agony; 'nights of misery,' he says, 'have been allotted to me' (vii. 3), probably because his pains were more severe in the night (xxx. 17). How can it be worth while, he asks, thus to persecute him? Even if Eliphaz be right, and Job has been a sinner, yet how can this affect the Most High?
(Even) if I have sinned, what do I unto thee,
O thou watcher of men? (vii. 20.)
What bitter irony again! He admits a vigilance in God, but only the vigilance of 'espionage' (xiii. 27, xiv. 16), not that of friendly guardianship; God only aims at procuring a long catalogue of punishable sins. Why not forgive those sins and relieve Himself from a troublesome task? Soon it will be too late: a pathetic touch revealing a latent belief in God's mercy which no calamity could destroy.
Thus to the blurred vision of the agonised sufferer the moral God whom he used to worship has been transformed into an unreasoning, unpitying Force. Bildad is shocked at this. 'Can God pervert judgment'? (viii. 3.) In his short speech he reaffirms the doctrine of proportionate retribution, and exhorts Job to 'seek earnestly unto God' (viii. 5), thus clearly implying that Job is being punished for his sins.[1] Instead of basing his doctrine on revelation, Bildad supports the side of it relative to the wicked by an appeal to the common consent of mankind previously to the present generation (viii. 8, 9). This common consent, this traditional wisdom, is embodied in proverbial 'dark sayings,' as, for instance—
Can the papyrus grow up without marsh?
can the Nile reed shoot up without water?
While yet in its verdure, uncut,
it withers before any grass.
So fares it with all that forget God,
and the hope of the impious shall perish (viii. 11-13).
It is interesting to see at how early a date the argument in favour of Theism was rested to some extent on tradition. 'We are of yesterday, and know nothing,' says Bildad, 'be-*
- ↑ Bildad more than implies that the fate which overtook Job's children was the punishment of iniquity (viii. 4). Wonderful harshness!
