They are exalted a little while, and then are gone; they are brought low and gathered up like all others; they are cut off like the heads of grain.
Job has spent this chapter listing cruelty that goes unpunished. Here he grants one point: the powerful do not stay high forever. But death alone brings them down, and it takes them the same way it takes everyone else. If the grave is the only leveller, where is God's justice?
Where the Verse Falls in Job's Argument
Job is not denying that God rules. He is saying that no one can read God's rule off the surface of events. This chapter makes the case in two halves.
William KellyThis leads him, in chapter 24, to show, not that God has no moral government now, but how impossible it is for man to understand it. The first half dwells on the sad sufferings of innocent people under wicked and mighty enemies. The second dwells on the men who succeed in doing evil, and who keep their wickedness hidden for a long time, until the punishment they deserve comes from God, as it surely will, at the end.
"Exalted a Little While"
Job admits that the rise is short. But the fall proves nothing about the man, since the same end comes to people who were not wicked.
Leslie M. GrantAt least Job recognised that the exaltation of the wicked was only for a little while, then they were brought low and taken away, "like all others," that is, they only shared the same end as others who were not wicked. If we look only at this life, then everything is certainly out of balance and frustrating. But all God's accounts are not settled on this side of the grave.
"Gathered Up Like All Others"
Cut grain sounds like a picture of judgment. Ridout reads the verse the other way — as the absence of any special judgment.
Samuel RidoutThe general thought of this part of Job's reply is that in this life, and often right up to the very end, men escape the penalties they deserve. He does not pull back the curtain that hides the terrible future. His purpose is to answer the arguments of his friends, and he answers them well... Job dwells rather on the absence of any special judgment. They are exalted in their life, and when the inevitable hour of death comes — appointed for all — they are no more. They sink away into the grave, snatched away like all others. They are cut off like the ripe heads of grain.
Kelly marks the line between what Job doubted and what he never doubted.
William KellyIt is not that Job doubted that everything is under the eye of God, even though His hand is not yet on the world, while death comes in and cuts off the highest when they least expect it.
Why the Reckoning Is Delayed
Commentators trace the delay not to indifference but to the kind of season the world is in. Mercy and judgment cannot run at the same time, and while mercy runs, the evidence stays mixed.
J. N. DarbyThis was what Job found so hard to understand — how evil-doers prospered, while the righteous suffered persecution. This is simply because the time of judgment has not come. The time of mercy is going on now, and we cannot have mercy and judgment at once. So everything is a riddle now. There is too much evil for man to think that these things come from God. And there is too much good, even in the middle of all the ruin and misery, for him to see how they do not come from God.
Kelly answers the same question by naming the One who will judge, and why it falls to Him.
William KellyHow is it that He lets it pass as He does, and that there is no day of reckoning now? We can answer that fully. It is all reserved for Christ... And so it is reserved for the Lord Jesus to carry out judgment. All judgment is committed to the Son, because He is the Son of man, and as the Son of man men have hated Him.
What the Sufferer Is to Do Meanwhile
If prosperity proves nothing, and a short spell of power proves nothing, what is left for the believer under trial?
William KellyJob makes it very clear that everything now is out of its normal order. You cannot judge how God feels about a man's prosperity here below, for the righteous are often tried far more. Their trials are no proof that anything is wrong on their part. On the contrary, God is putting them to the test, to show that they really are His. So a submissive heart is what we are all called to under trial, and full confidence in God.
Summary
- Brief — The rise of the wicked is real, but short. Job grants that much, but a short rise settles nothing.
- Level — "Like all others" is the sting. Death cuts every head of grain in the field, so the oppressor's end looks no different from anyone else's.
- Hidden — God's moral government runs now, but man cannot read it. This life is not where the accounts are settled.
- Reserved — The delay is not neglect. Mercy and judgment cannot run at once, and Christ holds the day of reckoning.
- Trusting — Outward circumstances prove nothing about a person. So trial calls for submission and confidence in God, not verdicts on others.