For he looks to the ends of the earth and sees everything under the heavens.
Job has just described men tunnelling into the earth for silver, gold and sapphires, then asked where wisdom is found. This verse says why God, not the miner, knows the answer: His gaze runs to the ends of the earth and takes in everything under the sky.
Why God Knows Where Wisdom Is
The verse opens with "For" — it explains the statement just before it, that God understands the way to wisdom. His knowledge rests on a range of vision no one else has.
Leslie M. Grant"God understands its way and He knows its place" (v.23). So Job rises high above the speculations of men, who by nature have no idea of wisdom. God alone is the Source of wisdom. He understands it in absolute perfection. He is the One who has established "the ends of the earth" and takes in all that is "under the whole heaven," as no creature can (v.24).
Why Human Searching Comes Back Empty
The mining picture earlier in the chapter shows real skill and effort. Yet the hardest search in the wrong place still misses what matters most.
F. B. HoleIn his days people mined: it may have been a new pursuit then, whether for iron or copper, for gold or silver or gems. They dig down. They turn the underground stream aside. They open paths that the strongest beasts and the sharpest-eyed birds have never travelled. But in all this searching they never find wisdom… Men may discover much, and since Job's day they have discovered far more. But wisdom escapes them.
What That Look Over the Earth Produces
God's survey of the whole earth is not idle watching. The lines that follow show Him weighing wind and measuring water — a settled order in nature that people took centuries to notice.
William Kelly"For he looks to the ends of the earth and sees everything under the heavens. When he gave to the wind its weight." Man discovered that the air has weight many hundreds — yes, some thousands — of years after that. The philosophers of that day never thought of it; they knew nothing about it… God "apportioned the waters by measure," so the sea is never too full, whatever comes.
From Creation to the One Who Reveals
The verse turns the reader away from the created world and towards its Author. He is more than the maker. He makes wisdom known — and He is Himself that wisdom.
Samuel RidoutWe turn now from nature to its Author, from creation to God. He knows the way, and He alone can reveal it to man. He is not only God the Creator. He is God the Revealer in the person of His Son — "I am the way, and the truth, and the life."… His all-seeing eye sweeps the heavens. He has given its weight to the unseen air and its set proportions to the water. He sends the gentle rain, and with it He gives the lightning its path. He has seen wisdom; no — He is that Wisdom.
Where the Chapter Lands for Ordinary People
The passage does not leave wisdom out of reach. It ends with a word God speaks to man. That word decides whether a person can think straight about anything.
W. W. FeredayGod alone can declare its true nature and value. He "said to man, 'Behold, the fear of the Lord, that is wisdom, and to turn away from evil is understanding.'"… So until God gets His rightful place in a man's mind and heart, he cannot view anything wisely. His thoughts are off centre. His beginning is all wrong.
One writer traces how this first shows itself in a person's own life.
William Kelly"And he said to man" — there is a wisdom above man — "Behold, the fear of the Lord, that is wisdom, and to turn away from evil is understanding." That is exactly what a soul feels when it is converted. He may know nothing more than that. He sees how he has been in almost all evil, and he turns from it.
Summary
- Digging — men sink shafts and uncover buried treasure, yet wisdom is never among the finds. The effort is real; the direction is wrong.
- Looking — man digs downward; God looks outward, to the ends of the earth, and takes in everything under heaven. That limitless view is why He alone knows where wisdom lives.
- Weighing — the same look that sweeps the earth sets the weight of the wind and the measure of the waters. People only began to grasp that order thousands of years later.
- Revealing — God is not only the Creator behind that order. He reveals wisdom in His Son, who said, "I am the way, and the truth, and the life."
- Fearing — the search ends in a word spoken to man: fear the Lord and turn from evil. Until God has His place in a person's heart, every other thought is off centre.