Link to this page

https://gebible.app/messianic-prophecies/catalog/job-19-23-27

Messianic Prophecies

Job 19:23-27

This passage comes from the wider catalog — a broader, more lightly curated list than the core set. Both readings are shown as peers; GEBible takes no side.

Show this passage in

WEB

Job 19:23-27

“Oh that my words were now written! Oh that they were inscribed in a book! That with an iron pen and lead they were engraved in the rock forever! But as for me, I know that my Redeemer lives. In the end, he will stand upon the earth. After my skin is destroyed, then I will see God in my flesh, whom I, even I, will see on my side. My eyes will see, and not as a stranger. “My heart is consumed within me.

Read in context

Show the surrounding verses

Even young children despise me. If I arise, they speak against me.

All my familiar friends abhor me. They whom I loved have turned against me.

My bones stick to my skin and to my flesh. I have escaped by the skin of my teeth.

“Have pity on me. Have pity on me, you my friends; for the hand of God has touched me.

Why do you persecute me as God, and are not satisfied with my flesh?

“Oh that my words were now written! Oh that they were inscribed in a book!

That with an iron pen and lead they were engraved in the rock forever!

But as for me, I know that my Redeemer lives. In the end, he will stand upon the earth.

After my skin is destroyed, then I will see God in my flesh,

whom I, even I, will see on my side. My eyes will see, and not as a stranger. “My heart is consumed within me.

If you say, ‘How we will persecute him!’ because the root of the matter is found in me,

be afraid of the sword, for wrath brings the punishments of the sword, that you may know there is a judgment.”

The fulfillment reading

How this passage is read as pointing to the Messiah.

The fulfillment reading takes Job's declaration of a living Redeemer who will ultimately stand and vindicate him, even after his body is destroyed, as an early expression of resurrection hope. Proponents argue this longing beyond death is best explained as genuine revelation that anticipates Christ's resurrection and the general resurrection he promises (John 5:24-29). On this view the passage's persistent orientation toward hope past death, despite its textual difficulty, points forward to the New Testament's teaching. The Redeemer who vindicates after death is read as foreshadowing the guarantee of the believer's resurrection.

The counter-reading

How this passage is read within its own context.

The critical reading emphasizes that Job 19:23-27 is among the most textually difficult passages in the Hebrew Bible, with uncertain wording in verses 25-27 and significant divergence between the Masoretic Text and the Septuagint. The term go'el is read most naturally as God functioning as Job's vindicator, with genuine scholarly debate over whether the hoped-for vindication comes within life or after death. On this view the passage concerns Job's individual hope amid suffering, not a general resurrection of the dead. Because the Hebrew Bible's clearest resurrection statement (Daniel 12:2) is dated to the 2nd century BCE, the christological resurrection reading of Job 19 is seen as importing later theology.

How the New Testament uses this passage

Each entry names how the New Testament author draws on the passage — a direct quotation, an allusion, an echo, or a typological reading. An echo or an allusion is not the same as a prediction; the label says which is which.

  • John 5:24-29 Not cited by the New Testament

    John 5:24-29 shares the resurrection theme but neither quotes nor verbally depends on Job 19; the connection is a thematic pairing.