who shakes the earth out of its place, and its pillars tremble;
Job is answering Bildad with a picture of God's power: mountains overturned, the earth shaken out of its place, sun and stars switched off at a word. The description is grand, but a painful question drives it: if God is this strong, how can a man ever be right with Him?
The picture behind the words
The trembling pillars are earthquake language. One writer takes the pictures one at a time — earth, then sky, then sea.
Leslie M. GrantGod could remove mountains by an earthquake. It shakes the earth and makes even its steadiest parts tremble. Also, high above the earth, He could command the sun not to rise — that is, as far as we can see. Of course He does this by placing clouds in the sky, and the clouds hide the stars too... Whether the earth or sky or sea, He is in perfect control.
The question this power raises
Job piles up this power for a reason. It belongs to a question he raised at the start of the chapter.
F. B. HoleHe began by admitting that God's disciplinary ways are right. But he raised the all-important question: how could a man be right with God? In our day the short sentence, "Get right with God," has been used to awaken interest in the gospel message. It might well provoke the reply, "Yes, but how is it to be achieved?"
Why arguing back is hopeless
One answer is to fight back and argue the case out with God. Job weighed that and saw where it ends.
F. B. HoleSin has made mankind into rebels, so defying God is their first instinct. But Job saw how ruinous such an attitude would be. God is so infinitely great that no rebel can prosper... The earth and the heavens with their constellations proclaim the Creator's greatness and glory.
Beauty on the surface, doubt underneath
Commentators differ on Job's tone here. One holds that every word of the description is true, and that something vital is still left out of it.
Samuel RidoutIn this part Job enlarges upon the power and greatness of God. The language is noble and the description is true. But underneath lies the awful doubt about this great and powerful Being's goodness. God overturns the unconscious mountains in His wrath; He makes the earth to tremble... These are marvellous sweeps of language, taking in the whole heavens. But sadly it is not, "The heavens declare the glory of God." It is a declaration of absolute, unstoppable Power.
The same writer hears a cornered man in the opening lines. Job grants that God is just because there is no appeal against Him.
Samuel RidoutThis is terrible. It is not someone humbly asking God for a reason, as Jeremiah does in similar circumstances (Jeremiah 12:1-4). It is the hardness of despair — might is right, and God has the might on His side.
Job knew whose hand it was
His trouble was never doubt about the source of his suffering. That certainty was precisely the problem.
William KellyThat is exactly where Job was. He was quite sure that it was of God, and that is the very thing that made the difficulty. Because his conscience was pure toward God, and he knew the goodness of God — and yet how was this? He could not understand it... He was not a proud man; but as all men are, until they learn in the way I have described, he had a very good opinion of himself. That must all come down.
The answer Job could not yet see
One writer names what Job was missing — and what no one on earth knew then.
William KellyJob did not doubt that God would see him through all his difficulties. But he could not imagine on what ground of righteousness that could be done. If man was a poor sinful man, and yet God showed him saving mercy, how was man to be just? You cannot put justice and sins together until you have Christ. He died for the sins and rose again for the believer's justification. There the sins are completely blotted out. How could Job know anything about that? Nobody knew it; no man on earth.
Summary
- Power — the shaking earth and trembling pillars are earthquake language. What looks most solid moves when God acts, on land, in the sky and at sea.
- Question — Job piles up that power to press one point: how can a man be right with God? "Get right with God" is quickly said, but how is it to be done?
- Defiance — arguing your case against a God who overturns mountains can only ruin you. No rebel prospers.
- Doubt — the poetry is true but incomplete. It declares unstoppable power, not goodness; one writer hears despair in it, not worship.
- Answer — what Job lacked was Christ, who died for the sins and rose again for the believer's justification. Only there do justice and sins meet, and the good opinion of self comes down.