27:12 Behold, all ye yourselves {h} have seen [it]; why then are ye thus altogether {i} vain?
{h} That is, these secret judgments of God and yet do not understand them.
(i) Why do you then maintain this error?
27:12 Have seen - I speak what is confirmed by your own, as well as others experiences. Vain - To condemn me for a wicked man, because I am afflicted.
27:11-23 Job's friends, on the same subject, spoke of the misery of wicked men before death as proportioned to their crimes; Job considered that if it were not so, still the consequences of their death would be dreadful. Job undertook to set this matter in a true light. Death to a godly man, is like a fair gale of wind to convey him to the heavenly country; but, to a wicked man, it is like a storm, that hurries him away to destruction. While he lived, he had the benefit of sparing mercy; but now the day of God's patience is over, and he will pour out upon him his wrath. When God casts down a man, there is no flying from, nor bearing up under his anger. Those who will not now flee to the arms of Divine grace, which are stretched out to receive them, will not be able to flee from the arms of Divine wrath, which will shortly be stretched out to destroy them. And what is a man profited if he gain the whole world, and thus lose his own soul?
