| Easton's Bible Dictionary God his strength. (1.) One of Job's "three friends" who visited him in his affliction (4:1). He was a "Temanite", i.e., a native of Teman, in Idumea. He first enters into debate with Job. His language is uniformly more delicate and gentle than that of the other two, although he imputes to Job special sins as the cause of his present sufferings. He states with remarkable force of language the infinite purity and majesty of God (4:12-21; 15:12-16). (2.) The son of Esau by his wife Adah, and father of several Edomitish tribes (Genesis 36:4, 10, 11, 16). Int. Standard Bible Encyclopedia ELIPHAZ (1) el'-i-faz, e-li'-faz ('eliphaz, "God is fine gold" (?)):
(1) Son of Esau by Adah, and father of Teman, Kenaz and Amalek (Genesis 36:4, 10 1 Chronicles 1:35 f).
(2) See next article. ELIPHAZ (2) The first and most prominent of the three friends of Job (Job 2:11), who come from distant places to condole with and comfort him, when they hear of his affliction.
That he is to be regarded as their leader and spokesman is shown by the greater weight and originality of his speeches (contained in Job 4; Job 5; Job 15; Job 22), the speeches of the other friends being in fact largely echoes and emotional enforcements of his thoughts, and by the fact that he is taken as their representative (Job 42:7) when, after the address from the whirlwind, Yahweh appoints their expiation for the wrong done to Job and to the truth.
He is represented as a venerable and benignant sage from Teman in Idumaea, a place noted for its wisdom (compare Jeremiah 49:7), as was also the whole land of Edom (compare Obadiah 1:8); and doubtless it is the writer's design to make his words typical of the best wisdom of the world. This wisdom is the result of ages of thought and experience (compare Job 15:17-19), of long and ripened study (compare Job 5:27), and claims the authority of revelation, though only revelation of a secondary kind (compare Eliphaz' vision, Job 4:12, and his challenge to Job to obtain the like, Job 5:1).
In his first speech he deduces Job's affliction from the natural sequence of effect from cause (Job 4:7-11), which cause he makes broad enough to include innate impurity and depravity (Job 4:17-19); evinces a quietism which deprecates Job's selfdestroying outbursts of wrath (Job 5:2, 3; compare Job's answer, Job 6:2, 3; Job 30:24); and promises restoration as the result of penitence and submission. In his second speech he is irritated because Job's blasphemous words are calculated to hinder devotion (Job 15:4), attributes them to iniquity (Job 15:5, 6), reiterates his depravity doctrine (Job 15:14-16), and initiates the lurid descriptions of the wicked man's fate, in which the friends go on to overstate their case (Job 15:20-35). In the third speech he is moved by the exigencies of his theory to impute actual frauds and crimes to Job, iniquities indulged in because God was too far away to see (22:5-15); but as a close holds open to him still the way of penitence, abjuring of iniquity, and restoration to health and wealth (22:21-30). His utterances are well composed and judicial (too coldly academic, Job thinks, 16:4, 5), full of good religious counsel abstractly considered.
Their error is in their inveterate presupposition of Job's wickedness, their unsympathetic clinging to theory in the face of fact, and the suppressing of the human promptings of friendship.
John Franklin Genung |  | Multi-Version Concordance Eliphaz (14 Occurrences) Genesis 36:4 Adah bore to Esau Eliphaz. Basemath bore Reuel. (WEB KJV JPS ASV BBE DBY WBS YLT NAS NIV) Genesis 36:10 these are the names of Esau's sons: Eliphaz, the son of Adah, the wife of Esau; and Reuel, the son of Basemath, the wife of Esau. (WEB KJV JPS ASV BBE DBY WBS YLT NAS NIV) Genesis 36:11 The sons of Eliphaz were Teman, Omar, Zepho, and Gatam, and Kenaz. (WEB KJV JPS ASV BBE DBY WBS YLT NAS NIV) Genesis 36:12 Timna was concubine to Eliphaz, Esau's son; and she bore to Eliphaz Amalek. These are the sons of Adah, Esau's wife. (WEB KJV JPS ASV BBE DBY WBS YLT NAS NIV) Genesis 36:15 These are the chiefs of the sons of Esau: the sons of Eliphaz the firstborn of Esau: chief Teman, chief Omar, chief Zepho, chief Kenaz, (WEB KJV JPS ASV BBE DBY WBS YLT NAS NIV) Genesis 36:16 chief Korah, chief Gatam, chief Amalek: these are the chiefs who came of Eliphaz in the land of Edom; these are the sons of Adah. (WEB KJV JPS ASV BBE DBY WBS YLT NAS NIV) 1 Chronicles 1:35 The sons of Esau: Eliphaz, Reuel, and Jeush, and Jalam, and Korah. The Second Book of Chronicles (WEB KJV JPS ASV BBE DBY WBS YLT NAS NIV) 1 Chronicles 1:36 The sons of Eliphaz: Teman, and Omar, Zephi, and Gatam, Kenaz, and Timna, and Amalek. (WEB KJV JPS ASV BBE DBY WBS YLT NAS NIV) Job 2:11 Now when Job's three friends heard of all this evil that had come on him, they each came from his own place: Eliphaz the Temanite, Bildad the Shuhite, and Zophar the Naamathite, and they made an appointment together to come to sympathize with him and to comfort him. (WEB KJV JPS ASV BBE DBY WBS YLT NAS NIV) Job 4:1 Then Eliphaz the Temanite answered, (WEB KJV JPS ASV BBE DBY WBS YLT NAS NIV) Job 15:1 Then Eliphaz the Temanite answered, (WEB KJV JPS ASV BBE DBY WBS YLT NAS NIV) Job 22:1 Then Eliphaz the Temanite answered, (WEB KJV JPS ASV BBE DBY WBS YLT NAS NIV) Job 42:7 It was so, that after Yahweh had spoken these words to Job, Yahweh said to Eliphaz the Temanite, "My wrath is kindled against you, and against your two friends; for you have not spoken of me the thing that is right, as my servant Job has. (WEB KJV JPS ASV BBE DBY WBS YLT NAS NIV) Job 42:9 So Eliphaz the Temanite and Bildad the Shuhite and Zophar the Naamathite went, and did what Yahweh commanded them, and Yahweh accepted Job. (WEB KJV JPS ASV BBE DBY WBS YLT NAS NIV) |
