In the previous chapter, Elihu laid the foundations of his words: he refuted Iyov's claim, refuted the claims of his friends, and determined that wisdom, experience, and old age are not where the answers are found, but rather in the spirit that Hashem planted within man. Within me, Elihu says, Hashem planted the answers through the spirit He instilled in me. Now, in Chapter 33, he approaches the answers themselves: until now we spoke about why what you said was incorrect, and now I will state what I have to say.
And another preliminary principle: I, says Elihu, stand, as it were, in place of God. Iyov requested that God answer him, and Elihu replies that he is the Holy One, blessed be He's representative on earth. Do you really expect that the Holy One, blessed be He, will speak to you directly with an open mouth? The Holy One, blessed be He, sent an emissary, and that emissary is me. And where did Hashem tell me these things? The Holy One, blessed be He, planted these things within me, in my spirit and in my soul - a portion of God from above resides within me - and therefore, when I answer you, God is essentially answering you.
Iyov further claimed: My desire is that Hashem answer me, and when He answers me, that I will not be terrified and dismayed by His greatness and exaltedness - which would silence all my arguments - but rather that He speak with me as a man speaks to his fellow. Elihu says to him: Behold, here Hashem is fulfilling your wish. When you speak with me, it is like a man speaking to his fellow; you are not terrified of God, and God is answering you with His reply through me.
Elihu further prefaces and says: Know that the Holy One, blessed be He, does not ask of you to serve Him according to the greatness of the One being served, but rather according to human capacity. For if we had to serve Hashem according to His greatness and exaltedness, it would never be possible to serve Him at all, since everything we do is as naught compared to the greatness of the Creator, may He be blessed. The Holy One, blessed be He, so to speak, placed Himself on an equal plane with man, as if He were not higher than him, descending as it were to man's level; and corresponding to this, He elevated man toward God by granting him a share of wisdom, true understanding, and faith, like one of the angels - so that man possesses divine intellect and wisdom. Then Hashem demands of man: Serve Me according to the powers within you, according to the wisdom I planted in you, and not according to the true extent of how it is fitting to serve Me, for in that we have no grasp at all.
And if the Holy One, blessed be He, so to speak, descends from His divinity to man and desires that he serve Him only according to his ability, asking nothing more of him, then Iyov's claim is inevitably refuted - that the Holy One, blessed be He, seeks pretexts against him and demands of him things beyond his capacity, or holds him accountable for things beyond his ability and punishes him for what he did not do. The Holy One, blessed be He, does not come with tyrannous demands upon His creatures: Hashem does not demand of man more than his strength, nor does He demand of him according to the Creator's true greatness.
Another claim of Iyov: Hashem concealed His words from human beings, did not reveal to them the ways of His providence, and does not inform them of their sins or why they are suffering. Elihu replies to him: Know that the afflictions a person suffers communicate these matters to him through heavenly messages - by means of dreams and visions, through which Hashem reveals to people their iniquity and what is destined to come upon them. The meaning of this is: Hashem does establish contact with human beings, and dreams are a vehicle for communication.
And there is another way in which Hashem speaks with man: through illnesses and severe afflictions. These afflictions are Hashem's way of speaking with you. To what can this be compared? We told a child not to do something, warning him several times, and suddenly he feels a little pinch on his ear and cries out, 'Ouch, someone pinched me for no reason!'. Did I grab you for no reason? Right in the middle of doing what I told you not to do, and now I want to hint to you, so I gave you a little pinch on the ear. And you ask, 'What do they want from me?' - but surely it is obvious: they told you not to do it, and you go and do it anyway. Such are afflictions: a little pinch on the ear that the Creator of the world gives a person when he does something improper. Hashem does establish contact with man, Hashem does speak with man - one only needs to learn the language, to become familiar with the language in order to know what Hashem wants from man.
וְאוּלָם שְׁמַע־נָא אִיּוֹב מִלָּי וְכָל־דְּבָרַי הַאֲזִינָה׃ - "However, please hear my words, Iyov, and give ear to all my utterances."
In speech there are two elements: the beauty of rhetoric, and the core fundamentals of the argument - what is actually being asserted. "My words" (milai) refers to the rhetoric and phrasing, whereas "all my utterances" refers to the underlying principles and the entirety of my system. When coming to analyze an argument, the beauty of the phrasing matters less; what matters are the claims themselves. Therefore, Elihu asks Iyov to listen to both: both the expressions he will use and the entirety of his claims. And why specifically "all my utterances"? Because the heart of the answer will come at the end. Iyov should not hear the beginning of his words and say, "He is offering nothing new," or "Where is the answer to my question here?" and stop listening. Elihu asks him to listen all the way to the end, for the core of the answer lies at the end.
הִנֵּה־נָא פָּתַחְתִּי פִי דִּבְּרָה לְשׁוֹנִי בְחִכִּי׃ - Behold, now I have opened my mouth; my tongue has spoken in my palate.
Only now have I opened my mouth to bring my words forth, but the words themselves have already been spoken: "my tongue has spoken in my palate." As he explained in the previous chapter, his belly is full, and he has been constantly churning within himself what he wishes to say, his tongue already conversing within his palate. Now he is merely bringing forth what has already been articulated internally.
יֹשֶׁר־לִבִּי אֲמָרָי וְדַעַת שְׂפָתַי בָּרוּר מִלֵּלוּ׃ - My sayings reflect the uprightness of my heart, and my lips speak knowledge clearly.
The sayings I speak do not stem from a desire for victory or an urge to debate just to be right. "My sayings reflect the uprightness of my heart" - often a person presents arguments that he grasps intellectually but does not feel in his heart; with me, Elihu says, these matters are understood intellectually and settle deeply in the heart.
"And my lips speak knowledge clearly" - sometimes a person has very powerful arguments, but falters in delivering them, struggling with articulation and expression. This is found even among the greatest of the great: a person may be extraordinarily brilliant, a towering figure, yet find it difficult to express all that wisdom with his lips. Moshe Rabbeinu was a giant among giants, the entire Torah came through him, and yet he was not a man of words (ish devarim). Similarly, the Chazon Ish in the last generation was an absolute giant in his Torah stature, and once he was asked to deliver a shiur in his kollel, Kollel Chazon Ish. He began to deliver the shiur, spoke and stammered, unable to express himself properly, and after a quarter of an hour he closed the Gemara and stepped down. Verbal articulation was not his primary strength. On the contrary, sometimes a person's very greatness causes him to have sublime ideas that he cannot bring down into ordinary language and articulate with his tongue.
We find here three introductory points that Elihu makes about himself: first, my thoughts were already fully formulated before being uttered by my lips; second, my heart fully agrees with what I am about to say, not just my intellect; third, I will speak clearly - not in allegories or in stammering, convoluted language, but in a lucid manner so that my words will be understood.
רוּחַ־אֵל עָשָׂתְנִי וְנִשְׁמַת שַׁדַּי תְּחַיֵּנִי׃ אִם־תּוּכַל הֲשִׁיבֵנִי עֶרְכָה לְפָנַי הִתְיַצָּבָה׃ - The spirit of God made me, and the breath of the Almighty gives me life. If you can, answer me; set your words in order before me, stand forth.
Until now, he spoke of the virtue of the words; now he speaks of the virtue of the speaker. His claim is that his words stem from what the Holy One, blessed be He, implanted in his soul - the divine perception naturally embedded in his spirit. Iyov had pleaded, "Remove Your hand from me, and let not Your dread terrify me," and declared, "Then call, and I will answer, or let me speak, and reply to me" - asking that the Holy One, blessed be He, not overwhelm him, that He remove His heavy hand and speak with him as one human speaks to another, so that he would not be paralyzed by fear of speaking with God. Elihu tells him: Here, the Holy One, blessed be He, has sent me. First, I am the creation of the Creator of the world - "the spirit of God made me" - and the answers you receive from me are from God.
And not only in the past did it "make me." As discussed, the Holy One, blessed be He, in His goodness renews the work of creation continually every day, and at every single moment He sustains all of creation, including man. Therefore, he adds: "and the breath of the Almighty gives me life" - right now. In terms of initial creation: "the spirit of God made me"; and in terms of ongoing reality: by what power do I speak at this very moment? By virtue of the breath of the Almighty that sustains me at every moment. Embedded within this is divine wisdom and divine understanding. It turns out, then, that the words I speak to you are as if God Himself were speaking to you, and the wisdom I express is divine wisdom: His mouth is as my mouth, His speech is as my speech, and I can, so to speak, serve as His representative, the one presenting the arguments on God's behalf.
הֵן־אֲנִי כְפִיךָ לָאֵל מֵחֹמֶר קֹרַצְתִּי גַם־אָנִי׃ - Behold, I am as your mouth pleaded before God; I too was formed from clay.
It is impossible for a person to debate with God; one can debate only with flesh and blood. Therefore Elihu tells him: This is precisely what you asked for. 'As your mouth pleaded before God' - just as you expressed with your mouth to God, asking that the one who debates you be perceptible to the senses, that he not terrify you, and that you not be gripped by dread and trembling from the mere act of speaking with God. And behold, I stand, as it were, in place of God, for 'I too was formed from clay.' Now you can speak with an equal, without being terrified of me and without trembling at the mere thought that you are offering a reply to God. The Holy One, blessed be He, has sent a representative with whom you can speak at eye level.
הִנֵּה אֵמָתִי לֹא תְבַעֲתֶךָּ וְאַכְפִּי עָלֶיךָ לֹא־יִכְבָּד׃ - Behold, my terror will not dismay you, nor will my pressure be heavy upon you.
Here you gain what you requested - that you will have no awe or fear of speaking with me. 'My terror will not dismay you' - corresponding to the awe of Divine majesty that you felt before God. 'Nor will my pressure be heavy upon you' - corresponding to the fear of punishment, the anxiety that you might say the wrong word and be punished immediately. 'Achpi' (my pressure) is related to 'kappi' (my hand): my hand is not placed heavily upon you; I am not striking you so that you should fear I might harm you. And this is exactly what you requested - 'Remove Your hand from upon me' - for my hand is not upon you, and I will not punish you for anything you say, so you will not be able to claim that you cannot answer out of fear.
אַךְ אָמַרְתָּ בְאָזְנָי וְקוֹל מִלִּין אֶשְׁמָע׃ - Surely you have spoken in my hearing, and I hear the sound of words.
What you spoke in my hearing, there you said that He writes bitter decrees against you, counts against you iniquities and transgressions, and 'puts my feet in the stocks.' 'And I hear the sound of words' - I understand that this is your claim:
זַךְ אֲנִי בְּלִי־פָשַׁע חַף אָנֹכִי וְלֹא עָוֺן לִי׃ - I am pure, without transgression; I am clean, and there is no iniquity in me.
You claim, 'I am pure, without transgression' - I have never sinned in actual deed; I am pure and pristine. And not only in action: 'I am clean, and there is no iniquity in me' - even if there was some leaning toward sin in my thoughts, that iniquity cannot be attributed to me. For this is essentially what Job claimed, that his actions were compelled by God and that there is no free will; and if so, even if there was some iniquity - 'there is no iniquity in me,' and I cannot be held accountable.
The word chaf ('clean') has two interpretations: either from the sense of covering (chipui), meaning I am shielded from iniquity and iniquity is shielded from me, so that there is no iniquity in me; or from the sense of cleansing, as the Sages taught, 'A nazirite rubs (chofef) and parts his hair' - running his fingers through his hair, and he is permitted to wash (lachoif) his head, meaning to cleanse it. 'I am chaf' - I am clean of iniquity.
הֵן תְּנוּאוֹת עָלַי יִמְצָא יַחְשְׁבֵנִי לְאוֹיֵב לוֹ׃ יָשֵׂם בַּסַּד רַגְלָי יִשְׁמֹר כָּל־אָרְחֹתָי׃ - Behold, He finds pretexts against me; He considers me His enemy. He puts my feet in the stocks; He watches all my paths.
You claim, Job, that 'He finds pretexts against me' - the Holy One, blessed be He, as it were, brings false pretexts against you and searches for reasons to punish you. And not only that, but He judges you as though you had free choice, as if you could thwart and negate the foreknowledge of the Holy One, blessed be He. Yet whatever Hashem knows is enduring and eternal, and His knowledge is unalterable. Here Job remains consistent with his own approach and arguments, and Elihu is merely restating them: Job claimed that the Holy One, blessed be He, knows everything that is destined to occur, and consequently there is no room for free will. If so, why do You punish me, Master of the Universe, as though I had altered Your foreknowledge? After all, everything I did You already knew I would do, and if You knew I would do it, I had no leeway to act otherwise; and if I had no leeway to act otherwise, I am like a robot performing compelled actions - so what justification is there to punish me?
'He counts me as His enemy' - He considers me an adversary as though I had free will, and therefore 'He puts my feet in the stocks.' The stock was a contraption into which feet were placed and clamped shut with a wooden or iron lock, preventing the prisoner from removing his feet. Indeed, Iyov had already claimed, 'Why do You hide Your face and count me as Your enemy?' and 'You put my feet in the stocks.' And here he adds, 'He watches all my paths' - He guards my ways so that I cannot budge or move from my place.
הֶן־זֹאת לֹא־צָדַקְתָּ אֶעֱנֶךָּ כִּי־יִרְבֶּה אֱלוֹהַּ מֵאֱנוֹשׁ׃ - Behold, in this you are not right, I will answer you, for God is greater than man.
I will answer you that you are not right in your claims. You argue that 'God demands more than man' - that the Holy One, blessed be He, has placed a burden of labor and difficult service upon man far beyond his capacity and natural limitations. Elihu tells him: In this you are not right; this is not true. Although the Holy One, blessed be He, expects labor and service from man and demands effort from him, He does not demand things too numerous and overwhelming for his strength, but only according to human capacity - according to what man is capable of as a physical and inherently limited creature. Nor does the Holy One, blessed be He, bring false pretexts against him, for the Holy One, blessed be He, does not deal tyrannically with His creatures, nor does He burden man with a task beyond what his strength allows.
מַדּוּעַ אֵלָיו רִיבוֹתָ כִּי כָל־דְּבָרָיו לֹא יַעֲנֶה׃ - Why do you contend with Him, [saying] that He answers none of his words?
'Why do you contend with Him' - you have quarreled with Him and argued against Him. And what was your contention? 'That He answers none of his words' - Master of the Universe, why do You not make Your words known, why do You not reveal Your ways of governance? As he said earlier: 'Then call, and I will answer, or let me speak, and reply to me,' and 'Why do You hide Your face?' This was Iyov's grievance: I speak in vain; why do You not respond, why do You not answer the arguments I raise against You? Elihu tells him: Your grievance is neither true nor just - why do you claim that the Holy One, blessed be He, answers none of man's words?