Job 24

Job 24 is the latter part of Job's reply to Eliphaz's speech in Job 22. In the preceding chapter, Job 23, Job lamented that he could not find God. In this chapter that lament broadens to encompass the injustice of the whole world. When this reply ends, Bildad's brief speech follows in Job 25.

Outline

• Verse 1 Job asks why the Almighty does not appoint times, and why those who know him do not see his days.
• Verses 2–4 Some remove landmarks (stones marking the boundaries of land), take away the donkey of the fatherless and the ox of the widow, and push the needy off the road.
• Verses 5–8 The poor search for food in the wilderness like wild donkeys. Without clothing, they endure the cold and the mountain rains and embrace the rock for want of shelter.
• Verses 9–12 The fatherless are snatched from their mother's breast, and the garments of the poor are taken in pledge. The hungry carry sheaves and tread winepresses for others. Groaning rises from the city, yet, Job says, God does not regard the wrong.
• Verses 13–17 Job describes those who rebel against the light: the murderer, the adulterer, and the one who digs through houses at night. To them the morning is like the shadow of death.
• Verses 18–21 Such a person is carried away on the waters, swallowed up by Sheol (the realm of the dead), and forgotten. Wickedness is broken like a tree.
• Verses 22–24 God preserves the mighty, yet his eyes are upon their ways. They are exalted for a little while, and then they are cut off like the tops of the ears of grain.
• Verse 25 Job concludes by asking who can prove him a liar.

Key Verses

• Job 24:1 "Why, seeing times are not hidden from the Almighty, do they that know him not see his days?": This is the question that drives the entire chapter. Job's challenge concerning God's justice is contained in this single sentence.
• Job 24:12 "Yet God layeth not folly to them": This verse expresses most sharply Job's charge that God remains silent before the cries of the suffering.

People and Places

• Job: The speaker of this chapter. Beginning from his own suffering, he speaks of the suffering of the oppressed throughout the world.
• Job's three friends: They do not appear directly. Job's words are a response to Eliphaz's speech.
• No specific place names appear.

Points for Reflection

• The speaker of verses 18–24: The statement that the wicked quickly perish resembles the friends' argument for retribution (the idea that people are repaid according to their deeds), so interpretations differ. Some read these verses as Job's own words, some as Job quoting his friends' position, and some as a speech originally belonging to another friend that has been placed here. Translations also render the tone of this section differently.
• Connection to the Law: The prohibition against removing landmarks appears in Deuteronomy 19. The requirement to return a garment taken in pledge appears in Exodus 22 and Deuteronomy 24. The acts Job denounces overlap with those forbidden by these laws.
• Connection to the New Testament: "His days" in verse 1 is commonly understood as the time when God judges evil. The verse is often read alongside Acts 17:31, which states that God has appointed a day of judgment, and alongside 2 Peter 3:9 and Romans 2:4, which explain the delay of judgment as God's longsuffering. These passages connect with the New Testament understanding of the Last Judgment.