And thou shalt be secure, because there is hope. Job, entering on this second period of prosperity, would be and feel secure; safe, i.e.' from any return of calamity, because hope would once more animate him and be his predominant feeling.
No doubt "hope springs eternal in the human breast;" and when Job's prosperity was actually restored (Job 42:12-16), these anticipations had their fulfilment; but, as uttered by Zophar, there is a ring of insincerity about them, and we cannot but feel that his object in expatiating at length on the details of Job's coming happiness is not to console and encourage his friend, but rather to annoy and exasperate him, since the entire basis on which he builds is the assumption of Job's heinous guilt (verses 3, 6, 11, 14), and the prosperity which he promises is to follow upon an acknowledgment of guilt and a putting sway of iniquity (verses 13, 14), which he knew that Job wholly repudiated.
Yea, thou shalt dig about thee. So Schultens, who understands it to mean that Job shall dig a moat around his habitation, to make himself perfectly secure. The verb has, however, two other meanings—"to investigate" or "search out," and "to blush;" and it is taken here in each of these meanings by some critics.
Our Revisers translate, "Yea, thou shalt search about thee;" and so Canon Cook and Professor Stanley Loathes. Rosenmuller, on the other hand, and Professor Lee render the words by "Though thou shouldst blush," or "be ashamed."
It is difficult to decide between such high authorities; but the fast that Job uses the verb in the sense of "search," "look after," in Job 39:29, and does not elsewhere use it in either of the other senses, should incline us to accept the rendering of the Revised Version.
And thou shalt take thy rest in safety; or, securely; i.e. with a sense of being in perfect security.