Job 15 Summary - 5 Minute Bible Study

Job 15 Short Summary:

Eliphaz is once again the speaker in Job 15. His comments are similar to those he made in chapter 4, accusing Job of empty words, hiding unconfessed sin, and disrespecting God. He proposed that Job’s pride was keeping him from repenting, and then went on to restate is confidence in the traditional wisdom that God always punishes evil people on earth.

Job 15 Bible Study

SHORT OUTLINE OF THE BOOK OF JOB

• Job 1-2 – Job is Persecuted by Satan

• Job 3-37 – Job and His Friends Discuss the Reason He is Experiencing Persecution

• Job 38-41 – God Speaks with Job and Reveals His Greatness to Him.

• Job 42 – God Restores What Job Lost

WHEN:

• The date of the writing of Job is unknown and still debated. Some believe it was written during the time of the patriarchs (Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob) or even earlier, while others suspect it was written during the time of Judah’s Babylonian captivity (607-537 B.C.).

• I take the earlier date. The description of Job as the “greatest of all the people of the east” (1:3) and an absence of references to Israel, Jerusalem, and the Temple suggests to me that this book was written early.

KEY CHARACTERS:

• Job – A blameless and upright man who Satan persecuted in an attempt to turn his heart away from God.

• Eliphaz – Job’s friend who insisted he was being punished for sin. Eliphaz is the main speaker in Job 15. He spoke previously in Job 4.  

WHERE:

• Job lived in the land of Uz. Most scholars surmise the land of Uz was in northern Saudi Arabia, either immediately south of the Dead Sea, I the land that would become known as Edom, or immediately east of the Dead Sea, which is today the country of Jordan.

OUTLINE:

• ELIPHAZ SUGGESTS JOB IS FULL OF PRIDE (15:1-13):

  • Eliphaz said that Job and his words were full of wind. The wind is unreliable, inconsistent, and unmeasurable. Eliphaz was calling Job’s words foolish and empty.

  • He tried to frame Job as arrogant. Job was opposed by all his friends and all the traditional wisdom of the day. Who did Job think he was? Eliphaz asked him if he thought he was wiser than everyone else’s collective wisdom (15:8-10).

  • He accused Job of not respecting God as he should, saying, “You are doing away with the fear of God” (15:4).

  • He didn’t provide any evidence that Job was lying about not sinning, he just accused him of being controlled by his sin and using crafty words to justify himself (15:5).

• MANKIND CANNOT BE PURE BEFORE GOD (15:14-16):

  • Eliphaz said, “What is man, that he can be pure? Or he who is born of a woman, that he can be righteous? Behold, God puts no trust in his holy ones, and the heavens are not pure in his sight; how much less one who is abominable and corrupt, a man who drinks injustice like water!” (15:14-16).

  • These sentiments echo Eliphaz’s previous words in Job 4:17-19.

  • There was a sense in which Eliphaz was right, no man could claim sinlessness before God, including Job, but he was wrong to suggest that Job’s suffering was because of that general sinfulness. Sense all men were sinful, why weren’t Eliphaz, Bildad, and Zophar suffering alongside Job, because undoubtedly, they were all guilty of sin at some point?

• ELIPHAZ REPEATS THE “WISDOM” OF THE ELDERS (15:17-35):

  • In the final verses of this chapter, we see Eliphaz doubling down on his previous claim that evil men always get what they deserve in this life.

  • Job refuted this traditional wisdom in Job 12:6, but Eliphaz thought it was worth repeating.  

  • He talked about how sinful people always end up in distress, with their prosperity ripped from them, because the hand of God smites them and does not let them go unpunished.

APPLICATION

• Sometimes the accusation of pride can be used as a weapon against godly reform.

• Eliphaz accused Job of being proud and thinking himself wiser than all of his friends because Job wouldn’t agree with the conventional wisdom of the day.

• Satan, who is himself probably the most prideful being in existence, likes to level the accusation of pride against God’s servants who are trying to make positive impacts.

• Reformers in the Church are often labeled as prideful because they don’t accept the status quo and want to challenge the Church to be better.

• When a person comes to know Jesus and wants to teach their family members about Him, they are often labelled as proud and self-righteous.

• Satan’s servants accuse God’s servants of pride to try to stop them from making positive progress.

• Satan uses this tactic very effectively to get Christians to question themselves and back off of their zeal to see positive change happen.