Job — Chapter 4

Respondens autem Eliphaz Themanites

On Eliphaz the Temanite beginning to speak: Corderius, following Pineda, affirms that the three friends were genuinely wise men and pious, their speeches being full of true and learned doctrine, as confirmed by St. Paul himself (1 Cor. 3:19) who quotes Eliphaz (ch. 5:13) to establish his own theological doctrine. Their probity and erudition are beyond doubt since they were intimate friends of Job — and true friendship cannot be cemented without virtue. God himself later speaks to them (ch. 42), and St. Paul would not cite heretics. Their error lay not in the substance of their theological propositions, which were largely true, but in their rash application of those principles to Job's specific case: they argued correctly about general truths but erred in the particulars when they assumed Job's suffering must be due to his own sins. On Eliphaz's opening courtesy (v. 2): "If we attempt to speak to you, perhaps you will take it amiss; but who can keep himself from speaking?" — Corderius notes the elegant metaphor: a word long-conceived in the mind is like a child mature for birth that can no longer be contained in the womb but bursts forth of itself; and so the saying "Who can contain a conceived speech?" has become proverbial for the difficulty of restraining the tongue.

Ecce docuisti multos et manus

On Eliphaz recalling Job's former role as teacher and consoler: Corderius notes the bitter irony Eliphaz skillfully uses — you have instructed many, strengthened the weary, confirmed the wavering; but now that trial has come upon yourself, you have grown faint. This rhetorical strategy of reminding the sufferer of his own former counsel is psychologically acute. Corderius cites Gregory (Moral. V.2) who interprets this passage spiritually: the man who has consoled others must be prepared to receive and apply his own teaching when affliction falls on him — otherwise his teaching was merely theoretical, not written in his heart. But Corderius also gently defends Job: there is a great difference between counseling another from outside and enduring one's own inner torments. Nevertheless the lesson stands: the truest test of one's spiritual doctrine is whether one lives by it under adversity. On verse 6: "where is now your fear, your patience, and the perfection of your ways?" — Eliphaz seems to suggest these were merely superficial, but Corderius shows that Job's patience is not negated but deepened by his lament.

Recordare obsecro te quis unquam innocens

On the (false) principle of exact retributive justice: "Remember: who that was innocent ever perished? Or where were the upright cut off? As I have seen, those who plow iniquity and sow trouble reap the same." Corderius acknowledges that Eliphaz's general principle (virtue is rewarded and vice is punished) has a basis in divine justice, and that under the ordinary operations of Providence this is often observable. He cites Psalms 37, 73, and 91 as testimony to this principle. However, the principle is not absolute in this life: cf. Psalm 73's opening ("But as for me, my feet had almost stumbled, because I was envious of the arrogant when I saw the prosperity of the wicked"). On vv. 10-11: the destruction of lions as an image for the destruction of the wicked — the lion is the most powerful of beasts, yet even it perishes when it cannot find prey. Corderius reads this as a meditation on the vulnerability of earthly power: no matter how great one's natural endowments, they cannot substitute for divine favor.

Porro ad me dictum est verbum

On Eliphaz's nocturnal vision: "To me a word was spoken in secret, and my ear received the whisper of it." Corderius gives a detailed treatment of this mystical experience: Eliphaz received a private divine revelation confirming that no creature is pure before God, and the angels themselves are charged with imperfection. On the mode of revelation (vv. 13-16): in the horror of a nightly vision, when deep sleep falls upon men, fear seized him and trembling, all his bones were terrified; a spirit passed before his face; the hair of his flesh stood up; something stood there, but he could not discern its form — Corderius identifies this as an angelic apparition or divine locution occurring in the sleep of the senses, a legitimate mode of prophetic communication. On v. 17: "Shall man be justified in comparison with God, or shall a man be more pure than his maker?" — Corderius makes clear this is a true theological proposition, even if Eliphaz applies it falsely to Job's case. It establishes the infinite distance between divine holiness and human creatureliness. On vv. 18-19: even the angels, who are mere ministers of God's will, contain some imperfection (not moral fault but creaturely limitedness); how much more are mortals who inhabit houses of clay and are destroyed by the moth.

Numquid homo Dei comparatione justificabitur

On the angelological dimension of Eliphaz's vision: "Behold, even in his servants he does not trust, and his angels he charges with error; how much more those who dwell in houses of clay, whose foundation is in the dust, who are crushed before the moth." Corderius treats this as a genuine theological proposition about the hierarchy of creatures. On "in his angels he finds fault" — this is interpreted as creaturely mutability, not moral fault: even the most exalted beings are subject to change and could in principle fall (as the fallen angels demonstrate). On v. 19: "those who dwell in houses of clay, whose foundation is in the dust" — Corderius develops the anthropology of human fragility: the soul inhabits a body of clay, as the potter inhabits his kiln (cf. Gen. 2:7). Gregory (Moral. V.15-17) reads the "house of clay" as both the mortal body and the earthly affections that weigh the soul down. On "crushed before the moth" — the moth destroys cloth without effort; so illness, age, and accident destroy the human body without resistance. The lesson of humility is absolute: before God even the angels are nothing; how much more so are we?