Olympiodorus of Alexandria
Late Patristic · AD 500–800 · d. AD 600 · 48 passages across 2 books
Commentary
Job 3:4-5
Let that day be darkness; let not God regard it from above, neither let the light shine upon it.
According to Job’s words, he desires that the moon or the stars might not illuminate his night but that it may be obscured by thick darkness, which Job calls the shadow of death. If one carefully examines the text’s meaning, Job demands through his prayers that sin may appear as it actually is in its great depravity, so that sin may not simulate virtue. Rather, after sin has been recognized as dark and deadly, it may be avoided and rejected.
Job 4:17
Shall mortal man be more just than God? shall a man be more pure than his maker?
And do not think, Eliphaz says, that I am speaking these words to you reproachfully. No person, in fact, is totally blameless, and if he can hide his sins from people, he does not hide them from God’s all-seeing eye that knows everything accurately. This indicates what is contrary to the Lord.
Job 5:21
Thou shalt be hid from the scourge of the tongue: neither shalt thou be afraid of destruction when it cometh.
He will hide you from the evil tongue, which knows how to persecute unjustly. In fact, they call “scourge” the malice and slander of the tongue. Moreover, you will end up in complete safety.
Job 6:25-26
How forcible are right words! but what doth your arguing reprove?
Job’s words mean … “It is likely you have suffered the same in many things.” Truth, however, is always hateful to many. Therefore, you despise my words of truth. “You do not come down to me,” Job says, “nor do you speak about the gifts of grace like people who desire to encourage. On the contrary, you accuse me openly, whereas I have never accused you. I hope, however, that after answering each of you, my words will defeat you.”
Job 7:15-16
So that my soul chooseth strangling, and death rather than my life.
“I beg of you. Take away my life. Deliver me from my pains through death. In fact, you did not create me immortal. So … may [I] enjoy quiet and tranquility in the future. I do not demand, O Lord, anything contrary to your decree. You made me mortal, not immortal. Therefore bring me death.” Moses prayed with these same words by saying, “If that is your purpose for me, then kill me.”
Job 8:5-7
If thou wouldest seek unto God betimes, and make thy supplication to the Almighty;
Bildad says, “I suggest you pray to the Lord with all your devotion and diligence. Everything else should come after your prayers.” This is what “be early” means. And if you are true and empty of any deceit and falseness, God will give you back a condition of life and a status worthy of a righteous person. You will enjoy an abundance of goods as great as you possessed earlier. Notice how Bildad demonstrates in this part of his discourse of praise his belief that the happiness of the righteous is found in the material goods of worldly life.
Job 8:16
He is green before the sun, and his branch shooteth forth in his garden.
The papyrus and the reed are dried by the scorching heat of the sun and their shoots rot, even though they are moistened by water. In fact, this is what “his branch shall sprout from his dung heap” means. The impious will suffer the same destiny, when the wrath of God falls upon them. Bildad appears to allude to the death of Job’s children through his use of “branch,” which can indicate shoots, branches or flowers.
Job 10:4-7
Hast thou eyes of flesh? or seest thou as man seeth?
“Do you judge things according to human views? May anything hide from your careful examination, as it is hidden from human beings? Are your years few, and do you ignore what was previous to your age? Do you need to make an enquiry and an investigation about what happened to me, in order to understand that I am not impious?” He says these words by bringing forward God as the witness of his righteousness and by demanding the benefit of his infinite benevolence. People, in fact, ask for similar things, and God, in his benevolence, reveals few of them to the many. “But if I have not committed iniquity,” he says, “I know, in my heart, that it is not possible to escape from your will; and if I did not know this by myself, your will which knows human things better than us, would have mastered me.” The blessed Job pronounces all these words by teaching us that in temptation we can only take refuge in God and supplicate that his mercy may spare his creature.
Job 11:13-14
If thou prepare thine heart, and stretch out thine hands toward him;
Here times are changed, and the meaning is, “If you want to obey me, open your arms in prayer to God with a pure heart, and you will never commit iniquity or transgression, and those things which Zophar mentions later will happen to you.” And here it seems that Zophar is giving advice to Job, save that he himself strikes him by saying that Job is punished for his sins.
Job 12:22
He discovereth deep things out of darkness, and bringeth out to light the shadow of death.
“Revealing deep things out of darkness, and he has brought into light the shadow of death.” The literal meaning is, “He manifests the things which are hidden to all, and preserves those who are in danger and close to death.” He calls danger “the shadow of death,” because, as shadow is very close to the body that produces it, so danger is very close to the death that causes it. However, the profound meaning of this sentence appears to announce prophetically the advent of the Lord, who said to the prisoners, “Come out, and to those who are in the shadow, show yourselves,” “and appeared to those, who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death.”
Job 13:6-7
Hear now my reasoning, and hearken to the pleadings of my lips.
“Consider now the words which I am about to say in order to correct you, and then judge whether I pronounce them thoughtfully.” “Do you not speak before the Lord and utter deceit before him?” “Do you not realize that God hears your speeches? How do you dare, while he hears you, say false words?” Consider also these words from that blameless and truthful man, how falsehood is able to blame everything, even when one appears to speak according to God. Therefore Job ponders with truth and frankness all the words that are spoken, so that God himself may approve him, as God is the truth. Falsehood, in fact, comes from the evil one, as the Savior says.
Job 13:17-19
Hear diligently my speech, and my declaration with your ears.
The Lord is near those, it is said, who invoke him, and therefore God is kindly disposed toward them. So listen, Job says, to what I am about to say: I will maintain my kindly disposed judgment upon God, who is just and speaks truthfully; and by trusting his truthfulness, I believe that I will appear to say words more righteous than yours. Or, in a different sense, “I am near my judgment,” that is, I am ready to suffer what God has decreed. Confiding in his truthfulness, I hope I will be seen to be righteous.
Job 14:13-14
O that thou wouldest hide me in the grave, that thou wouldest keep me secret, until thy wrath be past, that thou wouldest appoint me a set time, and remember me!
The meaning is, “Oh that in the time when you were inflamed with rage against me, you would have kept me in custody in the netherworld—there, in fact, custody is not due to faults—and that you would not have forgotten me completely but would have set a time for my custody there!” Job has given us a reason for his desiring death. Without trials, he says, while being kept there, I will wait for resurrection. In fact, Job says, if a person dies after completing the days of this life, he does not withdraw into nonexistence but lives in his soul and waits for resurrection.
Job 15:14-16
What is man, that he should be clean? and he which is born of a woman, that he should be righteous?
“Who is the person,” Eliphaz asks, “who can be blameless or can proclaim, I am righteous?” If, in fact, those who are very holy, both men and angels, and the purity itself of heaven before the judgment of the most pure God appear to be unclean, what should we say about the damnable and impure human being who drinks iniquity like a draught? He has said this because humans commit sin deliberately. The words “as he does not trust his saints” may also be interpreted in this manner, since the angels themselves can become different in their nature, and actually some of them slipped away from their own former position. Heaven is not pure because of this, and it is also often obscured by clouds.
Job 15:28-30
And he dwelleth in desolate cities, and in houses which no man inhabiteth, which are ready to become heaps.
He describes the absolute solitude of the impious and says that because of their misery, they inhabit desolation instead of prosperous cities and houses. “In fact,” Eliphaz says, “their wealth will not last.”
Job 18:7-9
The steps of his strength shall be straitened, and his own counsel shall cast him down.
Bildad says these things using the metaphor of the birds or the animals that are captured in the hunt. In fact, as they can no longer escape after falling into snares and nets, so the impious are caught by inevitable calamities that overwhelm them. And what is worse, after all their schemes have been overturned and reversed, their riches are taken away from them not by the powerful but by people of the lowest class.
Job 18:13-14
It shall devour the strength of his skin: even the firstborn of death shall devour his strength.
He calls the “soles of their feet” the products of their journeys, in order to say that the impious are not prosperous in their travels when they fall into “a violent ruin.” But also their fruits of season, that is, their children, are insatiately consumed by death; and from this entire condition, in which they find themselves, all healing withdraws. That is, their results will always be incorrigible and incurable. It is also possible to interpret the “soles of their feet” as their offspring or descendants.
Job 19:8-11
He hath fenced up my way that I cannot pass, and he hath set darkness in my paths.
“No speech,” Job says, “can describe my misfortunes. As those who are surrounded on every side by a wall or are oppressed by darkness, I cannot proceed any further. So, it is impossible for me to escape these calamities.” He says that his crown was taken away from him, that is, he also was a king before, or … “He tore me off,” he says, “and like a tree he cut away all my hopes from the roots. Like an enemy who is inflamed with anger, he destroyed all my prosperity.” Job correctly says “like an enemy,” because God does not inflict torments with an angry or hostile mind. He says these things in order to persuade his friends and himself that his punishment exceeds the limits of human crimes. Indeed, that righteous man was suffering not because of his crimes but in order that his patience might be tested.
Job 19:20-22
My bone cleaveth to my skin and to my flesh, and I am escaped with the skin of my teeth.
“My flesh is corrupt under my skin, and my teeth grip my bones.” “While I am alive,” Job says, “my flesh putrefies, and my bones are chewed by the teeth of some wild animal.” “Pity me, pity me, O friends, for it is the hand of the Lord that has touched me.” “You are not ashamed before the one who says righteous words. As benevolent persons, you have compassion upon me and take pity by considering also the respect due to what has been inflicted on me by God. You will not be tested by God through the same calamities.” “Why do you persecute me as also the Lord does, and are not satisfied with my flesh? Why do you add your wrath to divine wrath without doing this according to God’s will? Even though God punishes, he, nonetheless, wants to be good to us—and therefore, why do you insatiably use the harshness of your words against me?” In fact, abusive words are sufficient to devour flesh. So let us fear invectives and insults, because we are aware of the fact that they wound our brothers.
Job 20:19-21
Because he hath oppressed and hath forsaken the poor; because he hath violently taken away an house which he builded not;
“For he has broken down the houses of many poor men, and he has plundered a dwelling, though he did not build it. His possessions provide no security.” He has broken down, that is, has shattered mercilessly [their houses], has carried off all their properties and has not given them back. In fact, he has not mended this situation, that is, has not returned what he has stolen. But, as he has carried off the properties of the poor and has not restored them, so his own possessions will not be saved either. “He shall not be saved by his desire. There is nothing remaining of his provisions; therefore his goods shall not flourish.” The impious, Zophar says, will not save himself through his desire, and then he will not have any provision left, because he does not possess anything that has been left to him by his absolute misery.