I also could speak as you do: if your soul were in my soul's place, I could heap up words against you, and shake my head at you.
Read Chapter 16
George Leo Haydock
AD 1849
My soul. If you had experienced my state of misery, (Haydock) I surely would not have behaved thus to you. (Calmet) Facile, cum valemus, recta consilia ægrotis damus: Tu si hîc sis, aliter sentias. (Terent. Andria.)
5. It is sometimes necessary that wicked minds, which are incapable of being corrected by man’s preaching, should have the strokes of God wished for them, in a spirit of kindness; and while this is done with great earnestness of love, then plainly not the punishment but the correction of the guilty person is the thing aimed at, and it is shewn to be a prayer rather than a curse. And in these words blessed Job is shewn to aim at this, that the friends, who knew not how to sympathize in his grief through charity, might learn by experience how they ought to have pitied the affliction of another, and, being subdued by griefs might draw from their own suffering, how to minister consolation to others, and then live the more healthfully within, when they are made sensible of something of frailty without. Observe that he does not say, O that my soul were for your soul; but, O that your soul were for my soul; in that he would have been cursing himself, if he had wished himself to be made lik...
Job has phrased this in the form of a question and not in order to look for an argument. This means “Will I really join words together against you? Or will I really shake my head at you? Not at all! It is convenient for the righteous to take upon himself the afflictions of others and not to trample underfoot or to exaggeratedly insist wickedly, as you do concerning my torments.” - "Homilies on Job 19.16.4c–d"
