Job 10:2

I will say unto God, Do not condemn me; shew me wherefore thou contendest with me.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(2) I will say unto God . . .—This is a model of prayer for all, combining the prayer of the publican (Luke 18:13), and a prayer for that light for which we long so earnestly in times of affliction and darkness.

Benson Commentary

Job 10:2. I will say unto God, Do not condemn me — Hebrew, אל תרשׁיעני, al tarshigneeni, Do not pronounce me to be a wicked man; as my friends do; neither deal with me as such, as I confess thou mightest do, by thy sovereign power, and in rigorous justice: O discover my integrity by removing this stroke, for which my friends condemn me. Wherefore — For what ends and reasons, and for what sins; for I am not conscious to myself of any peculiar sins by which I have deserved to be made the most miserable of all men. When God afflicts, he contends with us: when he contends with us, there is always a reason for it. And it is desirable to know what that reason is, that we may forsake whatever he has a controversy with us for.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

10:1-7 Job, being weary of his life, resolves to complain, but he will not charge God with unrighteousness. Here is a prayer that he might be delivered from the sting of his afflictions, which is sin. When God afflicts us, he contends with us; when he contends with us, there is always a reason; and it is desirable to know the reason, that we may repent of and forsake the sin for which God has a controversy with us. But when, like Job, we speak in the bitterness of our souls, we increase guilt and vexation. Let us harbour no hard thoughts of God; we shall hereafter see there was no cause for them. Job is sure that God does not discover things, nor judge of them, as men do; therefore he thinks it strange that God continues him under affliction, as if he must take time to inquire into his sin.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

I will say unto God, Do not condemn me - Do not hold me to be wicked - תרשׁיעני אל 'al tarshı̂y‛ēnı̂y. The sense is, "Do not simply hold me to be wicked, and treat me as such, without showing me the reasons why I am so regarded." This was the ground of Job's complaint, that God by mere sovereignty and power held him to be a wicked man, and that he did not see the reasons why he was so considered and treated. He now desired to know in what he had offended, and to be made acquainted with the cause of his sufferings. The idea is, that it was unjust to treat one as guilty who had no opportunity of knowing the nature of the offence with which he was charged, or the reason why he was condemned.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

2. show me, &c.—Do not, by virtue of Thy mere sovereignty, treat me as guilty without showing me the reasons.

Matthew Poole's Commentary

Do not condemn me; or, Pronounce me not to be a wicked man, as my friends do; neither deal with me as such, as I confess thou mightest do by thy sovereign power and in rigorous justice. O discover my integrity by removing this stroke, for which my friends so highly censure and condemn me.

Wherefore, i.e. for what ends and reasons, and for what sins? for I am not conscious to myself of any peculiar and eminent sins by which I have deserved to be made the most miserable of all mortals.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

I will say unto God, do not condemn me,.... Not that he feared eternal condemnation; there is none to them that are in Christ, and believe in him as Job did; Christ's undertakings, sufferings, and death, secure his people from the condemnation of law and justice; nor, indeed, are the afflictions of God's people a condemnation of them, but a fatherly chastisement, and are in order to prevent their being condemned with the world; yet they may look as if they were, in the eyes of the men of the world, and they as very wicked persons; and so the word may be rendered, "do not account me wicked" (d), or treat me as a wicked man, by continuing thine afflicting hand upon the; which, as long as it was on him, his friends would not believe but that he was a wicked man; wherefore, as God knew he was not such an one as they took him to be, he begs that he would not use him as such, that so the censure he lay under might be removed; and though he was condemned by them, he entreats that God would make it appear he was not condemned by him: and whereas he was not conscious to himself of any notorious wickedness done by him, which deserved such usage, he further prays:

show me wherefore thou contendest with me. Afflictions are the Lord's controversy with his people, a striving, a contending with them; which are sometimes so sharp, that were they continued long, the spirits would fail before him, and the souls that he has made: now there is always a cause or reason for them, which God has in his own breast, though it is not always known to man, at least not at first, or as soon as the controversy or contention is begun; when God afflicts, it is either for sin, to prevent it, or purge from it, or to bring his people to a sense of it, to repent of it, and forsake it, or to try their graces, and make them more partakers of his holiness; and when good men, as Job, are at a loss about this, not being conscious of any gross iniquity committed, or a course of sin continued in, it is lawful, and right, and commendable, to inquire the reason of it, and learn, if possible, the end, design, and use of such dispensations.

(d) "neque judices me improbum", Vatablus; so Schultens.

Geneva Study Bible

I will say unto God, Do not {c} condemn me; shew me wherefore thou contendest with me.

(c) He would not that God would proceed against him by his secret justice, but by the ordinary means that he punishes others.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

2. Do not condemn me] Or, make me not guilty; that is, by mere arbitrary will. Job felt himself “made guilty” by his afflictions, which to all were proofs that God held him guilty.

thou contendest with me] Job’s afflictions were proof that God had a contention or plea against him, Job desires to know the ground of it. Perhaps the afflictions themselves may be called the contention.

Pulpit Commentary

Verse 2. - I will say unto God, Do not condemn me; literally, do not pronounce me wicked My friends, as they call themselves, have, one and all, condemned me: do not thou also condemn me. A touching appeal! Show me wherefore thou contendest with me. One of Job's principal trials is the perplexity into which his unexampled sufferings have thrown him. He cannot understand why he has been singled out for such tremendous punishment, when he is not conscious to himself of any impiety or other heinous sin against God. So now, when he has resolved to vent all the bitterness of his soul, he ventures to ask the question - Why is he so tried? What has he done to make God his enemy? Wherefore does God fight against him continually? Job 10:2

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

1 My soul is full of disgust with my life,

Therefore I will freely utter my complaint;

I will speak in the bitterness of my soul.

2 I will say to Eloah: Condemn me not;

Let me know wherefore Thou contendest with me!

His self-consciousness makes him desire that the possibility of answering for himself might be granted him; and since he is weary of life, and has renounced all claim for its continuance, he will at least give his complaints free course, and pray the Author of his sufferings that He would not permit him to die the death of the wicked, contrary to the testimony of his own conscience. נקטה is equivalent to נקטּה ot tnel, Ezekiel 6:9, after the usual manner of the contraction of double Ayin verbs (Genesis 11:6-7; Isaiah 19:3; Judges 5:5; Ezekiel 41:7; vid., Ges. 67, rem. 11); it may nevertheless be derived directly from נקט, for this secondary verb formed from the Niph. נקט is supported by the Aramaic. In like manner, in Genesis 17:11 perhaps a secondary verb נמל, and certainly in Genesis 9:19 and Isaiah 23:3 a secondary verb נפץ (1 Samuel 13:11), formed from the Niph. נפץ (Genesis 10:18), is to be supposed; for the contraction of the Niphal form נקומה into נקמה is impossible; and the supposition which has been advanced, of a root פצץ equals פוץ in the signification diffundere, dissipare is unnecessary. His soul is disgusted (fastidio affecta est, or fastidit) with his life, therefore he will give free course to his plaint (comp. Job 7:11). עלי is not super or de me, but, as Job 30:16, in me; it belongs to the Ego, as an expression of spontaneity: I in myself, since the Ego is the subject, ὑποκείμενον, of his individuality (Psychol. S. 151f.). The inner man is meant, which has the Ego over or in itself; from this the complaint shall issue forth as a stream without restraint; not, however, a mere gloomy lamentation over his pain, but a supplicatory complaint directed to God respecting the peculiar pang of his suffering, viz., this stroke which seems to come upon him from his Judge (ריב, seq. acc., as Isaiah 27:8), without his being conscious of that for which he is accounted guilty.