Job 19:25

The worth of a poor upright man. Riches preserve friends. False witnesses. False friends. A king's wrath. The foolish son. The prudent wife. Slothfulness. Pity for the poor. The fear of the Lord. The spendthrift son. Obedience to parents.

redeemer--UMBREIT and others understand this and Job 19:26, of God appearing as Job's avenger before his death, when his body would be wasted to a skeleton. But Job uniformly despairs of restoration and vindication of his cause in this life (Job 17:15-16). One hope alone was left, which the Spirit revealed--a vindication in a future life: it would be no full vindication if his soul alone were to be happy without the body, as some explain (Job 19:26) "out of the flesh." It was his body that had chiefly suffered: the resurrection of his body, therefore, alone could vindicate his cause: to see God with his own eyes, and in a renovated body (Job 19:27), would disprove the imputation of guilt cast on him because of the sufferings of his present body. That this truth is not further dwelt on by Job, or noticed by his friends, only shows that it was with him a bright passing glimpse of Old Testament hope, rather than the steady light of Gospel assurance; with us this passage has a definite clearness, which it had not in his mind (see on Job 21:30). The idea in "redeemer" with Job is Vindicator (Job 16:19; Num 35:27), redressing his wrongs; also including at least with us, and probably with him, the idea of the predicted Bruiser of the serpent's head. Tradition would inform him of the prediction. FOSTER shows that the fall by the serpent is represented perfectly on the temple of Osiris at PhilÃ&brvbr; and the resurrection on the tomb of the Egyptian Mycerinus, dating four thousand years back. Job's sacrifices imply sense of sin and need of atonement. Satan was the injurer of Job's body; Jesus Christ his Vindicator, the Living One who giveth life (Joh 5:21, Joh 5:26). at the latter day--Rather, "the Last," the peculiar title of Jesus Christ, though Job may not have known the preg…

And though after my skin worms destroy this body,.... Meaning not, that after his skin was wholly consumed now, which was almost gone, there being scarce any left but the skin of his teeth, Job 19:20; the worms in his ulcers would consume what was left of his body, which scarce deserved the name of a body, and therefore he points to it, and calls it "this", without saying what it was; but that when he should be entirely stripped of his skin in the grave, then rottenness and worms would strip him also of all the rest of his flesh and his bones; by which he expresses the utter consumption of his body by death, and after it in the grave; and nevertheless, though so it would be, he was assured of his resurrection from the dead: yet in my flesh shall I see God: he believed, that though he should die and moulder into dust in the grave, yet he should rise again, and that in true flesh, not in an aerial celestial body, but in a true body, consisting of flesh, blood, and bones, which spirits have not, and in the same flesh or body he then had, his own flesh and body, and not another's; and so with his fleshly or corporeal eyes see God, even his living Redeemer, in human nature; who, as he would stand upon the earth in that nature, in the fulness of time, and obtain redemption for him, so he would in the latter day appear again, raise him from the dead, and take him to himself, to behold his glory to all eternity: or "out of my flesh" (f), out of my fleshly eyes; from thence and with those shall I behold God manifest in the flesh, my incarnate God; and if Job was one of those saints that rose when Christ did, as some say (g), he saw him in the flesh and with his fleshly eyes. (f) "e carne mea", Tigurine version, Mercerus, Piscator, Cocceius, Schmidt, Schultens; so Gussetius, p. 4…

This chapter is Job's answer to Bildad's discourse in the foregoing chapter. Though his spirit was grieved and much heated, and Bildad was very peevish, yet he gave him leave to say all he designed to say, and did not break in upon him in the midst of his argument; but, when he had done, he gave him a fair answer, in which, I. He complains of unkind usage. And very unkindly he takes it. 1. That his comforters added to his affliction (Job 19:2-7). 2. That his God was the author of his affliction (Job 19:8-12). 3. That his relations and friends were strange to him, and shy of him, in his affliction (Job 19:20-22). II. He comforts himself with the believing hopes of happiness in the other world, though he had so little comfort in this, making a very solemn confession of his faith, with a desire that it might be recorded as an evidence of his sincerity (Job 19:23-27). III. He concludes with a caution to his friends not to persist in their hard censures of him (Job 19:28, Job 19:29) If the remonstrance Job here makes of his grievances may serve sometimes to justify our complaints, yet his cheerful views of the future state, at the same time, may shame us Christians, and may serve to silence our complaints, or at least to balance them.

19:25 Job’s faith in a Redeemer could find fulfillment only in Christ; the same was true of his request for an advocate (9:33) and a witness in heaven (16:19). The term “Redeemer” (Hebrew go’el) comes from both criminal and civil law. An individual could redeem or avenge wrongful bloodshed (Num 35:12-18) or redeem lost property, perhaps by buying back a slave or marrying the heir’s widow (Lev 25:25, 47-49; 27:11-13; Ruth 3:13). The Old Testament knew the Lord as redeemer (Exod 6:6; Pss 19:14; 103:4; Prov 23:10-11; Isa 43:1 [“ransomed”]; Isa 54:5); New Testament believers know the Redeemer as the Lord Jesus Christ (Eph 1:7, 14; Heb 9:12; 1 Pet 1:18). Job wanted his Redeemer to declare his innocence (see Job 1:1 and corresponding study note).