strength · interrogative particle + noun, common masculine singular absolute
pervert
יְעַוֵּ֣תye.'a.Vet
H5791
to wrest · verb, piel imperfect, 3rd person masculine singular
judgment
מִשְׁפָּ֑טmish.Pat
H4941
properly · noun, common masculine singular absolute
Almighty
שַׁ֝דַּ֗יSha.Dai
H7706
the Almighty · proper noun, a title
pervert
יְעַוֵּֽתye.'a.vet-
H5791
to wrest · verb, piel imperfect, 3rd person masculine singular
justice
צֶֽדֶקTze.dek
H6664
the right (natural · noun, common masculine singular absolute
Strong's Exhaustive Concordance (James Strong, 1890/1894), public domain; digitized by Open Scriptures (CC BY-SA). KJV word tagging: eBible.org (public domain). Original-language text, parsing and brief lexicon: STEPBible.org data from Tyndale House, Cambridge (CC BY 4.0).
Cross-references
Genesis 18:25 That be far from thee to do after this manner, to slay the righteous with the wicked: and that the righteous should be as the wicked, that b…
Deuteronomy 32:4 He is the Rock, his work is perfect: for all his ways are judgment: a God of truth and without iniquity, just and right is he.
2 Chronicles 19:7 Wherefore now let the fear of the LORD be upon you; take heed and do it: for there is no iniquity with the LORD our God, nor respect of pers…
Job 34:10-12 Therefore hearken unto me, ye men of understanding: far be it from God, that he should do wickedness; and from the Almighty, that he should…
Ezekiel 33:20 Yet ye say, The way of the Lord is not equal. O ye house of Israel, I will judge you every one after his ways.
Daniel 9:14 Therefore hath the LORD watched upon the evil, and brought it upon us: for the LORD our God is righteous in all his works which he doeth: fo…
Romans 3:4-6 God forbid: yea, let God be true, but every man a liar; as it is written, That thou mightest be justified in thy sayings, and mightest overc…
Job 4:17 Shall mortal man be more just than God? shall a man be more pure than his maker?
Cross-references from OpenBible.info (CC BY), in the lineage of the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge (public domain).
Commentary
Matthew Henry on Job 8:1-7
Here, I. Bildad reproves Job for what he had said (Job 8:2), checks his passion, but perhaps (as is too common) with greater passion. We thought Job spoke a great deal of good sense and much to the purpose, and that he had reason and right on his side; but Bildad, like an eager angry disputant, turns it all off with this, How long wilt thou speak these things? taking it for granted that Eliphaz had said enough to silence him, and that therefore all he said was impertinent. Thus (as Caryl observes) reproofs are often grounded upon mistakes. Men's meaning is not taken aright, and then they are gravely rebuked as if they were evil-doers. Bildad compares Job's discourse to a strong wind. Job had…
The repetition of "pervert" gives an emphasis galling to Job (Job 34:12). "Wouldst thou have God," as thy words imply, "pervert judgment," by letting thy sins go unpunished? He assumes Job's guilt from his sufferings.
John Gill on Job 8:3
Doth God pervert judgment?.... In his dealings with men in the way of his providence; no, he does not; here Bildad opposes himself to Job, who he thought had charged God with injustice in dealing with him, and his children, in the manner he had done: the same thing is intended in the following question:
or doth the Almighty pervert justice? for judgment and justice are the same, and often go together in Scripture, as being done either by God or men, when righteousness is executed by them, and this is never perverted by the Lord; there is no unrighteousness in him, neither in his nature, nor in his ways and works, either of providence or of grace; he is the Judge of all the earth, that does…
1 Then began Bildad the Shuhite, and said:
2 How long wilt thou utter such things,
And the words of thy mouth are a boisterous wind?
3 Will God reverse what is right,
Or the Almighty reverse what is just?
4 When thy children sinned against Him,
He gave them over to the hand of their wickedness.
Bildad
(Note: Nothing can be said respecting the signification of the name בּלדּד even as a probable meaning, unless perhaps = בל־דד, sine mammis, i.e., brought up without his mother's milk.)
begins harshly and self-confidently with quousque tandem, עד־אן instead of the usual עד־אנה. אלּה, not: this, but: of this kind, of such kind, as Job 12:3; Job 16:2. כּבּיר רוּח is poetical, equivalent to גּדולה…
The Church Fathers
Doth God pervert judgment? Or doth the Almighty pervert justice? These things blessed Job had neither in speaking denied, nor yet was ignorant of them in holding his tongue. But all bold persons, as we have said, speak with big words even well known truths, that in telling of them they may appear to be learned. They scorn to hold their peace in a spirit of modesty, lest they should be thought to be silent from ignorance. But it is to be known that they then extol the rectitude of God's justice, when security from ill uplifts themselves in joy, while blows are dealt to other men; when they see themselves enjoying prosperity in their affairs, and others harassed with adversity. For whilst they do wickedly, and yet believe themselves righteous, the benefit of prosperity attending them, they imagine to be due to their own merits; and they infer that God does not visit unjustly, in proportion as upon themselves, as being righteous, no cloud of misfortune falls. But if the power of correction from above touch their life but in the least degree, being struck they directly break loose against the policy of the Divine inquest, which a little while before, unharmed, they made much of in expressing admiration of it, and they deny that judgment to be just, which is at odds with their own ways; they canvass the equity of God's dealings, they fly out in words of contradiction, and being chastened because they have done wrong, they do worse. Hence it is well spoken by the Psalmist against the confession of the sinner, He will confess to Thee, when Thou doest well to him. For the voice of confession is disregarded, when it is shaped by the joyfulness of prosperity. But that confession alone possesses merit of much weight, which the force of pain has no power to part from the truth of the rule of right, and which adversity, the test of the heart, sharpens out even to the sentence of the lips. Therefore it is no wonder that Bildad commends the justice of God, in that he experiences no hurt therefrom. Now whereas we have said that the friends of blessed Job bear the likeness of heretics, it is well for us to point out briefly, how the words of Bildad accord with the wheedling ways of heretics. For whilst in their own idea they see Holy Church corrected with temporal visitations, they swell the bolder in the bigness of their perverted preaching, and putting forward the…
The Church Fathers: public-domain translations (Ante-Nicene and Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers), verse-indexed by SermonIndex (CC BY 4.0).
Dictionary and topics
Justice Of God, The · Declared to be: Undeviating — Declared to be: Undeviating
Dictionary: Easton's (1897) and Smith's (1863), public domain. Topics: Nave's Topical Bible (1896) and Torrey's Topical Textbook (1897), public domain. Both as parsed by NEUU (CC BY 4.0).
According to Bildad, God does not twist justice, so the death of Job’s children proved that they had sinned against God. Bildad divided people into the blameless (Hebrew tam, 8:20a; see 1:1) and the secretly wicked (Hebrew khanep, 8:13b). He believed that they could be differentiated by watching what God did to them.
Rashi on Job 8:3
Does God pervert judgment Heb. הא-ל. The “hey” is vowelized with a “patach,” and it means an expression of wonder.
