They make night into day: ‘The light,’ they say, ‘is near to the darkness.’
Job is answering the friends who came to comfort him. By chapter 17 he expects no more health and no more understanding from them. Verse 12 sums up their talk. They call his darkness daylight and promise that morning is close. Job can see nothing ahead but the grave.
Whose night, whose day
The verse is Job's description of other people, not of himself. One reading is that the friends treat Job's darkest nights as daylight — clear enough to tell them what is wrong with him.
Leslie M. GrantIt seemed to him his life was finished, and there was nothing to live for. In verse 12 he seems to refer to his friends as changing the night into day. That is, they treated Job's distressing night-time experiences as light enough for them to understand that his troubles came from his sin.
The promised morning
Commentators differ on what the "light" is. A second reading is that the light is the bright future the friends offered Job if he would repent. Job answers that the only bed left to him is spread in darkness.
William KellyHis friends might hold out fresh and bright hopes to him if he would repent. They put night for day, and made light seem near in the middle of very darkness. But if he was to hope, the grave was his house, his bed was spread in darkness, and decay and the worm were his closest family. Where, then, was his hope? Yes, his hope, who sees it? He sees nothing but going down to the grave, where they would rest together in the dust. What a blessed contrast to these gloomy words of a saint is the strong encouragement we have! We have run for refuge to take hold of the hope set before us. We hold that hope as an anchor of the soul, both sure and steadfast. It reaches inside the veil, where Jesus has gone in ahead of us as our forerunner, made a high priest for ever in the order of Melchizedek.
Optimism aimed at a dying man
They held out light to a man who was moving the other way, toward death. Job's own answer to them is not faultless either.
Samuel RidoutAgain he spoils his testimony. He blames his misery on God as well as on man, and says that his sufferings make upright people stumble. Yet through it all, Job keeps to his steady way. In answering the attack of his friends, though, there is a self-satisfied tone that does not suit a truly humble man. Verse 10 seems to be a challenge to them to keep up their attacks, since they completely lack the discernment that marks a wise man. They are holding out light to him, if penitent, while he is drawing ever nearer to death.
The phrase thrown back at him
Job's complaint did not go unnoticed. In the next speech Bildad picks up these words about light and darkness. He uses them as evidence against Job.
Leslie M. GrantIn verse 5 Bildad refers back to Job's claim that his friends were changing the night into day, saying the light is near in the face of darkness (ch.17:12). "The light of the wicked indeed goes out," Bildad says. He implies that Job had no clear light in the darkness of his experience, so Job must be wicked.
Where this sits in Job's speech
Verse 12 closes one part of Job's long reply. The next verse turns to the grave.
Samuel RidoutWe may divide this reply, as we did the address of Eliphaz, into five parts: (1) He reproaches them for their heartlessness (Job 16:1-5). (2) Under the wrath of God and the hatred of man (verses 6-14). (3) He appeals to God in it all (verses 15-22). (4) The experience of bitter trial (Job 17:1-12). (5) The dark outlook toward the grave (verses 13-16).
Summary
- Night. Job is quoting his friends, not himself. They call his darkness day and announce that light is near.
- Diagnosis. One reading: they treat his worst hours as light enough to read by. What they read there is his sin.
- Offer. The other reading: they offer him a bright recovery if he repents. They hold out light to a man moving nearer to death every day.
- Backfire. Bildad turns the words around. The wicked man's light goes out. So if Job has no light in his darkness, Bildad says Job must be wicked.
- Anchor. Job saw nothing past the grave and asked who could even see his hope. The hope set before us now is an anchor of the soul, sure and steadfast, because Jesus has gone in ahead of us.