Read Job chapter 24 online with LogosAI Bible study tools, highlights, and cross references.
Job 24 is part of “Third Cycle of Dialogue” (22–31) in the outline of Job.
Job 24 summary
Job having by his complaints in the foregoing chapter given vent to his passion, and thereby gained some ease, breaks them off abruptly, and now applies himself to a further discussion of the doctrinal controversy between him and his friends concerning the prosperity of wicked people. That many live at ease who yet are ungodly and profane, and despise all the exercises of devotion, he had shown, ch. 21. Now here he goes further, and shows that many who are mischievous to mankind, and live in open defiance to all the laws of justice and common honesty, yet thrive and succeed in their unrighteous practices; and we do not see them reckoned with in this world. What he had said before (Job 12:6), "The tabernacles of robbers prosper," he here enlarges upon. He lays down his general proposition (Job 24:1), that the punishment of wicked people is not so visible and apparent as his friends supposed, and then proves it by an induction of particulars. I. Those that openly do wrong to their poor neighbours are not reckoned with, nor the injured righted (Job 24:2-12), though the former are very barbarous (Job 24:21, Job 24:22). II. Those that secretly practise mischief often go undiscovered and unpunished (Job 24:13-17). III. That God punished such by secret judgments and reserves them for future judgments (Job 24:18-20, and Job 24:23-25), so that, upon the whole matter, we cannot say that all who are in trouble are wicked; for it is certain that all who are in prosperity are not righteous.
Source: Matthew Henry, Commentary on the Whole Bible (1706–21; Romans–Revelation completed by Nonconformist ministers). Public domain. Digital text: Free Use Bible API (bible.helloao.org).
1 “Why aren’t times laid up by the Almighty? Why don’t those who know him see his days?
2 There are people who remove the landmarks. They violently take away flocks, and feed them.
3 They drive away the donkey of the fatherless, and they take the widow’s ox for a pledge.
4 They turn the needy out of the way. The poor of the earth all hide themselves.
5 Behold, as wild donkeys in the desert, they go out to their work, seeking diligently for food. The wilderness yields them bread for their children.
6 They cut their food in the field. They glean the vineyard of the wicked.
7 They lie all night naked without clothing, and have no covering in the cold.
8 They are wet with the showers of the mountains, and embrace the rock for lack of a shelter.
9 There are those who pluck the fatherless from the breast, and take a pledge of the poor,
10 so that they go around naked without clothing. Being hungry, they carry the sheaves.
11 They make oil within the walls of these men. They tread wine presses, and suffer thirst.
12 From out of the populous city, men groan. The soul of the wounded cries out, yet God doesn’t regard the folly.
13 “These are of those who rebel against the light. They don’t know its ways, nor stay in its paths.
14 The murderer rises with the light. He kills the poor and needy. In the night he is like a thief.
15 The eye also of the adulterer waits for the twilight, saying, ‘No eye will see me.’ He disguises his face.
16 In the dark they dig through houses. They shut themselves up in the daytime. They don’t know the light.
17 For the morning is to all of them like thick darkness, for they know the terrors of the thick darkness.
18 “They are foam on the surface of the waters. Their portion is cursed in the earth. They don’t turn into the way of the vineyards.
19 Drought and heat consume the snow waters, so does Sheol those who have sinned.
20 The womb will forget him. The worm will feed sweetly on him. He will be no more remembered. Unrighteousness will be broken as a tree.
21 He devours the barren who don’t bear. He shows no kindness to the widow.
22 Yet God preserves the mighty by his power. He rises up who has no assurance of life.
23 God gives them security, and they rest in it. His eyes are on their ways.
24 They are exalted; yet a little while, and they are gone. Yes, they are brought low, they are taken out of the way as all others, and are cut off as the tops of the ears of grain.
25 If it isn’t so now, who will prove me a liar, and make my speech worth nothing?”