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Amplified Bible

Job 22:13

"You say, 'What does God know [about me]? Can He judge through the thick darkness?

Bible Study Resources

Concordances:

- Nave's Topical Bible - Blasphemy;   Blindness;   God Continued...;   Infidelity;  

Dictionaries:

- American Tract Society Bible Dictionary - Eliphaz;   Charles Buck Theological Dictionary - Greatness of God;   Hypocrisy;   Holman Bible Dictionary - Job, the Book of;  

Encyclopedias:

- International Standard Bible Encyclopedia - Eliphaz (2);   Job, Book of;   The Jewish Encyclopedia - Cloud;   Constellations;  

Parallel Translations

Christian Standard Bible®
Yet you say, “What does God know?Can he judge through total darkness?
Hebrew Names Version
You say, 'What does God know? Can he judge through the thick darkness?
King James Version
And thou sayest, How doth God know? can he judge through the dark cloud?
English Standard Version
But you say, ‘What does God know? Can he judge through the deep darkness?
New Century Version
But you ask, ‘What does God know? Can he judge us through the dark clouds?
New English Translation
But you have said, ‘What does God know? Does he judge through such deep darkness?
New American Standard Bible
"But you say, 'What does God know? Can He judge through the thick darkness?
World English Bible
You say, 'What does God know? Can he judge through the thick darkness?
Geneva Bible (1587)
But thou sayest, How should God know? can he iudge through the darke cloude?
Legacy Standard Bible
You say, ‘What does God know?Can He judge through the dense gloom?
Berean Standard Bible
Yet you say: 'What does God know? Does He judge through thick darkness?
Contemporary English Version
Do you think the deep darkness hides you from God?
Complete Jewish Bible
Yet you say, ‘What does God know? Can he see through thick darkness to judge?
Darby Translation
And thou sayest, What doth God know? will he judge through the dark cloud?
Easy-to-Read Version
But you might say, ‘What does God know? Can he see through the dark clouds to judge us?
George Lamsa Translation
And yet you say, How does God know? Can he judge through the thick darkness?
Good News Translation
And yet you ask, "What does God know? He is hidden by clouds—how can he judge us?"
Lexham English Bible
And you ask, ‘What does God know? Can he judge through deep gloom?
Literal Translation
And you say, What does God know? Can He judge through the dark cloud?
Miles Coverdale Bible (1535)
wilt thou therfore saye: Tush, how shulde God knowe? Doth his dominion reach beyonde the cloudes?
American Standard Version
And thou sayest, What doth God know? Can he judge through the thick darkness?
Bible in Basic English
And you say, What knowledge has God? is he able to give decisions through the deep dark?
JPS Old Testament (1917)
And thou sayest: 'What doth God know? Can He judge through the dark cloud?
King James Version (1611)
And thou sayest, How doth God know? can he iudge through the darke cloude?
Bishop's Bible (1568)
Wilt thou therfore say, Tushe, howe should God know? can he iudge through the darke cloude?
Brenton's Septuagint (LXX)
And thou has said, What does the Mighty One know? does he judge in the dark?
English Revised Version
And thou sayest, What doth God know? can he judge through the thick darkness?
Wycliffe Bible (1395)
And thou seist, What sotheli knowith God? and, He demeth as bi derknesse.
Update Bible Version
And you say, What does God know? Can he judge through the thick darkness?
Webster's Bible Translation
And thou sayest, How doth God know? can he judge through the dark cloud?
New King James Version
And you say, "What does God know? Can He judge through the deep darkness?
New Living Translation
But you reply, ‘That's why God can't see what I am doing! How can he judge through the thick darkness?
New Life Bible
So you say, ‘What does God know? Can He judge through the darkness?
New Revised Standard
Therefore you say, ‘What does God know? Can he judge through the deep darkness?
J.B. Rotherham Emphasized Bible
Wilt thou say then, What doth GOD know? Out through a thick cloud, can he judge?
Douay-Rheims Bible
And thou sayst: What doth God know? and he judgeth as it were through a mist.
Revised Standard Version
Therefore you say, 'What does God know? Can he judge through the deep darkness?
Young's Literal Translation
And thou hast said, `What -- hath God known? Through thickness doth He judge?
New American Standard Bible (1995)
"You say, 'What does God know? Can He judge through the thick darkness?

Contextual Overview

5"Is not your wickedness great, And your sins without end? 6"For you have taken pledges of your brothers without cause, And stripped men naked. 7"You have not given water to the weary to drink, And you have withheld bread from the hungry. 8"But the land is possessed by the man with power, And the favored and honorable man dwells in it. 9"You have sent widows away empty-handed, And the arms (strength) of the fatherless have been broken. 10"Therefore snares surround you, And sudden dread terrifies and overwhelms you; 11Or darkness, so that you cannot see, And a flood of water covers you. 12"Is not God in the height of heaven? And behold the distant stars, how high they are! 13"You say, 'What does God know [about me]? Can He judge through the thick darkness?14'Thick clouds are a hiding place for Him, so that He cannot see, And He walks on the vault (circle) of the heavens.'

Bible Verse Review
  from Treasury of Scripure Knowledge

How: or, What

doth God know: Psalms 10:11, Psalms 59:7, Psalms 73:11, Psalms 94:7-9, Ezekiel 8:12, Ezekiel 9:9, Zephaniah 1:12

Reciprocal: Genesis 4:9 - I know Exodus 14:24 - and troubled 2 Chronicles 18:12 - Behold Job 11:11 - he seeth Job 24:15 - No eye Psalms 14:1 - no Isaiah 29:15 - seek Isaiah 47:10 - thou hast said Jeremiah 23:24 - hide Acts 5:3 - lie to 1 Corinthians 15:35 - How

Cross-References

Genesis 22:6
Then Abraham took the wood for the burnt offering and laid it on [the shoulders of] Isaac his son, and he took the fire (firepot) in his own hand and the [sacrificial] knife; and the two of them walked on together.
Genesis 22:7
And Isaac said to Abraham, "My father!" And he said, "Here I am, my son." Isaac said, "Look, the fire and the wood, but where is the lamb for the burnt offering?"
Genesis 22:8
Abraham said, "My son, God will provide for Himself a lamb for the burnt offering." So the two walked on together.
Genesis 22:9
When they came to the place of which God had told him, Abraham built an altar there and arranged the wood, and bound Isaac his son and placed him on the altar, on top of the wood.
Genesis 22:10
Abraham reached out his hand and took the knife to kill his son.
Genesis 22:19
So Abraham returned to his servants, and they got up and went with him to Beersheba; and Abraham settled in Beersheba.
Genesis 22:20
Now after these things Abraham was told, "Milcah has borne children to your brother Nahor:
Isaiah 30:21
Your ears will hear a word behind you, "This is the way, walk in it," whenever you turn to the right or to the left.
1 Corinthians 10:13
No temptation [regardless of its source] has overtaken or enticed you that is not common to human experience [nor is any temptation unusual or beyond human resistance]; but God is faithful [to His word—He is compassionate and trustworthy], and He will not let you be tempted beyond your ability [to resist], but along with the temptation He [has in the past and is now and] will [always] provide the way out as well, so that you will be able to endure it [without yielding, and will overcome temptation with joy].

Gill's Notes on the Bible

And thou sayest, how doth God know?.... What is done on earth, the works of the children of men, their sinful actions, when he dwells at such a distance, and so remote from the earth, as the height of the stars, and highest heavens, be; not that Job said this expressly with his lips, but in his heart; Eliphaz imagined and supposed that such was the reasoning of his mind; it was an invidious consequence he had drawn from what Job had said concerning the afflictions of the godly, and the prosperity of the wicked; which he interpreted as a denial of the providence of God, as if he had no regard to human affairs, but things took place in a very disorderly and confused way, without any regard to right or wrong; and he concluded that Job was led into these sentiments by the consideration of the distance of God from the earth; that, dwelling in the highest heavens, he could not and did not see what was done here, and therefore men might commit all manner of sin with impunity; that their sins would never be taken notice of, or they be called to an account for them; which are the very language and sentiments of the most abandoned of men, see Psalms 10:11;

can he judge through the dark clouds? if he cannot see and know what is done, he cannot judge of it, whether it is good or bad, and so can neither justify nor condemn an action. By "the dark cloud" is not meant the matter, or corporeal mass, with which man is covered, as a Jewish commentator x interprets it; rather the cloudy air, or atmosphere around us; or that thick darkness in which Jehovah dwells, clouds and darkness being around him, Psalms 97:2; but all this hinders not his sight of things done here below; what is thick darkness to us is pure light to him, in which also he is said to dwell, and with which he covers himself as with a garment; and the darkness and the light are both alike to him, he can see and judge through the one as well as the other.

x Peritzol.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

And thou sayest, How doth God know? - That is, it “follows” from what you have said; or the opinion which you have advanced is “the same” as if you had affirmed this. How common it is to charge a man with holding what we “infer,” from something which he has advanced, he must hold, and then to proceed to argue “as if” he actually held that. The philosophy of this is plain. He advances a certain opinion. “We” infer at once that he can hold that only on certain grounds, or that if he holds that he must hold something else also. We can see that if “we” held that opinion, we should also, for the sake of consistency, be compelled to hold something which seems to follow from it, and we cannot see how this can be avoided, and we at once charge him with holding it. But the truth may be, that “he” has not seen that such consequences follow, or that he has some other way of accounting for the fact than we have; or that he may hold to the fact and yet deny wholly the consequences which legitimately follow from it. Now we have a right to show him “by argument” that his opinions, if he would follow them out, would lead to dangerous consequences, but we have a right to charge him with holding only what he “professes” to hold. He is not answerable for our inferences; and we have no right to charge them on him as being his real opinions. Every man has a right to avow what he actually believes, and to be regarded as holding that, and that only.

How doth God know? - That is, How can one so exalted see what is done on the distant earth, and reward and punish people according to their deserts? This opinion was actually held by many of the ancients. It was supposed that the supreme God did not condescend to attend to the affairs of mortals, but had committed the government of the earth to inferior beings. This was the foundation of the Gnostic philosophy, which prevailed so much in the East in the early ages of the Christian church. Milton puts a similar sentiment into the mouth of Eve in her reflections after she had eaten the forbidden fruit:

And I, perhaps, am secret: heaven is high,

High and remote from thence to see distinct

Each thing on earth; and other care perhaps

May have diverted from continual watch

Our great Forbidder, safe with all his spies about him.

Paradise Lost, B. ix.

Can he judge through the dark cloud? - Can he look down through the clouds which interpose between man and him? Eliphaz could not see how Job could maintain his opinions without holding that this was impossible for God. He could see no other reason why God did not punish the wicked than because “he did not see them,” and he, therefore, charges this opinion on Job.


 
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