Job 11:5

“But O that God would speak, etc.] To Job, and stop his mouth, so full of words; convict him of his lies, reprove him for his mocks and scoffs, and make him ashamed of them; refute his false doctrine and oppose it, and show him his folly and vanity in imagining it to be pure, and in conceit thinking himself to be free from sin, and even in the sight of God himself: Zophar seems by this wish to suggest, that what his friends had as yet spoke had had no effect upon Job, and signified nothing; and that he despaired of bringing him to any true sense of himself and his case, but that God only could do it; and therefore he entreats he would take him in hand, and speak unto him; as he had by his…”

“But oh that God would speak - Hebrew, “and truly, who will give that God should speak.” It is the expression of an earnest wish that God would address him, and bring him to a proper sense of his ill desert. The meaning is, that if God should speak to him he would by no means find himself so holy as he now claimed to be. return to 'Top of Page'”

“Speak - Plead with thee according to thy desire: he would soon put thee to silence. We are commonly ready with great assurance to interest God in our quarrels. But they are not always in the right, who are most forward, to appeal to his judgment, and prejudge it against their antagonists. Job 11:6”

“11:5-6 punishing you . . . less than you deserve: Zophar believed that calamity indicated divine retribution for sins (cp. 34:36).”

“Job 23:3-7, Job 31:35, Job 33:6-18, Job 38:1, Job 38:2, Job 40:1-5, Job 40:8, Job 42:7 Job 11:6”