Job 22 explained: Eliphaz Accuses Job Outright

God gains nothing from you (vv. 1-4)

Eliphaz argues that human goodness adds nothing to God, so God owes Job nothing and cannot be treating him unfairly. He asks, with heavy sarcasm, whether God is punishing Job for being too devout.

Charges with no evidence (vv. 5-11)

For the first time Eliphaz names crimes: taking a poor person's cloak, often their only blanket at night, as security for a debt, and turning away the thirsty, the hungry, widows and orphans. He offers no proof and seems to reason backward from Job's suffering, while the book's opening calls Job blameless.

Claiming Job thinks God is blind (vv. 12-20)

Eliphaz twists Job's earlier words to suggest Job thinks God is too high above the clouds to see wrongdoing, and even throws back a line Job used in chapter 21. He warns Job not to follow the old path of the wicked who were suddenly swept away, which many readers take as a hint at the flood story.

Come back and be restored (vv. 21-30)

He urges Job to make peace with God and to treat even fine gold from Ophir, a distant land famous for gold, as worthless dirt, promising that God will become his real treasure. With some irony, he says a guilty person can be rescued through the clean hands of a righteous one, and at the book's end God asks Job to pray for Eliphaz and his friends.

Key verse: Job 22:5

Where Christians differ

Christians differ on whether Eliphaz's call to return to God in verses 21 to 30 is sound advice wrongly aimed at Job, or is itself shaped by his flawed belief that God always rewards the good with prosperity.

Something to think about

When someone is suffering, what makes it tempting to look for a reason they must have brought it on themselves?