Verse 18. — When he had filled their houses with good things. God heaps benefits even upon the wicked. Fittingly. — The Lord fills the houses of the wicked with good things, because he does not deny his gifts even to the ungrateful, so that either they may blush at the kindness of their Creator and return to goodness; or, if they utterly scorn to return, they may thereby be the more grievously punished there, because here they returned evil for God's more abundant good things, so that harsher torments may then punish those whose malice not even his gifts overcame here. There follows: In the same place. — Whose counsel be far from me. Sentence is one thing, counsel another. — This too was spoken by blessed Job. For he says: Whose counsel be far from me (Job [21:16]),
(21:16), although 'sentence' and 'counsel' may be understood as different things. For a sentence is on the lips, counsel is in the thought. Since, then, Eliphaz desired to be far from the sentence of the wicked, but blessed Job from their counsel, it is surely evident that the one longs to be unlike the words of the wicked, while the other longs to be unlike even their thought. There follows: