Homilist Job 2:11 Now when Job's three friends heard of all this evil that was come on him, they came every one from his own place; Eliphaz the Temanite… "Weep with them that weep." Just as we should be glad in the gladness of others, so we must grieve in the griefs of others. There are people who find it almost impossible to do this. They can neither feel for nor with others. They are naturally unsympathetic. This exhortation comes to such as a duty. They must learn the art, and so thoroughly that they will sympathise naturally and truly. It is no excuse to say that we cannot. We must. Dr. Dale is a case in point. This is what his son says of his father: "He was not selfish, but he was apt to be self-absorbed, engrossed by his own thoughts, and so absorbed as to be heedless of those whom he met, and of what was going on around him; he often gave offence unwittingly. His nature was not sympathetic. The faculty so bestowed on some, he had to cultivate sedulously and patiently as one of the moral virtues...He was conscious of his defect, and set himself to overcome it, not as a mere infirmity, but as a fault: He became sympathetic by sympathising." Dr. Dale was not singular in this instinctive lack of sympathy. There are many similarly destitute of the grace of sorrowing. (Homilist.) Parallel Verses KJV: Now when Job's three friends heard of all this evil that was come upon him, they came every one from his own place; Eliphaz the Temanite, and Bildad the Shuhite, and Zophar the Naamathite: for they had made an appointment together to come to mourn with him and to comfort him. |
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