"I know that I am righteous" (13:18). Was Job right to say that?

These are Job's words: "See now, I have set my cause in order. I know that I am righteous" (13:18) (tap righteous). For this form of the verb Brown-Driver-Briggs gives "have a just cause, be in the right", and Job sets it beside I have set my cause in order, where cause is mishpat (Brown-Driver-Briggs: "judgment"). He wants a hearing: "Who is he who will contend with me?" (13:19). In the same chapter he asks God, "How many are my iniquities and sins? Make me know my disobedience and my sin" (13:23); earlier he had said, "Though I am righteous, my own mouth will condemn me" (9:20). The book says of Job, "That man was blameless and upright" (1:1), and "In all this, Job didn’t sin, nor charge God with wrongdoing" (1:22), and the LORD says, "there is no one like him on the earth" (1:8). Later Elihu's wrath "was kindled because he justified himself rather than God" (32:2), where justified is 13:18's verb. The LORD asks Job, "Who is this who darkens counsel by words without knowledge?" (38:2), and "Will you condemn me, that you may be justified?" (40:8). Job answers, "I have uttered that which I didn’t understand" (42:3). And the LORD says to Eliphaz that he and his two friends "have not spoken of me the thing that is right, as my servant Job has" (42:7). The book doesn't say which words 38:2 or 42:7 has in view. These notes set the verses side by side and give no verdict on 13:18.