Is there any injustice on my tongue? Cannot my palate discern the cause of calamity?
Job has begged his friends to look him in the face and name the sin they suspect. This verse closes his plea with two questions thrown back at them: has his suffering destroyed his honesty, or his judgment?
The Last Line Of A Demand For Fair Judgment
Job's reply ends by asking his friends to stop hinting and start testing. His last two questions put that test to them:
Samuel RidoutSet against their injustice, let them take a careful look at him. Is he lying when he insists that he is upright? Let them turn back from their sweeping charges of evil against him to the simple, obvious fact that he is upright. There is no sin in him that can explain the torments he is now suffering. He can recognise evil, and he would not hide it, even if it were in himself.
Samuel Ridout reads Job's appeal as an invitation to think again:
Samuel RidoutSo he tells them to "try again," as some translate the word. Let them be fair in their judgment. Let them see if they can explain the strange puzzle of a good man suffering as he does. It is as great a mystery to him as to them.
What Job Was Right About — And What He Still Had To Learn
William Kelly, quoting the older wording of the previous verse, hears Job asking them to drop the charge of sin. He then looks ahead to what Job himself still had to learn:
William Kelly"Return, I pray you, let it not be iniquity" — he begs them to come back to that, and to come back to a sound judgment of the case. Here was their poor friend, put to a tremendous trial, unable to see why it had come upon him. "Let it not be iniquity." It has nothing to do with that. He had to learn that his own righteousness, however real, could be no ground to stand on. He needed the righteousness of God to stand on, though he hardly knew how that could be. That is what comes out later in the book.
The Second Question — And What Job Wants
Commentators differ over what Job's palate tastes. Ridout hears him saying that he can still tell evil from good. Kelly translates the lines again, and has Job tasting his own disasters. Here is his rendering of the close of Job's plea:
William KellyReturn, I pray; let there be no wrong. Yes, return; I am still in the right here. Is there wrong in my tongue? Does not my palate discern calamities?
Job is not asking them to agree with him. He wants two things from them:
William KellyHe asks for an open judgment of his ways, and a kind estimate of his complaints.
The Warning For Anyone Who Counsels A Sufferer
Job had already told them that honest words carry weight. The trouble with his friend Eliphaz was not that he spoke, but that he never named anything. That failure outlives Job:
F. B. HoleAt verse 24 a more direct appeal begins. He challenged his friends to drop their vague hints and make a direct accusation. Let them show where he had gone wrong, so that, taught by them, he might keep quiet. He was right to say, "How forcible are right words," but what did Eliphaz's "arguing," or "scolding," achieve? How often among Christians have vague hints, or even accusations, done great harm, where "right words," based on specific facts, would have proved powerful and done good.
Why His Refusal To Back Down Mattered
Holding his ground could look like stubbornness. In fact Job was answering a charge he knew nothing about — Satan's:
Samuel RidoutHere we see the settled state of Job's mind all through his dispute with his friends. He has a sense of moral uprightness, of genuine fear of God, which he cannot deny. It is the testimony of a good conscience, and it stands like a rock against all the outrageous suspicions and accusations. He holds fast to his integrity, and so proves that Satan's malicious charge was false and that his friends' principles were wrong.
Summary
- Test, don't guess. Job asks his friends to examine him, not guess about him. Nothing in his life explains what he is suffering.
- Name it or drop it. Vague suspicion wounds. Plain, specific words would have helped instead — and that failure did not stop with Job's friends.
- Taste still works. Pain had not destroyed his judgment. He could still recognise evil, and he would not hide it, even in himself.
- Integrity answers the accuser. Job would not confess a sin he had not committed. That refusal proved Satan's charge false and his friends' rule wrong.
- Integrity is not enough. Job's uprightness was real, but it could never be his ground before God. He still had to learn that he needed the righteousness of God.