Job’s Reply to Bildad
9:1 Then Job answered:
2 Yes, I know what you’ve said is true,
but how can a person be justified before God?
3 If one wanted to take him to court,
he could not answer God once in a thousand times.
4 God is wise and all-powerful.
Who has opposed him and come out unharmed?
5 He removes mountains without their knowledge,
overturning them in his anger.
6 He shakes the earth from its place
so that its pillars tremble.
7 He commands the sun not to shine
and seals off the stars.
8 He alone stretches out the heavens
and treads on the waves of the sea.
9 He makes the stars: the Bear, Orion,
the Pleiades, and the constellations of the southern sky.
10 He does great and unsearchable things,
wonders without number.
11 If he passed by me, I wouldn’t see him;
if he went by, I wouldn’t recognize him.
12 If he snatches something, who can stop him?
Who can ask him, “What are you doing?”
13 God does not hold back his anger;
Rahab’s assistants cringe in fear beneath him!
Commentary
(the following is from Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary, 1706 -- www.christianity.com)
"In this answer Job declared that he did not doubt the justice of God, when he denied himself to be a hypocrite; for how should man be just with God? Before him he pleaded guilty of sins more than could be counted; and if God should contend with him in judgment, he could not justify one out of a thousand, of all the thoughts, words, and actions of his life; therefore he deserved worse than all his present sufferings.
When Job mentions the wisdom and power of God, he forgets his complaints. We are unfit to judge of God's proceedings, because we know not what he does, or what he designs. God acts with power which no creature can resist. Those who think they have strength enough to help others, will not be able to help themselves against it."
