“Today also my complaint is bitter; my hand is heavy on account of my groaning.
Job is answering Eliphaz, but instead of defending his record he gives a fresh cry of pain. Two questions run through the verse: what he means by a "bitter" complaint, and why a man crushed by God's blow still wants nothing more than to find Him.
The Answer That Ignores the Accusers
Job does not take up the charges point by point. He goes past his friends to the trouble itself, and says that nothing they said has helped.
Leslie M. GrantWhat Eliphaz said to Job was barely worth an answer. So Job all but ignores it and lays before his friends the real distresses that filled his mind and heart. They had had no answer for this before, and when he is finished they still have no answer. Despite all that his friends have said, he tells them, "Even today my complaint is bitter" (v.2). All their talk had changed nothing for him.
What "Bitter" Means Here
Some render the word for "bitter" another way. That changes the tone of the whole verse. On this reading Job is not describing how much it hurts. He is protesting that it is unfair. (Older translations read the second line as "my stroke is heavier than my groaning." The ESV has "my hand is heavy on account of my groaning.")
Samuel Ridout"Even today" (after so much discussion and accusation by the friends) "my complaint is still defiant." That is how some render it, rather than "is bitter." This is the bitterness of resistance against their charges, not the bitterness of grief. He brings out his groaning as a protest against the unfairness of his treatment… He is not complaining about the bitterness of his suffering, but about its injustice. If he had only known it, Job's acknowledgment would have been, "He has not dealt with me after my sins." If we got what we deserve, where would we be!
Commentators differ here. Others keep "bitter" and read the line as plain grief.
A Blow Too Heavy to Groan Out
Read it either way, the second line says his groaning cannot match the blow. And the blow came from God — the one Job cannot find.
F. B. HoleJob 23 reads like a lament, with a great deal of sorrow in it. Here he was full of bitter complaint. Yet he felt that the weight of the stroke laid on him was beyond any groan he uttered. The stroke came from God, yet he did not know where He was nor how he might find Him.
A Rebellious Will and a Heart That Still Wants God
Two things run side by side in Job, and neither cancels the other.
J. N. DarbyIn Job two things are brought out. One is an unbroken, impatient will, which set up to judge God and say that he was more righteous than He. The other is a heart which had a sense of relationship with God, even while in rebellion against Him and writhing under His hand… When he can get rid of the stupid, pestering talk of his moralising and heartless friends, he turns to cry after God with an "O that I might find Him!"… Nothing can be more beautiful than the way he turns like this, casting aside his friends as best he can, to throw himself into the arms of God, if he could only find Him. But all was not ready yet. The confidence would be sustained, but the will had to be broken and self-satisfaction destroyed.
The Arguments That Never Got Used
Job is sure that if God would only appear, he could lay out his case. He got his wish, and the meeting went nothing like he imagined.
Arno Clemens GaebeleinHe acknowledges that he is still rebellious. His hand is upon him, and it is heavier than all his groanings. Then comes the outburst that reveals the longing of his tried and storm-tossed soul — "Oh, that I knew where I might find Him, that I might even come to His seat! I would order my cause before Him, and fill my mouth with arguments."… How different it was when the Lord did speak! Job's lips are sealed, only to open in the deepest self-loathing. Yet even here, still in the dark about the reason for his suffering, he shows that he is not the defiant wicked man, but one who longs for God.
Summary
- Blow. The stroke came from God, and Job feels its weight is greater than anything his groaning can express.
- Bitterness. Some read the complaint as defiance rather than grief — a protest that the treatment is unjust, not just that it hurts.
- Blindness. Job could not see it, but God had not dealt with him according to his sins. If we got what we deserve, where would we be?
- Bond. An unbroken, impatient will and a real sense of relationship with God run together in him. He throws himself toward God even while writhing under His hand.
- Breaking. The confidence would be kept, but the will had to be broken. When God spoke at last, the mouth full of arguments had nothing left to say.