over a matter from which he will derive no benefit, like (I Kings 1:2), “and she shall be to him a warmer (סכנת),” and like (Ecc. 10:9), “is warmed (יסכן) by it,” i.e., he will derive benefit from it.

'Unprofitable' [yiskon] — means 'to profit,' as in 'can a man be profitable [to God]' (Job 22:2). Some say: yiskon means 'to teach.'

'Profit' [the root underlying the verse's 'unprofitable'] — meaning: avails, is of use.

"Should he reason" — to clarify further, he elaborates on his own words, as if to say: is it fitting to argue over a matter with no benefit in it, and to speak words that do no good? For what does it matter to us in this dispute, whether you are wiser than we, or we than you?

'profitable' — a term for benefit; so too, 'a man is of no profit' (below, 34:9). 'or with speeches' — or with words.

'Should he reason' — and against the second point he says: is it fitting for a wise man to argue over a matter that serves no purpose, so that no benefit comes from the argument? And it is not enough that the argument itself yield benefit — even the words he speaks and the rhetoric in which he clothes the argument must be of benefit; he should not speak even words that do no good.

Surely you Surely you, who are very wise, will do away with fear by the multitude of your words. and increase speech Heb. ותגרע, like (below 36:27) “He will increase (יגרע) the drops of water,” and like (ibid. 15:8), “and [did] you increase (ותגרע) wisdom to yourself.”

'Devotion' — meaning: prayer, in the sense of 'and pours out his prayer before Hashem' (Psalms 102:1). (v. 5) 'Teaches' — meaning: instructs and makes known. 'The crafty' — meaning: people who speak with cunning and deceit.

"Indeed, you" — meaning: is it not so that even you, for all your great wisdom, do away with the fear of God? For by claiming that everything comes about through the celestial order, you do away with the fear of God among the mass of people; and you likewise diminish and lessen prayer before God — for if everything comes through the celestial order, there is no room for prayer at all. So your sin is very great.

'Do away' [תפר] — [means] you negate, annul. 'Impair' [ותגרע] — a term of deficiency, diminishment. 'Devotion' [שיחה] — an expression for the utterance of prayer, as in 'and Isaac went out to pray in the field' (Genesis 24:63).

'Indeed' — all the more so, since the things you say not only yield no benefit but cause actual harm. For 'you do away with fear': in your words you claim that Hashem does not oversee the deeds of mankind, and that man is not free in his actions but is compelled in them, so that he receives neither reward nor punishment for them. If so, a person has no reason to fear Hashem at all, nor to fear His punishment and judgment, since there is no providence and no reckoning. And against 'words that do no good' he explains 'and impair devotion before God': your speech is severely deficient, with a great flaw in it — for how can you speak this way before God?

For your iniquity teaches Your evil inclination [teaches] your mouth to speak such words, but you should have chosen the tongue of the crafty.

'For your iniquity teaches your mouth' — the sense is: your mouth instructs other people, informing them of your iniquity.

"For your iniquity teaches" — the words of your mouth teach your iniquity to others. Meaning: the sin within you — your thinking that serving God is in vain — this very sin you teach to others, so that they too take hold of it. "And you choose" — but you have chosen a crafty tongue, to conceal the matter beneath the sweetness of eloquent words; you do not state it outright, but twist your words about — yet from the words themselves, the intent still shows through.

'Teaches' [יאלף] — [means] instructs, as in 'lest you learn his ways' (Proverbs 22:25).

'For your iniquity teaches' — he goes on to say that since your iniquity has trained your mouth, so that you speak your words with great fluency, this shows that you have already thought through and rehearsed these heretical statements again and again for a long time, until your sin trained your mouth to speak them rapidly. Moreover, your choosing 'the tongue of the crafty' — speaking your words in philosophical language — shows that these things did not fall from your mouth by chance, out of the greatness of your pain and suffering, but only after much study and diligence over many days. If so, surely:

Let your own mouth condemn you and not I That is to say: Give me an answer to my question; the result will be that your own mouth will condemn you, for it better for me that your mouth should condemn you and not I. Now this is my question:

"Your own mouth condemns you" — the words of your own mouth will proclaim your wickedness, and I will have no need to say it myself; the words of your own lips will testify against you concerning the sin in your hand.

'Testify' [יענו] — [means] bear witness, as in 'you shall not bear false witness' (Exodus 20:13).

'Your own mouth condemns you, and not I' — so I have no need to condemn you myself in order to prove that you are wicked, for your own mouth, speaking heresy, condemns you and establishes that you are wicked. 'And your own lips testify against you' — the witnesses to this are your own lips, meaning the lips that speak with such rhetoric and crafted language: the very fact that you spoke words of heresy and denial condemns you, and the eloquence and rhetoric of your speech are themselves witnesses against your mouth and proof of this — so there is no need at all for me to condemn you.

Were you born before Adam Heb. הראישון. Were you born before Adam? This “hey” serves as the interrogative expression. Therefore, it is vowelized with a “hattaf pattah” and its meaning is: Were you born the first one, before Adam who was formed from the earth, so that you knew to fulfill all the wisdom of the commandments of the Creator?

"Are you the first man" — meaning: why do you scorn Zophar's words simply because he is younger and you are aged? Were you the first man ever born? Were you brought forth before the hills, such that no human being came before you? As if to say: so what if he is younger — it is quite possible he received his words from one who came before even you, who likewise judged from experience gathered over many days.

'Hills' — mountains. 'Brought forth' [חוללת] — [means] created, as in 'before You had formed the earth' (Psalms 90:2).

'Are you the first man who was born?' — Here you complain about the creation of man, questioning why Hashem made him in this way and not some other way, since the way things now stand, it would be better for him not to have been created at all. It is as if you were the very first man about to be born - as though the human race had not yet been created, and now it is about to be created, and you would be the first one born to become man. And 'or were you brought forth before the hills' - as though the hills of the world had not yet been created, as though it were still the time of the six days of Creation, and you had been formed (that is, the state of gestation preceding birth) before the hills existed, with Hashem still wishing to complete your creation and bring you into being.

and increase And bring down much [wisdom] from above to descend upon you?

'And do you restrain wisdom to yourself' — [either:] the deficiency belonged to wisdom, and it was in need of you [to supply it]; or: you yourself regard wisdom as inferior compared to yourself — reading the tav [prefix] as second person [i.e., 'you diminish'].

'And do you restrain wisdom to yourself' — meaning: you withhold wisdom for yourself, so that it belongs entirely to you, with none left over for others.

"Do you hearken in the council of God" — and if you pride yourself against him on your greater knowledge, which comes from wisdom, have you gazed into the council of God, to understand His mysteries? "And do you restrain wisdom to yourself" — have you deprived the rest of mankind of wisdom, taking it all for yourself? As if to say: have you taken all wisdom for yourself alone, leaving none for anyone else?

'Do you hearken in the council of God?' — At the time when Hashem wished to bring you into being, so that you should come forth into actuality as the first man, He summoned His host of angels and took counsel with them as to how you should be created. And do you listen in on God's secret council and His counsel with His angels, 'and do you restrain wisdom to yourself' - drawing off to yourself some portion of God's own wisdom - and say that His counsel was not good, and advise that you be created in some other, better way? This is a sublime figure of speech: after countless generations of mankind have already passed, and even before man was created mountains and hills were formed, and there exist things whose wisdom is beyond all searching out - should one man rise up to complain about the creation of man, as though he were wiser than all the generations that came before him and than Hashem who forms everything, wanting Hashem to reconsider His work and change the whole of nature according to his own counsel and will? Surely there is no folly greater than this.

"What do you know" — what is this wisdom that you know and we do not know? And what is this thing you understand, which is not found in us?

'What do you know' - With what can you boast, claiming to be wiser than everyone else? You cannot even boast such knowledge over us. Now, knowledge comes about either through sense-perception and direct awareness - and of this he says, 'what do you know, that we know not?' - or through understanding and reasoning, which grasps one thing by means of another - and of this he says, 'what do you understand, which is not in us?' - or through examination and experience, testing what has happened over the days, as one who is old and has examined all that has occurred through time and nature - and of this he speaks in what follows.

more of more days than you father.

'Much older than your father' — [kabbir] means 'great'; and so too in the language of Kedar (Arabic).

"With us are both the gray-headed and the very aged men" — as if to say: and if you pride yourself on wisdom together with old age, do we not also have among us a gray-headed man, and an elder far older than your father? And although Zophar himself was young in years, he says this of Bildad, or of himself.

'Much' [כביר] — [means] plentiful, as in 'the remnant shall be small, not great' (Isaiah 16:14).

'With us are both the gray-headed' - Among us can be found both a man of gray hair, and also a very aged man older still than the gray-headed, one who is 'much older than your father.' So how can you boast against us that you know more than we do - and how much more so, how can you boast against the whole of the generations that came before you?

Are God’s consolations little for you with which the Rock benefited you until now for many days, and His good thing that He gave you with pleasantness and gentleness, viz. His fatness [i.e., plenty]. He gave...gently Heb. לאט, he gave gently. This is a verb, not a noun. Therefore, it is vowelized half with a “kamatz” and half with a “pattah.”

'The word that deals gently with you' — [la'at is] a word spoken softly with you, comparable to 'in secret.' 'Why does your heart carry you away' — what proof does your heart draw upon? As in 'and the men took of the provisions' (Joshua 9:14); or it is from the same root as 'my teaching shall drop as the rain' (Deuteronomy 32:2).

'The consolations of God' — meaning: the consolations of these men, that is, Bildad and Zophar [reading 'El' here as related to 'these,' rather than as a name of God]. 'Gently' — meaning: secretly and quietly.

"Are the consolations of God too small for you" — why do you complain about your sufferings, seeing that you once did something good and upright? Are the consolations of God too small for you regarding the pain of your sufferings, given the good and the success you once had, for which you already received full recompense for the good you did? For the sin found within you is still hidden and buried inside you; you have not yet been cleansed of it. And now you receive the recompense of the evil, just as you once received the recompense of the good — so that the good of earlier days is counted as consolation for the evil now come upon you.

'Gently' [לאט] — an expression of concealing, hiding, as in 'the king covered his face' (II Samuel 19:5).

'Are the consolations of God too small for you' — Now Eliphaz responds to Job's denial of reward in the World to Come (as Job had said, in his words to Eliphaz, 'as the cloud fades and vanishes, so he who goes down to Sheol does not come up again' (Job 7:9), and had repeated this again at length in his response to Zophar, saying, 'and a man lies down and does not rise' (Job 14:12)). To this Eliphaz responds: can you really deny that the soul survives after death? Do you not know that the outer body is not the true man, but merely a garment for the soul, which lies hidden and wrapped within this cloak - the body? And when it sheds its outer garment, the body, it will live eternal life, and it will receive its eternal reward and a life of happiness for its good deeds. (This was in fact the essential point Eliphaz had meant when he said, 'from morning to evening they are beaten to pieces; they perish forever, unregarded' (Job 4:20) - meaning that Hashem chastises the body, since the body's life is only a temporary life, 'from morning to evening,' and its afflictions are likewise temporary, so that it not be lost forever in the life of eternity.) And so he says: 'are the consolations of God too small for you, and the word that deals gently with you' - the consolation with which God consoles you for the toil of your hands upon the ground that Hashem cursed (Genesis 3:17), and for the transient, perishing life of this world - God consoles you with a matter that deals gently and lies hidden together with you: namely, the spiritual soul, which lies hidden and covered beneath the cloak of the body, concealed within God's secret counsel. Through this you may find comfort for the sufferings of the body and for the evils of this passing world.

teach you Heb. יקחך, teach you, as in (Deut. 32:2), “so that my teaching (לקחי) may drip like rain.” hint Heb. ירזמון, like יִרְמְזוּן ; like שַׂלְמָה שִׂמְלָה (Exod. 22:8, 26).

'And why do your eyes wink' — this word [yirzemun] has no parallel elsewhere in Scripture; in transposed form, however, it appears in the language of our predecessors, of blessed memory [i.e., as 'remez,' a hint or gesture].

"Why does your heart carry you away" — what teaches your heart to speak falsely about providence, and what are your winking eyes signaling, meant to implant a false view in people's hearts?

'Carry you away' [יקחך] — [means] teaches you, as in 'I give you a good teaching' (Proverbs 4:2). 'Wink' [ירזמון] — this is a transposed form of ירמזון, an expression of signaling [with the eyes].

'Why does your heart carry you away?' — This is a parenthetical remark. He says to him: I know that you harbor thoughts of denial about this. 'Why does your heart carry you away,' to deny this matter, 'and why do your eyes wink,' as if hinting that you deny the survival of the soul and its eternity?

'That you turn your spirit against God' — 'your spirit' means your anger, as in 'a fool vents all his spirit' (Proverbs 29:11).

'Your spirit' — meaning: your will.

"That you turn" — in that you turn the spirit of your mouth against Hashem, and bring forth words against Him.

'That you turn your spirit against God' — The proper construal of these verses is: 'are the consolations of God too small for you,' coming 'through the word that deals gently with you' - meaning, His consolation reaches you by way of the soul concealed within the body, in that He consoles you with this: 'that you shall return your spirit to God' - for after 'the dust returns to the earth as it was, the spirit returns to God who gave it' (Ecclesiastes 12:7), and there it will receive its reward in the life of souls, 'bound up in the bond of life with Hashem your God' (1 Samuel 25:29). If so, why does your heart carry you away, and why do your eyes wink, that you 'let such words go out of your mouth' denying all this, and complaining and grumbling - showing thereby that you do not believe any of it, and that you consider the spirit of man to be like the spirit of the beast: 'as this one dies, so that one dies' (Ecclesiastes 3:19).

What is man that he should be innocent What is his strength, that he can be innocent against the Holy One, blessed be He?

"What is man, that he should be clean" — what is man, that he should be innocent through his own deeds, such that one could say Hashem perverts his judgment to punish him for nothing? "That he should be righteous" — spoken as a rhetorical question; it repeats the same matter in other words.

'What is man' — On this basis he returns to the premise he had laid down in his first response: that the evils that befall the righteous come to cleanse some light sin committed against Hashem, since it is impossible for there to be a righteous man on earth who does good and never sins, as he had said, 'Behold, He puts no trust in His servants' (Job 4:18). So he returns to this same point here a second time: 'what is man, that he should be clean' - how can lowly man be clean before Hashem? - 'and how can he who is born of a woman be righteous,' since by virtue of being born of a woman he is inclined by nature toward evil and desire, as it is said, 'Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity' (Psalms 51:7) - so how can he be righteous?

and the heavens the host of the heavens. pure Heb. זכו, shine. Every expression of זַךְ is splendor.

"Behold, He puts no trust in His holy ones" — He has not granted His holy angels a self-sufficient existence, such that they would not need God's sustaining influence at every moment. "The heavens" — the host of heaven, though pure and bright, are nonetheless not clean in His eyes; so deficiency reaches everyone, when measured against Him.

'Trust' [יאמין] — an expression of reliance, as in 'Behold, He puts no trust in His servants' (above, Job 4:18).

'Behold, He puts no trust in His holy ones' - that is, the angels; 'and the heavens' - that is, the celestial spheres - 'are not clean in His sight,' even though their substance is pure compared to the substance of man.

Surely Heb. אף, how much more. and impure Heb. ונאלח, abominable and mixed. Similarly (Ps. 53: 4), “Are they all dross, altogether filthy (נאלחו)?”

'Impure' — meaning: abhorrent and repulsive.

"How much less" — how much more, then, is man — abominable in his deeds and foul in his doings, multiplying wrongdoing the way a man drinks water, drinking his fill of it because there is no charge set upon it. And if all this is true of him, how much greater is his deficiency, set against the perfection of God, blessed be He — so how then could he be considered righteous?

'Impure' [ונאלח] — [means] became foul, as in 'together they have become impure' (Psalms 53:4).

'How much less one who is abominable and impure' - for man is abominable because of the baseness of his physical substance, and impure because of the stirrings of his desires. 'A man who drinks iniquity like water' - for his nature inclines him toward iniquity just as it is his nature to drink water. This is a summary of what he had said in chapter 4, relating what he had seen in a prophetic vision: that since man is prone to sin, Hashem brings afflictions upon him to cleanse his sins, so that he not be lost in the eternal world.

'I will tell you' — meaning: I will declare it to you.

"I will tell you" — I will tell you something, so listen to me; and what I have seen with my own eyes, I will relate to you.

'I will tell you' [אחוך] — an expression of relating, telling. 'I have seen' [חזיתי] — [means] I saw.

'I will tell you' — Since Job, in his response to Eliphaz, had mocked these words of his, arguing that if it were truly the case that this answer had reached him through prophecy, then why had that prophecy not come to Job himself - as he had said, 'is not my help within me?' (Job 6:13) - Eliphaz now reinforces his words a second time, saying: 'I will tell you, hear you me' - I am revealing this matter to you, and you must listen and accept these words from me, for this is what I saw in prophecy, as he goes on to say, 'a word was secretly brought to me' (Job 4:12). 'And that which I have seen I will declare' - just as I saw it in the vision, so I relate it; for what I say - 'what is man, that he should be clean' - is among the things I saw in prophecy, and you must listen and believe it.

That the wise men tell and confess their transgression. and do not hide their iniquity from their fathers. This is what I saw, and behold, I will tell you. Now where did I see it? Judah confessed and was not ashamed in the incident of Tamar. Reuben confessed and was not ashamed in the incident of Bilhah. And what was their reward?

"Which wise men have told" — this refers back to what precedes, meaning: I will relate to you what I perceived directly — the very thing the wise men have told, not withholding what they received from their fathers.

'Hid' [כחדו] — [means] withheld, as in 'do not withhold [it] from me' (I Samuel 3:17).

‘Which’ — against Job’s lengthy argument that man is not free in his choice, but that all his deeds are compelled (since foreknowledge and the decree of the stars compel him in every deed, whether for good or for evil), he [Eliphaz] answers that this is a matter agreed upon, which all the wise men have stated — ‘and have not hidden [it] from their fathers’ — that is to say [reading מאבותם not as “from their fathers” but from the root אבה, “to desire”]: that they could not deny their own desire and will. For everyone senses that man has a faculty of desiring and willing, to act according to his wish, and this faculty of desire moves him toward every deed that he performs.

To them alone the land was given As a reward for this, Judah merited eternal kingship, and both took their share of the heritage, and they were not driven out of their heritage because of their iniquity, since they confessed. and no stranger passed in their midst when Moses came to bless them, as it is stated (Deut. 33:6f): “Reuben shall live and not die etc. And is this for Judah?” And no stranger passed in their midst in the heritage of the future that is apportioned in the Book of Ezekiel (48). But...

"To whom alone" — those wise men held sway over the entire world by virtue of their great wisdom, as though the earth had been given to them alone, with no stranger who was not of them passing among them to share the inheritance. As if to say: since they received this matter from their fathers — and it is not the way of a father to implant a falsehood in a son's heart — and since those who received it were great, discerning sages, capable of testing whether a thing is true or false, and since my own eyes likewise saw it directly — then the matter is certainly true and correct.

‘To whom alone the land was given’ — everyone senses that the land was given into their own hands, to do with it as they wish, according to the faculty of desire and will: that as they desire and will, so do they act upon the land by their own choice. ‘And no stranger passed among them’ — no outside force is found among them to compel them in their deeds, for it is their own will that rules them, to do everything according to their choice, with no outside force among them to compel them or change their choice. This is what all the wise-hearted have stated — and how can we deny what every person senses, that he is free in his deeds?

All the days of a wicked man who does not repent of his sin and does not confess his transgressions, all his days... he mourns and grieves over his certainty of being requited for his evil that he committed. All the number of years that were laid up for the oppressor, he mourns. The word מתחולל is an expression of mourning, but I did not hear this.

'The wicked man travails with pain' — [mitcholel is] from the root meaning labor pain, like a woman giving birth. 'Even the number of years' — [namely, the years] during which vengeance shall be exacted from him.

'Travails with pain' — meaning: from the term for labor pangs, like a woman giving birth. 'The oppressor' — meaning: this is the wicked man, so called because he is powerful and tyrannizes the rest of mankind.

"The wicked man travails with pain all his days" — and this is the thing I myself have seen, which those wise men received from their fathers: that all the days of the wicked man are filled with dread. Even when he prospers he is constantly anxious, fearing lest harm reach him; and the span of years laid up for the oppressor's success will be filled with dread. The matter is repeated in other words.

'Travails with pain' [מתחולל] — an expression of anguish, trembling. 'Are laid up' [נצפנו] — [means] are hidden away. 'For the oppressor' [לעריץ] — [means] for the strong one, as in 'the most ruthless of nations' (Ezekiel 28:7); that is, one who is strong in wickedness.

‘All’ — now he comes to answer the new question that Job had raised, from the fact that we see there is a wicked man who prospers (for until now the argument concerned the question of a righteous man to whom evil happens). Eliphaz’s view here is that true success is not the outward success visible to the eye — wealth and pleasures — but only inner success: whether one is calm and at peace in his heart, and content with his lot. And this success is lacking in the wicked man, in Eliphaz’s view: for even though he may appear to us to prosper, his heart is always like a driven sea, full of fear, trembling, and dread, because his heart forecasts for him that evils are destined to come upon him. This is [the meaning of] ‘the wicked man travails with pain all his days’ — that is, he is full of trembling and dread; and ‘[even] the number of years that are laid up for the oppressor’ — he travails and is in constant fear.

The voice of terrors is in his ears saying that the time of his retribution has arrived. in peace And when he lives in peace, then the robber will come upon him.

'A sound of terrors is in his ears' — [this comes] at his end.

"A sound of terrors" — and what he dreads comes upon him: a sound of terrors reaches his ears, and suddenly, while he still sits in peace, the plunderer comes upon him.

‘A sound’ — it always seems to him that he hears in his ears a sound of terrors, as though [pursuers] were chasing him to kill him; and even at a time of peace, it seems to him [like] a sound of terrors, [as if] a destroyer will come upon him.

and he is destined to the sword Heb. וצפוי. He is destined to the sword, and his eye to wander for bread—where should he find it?

'And he is waited for of the sword' — meaning: that the sword already watches for him; the sense is that the sword will pass over him, and the terrors of death will pierce him through.

"He believes not" — when darkness comes upon him, he does not believe he will ever emerge from it and return to his former state. "And he is waited for" — he lies exposed to the sword, for the sword sees him and comes upon him.

'Waited for' [וצפוי] — an expression of watching, as in 'the wicked watches the righteous' (Psalms 37:32).

‘He believes not’ — and when he is in a place of darkness, it seems to him impossible that he could return from that dark place, for he will be killed there; and it seems to him that even though it is dark, still he is ‘waited for of the sword’ — that the murderer, sword in hand to kill him, sees him even though he himself cannot see the murderer.

He wanders i.e., he is assured of wandering. He knows in fact. that...is ready and prepared to come to his hand, i.e., to him, and with him is the day of darkness. at his hand Like (Gen. 32: 14), “from what came into his hand.”

"He wanders abroad" — he wanders from his place on account of bread, seeking to know where he might find it. "He knows" — he knows in himself that the day of darkness stands ready and firmly fixed for him, for he judges of himself that the evil has been decreed to reach him; and because of this he grows ever more anxious, at all times.

'Where' [איה] — [equivalent to] אנה, another word for 'where.'

‘He wanders’ — that is, all this seems to him, through the power of his imagination, even at a time of peace; how much more so at a time when he ‘wanders abroad for bread: Where is it?’ and must go seeking his sustenance, which he lacks — for then the fear grows even greater, and he trembles so much, as though he knew for certain that a day of darkness stood ready at his hand, and as though his end had come; and how much more so at the time when—

it overpowers him The anguish is stronger than him and it will prevail over him. like a king destined for the inferno Heb. לכידור. I have not found anything similar to it, but it may be interpreted by means of the interchangeable letters, “resh” with “dalet,” like (Gen. 10:3), “Ashkenaz and Riphath” in the Torah, and in Chronicles (I, 1:6): “Ashkenaz and Diphath;” and similarly (Gen. 10: 4). “Kittim and Dodanim” Here too, לַכִּידוֹר is equivalent to לַכִּידוֹד, to the king who is destined to burn (ליקוד) in the fire of Gehinnom; i.e., Sennacherib, about whom the prophet prophesied (Isa. 30: 33): “For Tophteh has been set up from yesterday, that too has been prepared for the king,” to burn his legions; (Isa. 10:16), “a burning shall burn.” Similar to this (below 41:11), “sparks of (כידודי) fire go forth”; either brands or flames.

'They prevail against him, as a king ready to the battle' — he is one who is prepared to enter into battle; this word has no parallel elsewhere [in Scripture]. Some say that troubles surround him the way the [celestial] sphere encircles the ball — that is, the earth — so that the word would be understood as 'a ball for the earth'; on this reading, the kaf of kaddur ('ball') is a formative letter that may drop off, while the kaf of kidor is a root letter — but this is far-fetched.

'Distress and anguish overwhelm him; they prevail against him, as a king ready to the battle' — meaning: distress presses hard upon him and surrounds him, like a king who is ready for a joust, prepared for war — called in the vernacular 'tornois.' Or perhaps the sense is: the distress overpowers him and presses hard upon him, just as a king overpowers and forces a man who is about to be sentenced 'to the kaddur [ball]' — that is, people who are condemned to drowning: for when their captors wish to drown them easily, they bind the person's head between his knees, and his hands and feet, so that he becomes like a ball, until he has no way at all to escape the drowning.

"Overwhelm him" — the troubles terrify him. "Prevail against him, as a king" — trouble seizes him with force, like a king who holds fast to his rule. "Ready to the battle" [reading כידור as כדור, "a ball"] — he is prepared to become like a ball, wandering and unsettled, tossed about like this ball as it is bandied and hurled from hand to hand.

'Anguish' [ומצוקה] — this too is an expression of distress. 'Prevail against him' [תתקפהו] — [means] they seize him with force. 'Ready' [עתיד] — [means] prepared, as in 'who are ready to rouse leviathan' (above, Job 3:8). '[Ready] to the battle' [לכידור, understood here as 'a ball' (kaddur)] — it is made to be played with, tossed from hand to hand, as in 'He will wind you about... a ball, into a wide land' (Isaiah 22:18).

‘Distress and anguish overwhelm him’ — then this dread seizes him with great force, for his imagination terrifies him that he is like a king destined for the ball [reading כידור as כדור, “ball”] — for in Job’s days it was the practice to punish a ruler by throwing him about like a ball and rolling him from place to place until he died this strange death; and the wicked man trembles so much, as though it had been decreed that he die such a horrible death — so greatly does the fear of his heart grow.

"Because he has stretched out" — because he stretched out his hand against Hashem, to scorn Him on high with an outstretched hand, and made himself strong against Him; for he thought that his own power and the might of his hand had gained him his wealth.

‘Because he has stretched out’ — this fear comes upon him because he stretched out his hand against God, as though wishing to fight with Him and overpower the Almighty; and therefore—

He runs towards Him He would run toward the Creator with his neck high and upright, in order to provoke Him. the thickness of the body of his shields With the power of his strength. the body of an expression of height, as (Ezek 16:24), “and you built yourself a platform (גב).”

'With the thick bosses of his bucklers' — this refers back to the thickness of his neck. 'His bucklers' — these are, by way of metaphor, his bones. 'The bosses' [gabei] — these are the sinews.

'With the thick bosses of his bucklers' — meaning: at the place where the bodies of his shields are thickest and strongest.

"He runs upon him" — he ran against Hashem with a stiff neck and in pride, on account of the thick bosses of his bucklers that were upon him — meaning, because he trusted in the greatness of his strength and might.

'Thick' [בעבי] — a term related to עב, 'thickness.' 'Bosses' [גבי] — [means] bodies, as in 'your eminences to eminences of clay' (above, Job 13:12); the term is used for the substance, the body, of anything.

‘He runs’ [Malbim connects ירוץ, “he runs,” with the kindred root רצץ, “to crush”] — God crushes him at the neck (for one who fights with someone standing above his head — the one above crushes the neck of the one below); He crushes him with the thickness of the bosses of his shields, that is, with the thick flesh of his back, which is strong as a shield.

collops of fat on his loins He made a mouth on his loins, for his fat and the thickness of his blubber is folded on his loins, and they look like a sort of mouth.

'Because [he has covered his face with his fatness]' — his fat covers his face, as though he needed to make a layer of fat on his loins in order to use up the excess. This is a metaphor: at first the wicked man grows rich, but in the end it is reversed, in the sense of 'when the wicked spring up like grass' (Psalms 92:8), which ends: 'he shall dwell in cities that are cut off' (Job 15:28). Some say that there he chooses a place with no settlement, so as to be alone and do evil — reading it as cities that were 'destined' [me'utadim, from atid] to become heaps, like 'a heap of stones' (cf. Genesis 31:46); and likewise, 'heaps that clash.'

'And made collops of fat on his loins' — meaning: he formed folds of flesh over his loins from his abundance of fat.

"Because he has covered" — because he indulged himself, feasting his soul richly to fatten his flesh, until he covered his face with his fatness, and made upon his loins fold upon fold of fat from his great grossness, which look like the lips of mouths; and because of his great prosperity his heart grew haughty, and he trusted in the greatness of his strength to scorn Heaven.

'Fatness' [פימה] — a term related to פה, 'mouth' [the fat about the jowls]. 'Loins' [כסל] — this is the part of the spine adjoining the kidneys, as in 'which is by the loins' (Leviticus 3:4).

‘Because’ — even though he has covered his face with his fatness, so that from the abundance of his fat and richness his face is covered, nevertheless Hashem crushes him, and ‘makes an opening’ [reading פימה as containing פה, “mouth”] ‘upon his loins’ — for through the crushing of his back, He splits open his flesh and fat until it forms a mouth, an opening, through his fatness; and this “mouth” speaks and tells what is in the loins and thought of the wicked man. The image is that even though he appears thick and fat, through Hashem’s battling against him, crushing him with constant fear and trembling, what is in his loins and his thoughts becomes recognizable: that his loins are full of disgrace and terror, and that he is not a prosperous man but a man full of distress and anguish.

And he dwelt in ruined cities So is the custom of haughty people, to build ruins for a name.

'Which were ready to become heaps' — meaning: which were destined to become heaps of rubble. 'Heaps' [continuing the sense of the 'heaps' just mentioned] — meaning: that is, a place of desolation.

"And he has dwelt" — he dwelt in cities cut off and destroyed, for he built them for himself in the manner of great men, who build ruined cities to make themselves a name, as it is written above, "who build ruins for themselves" (Job 3:14). "Houses" — he dwelt in houses that were not fit to live in, which were readied and destined to become heaps of rubble and haunts of desolation, in the manner of ruins.

'Desolate' [נכחדות, lit. 'cut off'] — [means] decreed and cut off, as in 'and you would have been cut off from the earth' (Exodus 9:15). '[Which no man would] inhabit' [למו, lit. 'to them'] — [means] to them, that is, in them. 'Were ready' [התעתדו] — [means] were destined. 'To become heaps' [לגלים] — an expression of a mound and a heap.

‘And he has dwelt’ — and even though this wicked man dwells in desolate cities — for out of his great fear he is afraid to live in an inhabited city among people, lest they rob him of his money and property — and dwells in ruined towns, where there are houses that no one inhabits, houses unfit to live in, destined only to become heaps of rubble, because he thinks that there no one will find him; and also, out of his great fear for his money, he is too stingy to build a house, and dwells in caves and bare rocks and ruined heaps — nonetheless—

and his possessions will not remain They will not be preserved for long. neither will...bend Heb. יטה, [like] ינטה, like (I Sam. 8:3), “and they turned (ויטו) after gain.” They themselves turned (וינטו). It means that they did not bend from heaven to earth. the gratification of their desire Heb. מנלם, the granting of their desire and the fulfillment of their plans. It is like two words, מן להם. מן means their preparation, like (Dan. 1:5), “And the king prepared (וימן) for them.” Similar to it is (I Sam. 13:21), “a file (הפצירה פים),” in two words. [The analogy is obscure.] (Isa. 33:7), “Behold I will appear to them (אראלם),” which Jonathan renders: I will appear to them. So it appears to me, and Menachem supports me. Another explanation: מִנְלָם is an expression of (Isa. 33:1), “when you finish (כנלתך) dealing treacherously,” in which the “nun” is a radical that sometimes is omitted, an expression of completion. It will not bend to the ground to be freed from a decree of destruction.

'His substance' [cheilo] — his wealth, as in 'this wealth that I have gained for myself' (Deuteronomy 8:17). 'Continue' [yakum] — means 'stand, endure.' 'Their produce' [minlam] — [that is,] the complete matter that is theirs. The meaning of 'bend' [yiteh] is like 'stretches out' [as in 'who stretches out the heavens,' Isaiah 40:22]; and similarly, [the sense connects to] 'kinlotkha' [when you are joined], meaning 'when you are complete.'

'Their produce' — meaning: their completeness, in the sense of the term 'when you have finished' in 'When you have finished betraying, you shall be betrayed' (Isaiah 33:1).

"He shall not be rich" — because of the insolence of his heart, his riches will not endure, nor will his wealth remain; and the matter is repeated in other words. "Neither shall [their produce] bend" — their end and the fulfillment of their recompense will not be allowed to trail off and fall away into the ground; rather, it shall come squarely upon their own heads, and they shall receive their recompense in full.

'His substance' [חילו] — [means] his wealth. 'Their produce' [מנלם] — [means] their culmination, their completion, as in 'when you have finished betraying' (Isaiah 33:1).

‘He shall not be rich’ — his wealth will not remain in his hand; ‘neither shall his substance continue’; ‘neither shall their produce’ — their abundance and its consumption — ‘bend to the earth’: for despite all this, his wealth will come to an end and be lost in an evil way, even though he never enjoyed his wealth, and God never empowered him to eat from it.

and he will turn away from the world. by the breath of His mouth Of the Ruler of the world. This is an ellipsis, Others interpret this to mean: because of the breath of his mouth that was guilty of speaking lies.

'And by the breath of His mouth shall he go away' — even by the mere breath of His mouth.

"He shall not depart" — he will no longer have help to return to his former state. "His branches" — his tender shoots will be dried up by the flame, until they are removed from their place and swept along by the breath of the blower's mouth, in the manner of a dry thing which, because of its great lightness, is shaken about by the slightest breath of wind — meaning, by a light matter his prosperity will be lost.

'His branches' [יונקתו] — a tender shoot.

‘He shall not depart’ — and even though he does not depart out of darkness — for out of his great fear he is afraid to dwell in a place of light — nonetheless there too he will find a flame that will dry up his branches, the moist shoot that draws in the moisture of the earth; and he will go away ‘by the breath of His mouth’ — for the breath of His own mouth will blow upon the flame and the dry shoot, until it departs from there and is consumed and is no more. By this he alludes to Job, on whom fire fell from heaven and burned among the flocks and the young men; and so, too, he had hinted at him earlier in saying that he feared that a destroyer would come upon him and that he was ‘waited for of the sword’ — for Job was in constant fear of all this, and all of it came upon him through the Sabeans and the Chaldeans, as it is written, ‘For what I feared has overtaken me’ (Job 3:25).

will not believe He who was misled by futility will not believe that his recompense and his toil shall be futility, like (Ruth 4:7), “and concerning exchange (התמורה).”

'Deceiving himself' — meaning: the man who is deceived by falsehood and by the vanities of the world — that is his 'glory.'

"Let him not trust" — one who strays to walk in the way of falsehood does not truly believe that his exchange will likewise be falsehood — meaning, that his recompense will match his own deeds.

'His recompense' [תמורתו] — a term of exchange, substitution.

‘Let him not trust’ — the one who has strayed from the way of Hashem does not himself [truly] trust in vanity — meaning, he does not [truly] believe in his own success, which is vanity, a thing with no substance, and he is always afraid that it will not endure in his hand, because vanity shall be his recompense — that in place of vanity will come vanity: meaning, in place of his false success there will come to him vanity, a thing with no substance. This is just as it was with Job, who did not [truly] believe in his own vain success, for it was destined that in place of his possessions would come vanity and nothingness — for in one night it came, and in one night his wealth and possessions were lost. And it also means that in place of himself, too, there would be vanity: for he was stricken in his body, and his life and the health of his body were lost, and in their place came illness and a severe boil.

Before his time his recompense will be complete [and will cease] from growing and prospering anymore, like (Gen. 50:3), “were fulfilled for him,” i.e., they were completed. and his branches His bent-over branches. All branches of a tree resemble a dome.

'It shall be accomplished before his time' — most commentators say that the aleph [in timmale] stands in place of a doubled lamed [i.e., the root is m-l-l, not m-l-a], related to 'and you shall pluck the ears' (Deuteronomy 23:25), and to the language of our Rabbis, of blessed memory: 'rubbing it and smelling it' [i.e., testing grain kernels by hand] — so the sense here is 'wither,' not 'be filled.' 'His branch' [kapato] — related to 'the palm branch and the rush' (Isaiah 9:13).

"Before his time" — therefore his term will be filled and completed before its proper time — meaning, he will die before his time. "And his branch" — his branches will not be moist with sap — meaning, no good will come to his offspring after him.

'It shall be accomplished' [תמלא] — [means] shall be completed, as in 'and when the days of her purification are fulfilled' (Leviticus 12:6). 'His branch' [וכפתו] — [means] his branches, as in 'branches of palm-trees' (Leviticus 23:40); so called because they bend, curve. 'Leafy' [רעננה] — an expression of moistness, freshness, as in 'I am anointed with rich oil' (Psalms 92:11).

‘It shall be accomplished before his time’ — ‘his branch’ means his branches and leaves that shade over the fruit, a metaphor for his possessions and his wealth — it shall be accomplished before its time, while his branch is not yet leafy: everything will be lost before its time.

'He shall shake off his unripe grape as the vine' — [yachmos is] like 'and He has stripped His tabernacle like a garden' (Lamentations 2:6) and 'your heels suffer violence' (Jeremiah 13:22); its sense here is 'to scatter.'

'He shall shake off' — meaning: strips bare, in the sense of 'it has been stripped like a garden' (Lamentations 2:6). 'His unripe grape' — meaning: his own unripe grapes. 'His flower' — meaning: the same as 'his blossom.'

"He shall shake off" — the One who has power to remove will remove his offspring for the slightest cause, like this vine, which sheds its unripe grapes for the smallest cause. "And shall cast off" — He will cast off his offspring quickly, like an olive tree, which quickly casts off its blossom; and the matter is repeated in other words.

'He shall shake off' [יחמוס] — [means] shall be stripped away, as in 'your heels are stripped bare' (Jeremiah 13:22). 'His unripe grape' [בסרו] — this is the name for fruit whose ripening is not yet complete, as in 'when the blossom has hardened into unripe grapes' (Isaiah 18:5). 'His flower' [נצתו] — [means] his blossom, as in 'the pomegranates were in flower' (Song of Songs 6:11).

‘He shall shake off’ — he will also be like a vine that shakes off and casts away its unripe grape, meaning grapes not yet fully formed, before they even become fruit; and like an olive tree that casts off its blossom, its flower, before it even reaches the stage of an unripe grape. So too his grown sons and his young offspring were lost.

'And fire shall consume' — he likens God's wrath to fire, because they had 'conceived mischief' (cf. Job 15:35).

"The tents of bribery" — that is, the tents built through bribery. Explanation of the words of the response: Eliphaz the Temanite answered and said: Is it fitting for a wise man to argue false claims — mere words of wind and vanity? Or is it the way of the wise to debate with words and arguments that serve no purpose in establishing the truth of what he wants to establish? You cannot escape the charge that you have done something even more wrong than these words themselves, for by them you annul the fear of Hashem among the common people — since the common people, owing to the weakness of their understanding, refrain from doing evil only out of fear that Hashem will punish them. So when you say that righteousness does nothing to keep these evils away, and that they come only to one whose constellation at the hour of birth destined them to come, you annul the fear of Hashem among the common people, and you also discourage prayer before Hashem for the evils that befall each person — since, by your own words, praying about them is vain and useless. Your own words thus reveal your iniquity, for in speaking them you choose the language of the cunning, who speak with cunning and deceit and by misleading ways. I need not even say that you are wicked and that this is why this calamity has come upon you — your own mouth and lips testify against you that you are wicked. What is this boasting of yours in age and old age? Were you born before Adam, the first man, and before the hills were created? Now, even if Zophar is younger in years, that does not stop him from having gained, through experience, knowledge sufficient for this inquiry — for it is possible that he already received testimony from people even earlier than you, so that what has long been well known through this experience reached him a long time ago. So if you are not the very first of all men, your argument here collapses. Have you listened in on God's secret council, that it has already been revealed to you, so that wisdom is kept for you alone and not for others besides you? What do you know of the works of Hashem that we do not know? What do you understand of them that is not with us as well? And should you argue that, because of your old age, you are perhaps the wiser — well, among us too are gray-haired and aged men, older in years than your own father. (I take it that Eliphaz was older than Job, while his other companions were younger than Job — or perhaps Zophar alone was younger than him.) Are the consolations with which these men — Zophar and Bildad — have consoled you too small a thing for you, that you called them "physicians of no value"? Is what they argued — that Hashem understands all of man's deeds and judges him for them — so slight and covert a matter to you, that you branded them "forgers of lies" and called their very arguments an act of secrecy, as you said to them, "if you show partiality in secret"? How has your heart carried you away, and how have your eyes signaled, that you turn your spirit against God and let words against Him pour from your mouth? How can you imagine yourself so pure and righteous that no punishment could ever reach you? It is impossible, given man's inherent deficiency, for him to be pure and righteous. And how can you imagine that you will escape deficiency altogether? In the eyes of Hashem, nothing escapes deficiency — even the angels and the celestial spheres are subject to some deficiency, since their very existence depends on another existence from which they derive; and beyond that, they carry a striking deficiency relative to Hashem, as we explained in the Fifth Treatise of the Wars of Hashem. Perfection, therefore, is found only in Hashem. Given all this, how did you count yourself free of deficiency, when you are abominable and loathsome, and drink iniquity like water — for such is the way of man? You therefore have no grounds to complain against Hashem over this punishment, for without doubt it is impossible that you did not sin. And if you are unaware of it, that is only because there are surely many things you have sinned in that count as sin before Hashem, on account of His perfection, though you do not consider them sins at all. I will tell you what I have seen through my own experience, and what wise men have declared, without concealing what they received on this matter, by way of experience, from their fathers — for I will bring you no testimony drawn from what lesser men say, since they cannot be relied on, but only what was declared by the truly accomplished, to whom alone the land was given, on account of their abundant wisdom and perfection, with no outsider ever passing among them; it is they who will tell you. I too have seen with my own eyes that the wicked man, even when he prospers, writhes in torment all his days — meaning that trembling and heartache grip him all his days, from his fear and dread that evil will befall him — and as for the years, however many, that are stored up for a powerful oppressor of men, in every one of them a sound of terrors rings in his ears warning him that evil is coming. And so, even while he is at peace, the plunderer comes upon him, and distress overtakes him in a way that leaves him unable to believe he will ever return from that darkness and trouble. The sword awaits him, so that deathly terrors fall upon him. The wicked man wanders about for bread — where can he find it? — for he has no bread to eat; he knows that a day of darkness and great trouble stands ready at his hand, and so he is in constant heartache. Distress and anguish terrify him; anguish overpowers him and seizes him, the way a king overpowers and forces a man about to be sentenced to "the ball" — meaning those condemned to drowning, whose heads are bound between their knees and whose hands and feet are tied, so that they become like a ball, unable to save themselves from drowning. All this because the wicked man stretched out his hand against God and thought to overpower Hashem — so Hashem will run at him and strike him on the neck, at the very spot where his armor is thickest and strongest, to show him that his might avails nothing against Hashem. Because the wicked man covered his face with fat, from his sheer abundance of flesh, and dwelt in ruined cities — meaning, he rebuilt them — and lived in houses that had stood uninhabited and were destined to become heaps of rubble, rebuilding them so that he could rely on their strength all the more and so that they would stand as a memorial to him — he will be punished by not growing rich, and the wealth for whose sake he fattened himself will not endure; nor will he extend to the people of the land the fullness he sought — meaning, the buildings he erected will not survive, but will be destroyed and fall. He will not depart from the darkness of these troubles; his shoot, which grew so richly while he was wealthy, at the very height of his fatness and abundance, will be dried up by the flame of the very troubles that come upon him, until he grows so gaunt that the breath of his own mouth will shake him and drive him from his place — all because this man, deceived by vanity and the world's futilities, did not believe that they would perish and that vanity and futility would be his own reward; that is, he was not afraid of death. So his punishment was to die before his time: his shoot cut off before its time, his branch — no longer fresh — withering away with ease. The blossom and bud that the wicked man put forth to bear fruit will fare like a vine stripped violently of its unripe grapes, or an olive tree that sheds its blossom for the slightest cause. In the end, the company of the godless will be left barren, since they destroy one another and their assembly among themselves does not hold together; and fire will consume the tents built from bribery and injustice — since they are forever scheming and laboring at mischief, and their minds are always readying deceit — and it is for this that Hashem punishes them with such punishments as these. The general principle that emerges from all this is that Eliphaz was condemning Job for claiming he had not sinned, while Eliphaz himself testifies that Job had indeed sinned — in that, through these very words, Job annuls the fear of Hashem among people and discourages them from praying to Him in time of trouble; prayer which, beyond its benefit of delivering a person from evil, plainly also serves the ordering of society and points the soul toward its ultimate good. He then brought proof from experience that these evils are ordained by Hashem according to man's deeds, from the fact that evils are found to befall the wicked — none of them spared, whether from fear of evil or otherwise — which shows that these evils come upon the wicked precisely because they are wicked. Moreover, we see that the punishment that comes upon them corresponds, measure for measure, to their own rebelliousness. Had it instead been fixed at the moment of his emergence from the womb, this correspondence could not hold — unless one were to say that it was likewise fixed, at that very moment, that this man would commit the very rebellion matching the punishment already destined for him; but this is utterly absurd and objectionable, for if that were so, free choice would be nullified and everything would become a matter of necessity. This, then, is the sum of what Eliphaz added in arguing this reply.

"For the company [of the godless], etc." — for it is indeed fitting that the company of the godless be solitary and desolate, with neither sons nor daughters found within it. "And fire" — the wrath of Hashem, which burns like fire, shall consume the tents built with bribe-money.

'Desolate' [גלמוד] — [means] solitary, as in 'let that night be desolate' (above, Job 3:7). 'Consume' [אכלה] — [means] burn.

‘For the company of the godless’ — the community that belonged to him, namely most of his sons and servants, ‘shall be desolate,’ for they all died; and ‘fire shall consume the tents of bribery’ — his tent and his possessions were burned up in fire, as above.

They conceive trouble and bear iniquity They commit evil and are recompensed. The recompense of the birth is in accordance with the conception. prepares makes ready. deceit Their desire shall be converted for them into deceit.

'Their belly' — alludes to their hidden thoughts.

"They conceive mischief" — just as they conceive mischief, so do they bring forth iniquity — meaning, just as the birth corresponds to the conception, so the recompense corresponds to the deed. "Their belly" — the heart, situated within the belly — this is what devised the deceit; and therefore he will receive his recompense in full, without lack. (What emerges from this discourse is that he answers in his own words, saying to Job: how can you say, "I have not sinned"? Why, by these very words of yours, you cause others to sin as well, for you plant in their hearts the stumbling-block of your iniquity, leading them to think that there is no One watching over the world — and so your wrongdoing is great indeed. And as for his complaining about his sufferings on account of the good deeds he had done, he replies: did you not already receive reward for them long ago, while the debt of sin still remains upon you, so that you are now receiving your recompense through these very sufferings? And he proves providence from the downfall of the wicked, who never recover; and even in his days of prosperity his soul is filled with dread, and he expects at every moment that evil will befall him — which is not so with the innocent and the righteous.)

'Mischief' and 'iniquity' [עמל, און] — their sense is harm, hardship, and something evil.

‘They conceive’ — though his mouth was godless while he appeared righteous, in fact he ‘conceives mischief,’ meaning thoughts of heresy and denial; therefore he ‘brings forth iniquity’ and ruin, and his downfall comes. And even so, ‘their belly prepares deceit’ — for even after he has been broken he does not repent, but instead prepares deceit and fabricated arguments with which to complain against Hashem and deny His providence, His goodness, and His kindnesses.