Job 31:38-40

38. Personification. The complaints of the unjustly ousted proprietors are transferred to the lands themselves (Job 31:20; Ge 4:10; Hab 2:11). If I have unjustly acquired lands (Job 24:2; Isa 5:8).

furrows—The specification of these makes it likely, he implies in this, "If I paid not the laborer for tillage"; as Job 31:39, "If I paid him not for gathering in the fruits." Thus of the four clauses in Job 31:38, 39, the first refers to the same subject as the fourth, the second is connected with the third by introverted parallelism. Compare Jas 5:4, which plainly alludes to this passage: compare "Lord of Sabaoth" with Job 31:26 here.

39. lose . . . life—not literally, but "harassed to death"; until he gave me up his land gratis [MAURER]; as in Jud 16:16; "suffered him to languish" by taking away his means of living [UMBREIT] (1Ki 21:19).

40. thistles—or brambles, thorns.

cockle—literally, "noxious weeds."

The words . . . ended—that is, in the controversy with the friends. He spoke in the book afterwards, but not to them. At Job 31:37 would be the regular conclusion in strict art. But Job 31:38-40 are naturally added by one whose mind in agitation recurs to its sense of innocence, even after it has come to the usual stopping point; this takes away the appearance of rhetorical artifice. Hence the transposition by EICHORN of Job 31:38-40 to follow Job 31:25 is quite unwarranted.