36 And Elihu continued, and said: 2 “Bear with me a little, and I will show you,
for I have yet something to say on God’s behalf.
3 I will get my knowledge from afar
and ascribe righteousness to my Maker.
4 For truly my words are not false;
one who is perfect in knowledge is with you. (Job 36:1-4)
Through the Bible: Job 35-37
When Elihu says “one who is perfect in knowledge is with you” (verse 4), scholars are divided over whether Elihu is talking about himself or God. If he is talking about God, then he is claiming that he is one “perfect in knowledge” only because he is speaking “on God’s behalf” (v. 2).
I really hope Elihu is talking about God.
Because if he’s talking about himself as “one who is perfect in knowledge,” then… wow. Can you imagine being around someone with such an inflated sense of the importance of his own words? It would be like someone who posts multiple blog posts because he’s convinced everyone wants to hear his take on the Bible passage for the day (oh, wait…).
In chapter 32, Elihu goes on at length about how he didn’t want to speak out of respect for his elders. But eventually he just can’t hold it in any longer—because what they’re saying is wrong, and somebody has to set the record straight, and that somebody is him.
I can’t get past the arrogance of his opening words in 33:1–5, where Elihu essentially says, Listen closely—what I’m about to say is important, sincere, Spirit-inspired, and unimpeachable. Then he proceeds to talk. And talk. And talk.
How much does he talk?
Elihu speaks more than any character in the book of Job except Job himself. And if you strip away the brief introduction and conclusion of the book, Elihu actually speaks more than God.
Who does that?
When Elihu finally takes a breath at the beginning of chapter 36, he seems to acknowledge that he’s already talked longer than the other three friends—yet he still isn’t done. He sounds exactly like the kid in the youth group who schedules a meeting with the pastor to explain everything that’s wrong with his theology.
But here’s where a question keeps surfacing in Bible reading groups—and it’s a fair one:
If Job’s friends say so many true things about God, why does God later say, “You have not spoken the truth about me, as my servant Job has” (42:7)?
That’s the key question. And Elihu actually helps us answer it.
Job’s friends—and Elihu most of all—are often theologically correct. They say many things about God’s power, justice, sovereignty, and holiness that are absolutely true. The problem isn’t that they speak falsehoods about God. The problem is that they speak true things in false ways.
They turn wisdom into weapons.
They turn doctrine into diagnosis.
They turn God’s justice into a cudgel for the suffering.
In doing so, they don’t just misread Job—they misrepresent God.
And that’s why God’s verdict matters so much. God does not say, “Everything you said was wrong.” He says, “You have not spoken the truth about me.” Their failure is not primarily intellectual. It’s relational. Their theology may be orthodox, but their witness is unfaithful.
Elihu doesn’t fix that problem—he intensifies it.
And here’s what bothers me most about him: we don’t know when he showed up. He isn’t listed among the friends who sat in silence with Job for seven days (Job 2:11–13). He heard at least some of the speeches, but he didn’t sit in the ashes. He didn’t keep watch in the quiet. He didn’t earn the right to speak.
And if you don’t sit in silence with the grieving, you should think very carefully before you speak at all.
That lesson hits close to home for me as a pastor. I can be 100% right in what I say to my congregation. I can rebuke, correct, admonish, and warn. For thirty minutes every Sunday morning, I’ve got the microphone—and they’re too polite to stop me.
But if I haven’t sat in silence with them at a graveside or a hospital bedside, then it doesn’t matter how right I am. There are a hundred wrong ways to speak truth, but I don’t know that there is a wrong way to demonstrate love.
At the end of the book, God never tells us exactly why He doesn’t rebuke Elihu the way He rebukes the other friends. But He does tell us what matters most. And I hear that rebuke—and that reminder—clearly in 1 Corinthians 13:
“If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal.”
We can be right in what we say about God’s Word and still miss God’s heart.
We can win arguments and lose people.
We can speak about God and sound nothing like Him.
And that may be the most sobering lesson Elihu leaves us with.
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