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The arms of the fatherless - Whatever strength or power or property they had, of that thou hast deprived them. Thou hast been hard-hearted and cruel, and hast enriched thyself with the spoils of the poor and the defenceless.
Thou hast sent widows away empty - That is, without regarding their needs, and without doing anything to mitigate their sorrows. The oppression of the widow and the fatherless is, in the Scriptures, every where regarded as a crime of special magnitude; see the notes at Isaiah 1:17.
The arms of the fatherless have been broken - Thou hast taken away all that they relied on. Thou hast oppressed them and taken advantage of their weak and defenseless condition to enrich yourself. This charge was evidently gratuitous and unjust. It was the result of an “inference” from the fact that he was thus afflicted, and about as just as inferences, in such cases, usually are. To all this, Job replies in beautiful language in Job 29:11-16, when describing his former condition, and in justice to him, we may allow him to speak “here,” and to show what was, in fact, the course of his life.
When the ear heard me, then it blessed me;
And when the eye saw me, it gave witness to me:
Because I delivered the poor that cried,
And the fatherless, and him that had none to help him.
The blessing of him that was ready to perish came upon me:
And I caused the widow‘s heart to leap for joy.
I put on righteousness, and it clothed me;
My judgment was as a robe and a diadem.
I was eyes to the blind,
And feet was I to the lame;
I was a father to the poor,
And the cause which I knew not, I searched out