Job 19:12

“His troops come together, etc.] Afflictions which are many, and of which it may be said, as was at the birth of God, who had his name from the word here used, “a troop cometh”: (<013011>Genesis 30:11); and these sometimes come together, or follow so quick one upon another, that there is scarce any interval between them, as did Job’s afflictions; and they are God’s hosts, his troops, his soldiers, which are at his command; and he says to them, as the centurion did to his, to the one, Go, and he goes, and to another, Come, and it comes: and raise up their way against me; as an army, when it comes against a place, throws up a bank to raise their artillery upon, that they may play it to greater…”

“troops--Calamities advance together like hostile troops (Job 10:17). raise up . . . way--An army must cast up a way of access before it, in marching against a city (Isa 40:3).”

“His troops - The calamities which he had sent, and which are here represented as “armies” or “soldiers” to accomplish his work. It is not probable that he refers here to the bands of the Chaldeans and the Sabeans, that had robbed him of his property, but to the calamities that had come upon him, “as if” they were bands of robbers. And raise up their way - As and army that is about to lay siege to a city, or that is marching to attack it, casts up a way of access to it, and thus obtains every facility to take it; see Isaiah 40:3, note; Isaiah 57:14, note. And encamp round about my tabernacle - In the manner of an army besieging a city. Often an army is encamped in this manner for months or…”

“Troops - My afflictions, which are God's soldiers marching under his conduct. Raise - Cast up a trench round about me. Job 19:13”

“His: Job 16:11; Isa 10:5, Isa 10:6, Isa 51:23 raise: Job 30:12 Job 19:13”

“12 His troops came together, And threw up their way against me, And encamped round about my tent. 13 My brethren hath He removed far from me, And my acquaintance are quite estranged from me. 14 My kinsfolk fail, And those that knew me have forgotten me. 15 The slaves of my house and my maidens, They regard me as a stranger, I am become a perfect stranger in their eyes. It may seem strange that we do not connect Job 19:12 with the preceding strophe or group of verses; but between Job 19:7 and Job 19:21 there are thirty στίχοι, which, in connection with the arrangement of the rest of this speech in decastichs (accidentally coinciding remarkably with the prominence given to the number ten in…”