Job 14:5-6(v1)Seeing his days are determined, the number of his months is with you, and you have appointed his bounds that he can’t pass; Look away from…
Psalms 39:4(v1)“Yahweh, show me my end, what is the measure of my days. Let me know how frail I am.
Job 5:7(v1)but man is born to trouble, as the sparks fly upward.
Leviticus 19:13(v2)“ ‘You shall not oppress your neighbor, nor rob him. “ ‘The wages of a hired servant shall not remain with you all night until the morning.
Job 14:13-14(v1)“Oh that you would hide me in Sheol, that you would keep me secret until your wrath is past, that you would appoint me a set time and…
Show all 24 cross-references
Psalms 6:6(v3)I am weary with my groaning. Every night I flood my bed. I drench my couch with my tears.
Deuteronomy 24:15(v2)In his day you shall give him his wages, neither shall the sun go down on it; for he is poor and sets his heart on it; lest he cry against…
Leviticus 25:50(v1)He shall reckon with him who bought him from the year that he sold himself to him to the Year of Jubilee. The price of his sale shall be…
Deuteronomy 15:18(v1)It shall not seem hard to you when you let him go free from you; for he has been double the value of a hired hand as he served you six…
Ecclesiastes 1:14(v3)I have seen all the works that are done under the sun; and behold, all is vanity and a chasing after wind.
Ecclesiastes 8:8(v1)There is no man who has power over the spirit to contain the spirit; neither does he have power over the day of death. There is no…
Isaiah 40:2(v1)“Speak comfortably to Jerusalem; and call out to her that her warfare is accomplished, that her iniquity is pardoned, that she has received…
Malachi 3:5(v2)I will come near to you to judgment; and I will be a swift witness against the sorcerers, and against the adulterers, and against the…
Matthew 20:1-15(v1)“For the Kingdom of Heaven is like a man who was the master of a household, who went out early in the morning to hire laborers for his…
John 11:9-10(v1)Jesus answered, “Aren’t there twelve hours of daylight? If a man walks in the day, he doesn’t stumble, because he sees the light of this…
James 5:4(v2)Behold, the wages of the laborers who mowed your fields, which you have kept back by fraud, cry out, and the cries of those who reaped have…
Job 16:7(v3)But now, God, you have surely worn me out. You have made all my company desolate.
Job 29:2(v3)“Oh that I were as in the months of old, as in the days when God watched over me;
Psalms 39:5(v3)Behold, you have made my days hand widths. My lifetime is as nothing before you. Surely every man stands as a breath.”
Isaiah 21:16(v1)For the Lord said to me, “Within a year, as a worker bound by contract would count it, all the glory of Kedar will fail,
Isaiah 38:5(v1)“Go, and tell Hezekiah, ‘Yahweh, the God of David your father, says, “I have heard your prayer. I have seen your tears. Behold, I will add…
Jeremiah 6:4(v2)“Prepare war against her! Arise! Let’s go up at noon. Woe to us! For the day declines, for the shadows of the evening are stretched out.
Psalms 119:131(v2)I opened my mouth wide and panted, for I longed for your commandments.
Psalms 143:6(v2)I spread out my hands to you. My soul thirsts for you, like a parched land.
Cross-references from openbible.info (CC BY 4.0)
Explain this passage (21 sources)
Historical commentary, presented as a primary source — not an endorsement.
Geneva Bible translators1599 · Public DomainOn vv1, 3Hath not an hired servant some rest and ease?…
Hath not an hired servant some rest and ease? then in this my continual torment I am worse than an hireling.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp1656 · Public DomainOn vv1–3Job 7:1 [Is there] not an appointed time to…
Job 7:1 [Is there] not an appointed time to man upon earth? [are not] his days also like the days of an hireling?
Ver. 1. Is there not an appointed time to man upon the earth?] There is, certainly. Our bounds are prescribed us, and a pillar set by him who bears up the heavens, which we are not to transpass. Stat sua cuique dies, said the heathen poet (Virg. Aeneid 10), our last day stands, the rest run. It is said of the Turks, that they shun not the company of those that have the plague, but pointing upon their foreheads, say, it was written there at their birth when they should die. Now if there be an appointed time, &c., what mean the Lutherans to teach that God hath not determined the period of men’s days, but it is in man’s power to lengthen or shorten them, Humanae vitae terminus non est decreto simplici et absoluto constitutus (Homing). In this one verse we have two metaphors, both which do evince the contrary. The first is from soldiers, implied in the word צבא translated an appointed time, or a warfare, because there was a set time for soldiers to fight, and a set time also for them to serve. The second is from a hireling.
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Are not his days also like the days of an hireling?] Describit humanae vitro brevitatem, saith Vatablus. Here he describeth the shortness of man’s life, and with it that his days are determined; for with a hireling we agree to work with us for a certain time, and usually for a day, or by the day; and hence we call them day labourers. It importeth then that the time of man’s life is short and set; for hirelings are appointed to an hour. See Job 14:14; Ecc 2:3; Joh 7:30; Isa 38:5. Fifteen years just were added to Hezekiah’s life. Our hairs are numbered, much more our days. This Job allegeth to set forth his own extreme misery, as one condemned to perpetual torments without any respite or refreshing; and therefore in a worse case than any soldier or servant.
John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Poole1685 · Public DomainOn vv1–3Is there not a certain and short time limited…
Is there not a certain and short time limited by God wherein man shall live in this sinful, and vain, and miserable world, after which he shall live in a holier and happier place and state? and is it a crime in me to desire that God would give me some ease and respite for the present, and bring me to that blessed and joyful period?
Like the days of an hireling; whose time is limited and short, being but for a few years, Isa 16:14; 21:16, and sometimes but for days, Job 14:6; Mat 20:1,2, and whose condition is full of toil and hardship.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Matthew Henry1710 · Public DomainOn v1Job is here excusing what he could not justify,…
Job is here excusing what he could not justify, even his inordinate desire of death. Why should he not wish for the termination of life, which would be the termination of his miseries? To enforce this reason he argues,
I. From the general condition of man upon earth (Job 7:1): "He is of few days, and full of trouble. Every man must die shortly, and every man has some reason (more or less) to desire to die shortly; and therefore why should you impute it to me as so heinous a crime that I wish to die shortly?" Or thus: "Pray mistake not my desires of death, as if I thought the time appointed of God could be anticipated: no, I know very well that that is fixed; only in such language as this I take the liberty to express my present uneasiness: Is there not an appointed time (a warfare, so the word is) to man upon earth? and are not his days here like the days of a hireling?" Observe, 1. Man's present place. He is upon earth, which God has given to the children of men, Psa 115:16. This bespeaks man's meanness and inferiority. How much below the inhabitants of yonder elevated and refined regions is he situated! It also bespeaks God's mercy to him. He is yet upon the earth, not under it; on earth, not in hell. Our time on earth is limited and short, according to the narrow bounds of this earth; but heaven cannot be measured, nor the days of heaven numbered. 2. His continuance in that place. Is there not a time appointed for his abode here? Yes, certainly there is, and it is easy to say by whom the appointment is made, even by him that made us and set us here. We are not to be on this earth always, nor long, but for a certain time, which is determined by him in whose hand our times are. We are not to think that we are governed by the blind fortune of the Epicureans, but by the wise, holy, and sovereign counsel of God. 3. His condition during that continuance. Man's life is a warfare, and as the days of a hireling. We are every one of us to look upon ourselves in this world, (1.) As soldiers, exposed to hardship and in the midst of enemies; we must serve and be under command; and, when our warfare is accomplished, we must be disbanded, dismissed with either shame or honour, according to what we have done in the body. (2.) As day-labourers, that have the work of the day to do in its day and must make up their account at night.
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II. From his own condition at this time. He had as much reason, he thought, to wish for death, as a poor servant or hireling that is tired with his work has to wish for the shadows of the evening, when he shall receive his penny and go to rest, Job 7:2. The darkness of the night is as welcome to the labourer as the light of the morning is to the watchman, Psa 130:6. The God of nature has provided for the repose of labourers, and no wonder that they desire it. The sleep of the labouring man is sweet, Ecc 5:12. No pleasure more grateful, more relishing, to the luxurious than rest to the laborious; nor can any rich man take so much satisfaction in the return of his rent-days as the hireling in his day's wages. The comparison is plain, the application is concise and somewhat obscure, but we must supply a word or two, and then it is easy: exactness of language is not to be expected from one in Job's condition. "As a servant earnestly desires the shadow, so and for the same reason I earnestly desire death; for I am made to possess, etc." Hear his complaint.
1. His days were useless, and had been so a great while. He was wholly taken off from business, and utterly unfit for it. Every day was a burden to him, because he was in no capacity of doing good, or of spending it to any purpose. Et vitae partem non attigit ullam - He could not fill up his time with any thing that would turn to account. This he calls possessing months of vanity, Job 7:3. It very much increases the affliction of sickness and age, to a good man, that he is thereby forced from his usefulness. He insists not so much upon it that they are days in which he has no pleasure as that they are days in which he does not good; on that account they are months of vanity. But when we are disabled to work for God, if we will but sit still quietly for him, it is all one; we shall be accepted.
2. His nights were restless, Job 7:3, Job 7:4. The night relieves the toil and fatigue of the day, not only to the labourers, but to the sufferers: if a sick man can but get a little sleep in the night, it helps nature, and it is hoped that he will do well, Joh 11:12. However, be the trouble what it will, sleep gives some intermission to the cares, and pains, and griefs, that afflict us; it is the parenthesis of our sorrows. But poor Job could not gain this relief. (1.) His nights were wearisome, and, instead of taking any rest, he did but tire himself more with tossing to and fro until morning. Those that are in great uneasiness, through pain of body or anguish of mind, think by changing sides, changing places, changing postures, to get some ease; but, while the cause is the same within, it is all to no purpose; it is but a resemblance of a fretful discontented spirit, that is ever shifting, but never easy. This made him dread the night as much as the servant desires it, and, when he lay down, to say, When will the night be gone? (2.) These wearisome nights were appointed to him. God, who determines the times before appointed, had allotted him such nights as these. Whatever is at any time grievous to us, it is good to see it appointed for us, that we may acquiesce in the event, not only as unavoidable because appointed, but as therefore designed for some holy end. When we have comfortable nights we must see them also appointed to us and be thankful for them; many better than we have wearisome nights.
3. His body was noisome, Job 7:5. His sores bred worms, the scabs were like clods of dust, and his skin was broken; so evil was the disease which cleaved fast to him. See what vile bodies we have, and what little reason we have to pamper them or be proud of them; they have in themselves the principles of their own corruption: as fond as we are of them now, the time may come when we may loathe them and long to get rid of them.
4. His life was hastening apace towards a period, Job 7:6. He thought he had no reason to expect a long life, for he found himself declining fast (Job 7:6): My days are swifter than a weaver's shuttle, that is, "My time is now but short, and there are but a few sands more in my glass, which will speedily run out." Natural motions are more swift near the centre. Job thought his days ran swiftly because he thought he should soon be at his journey's end; he looked upon them as good as spent already, and he was therefore without hope of being restored to his former prosperity. It is applicable to man's life in general. Our days are like a weaver's shuttle, thrown from one side of the web to the other in the twinkling of an eye, and then back again, to and fro, until at length it is quite exhausted of the thread it carried, and then we cut off, like a weaver, our life, Isa 38:12. Time hastens on apace; the motion of it cannot be stopped, and, when it is past, it cannot be recalled. While we are living, as we are sowing (Gal 6:8), so we are weaving. Every day, like the shuttle, leaves a thread behind it. Many weave the spider's web, which will fail them, Job 8:14. If we are weaving to ourselves holy garments and robes of righteousness, we shall have the benefit of them when our work comes to be reviewed and every man shall reap as he sowed and wear as he wove.
Matthew Henry's Commentary on the Whole Bible (1708–1710) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Gill1763 · Public DomainOn vv1–3Is there not an appointed time to man upon…
Is there not an appointed time to man upon earth?.... There is a set time for his coming into the world, for his continuance in it, and for his going out of it; this is to man "on earth", with respect to his being and abode here, not in the other world or future state: not in heaven; there is no certain limited time for man there, but an eternity; the life he will enter into is everlasting; the habitation, mansion, and house he will dwell in, are eternal; saints will be for ever with Christ, in whose presence are pleasures for evermore: nor in hell; the punishment there will be eternal, the fire will be unquenchable and everlasting, the smoke of the torments of the damned will ascend for ever and ever; but men's days and time on earth are but as a shadow, and soon gone; they are of the earth, earthly, and return unto it at a fixed appointed time, time, the bounds of which cannot be passed over: this is true of mankind in general, and of Job in particular; see Job 14:1; the word "Enosh" (i), here used, signifies, as is commonly observed, a frail, feeble, mortal man; Mr. Broughton renders it "sorrowful man"; as every man more or less is; even a man of sorrows, and acquainted with griefs, is attended with them, has an experience of them: this is the common lot of mankind; and if anything more than ordinary is inflicted upon them, they are not able to bear it; and these sorrows death at the appointed time puts an end to, which makes it desirable; now, seeing there is a set time for every man's life on earth, and there was for Job's, of which he was well assured; and, by all appearance of things, and by the symptoms upon him, this time was near at hand; therefore it should not be thought a criminal thing in him, considering his extraordinary afflictions, and which were intolerable, that he should so earnestly wish the time was come; though in his more serious thoughts he determined to wait for it: some render the words, "is there not a warfare are for men on earth?" (k) the word being so rendered elsewhere, particularly in Isa 40:2; every man's state on earth is a state of warfare; this is frequently said by the stoic philosophers (l); even so is that of natural and unregenerate men, who are often engaged in war with one another, which arise from the lusts which war in their members; and especially with the people of God, the seed of the woman, between whom and the seed of the serpent there has been an enmity from the beginning; and with themselves, with the troubles of life, diseases of body, and various afflictions they have to conflict and grapple with: and more especially the life of good men here is a state of warfare, not only of the ministers of the word, or persons in public office, but of private believers; who are good soldiers of Christ, enter volunteers into his service, fight under his banners, and themselves like men; these have many enemies to combat with; some within, the corruptions of hearts, which war against the spirit and law of their minds, which form a company of two armies in militating against each other; and others without, as Satan and his principalities and powers, the men the world, false teachers, and the like: and these are properly accoutred for such service, having the whole armour of God provided for them; and have great encouragement to behave manfully, since they may be sure of victory, and of having the crown of righteousness, when they have fought the good fight of even though they are but frail, feeble, mortal, sinful men, but flesh and blood, and so not of themselves a match for their enemies; but they are more than so through the Lord being on their side, Christ being the Captain of their salvation, and the Spirit of God being in them greater than he that is in the world; and besides, it is only on earth this warfare is, and will soon be accomplished, the last enemy being death that shall be destroyed: now this being the common case of man, to be annoyed with enemies, and always at war with them, if, besides this, uncommon afflictions befall him, as was Job's case, this must make life burdensome, and death, which is a deliverance from them, desirable; this is his argument: some choose to render the words, "is there not a servile condition for men on earth" (m) the word being used of the ministry and service of the Levites, Num 4:3; all men by creation are or ought to be the servants of God; good men are so by the grace of God, and willingly and cheerfully serve him; and though the great work of salvation is wrought out by Christ for them, and the work of grace is wrought by the Spirit of Christ in them, yet they have work to do in their day and generation in the world, in their families, and in the house of God; and which, though weak and feeble in themselves, they are capable of doing, through Christ, his Spirit, power, and grace: and this is only on earth; in the grave there is no work, nor device, nor knowledge; when the night of death comes, no man can work; his service, especially his toilsome service, is at an end; and as it is natural for servants to wish for the night, when their labours end, Job thought it not unlawful in him to wish for death, which would put an end to his toils and labours, and when he should have rest from them:
are not his days also like the days plan hireling? the time for which a servant is hired, whether it be for a day or for a year, or more, it is a set time; it is fixed, settled, and determined in the agreement, and so are the days of man's life on earth; and the of an hireling are few at most, the time for which he is hired is but and as the days of an hireling are days of toil, and labour, and sorrow, so are the days of men evil as well as few; his few days are full of trouble, Gen 47:9; all this and what follows is spoken to God, and not to his friends, as appears from Job 7:7.
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(i) "mortali", Junius & Tremellius, Piscator; "misero et aerumnoso homini", Michaelis. (k) "militia", Montanus, Tigurine version, Schultens; so V. L. Targum. (l) Vid. Gataker. Anotat. in M. Antonin. de seipso, p. 77, 78. (m) "Conditio servilis", Schmidt.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Wesley1765 · Public DomainOn vv1–3Job bemoans himself to his friends, ver. 1-6. To…
Job bemoans himself to his friends, ver. 1-6. To God, ver. 7- 16. Begs for pardon and death, ver. 17-21.
Is there not - Job is here excusing what he cannot justify, his passionate longing for death. A time - Is there not a time limited by God, wherein man shall live in this sinful, and miserable world? And is it a crime in me, to desire that God would bring me to that joyful period? Our time on earth is limited and short, according to the narrow bounds of this earth. But heaven cannot be measured, nor the days of heaven numbered. Hireling - Whose time is short, being but a few years, or days, whose condition is full of toil and hardship.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke1810 · Public DomainOn vv1–3Job continues to deplore his helpless and afflicted state,…
CHAPTER VII
Job continues to deplore his helpless and afflicted state, 1-6.
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He expostulates with God concerning his afflictions, 7-12;
describes the disturbed state of his mind by visions in the
night season; abhors life, 13-16;
and, showing that he is unworthy of the notice of God, begs
pardon and respite, 17-21.
NOTES ON CHAP. VII
Verse 1. Is there not an appointed time to man] The Hebrew, with its literal rendering, is as follows: הלא צבא לאנוש עלי ארץ halo tsaba leenosh aley arets, "Is there not a warfare to miserable man upon the earth?" And thus most of the versions have understood the words. The SEPTUAGINT: Ποτερον ουχι πειρατηριον εστι ὁ βιος ανθρωπου επι της γης; "Is not the life of man a place of trial upon earth?" The VULGATE: Militia est vita hominis super terram, "The life of man is a warfare upon earth?" The CHALDEE is the same. N'y a-t-il pas comme un train de guerre ordonne aux mortels sur la terre? "Is there not a continual campaign ordained for mortals upon the earth?" FRENCH BIBLE. The GERMAN and DUTCH the same. COVERDALE: Is not the life off man upon earth a very batayle? CARMARDEN, Rouen, 1566: Hath man any certayne tyme upon earth? SYRIAC and ARABIC: "Now, man has time upon the earth." Non e egli il tempo determinato a l'huomo sopra la terra?" "Is there not a determined time to man upon the earth?" BIB. ITAL., 1562. All these are nearer to the true sense than ours; and of a bad translation, worse use has been made by many theologians. I believe the simple sentiment which the writer wished to convey is this: Human life is a state of probation; and every day and place is a time and place of exercise, to train us up for eternal life. Here is the exercise, and here the warfare: we are enlisted in the bands of the Church militant, and must accomplish our time of service, and be honourably dismissed from the warfare, having conquered through the blood of the Lamb; and then receive the reward of the heavenly inheritance.
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Joseph Benson1811 · Public DomainOn vv1–3Job 7:1. Is there not, &c. — Job is…
Job 7:1. Is there not, &c. — Job is here excusing what he cannot justify, his passionate longing for death. An appointed time for man upon earth — Hebrews צבא, tzaba, a warfare; or, time of warfare. The Targum is, Chela, militia. The Vulgate, militia est vita hominis, The life of man is a warfare. The heathen had the same thoughts of life: ο δε βιος πολεμος, M. Anton. 50. 2. sec. 17. Comp. Job 14:14. All the days, tzebai, of my appointed time; militiæ meæ, of my warfare. But our own translation appears to be as agreeable to the Hebrew, and to contain as good sense, as any other. Job seems to mean, Is there not a short time, limited by God, wherein man shall live in this sinful and miserable world; that afterward he may live in a more holy and happy place and state? And is it a crime in me to desire that God would bring me to that joyful period? Our time on earth is limited and short, according to the narrow bounds of this earth. But heaven cannot be measured, nor the days of heaven numbered. Reader, consider this! Are not his days also like the days of a hireling? — Whose time is short, being but a few years or days, and whose condition is full of toil and hardship.
Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Albert Barnes1834 · Public DomainOn vv1–3Is there not an appointed time to man upon…
Is there not an appointed time to man upon earth? - Margin, or, warfare. The word used here צבא tsâbâ' means properly a host, an army, see the notes, Isa 1:9; then it means warfare, or the hard service of a soldier; notes, Isa 40:2. Here it means that man on the earth was enlisted, so to speak, for a certain time. He had a certain and definite hard service to perform, and which he must continue to discharge until he was relieved by death. It was a service of hazard, like the life of a soldier, or of toil, like that of one who had been hired for a certain time, and who anxiously looked for the period of his release. The object of Job in introducing this remark evidently is, to vindicate himself for the wish to die which he had expressed. He maintains that it is as natural and proper for man in his circumstances to wish to be released by death, as for a soldier to desire that his term of service might be accomplished, or a weary servant to long for the shades of the evening. The Septuagint renders it, “Is not the life of man upon the earth peirateerion “ - explained by Schleusner and rendered by Good, as meaning a band of pirates. The Vulgate renders it, militia - miltary service. The sense is, that the life of man was like the hard service of a soldier; and this is one of the points of justification to which Job referred in Job 6:29-30. He maintains that it is not improper to desire that such a service should close.
The days of an hireling - A man who has been hired to perform some service with a promise of a reward, and who is not unnaturally impatient to receive it. Job maintained that such was the life of man. He was looking forward to a reward, and it was not unnatural or improper to desire that that reward should be given to him.
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary1859 · Public DomainOn vv1, 3Warfare. Hebrew, "is it not determined" (Haydock) for some…
Warfare. Hebrew, "is it not determined" (Haydock) for some short space, as the Levites had to serve from 30 to 50 years of age; (Numbers iv. 3., and viii. 25.) and the days of a hireling are also defined and short, Isaias xvi. 14. (Amama) --- No soldier or hireling was ever treated so severely as Job. Yet they justly look for the term of their labours. Septuagint have Greek: peiraterion. Old Vulgate tentatio. "Is not the life of man a temptation?" (Calmet) --- Palæstra, school, or time given to learn the exercise of a soldier and wrestler; or of one who has to prepare himself for a spiritual warfare, and for heaven. (Haydock) --- Are we not surrounded with dangers? and may we not desire to be set at liberty? The Vulgate is very accurate, (Calmet) and includes all these senses. (Haydock) --- A soldier must be obedient even unto death, and never resist his superior. (Worthington) --- Hireling, who has no rest till the day is spent. (Calmet)
George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).
Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset & David Brown1871 · Public DomainOn vv2–3earnestly desireth--Hebrew, "pants for the [evening] shadow." Easterners measure…
earnestly desireth--Hebrew, "pants for the [evening] shadow." Easterners measure time by the length of their shadow. If the servant longs for the evening when his wages are paid, why may not Job long for the close of his hard service, when he shall enter on his "reward?" This proves that Job did not, as many maintain, regard the grave as a mere sleep.
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
Daniel D. Whedon1874 · Public DomainOn vv1–3Fourth long strophe — JOB BEWAILS THE VANITY OF…
Fourth long strophe — JOB BEWAILS THE VANITY OF LIFE, Job_7:1-11.
a. Eliphaz had drawn a glowing picture of justice and mercy as blended together in the divine ordering of human life. On the contrary, Job shows life to be a mingled scene of vanity and misery, Job_6:1-6. “Job’s inflamed eye throws up against the sky, in gigantic outline, an omnipotent slave driver, who fills the earth with miserable wretches overworked by day and shaken by feverish weariness and dreams of torture by night.” — Davidson.
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1. An appointed time — צבא, (Job_14:14; Isa_40:2,) a warfare. The word is properly used of military service, and is rendered by the Septuagint πειρατηριον, “a state of trial.” Life means service — the hard service of a soldier. “Life,” says Zoroaster, “is the post of man. It is forbidden to quit a post without the permission of the commander.” (Maxims.) “The fact that Job, in Job_7:1, brings his suffering into connexion with the misery of the whole race, indicates progress in relation to chapter iii, where, predominantly at least, he limited himself to the representation of his individual condition. By this advance, the question concerning God’s righteousness and love receives a much more forcible significance. The question is no longer about a solitary exception, which may have a secret personal reason for its existence. Job now stands forth as representative of the whole of suffering, oppressed humanity, arraigning God because of his injustice.” — Hengstenberg.
Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges1878 · Public DomainOn vv1–31. The connexion is with the preceding verses ch.…
1. The connexion is with the preceding verses ch. Job_6:28-30, which express the thought of Job’s innocence, and the thought that in spite of his innocence he is miserably plagued. Under this feeling he throws his eye over all mankind, and sees them also doomed by an inexorable destiny to a life that is brief and filled with pain.
an appointed time] Or, a time of service. The reference is to the hard service of the soldier, in which there are two elements, the fixed period and the hard toil of the campaign. Both are laid on man by a power to which he is subject; cf. Isa_40:2; Job_14:14.
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days of a hireling] The “hireling” might be the mercenary soldier, whose fate, far from home and at the disposal of an alien power, might be thought harder even than that of the ordinary soldier. The word is used in this sense, Jer_46:21, and the verb, 2Sa_10:6. In Job_7:2, however, the word has its ordinary sense of a hired labourer, and this is probably its meaning here.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Pulpit Commentary1880 · Public DomainOn vv1–3Vers. 1-21. In this chapter Job first bewails his…
Vers. 1-21. In this chapter Job first bewails his miserable fate, of which he expects no alleviation (vers. 1-10); then claims an unlimited right of complaint (ver. 11); and finally enters into direct expostulation with God an expostulation which continues from ver. 12 to the end of the chapter. At the close, he admits his sinfulness (ver. 20), but asks impatiently why God does not pardon it instead of visiting it with such extreme vengeance (ver. 21). Is there not an appointed time to man upon earth? rather, Is there not a warfare (or, a time of service) to man upon earth? Has not each man a certain work appointed for him to do, and a certain limited time assigned him within which to do it? And thus, Are not his days also like the days of a hireling? Since the hireling is engaged to do a certain work in a certain time.
Vers. 1-10. Job to God: 1. The soliloquy of sorrow.
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I A PATHETIC REPRESENTATION OF HUMAN LIFE. In contrast to the fascinating picture sketched by Eliphaz, (Job_5:17-27) Job depicts human life in general, and his own sorrowful existence in particular, as:
1. A term of hard service. "Is there not an appointed time literally, "a warfare, a term of hard service on the earth?" like that of a mercenary soldier hired out for military purposes to a foreign despot; and "are not his days like the days of a hireling?" i.e. a hired slave who has been let out to some pitiless taskmaster; both of whom, the soldier and the slave, "pant for the shadow" on the dial, and "long for their wages," to give them a release from their heavy toils. The language suggests:
(1) That the period of human life is in every instance fixed, the Almighty having not only determined the bounds of our habitation, (Act_17:26) but the number of our months, (Job_14:5) retaining in his own hand our, (Psa_31:15) and measuring out our days. (Psa_39:4)
(2) That the allotted space of human life is in every instance designed to be a season of service, not of ease, enjoyment, or indulgence, but of labour, endurance, and fatigue; not always hard in the sense alluded to by Job, viz. exacting, oppressive, exhausting, pitiless, but ever hard in the sense of being earnest, arduous, and continuous. Life was never meant for idleness. If God promises strength for the day, he first assigns work to the day. (Deu_33:25) Christ recognized that the day of life was designed for toil. (Joh_9:4)
(3) That faithful work performed in time will in every instance meet with a just reward. As the hired soldier received his pay, and the slave obtained his wages, so will every one on earth be recompensed at last according to his works. (Pro_24:12 Mat_16:27 2Ti_4:14) In particular every faithful labourer in Christ"s vineyard will receive his "penny". (Mat_20:9) The doctrine of heavenly rewards is not inconsistent with the idea of free grace. (Heb_11:26 Heb_12:2)
(4) That good men may sometimes long to be released from their labours, not, however, like the bondman or the mercenary soldier, because they serve an exacting and alien taskmaster, who grinds them to the dust with oppression, but because, though not weary of their labours, they are weary in them, and would fain be at rest (cf. Paul, Php_1:2:3 2Ti_4:6).
2. A heritage of incessant misery. As realized in the experience of Job, this misery was:
(1) Heaven-imposed in its origin; he having been made to possess (literally, "caused to inherit") it by compulsion, through the stern will of an unseen but relentless taskmaster, without himself having done anything to either originate or merit it. (ver. 3) a mode of representing human life which has a superficial truthfulness about it in so far as it asserts that affliction is the almost uniform experience of man on earth, that nothing enters into the composition of human history, either collectively or individually, without the expressly given sanction of God, and that no amount of wisdom or endeavour on the part of man will enable him to escape that particular earth-experience which by Divine wisdom and love has been assigned him as his inheritance, but is radically false in insinuating that God acts capriciously and tyrannically, and alleging that man neither shapes nor deserves his particular lot, since no fact is more apparent than that man, as a sinful being, deserves more affliction than he gets, and that, to a large extent at least, every individual is the master of his own destiny.
(2) Tedious in its continuance; Job characterizing his days of affliction as months of vanity; i.e. months which come without bringing relief to the sufferer, and go leaving nothing in their trail but disappointed hopes, each day seeming like a month in duration, and his sleepless nights as "nights of weariness," measured out to him one by one in slow and solemn regularity, each one appearing to interminably lengthen itself out as if it would never come to an end. Behold the subtle alchemy of grief, which can change the pace of time, and make that go with leaden feet which mostly flies with lightning wing.
(3) Painful in its character; arising from a combination of troubles not often meeting in the same individual.
(a) Extinction of hope by day; the absolute expiry of everything like expectation of betterment, which must have been a greater burden to the heart of Job than ever the elephantiasis was to his body: "We are kept alive by hope"; (Rom_8:24) but within the soul of Job the principle of life was gone.
(b) Want of sleep by night. As sleep is one of God"s best gifts to man, (Psa_127:2) restoring nature"s exhausted powers, refreshing mind and body both, (Ecc_5:12 Jer_31:26; cf. Shakespeare, "Henry IV," Part 2 Act 3: So 1) so is the want of it one of the heaviest afflictions that can befall a sufferer, arising sometimes from excessive labour, as with Jacob; (Gen_31:40) sometimes from intense bodily pain, as in the case of Job (ver. 5); sometimes from disturbed thoughts, as with Nebuchadnezzar, (Dan_2:1) Ahasuerus, (Est_6:1) and wicked men; (Pro_4:16) the restless tossings to and fro of the body keeping time with the inward agitations of the mind.
(c) Bodily pain both day and night, springing from a loathsome malady, detailed (ver. 5) as breeding worms in his flesh, covering his skin with earth-coloured scales, causing it to stiffen and emit a purulent discharge, and commonly believed to be elephantiasis. (see homiletics on Job_2:7)
3. A period of exceeding brevity. "My days are swifter than a weaver"s shuttle, and vanish without hope" (ver. 8); i.e. they flee more rapidly than the shuttle passes backwards and forwards in the warp of the weaver"s web, and vanish without hope of any to succeed themi.e. of any days of happiness on earthman affecting emblem of the vanity and shortness of life.
II A PITIFUL SUPPLICATION FROM HUMAN SORROW.
1. The Being addressed. "Oh, remember!" Though not named, God is meant. It is well, though not always necessary, to invoke God by name in our prayers; but certainly it is better to leave God"s name out altogether than to introduce it too frequently into our devotions. That Job called on God in his calamity was a sign that his faith was not yet extinguished, and that he still retained his hold upon the God whom he had formerly professed to serve. It was likewise a more hopeful way of obtaining relief from, or support under, his troubles, since it is always better in our distresses "to cry to God than to complain to creatures" (Caryl).
2. The prayer presented. "Oh, remember!" As applied to God, the word signifies
a. to take notice, to observe, to bear in mind; (Psa_78:39) hence
b. to regard with pity; (Psa_132:1) and
c. to interpose with help. (Gen_8:1)
God remembers when, so to speak, he allows an object to remain in the contemplation of his infinite mind so as to be suitably affected thereby.
Job desires that God would
(1) consider his case;
(2) commiserate his person; and
(3) commute his sorrow.
This, however, does not imply that God ever forgets his people, (Isa_49:15) though he may sometimes appear to do so; (Psa_13:1) or fails to sympathize with them in trouble,though (Psa_103:13 Isa_66:13) afflicted saints may sometimes imagine so; (Psa_44:24 Isa_49:14) or is indisposed to succour them, (1Sa_2:9 Psa_31:23 Psa_91:1) though he frequently, for wise and good reasons, delays his intervention. (Exo_14:13 Mat_14:25 Mat_15:23)
3. The plea offered. The irrevocableness of life which Job depicts by means of two impressive images, comparing his sorrowful existence to:
(1) A passing wind. "Oh, remember that my life is wind!" a breath, a puff of air (Psa_78:39 Psa_103:16) an emblem suggestive of the frailty, the rapidity, and (more especially here) the irrevocability of life. Job interprets the metaphor with regard to himself by saying that when once he had departed this life:
(a) His eye should never more see good (ver. 7); i.e. it should never more return to enjoy the things that constitute (or are supposed to constitute) earthly felicity. (cf. the language of Hezekiah, Isa_38:11) Life"s pleasures, opportunities, privileges, can only be enjoyed once. Yet good in the highest sense does not terminate with death. When a saint departs from this mortal scene he enters upon the chief good, the experience of nobler pleasures and loftier privileges than ever he possessed on earth. (Php_1:21)
(b) Men"s eyes should never see him (ver. 8); i.e. he should never more mingle in the society of the living, never more participate in the friendships and associations of time, having bid farewell to all companions and loved ones (cf. Ecc_9:9, Ecc_9:10) an argument for living peacefully and lovingly amongst friends, companions, and neighbours, since we must soon be parted from them and they from us.
(c) Even God"s eye should fail to see him (ver. 8); i.e. God would not be able to do him good after he was dead, the present life being the only season in which man has an opportunity of receiving "gracious" visitation from God. It is too late to give a man a cordial when he is in his grave; and much more is it post horam to look for salvation when life is ended. (2Co_6:2)
(2) A vanishing cloud. "The cloud dissolves and disappears" (ver. 9). The metaphor is appropriate, as setting forth the unsubstantial, transitory, and irrevocable character of human life. (cf. Jam_4:14) Like the cloud which is quickly dispersed (often by a gentle puff of wind), vanishing into a realm where human vision cannot follow it, so man goeth down into Sheol, the unseen abode of departed spirits. And as the scattered cloud never again gathers itself upon the face of heaven, so never more does man revisit the upper air when once he has descended into "that undiscovered country from whose bourne no traveller returns." In particular, he never again returns to his house, neither shall his place in the family circle, at the social banquet, on change, and in the public assembly, know him any more (ver. 10). Though the doctrine of immortality and the hope of a resurrection am not here insisted on, it does not follow that they were unknown to either Eliphaz or Job. (Job_19:26)
Learn:
1. Since life, and especially the Christian life, is a war-service, (1Ti_6:12) it becomes saints not unnecessarily to entangle themselves with the affairs of this world, (2Ti_2:4) but to endure hardness as good soldiers of Jesus Christ. (2Ti_2:3)
2. Since God will faithfully recompense his servants, (Pro_12:14 Rom_2:10 1Co_3:8) they whom he has hired should be faithful in the rendering of service to him. (Rom_12:11 Eph_6:6, Eph_6:7)
3. Since the natural life of man, even when taken at its best estate, is altogether vanity, (Psa_39:5, Psa_39:11) it is the part of wisdom to aspire after that life which will never disappoint, (Joh_4:14) never know affliction, (Rev_7:16, Rev_7:17) and never pass away. (1Jn_2:17)
4. Since it is certain that we must all go down into the grave, (Psa_89:48 Joh_9:4 Heb_9:27) it becomes us to prepare for that event. (Psa_39:4 2Ki_20:1 1Pe_1:17)
5. Since it is equally certain that we shall all come up again out of our graves, (Job_19:26 Dan 12:2Jo Dan_11:23, 24 Act_24:15) it is folly not to seek before we die the sure and certain hope of a glorious resurrection. (Php_3:11)
HOMILIES BY E. JOHNSON Vers. 1-10. The weakness of man"s appeal to the clemency of God.
I GENERAL VIEW OF MAN"S MISERY AND HIS OWN. (Vers. 1-5) Man is compared to a hireling with an appointed time of service, the end of which is wearily and wistfully looked for. The ideas suggested are
(1) toilsomeness;
(2) fatigue and exhaustion;
(3) intense longing for rest.
As the slave longs for the lengthening shadows of evening, the hired labourer for pay-time, so the oppressed sufferer, toiling beneath a load of pain, longs for the welcome end of death. He "would "twere bedtime, and all well." Voluntary and moderate labour is one of the keenest delights of life; but forced and prolonged toll exhausts the very springs of enjoyment. Rest is the reward of moderate exertion, but to the excessive toiler or sufferer it is denied. We have a picture here of the extreme misery of sleeplessness, than which none can be more acute; the tossing through the wakeful hours of darkness, the mind travelling over and over again the same weary track of its melancholy contemplations. It may be appropriate here to think of the great blessing of sleep. Homer termed it "ambrosial." It was one of the great boons of Heaven to suffering mortals. It is "the season of all natures," as Shakespeare beautifully says. It is the preservation of sanity. Connected with this, the lesson of moderate exertion is one needed by many in these busy, striving days; and no less the fault of over-anxiety, and the duty of casting care upon God. on which the gospel insists so strongly. It is the life according to our true nature, and according to simple piety, which brings sound sleep by night, and healthy thought by day.
II REFLECTION ON THE BREVITY OF LIFE, AND PRAYER. (Vers. 6-10) The mood of self-pity continues. Then follows a lament on the shortness of life. It is compared to a weaver"s shuttle, to smoke, to the vanishing of a cloud, as it is elsewhere compared (Job_9:25) to the hasty passage of a courier, or, in the well-known old story of English history, to the flight of a bird through a hall and out into the darkness again. We may compare the following plaintive passage from the Greek poet Aeschylus:Ah! friend, behold and see What"s all the beauty of humanity? Can it be fair? What"s all the strength? can it be strong And what hope can they bear, These dying livers living one day long? Ah! seest thou not, my friend, How feeble and slow And like a dream doth go This poor blind manhood, drifted from its end? (Mrs. E. B. Browning"s translation.)
We may draw from this passage the following lessons:
1. There is a constant sense of infirmity in human nature, and of the inexorable law of death.
2. The mind cannot submit patiently to this doom. Dear earthly affections (ver. 8) cry out against it, and unconsciously witness for the immortality of the soul.
3. The thought of utter extinction cannot be endured by an awakened and elevated spirit (ver. 10). These impotences and reluctances in the presence of decay and death are really tokens of immortality. We see them to be so in this instance, in an age when life and immortality were not brought to light.
4. The natural relief from all such sorrows and perplexities is in prayer (ver. 7). The cry, "Oh, remember!" is not unheard by him who knows our frame and remembers that we are dust. There may be the clear consciousness of God where there is not the definite assurance of immortality. But a firm faith in him, when cherished and educated, leads ultimately to the conviction that the soul cannot perish. J.
HOMILIES BY R. GREEN Vers. 1-6. The days of the hireling.
Job speaks from the depth of suffering, and as yet he has no clear light upon the Divine purpose concerning him. God, who is his true Refuge, appears to be his Enemy; and he likens his miserable days to those of the oppressed slave. This he urges as a justification of the longing for rest which he has expressed. For him there is no prospect of that rest but in the grave. It is the cry of bitter subjection.
I THE COMPARISON OF HUMAN LIFE TO THAT OF THE HIRELING. It is an appointed lot. It is a lot of subjection. It is a life of toil and weariness. In Job"s case the comparison is most apt. But his thought is especially upon the longing of the hireling for the close of the day. For this the toil, the heat, the weariness, prepare him. Job"s condition is one of hard toil. He is weary even of his life. And his longing for the rest which death alone can bring is the precise point of his comparison. How often does life present no brighter or more beauteous aspect! Its many cares, its disappointments, its multiplied sorrows and keen, penetrating pains make life to many to be as the hard drudgery of the hireling. How many long for death as the hireling for night I In a true sense life is the life of a hireling, and the good Master who has sent us into his vineyard to toil will reward the faithful labourer with his sufficient hire.
II THE AGGRAVATIONS OF JOB"S LOT. He is to his own view as one whose toil is a grievous one. He is more than weary; and his longing for the shadows of evening is justified by what seems to him to be the hardness of his taskmaster. Earnestly he "desireth the shadow;" for long "months of vanity" he is "made to possess," and "wearisome nights are appointed" to him. When the tired labourer lies down to rest in unconscious sleep, and to gain strength for the toil of the morrow, Job is "full of tossings to and fro." The dawn brings him no refreshment. The fevered night leaves him to encounter unprepared the enemy of the day. His poor afflicted body presents the saddest picture; "worms and clods of dust" clothe it, His "skin is broken;" his sores make his flesh "loathsome" to him, and his "days are spent without hope." From such a sufferer comes the word of complaining. It is little to be wondered at by one who remembers his own frailty. The picture of Job is a lesson for us, and, turning our thoughts from our own healthy life to the sufferings of the afflicted, let us learn our duty, and cherish:
1. The pitifulness of spirit which is due to all sufferers.
2. Their claim upon our help and sympathy.
3. The forbearance with which we should hear their complainings.
4. We also may, in our turn, become the sufferers, and need the comfort we now give to others.
Thus may each man see himself in every sufferer, and learn to give that consolation he himself so soon may need. R.G.
Vers. 1-6. The weariness of sorrow.
Expressing Itself
I IN A DESIRE FOR THE CLOSE OF LIFE. (Ver. 2)
II As A CONTINUOUS DISAPPOINTMENT. (Ver. 3)
III As A CEASELESS RESTLESSNESS. (Ver. 4)
IV AS A REVOLT FROM THE PAINFULNESS OF ITS CIRCUMSTANCES. (Ver. 5)
V AS A CONDITION OF HOPELESSNESS. (Ver. 6) R.G.
HOMILIES BY W.F. ADENEY Vers. 1-3. The days of a hireling.
Job compares himself to a mercenary in war and to a hired servant at work. As these men have little interest in what they are doing, partly because the masters who hire them take little interest in them, Job feels his life but a weariness, and longs for the term of his service to expire.
I LIFE MAY APPEAR LIKE THE DAYS OF A HIRELING.
1. It involves hard toil. The lot of most men is not easy; but some find life a grinding servitude.
2. Its labour is often weary and unattractive. Many people have to work at uninteresting tasks, and only regard their labour as drudgery. There is neither pleasure in the work nor pride in the result of it. If men could all choose their lots, many of the most necessary industries would be entirely abandoned.
3. It is only undertaken for the sake of its rewards. Men work for wages, and, needing the wages, they endure the toil which they detest. This is not only true of what is called the wage-earning portion of the community. It applies also to many who seem to be their own masters, but whose work is undertaken solely for the remuneration which it brings in.
4. The supreme Muster is not seen to take interest in his servants. The laws of life are inexorable. There is no evading the rules of God"s great factory in which we are all set to work. Men fall and die at their tasks without visible signs of compassion from their Lord. Thus faith is severely tried, and some weakly ones sink to low views of life and of man"s relations to God.
II IT IS NEITHER HELPFUL NOR RIGHT TO REGARD LIFE AS THE DAYS OF A HIRELING.
1. It is not helpful. Hireling service is never of any great value. The work that is only done for pay is apt to be done hastily if by the piece, and in a wastefully slow and slovenly fashion if by the hour. Until a man puts his heart into his task, he cannot put good work into it. No one can live a worthy life chiefly in the hope of its rewards. The service of God which is only undertaken that good things may be obtained from God is degrading and of little worth. The Christian who lives solely on the hope of heaven is spending a poor life on earth. We have to discover higher motives and to serve God joyfully and lovingly, because his service is delightful, and because we love him.
2. It is not right. The hireling idea of life is delusively suggested to us by a superficial view of facts and by a low tone in our own minds. But it is completely false, for God does not treat us as hirelings. He knows our frame, and remembers that we are dust. He is our Father, and he pities us as his children. And therefore we owe to him more than a hired servants drudgery we owe filial obedience and the rich service of love. Now, when we have learnt to take right views of God and his service, the miserable, degrading idea of the hireling"s lot drops off, and a much nobler and happier conception of life dawns upon us. Then the most common task ceases to be a piece of drudgery and becomes a labour of love. By a gracious law of providence it seems to be ordered that any duty which is undertaken conscientiously and heartily becomes interesting and even a source of pleasure. So while the hireling longs for the shadow that tells of the declining day and of the end of his task, the faithful Christian makes the most of his day of service, knowing "that the night cometh, wherein no man can work. W.F.A.
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Biblical Illustrator1887 · Public DomainOn vv1–3Is there not an appointed time to man upon…
Job_7:1
Is there not an appointed time to man upon earth?
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An appointed time
I. The nature of the fact which is here affirmed.
1. That the existence of man will be terminated by death. When sin was committed, the order and harmony of the universe was disturbed, and then the solemn and awful sentence was pronounced. What is the world itself, but a vast charnel house, to be filled with the ashes of innumerable dead?
2. The existence of man is confined to a narrow compass. There has been a serious abridgment of the average length of life. All the Scripture representations describe the extreme brevity of human life. We are pushed on by the hand of time, from the various objects we meet with in our course, wondering at the swiftness with which they are taken from our vision, and astonished at the destiny which winds up the scene and ratifies our doom.
3. The existence of man is, as to its precise duration, uncertain and unknown. We know not the day of our departure. There is an impervious gloom about our final departure which no man can penetrate. But all is well known to the wisdom of God. With Him all is fixed--to us, all is uncertain.
4. Our departure from this world is for the purpose of our mingling in scenes which are beyond the grave. We do not depart and sink into the dulness of annihilation. This life is but the threshold of eternity; we are placed here as probationers for eternity.
II. The feelings which arise from the contemplation of it. There is a universal inclination to avoid these truths; they are regarded in general as merely professional; and there is much in the world to counteract their influence. All this can only be removed by the Spirit of God.
1. We ought to make our final departure the subject of habitual contemptation.
2. We should be induced to moderate our attachment to the world, from which we shall so soon be separated.
3. You should be induced to seek an interest in that redeeming system by which you may depart in peace, with the prospect of eternal happiness.
4. We should be induced to pursue with Christian diligence those great employments which the Gospel has proposed. (James Parsons.)
Life as a clock
Our brains are seventy year clocks. The angel of life winds them up at once for all, then closes the cases, and gives the key into the hand of the angel of resurrection. Tic-tac, tic-tac! go the wheels of thought. Our will cannot stop them, madness only makes them go faster. Death alone can break into the case, and, seizing the ever-swinging pendulum which we call the heart, silence at last the clicking of the terrible escapement we have carried so long beneath our aching foreheads. If we could only get at them as we lie on our pillows, and count the dead beats of thought after thought, and image after image, jarring through the overtired organ. Will nobody block those wheels, uncouple their pinion, cut the string which holds those weights? What a passion comes over us sometimes for silence and rest, that this dreadful mechanism, unwinding the endless tapestry of time, embroidered with spectral figures of life and death, might have but one brief holiday! (J. Holmes.)
The hand of God in the history of a man
I. There is a Divine appointment ruling all human life. Not that I single out mans existence as the sole object of Divine forethought, far rather do I believe it to be but one little corner of illimitable providence. A Divine appointment arranges every event, minute or magnificent. As we look out on the world from our quiet room it appears to be a mass of confusion. Events happen which we deeply deplore--incidents which appear to bring evil, and only evil, and we wonder why they are permitted. The picture before us, to the glance of reason, looks like a medley of colour. But the affairs of this world are neither tangled, nor confused, nor perplexing to Him who seeth the end from the beginning. God is in all, and rules all. In the least as well as in the greatest, Jehovahs power is manifested. It is night, but the watchman never sleepeth, and Israel may rest in peace. The tempest rages, but it is well, for our Captain is governor of storms. Our main point is that God rules mortal life; and He does so, first, as to its term, Is there not an appointed time to man upon earth? He rules it, secondly, as to its warfare, for so the text might most properly be read, Is there not an appointed warfare for man upon earth? And, thirdly, He rules it as to its service, for the second clause of the text is, Are not his days as the days of an hireling?
1. First, then, Gods determination governs the time of human life.
(1) We shall all acknowledge this as to its commencement. Not without infinite wisdom did any infants life commence there and then, for no man is the offspring of chance. Who would wish to have first seen the light at the era when our naked forefathers sacrificed to idols? Our presence on earth in this day of grace was a matter altogether beyond our control, and yet it involves infinite issues; therefore let us with deepest gratitude bless the Lord, who has cast our lot in such an auspicious season.
(2) The continuance of life is equally determined of God. He who fixed our birth has measured the interval between the cradle and the grave, and it shall not be a day longer or a day shorter than the Divine decree.
(3) So, too, has He fixed lifes termination. Is there not an appointed time for man upon earth? a time in which the pulse must cease, the blood stagnate, and the eye be closed. Moreover, how consoling is this truth; for, if the Father of our Lord Jesus arranges all, then our friends do not die untimely deaths. The beloved of the Lord are not cut off before their time; they go into Jesus bosom when they are ready to be received there.
2. But we must now consider the other translation of our text. It is generally given in the margin of the Bibles. Is there not an appointed warfare to man upon earth? which teaches us that God has appointed life to be a warfare. To all men it will be so, whether bad or good. Every man will find himself a soldier under some captain or another. Alas for those men who are battling against God and His truth, they will in the end be clothed with dishonour and defeat. No Christian is free to follow his own devices; we are all under law to Christ. A soldier surrenders his own will to that of his commander. Such is the Christians life--a life of willing subjection to the wilt of the Lord Jesus Christ. In consequence of this we have our place fixed and our order arranged for us, and our lifes relative positions are all prescribed. A soldier has to keep rank and step with the rest of the line. As we have a warfare to accomplish, we must expect hardships. A soldier must not reckon upon ease. If life be a warfare, we must look for contests and struggles. The Christian man must not expect to go to heaven without opposition. It is a warfare, for all these reasons, and yet more so because we must always be upon the watch against danger. In a battle no man is safe. Blessed be God that the text says Is there not an appointed warfare? Then, it is not our warfare, but one that God has appointed for us, in which He does not expect us to wear out our armour, or bear our own charges, or find our own rations, or supply our own ammunition. The armour that we wear we have not to construct, and the sword we wield we have not to fabricate.
3. The Lord has also determined the service of our life. All men are servants to some master or another, neither can any of us avoid the servitude. The greatest men are only so much the more the servants of others. If we are now the servants of the Lord Jesus, this life is a set time of a labour and apprenticeship to be worked out. I am bound by solemn indentures to my Lord and Master till my term of life shall run out, and I am right glad to have it so. Now, a servant who has let himself out for a term of years has not a moment that he can call his own, nor have any of us, if we are Gods people. We have not a moment, no, not a breath, nor a faculty, nor a farthing that we may honestly reserve. You must expect to toil in His service till you are ready to faint, and then His grace will renew your strength. A servant knows that his time is limited. If it is weekly service, he knows that his engagement may be closed on Saturday; if he is hired by the month, he knows how many days there are in a month, and he expects it to end; if he is engaged by the year, he knows the day of the year when his service shall be run out. As for us, we do not know when our term will be complete. The hireling expects his wages; that is one reason for his industry. We, too, expect ours--not of debt truly, but of grace, yet still a gracious reward. God does not employ servants without paying them wages, as many of our merchants now do.
II. Secondly, the inferences to be drawn from this fact.
1. First, there is Jobs inference. Jobs inference was that as there was only an appointed time, and he was like a servant employed by the year, he might be allowed to wish for lifes speedy close, and therefore he says, As a servant earnestly desireth the shadow, and as an hireling looketh for the reward of his work. Job was right in a measure, but not altogether so. There is a sense in which every Christian may look forward to the end of life with joy and expectancy, and may pray for it. At the same time, there are needful modifications to this desire to depart, and a great many of them; for, first, it would be a very lazy thing for a servant to be always looking for Saturday night, and to be always sighing and groaning because the days are so long. The man who wants to be off to heaven before his lifes work is done does not seem to me to be quite the man that is likely to go there at all. Besides, while our days are like those of a hireling, we serve a better master than other servants do.
2. I will tell you the devils inference. The devils inference is that if our time, warfare, and service are appointed, there is no need of care, and we may cast ourselves down from the pinnacle of the temple, or do any other rash thing, for we shall only work out our destiny. Oh, say they, we need not turn to Christ, for if we are ordained to eternal life we shall be saved. Yes, sirs, but why will you eat at meal time today? Why, sirs, nothing in the world more nerves me for work than the belief that Gods purposes have appointed me to this service. Being convinced that the eternal forces of immutable wisdom and unfailing power are at my back, I put forth all my strength as becometh a worker together with God.
3. I will now give you the sick mans inference. Is there not an appointed time to men upon earth? Are not his days also like the days of an hireling? The sick man, therefore, concludes that his pains will not last forever, and that every suffering is measured out by love Divine. Therefore, let him be patient, and in confidence and quietness shall be his strength.
4. Next comes the mourners inference--one which we do not always draw quite so readily as we should. It is this: My child has died, but not too soon. My husband is gone; ah, God, what shall I do? Where shall my widowed heart find sympathy? Still he has been taken away at the right time. The Lord has done as it pleased Him, and He has done wisely.
5. Furthermore, let us draw the healthy mans inference. I have no end of business--too much, a great deal; and I resolved I will get, all square and trim as if I were going off, for perhaps I am. You are a healthy man, but be prepared to die.
6. Lastly, there is the sinners inference. My time, my warfare, and my service are appointed, but what have I done in them? I have waged a warfare against God, and have served in the pay of the devil; what will the end be? Sinner, you will run your length, you will fulfil your day to your black master; you will fight his battle and earn your pay, but what will the wages be? (C. H. Spurgeon.)
The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary1892 · Public DomainOn v1Job ceases to altercate with Eliphaz and to defend…
CONTINUATION OF JOB’S SPEECH
Job ceases to altercate with Eliphaz and to defend himself. Resumes his complaints, and ends by addressing himself to God.
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I. Complains of the general lot of humanity (Job_7:1)
“Is there not an appointed time (margin, a warfare,’ or war-service) to man (properly, to wretched man, Heb., ‘Enosh,’—man viewed as fallen, and therefore miserable) upon earth? Are not his days also as the days of an hireling?” Wishes to show—
(1) His desire for death excusable;
(2) Suffering not peculiar to the bad. Suggests instructive views of
Human Life
1. As an appointed period. War-service, and the time of a hired labourer’s employment, limited. The term used also to express the time of a Levite’s service at the tabernacle, namely, twenty years (Num_4:23). Doctrine: The bounds of man’s life appointed (ch. Job_14:5). Our days measured out by Him who created us (Psa_39:4). Our times in His hand (Psa_31:15). Not without respect to the means necessary for life’s continuance. God’s predestination neither interferes with the human will nor the operation of second causes, but embraces both. The means taken into view along with the appointment of the end. The crop not appointed without the ploughing and sowing. If the passengers’ lives are to be preserved, the sailors are to do their duty (Act_27:22-31). The elect saved, but not without regeneration, repentance, and faith. If a man is to reach his “threescore years and ten,” he is not to shorten them by neglect, intemperance, or crime. The wicked often do not “live out half their days,”—the days they might and should have lived. Disease as much appointed as the death it occasions. Lessons: Life an appointed period. Hence—
(1.) Bear meekly its trials; they are but for a limited time;
(2.) Wait patiently for its termination: it will come in God’s time. Neither greatly desire nor hasten it;
(3.) Carefully improve its continuance. Much to be done, and but a short time to do it in (Ecc_9:10).
2. As a war-service. Such a period not one of ease, enjoyment, or indulgence; but of hardship, privation, unrest. Job’s reason for desiring its termination. Life a war-service—
(1) As a time of trouble and suffering. Man born to trouble (ch. Job_5:7);
(2) As a time of conflict. Sin and Satan our great enemies;
(3) As a time of service. Man bound to serve God as his rightful sovereign. Lessons:
(1) Be patient of hardship, and prepared for trial and suffering. Man’s, and especially a Christian’s, is a soldier’s, life. “Endure hardness” (2Ti_2:3). Tedious marches, camp discomforts, field duties.
(2) Be careful to be on the right side. We must serve; but it may be either under Christ’s banner or the devil’s.
(3) Be faithful, obedient, and active; faithful to your King, obedient to your Captain, active in discharge of your duty.
(4) Be hopeful, courageous, and enduring. With Christ as our captain victory is certain; and, after short and faithful service, comes long and honourable reward (2Ti_4:7-8).
3. As the term of a hired servant. We may have a hireling’s post, without a hireling’s spirit. Salvation by grace not inconsistent with “respect to the recompense of reward.” Each believer has his work in the vineyard, and each receives “his penny.” A hired labourer has—
(1) Painful and self-denying labour to undergo;
(2) A short and limited time to do it in;
(3) Due wages to receive when it is done. Life such a service. Man must serve—either God or Satan, righteousness or sin (Rom_6:16-22). Each thought, word, and action, a service to one or other of these two masters. Hence—
(1) “Choose the best master. God’s service is—(i.) Honourable; (ii.) Pleasant; (iii.) Satisfying to the conscience. Has along with it—(a) Kind treatment; (b) Comfortable provision; (c) Liberal remuneration.—
(2) Be diligent in doing the Master’s work and watchful in looking for the Master’s coming (Mar_13:34-37.)
II. Renews his complaint and describes his sad condition. Mention of the “hireling” in verse I suggests to him the comparison of himself to a slave or a day-labourer who longs for the evening rest (Job_7:2). “As the servant (or slave) earnestly desireth (margin—‘gapeth’ or pants after) the shadow [of evening], and as a hireling (hired servant, as distinguished from a slave) looketh for the reward (or finishing) of his work, so,” &c.
Describes his afflicted condition in three particulars:—
1. Comfortless days and painful nights (Job_7:3). “So am I made to possess (Heb. ‘to inherit’) months of vanity (without comfort or relief to myself, and without profit either to myself, or others), and wearisome nights (Heb. ‘nights of labour or trouble’) are appointed (Heb. ‘numbered’) to me.” Such days and nights the result—
(1) Of his disease;
(2) Of his bereavement;
(3) Of spiritual darkness. Says not days, but “months” of vanity, each day appearing a month. So Jonah speaks of his three days in the fish’s belly as an eternity,—“for ever” (Jon_2:6). “A man in great misery may so far lose his measure as to think a minute an hour” [Locke]. On the other hand, as grief retards, so joy hastens time. The bliss of heaven makes “eternity seem as a day.” Job’s troubles, however, may now have probably lasted some months. These painful days and nights spoken of as an inheritance. A bitter irony, yet true. Trouble handed down to us with sin as its consequence. “A sad inheritance of woe.” Adheres to us as our ancestral possession. “Made to possess” them, as against his will. “The creature made subject to vanity, not willingly” (Rom_8:20). Blessed contrast to this inheritance is that found in Christ (Rom_8:17; Heb_9:15; 1Pe_1:4). Yet months of suffering not necessarily “months of vanity.” These, to a child of God, among the all things working together for his good (Rom_8:24). Times of affliction are made times of profit, to ourselves, through spiritual teaching and Divine communion; to others, by the example afforded of patience and Divine support.
“In all my list of blessings infinite
Stands this the foremost, that my heart has bled.”
2. Rest lessness of mind and body (Job_7:4). “When I lie down, I say, when shall I arise, and the night be gone? (or, ‘but the night is extended;’ margin, ‘and the evening be measured?’) And I am full of tossings,” &c. The distressing nights dwelt upon rather than the days. Long, weary, sleepless nights among the most painful circumstances connected with sickness or sorrow. Such nights contrasted with the refreshing rest of the worn-out slave and weary labourer. These wearisome and restless nights, however, counted out by God to his people. (Job_7:3). Not one too many, or more than He will over-rule for our good. God an accurate dispenser of His people’s sufferings and sorrow (Isa_27:8). Connected with the long sleepless nights are the “tossings to and fro upon the bed.” “We change the place, but keep the pain.” The nocturnal tossings in mind often more painful than those of the body (Psa_77:2-9; Isa_38:13). Sleep God’s gift to his beloved (Psa_127:2). Its absence in sickness or trouble itself no small affliction.
“Nature’s soft nurse, how have I frighted thee,
That thou no more wilt weigh my eyelids down?”
3. Loathsomeness of body (Job_7:5). “My flesh is clothed with worms and clods of dust (literally, or in appearance); my skin is broken and become loathsome;” (or, breaks [in ulcers] and dissolves [in matter]). Corruption breeding worms, ulcerous running sores, and rough ashy scales covering the body, prominent features in Job’s disease. The Elephantiasis a species of leprosy (Lev_13:9-17). Renders the patient loathsome to look at, and forbids contact or near approach. Similar revolting picture probably presented in Lazarus (Luk_16:20), and in Herod (Act_12:23). Some thing like it complained of by David (Psa_38:3; Psa_38:5; Psa_38:7; Psa_38:11), and by Heman (Psa_88:8; Psa_88:18). A sad aggravation of our affliction when it renders us loathsome to our friends.
Lessons from Job’s Disease
(1) Terrible power of Satan. Satan the immediate author of Job’s disease.
(2) Dreadful effects of sin. But for sin there had been no disease. Sin turns our comeliness into corruption, and covers a formerly fair and healthy body with foul putridity and worm-breeding sores.
(3) Character of our mortal body. Soon reduced to loathsome putrefaction even while alive. “Our vile body,”—the “body of our humiliation” (Php_3:21).
(4) The saint as liable to the most loathsome diseases as the sinner. Witness Job and Lazarus.
(5.) The love of Christ in assuming a body with such liabilities. Made “in the likeness of sinful flesh” (Rom_8:2). “Took our infirmities and bare our sicknesses” (Mat_8:17, quoted from Isa_53:4). From the same prophecy, the Messiah said by the Jews to have his place among the lepers.
(6.) Preciousness of a glorious resurrection. Our vile body changed and fashioned like to Christ’s glorious body (Php_3:21.)
(7.) Affecting picture of the loathsomeness of sin. Leprosy the most loathsome of all bodily diseases. Sin symbolized by it as the most loathsome thing in the universe. The only truly loathsome thing in the eyes of God and holy beings. Makes the soul infinitely more loathsome than Job’s disease did his body. The godless rich man loathsome with his plump, well-fed, and richly-clad body; godly Lazarus beautiful and comely in his sores.
4. The prematureness of his anticipated death (Job_7:6). “My days are swifter than a weaver’s shuttle (or, ‘come more quickly to an end than the weaving of a web’), and are spent without hope,” (viz., of extension or relief; or, ‘are finished for want of thread’) so Isa_38:12. Job anticipated death as the certain and not distant result of his affliction (ch. Job_9:25-26; Job_17:11). Himself, as life was then, still comparatively young. Probably not more than seventy,—only a third of the age then usually attained and actually attained by himself (ch. Job_42:16). A premature death, especially in Old Testament times, viewed as a grievous calamity (Isa_6:5; Isa_30:9; Isa_38:10-19. The language suggestive in regard to
Time
1. Its rapid flight and short duration. Set forth in Scripture under various comparisons:—a flower, a vapour, a dream, a watch of the night, a tale that has been told, & Here, either a weaver’s shuttle passing quickly to and fro, or a web, speedily and perhaps suddenly finished from want of thread. Time represented by the ancients with wings, as not running but flying. Jacob speaks of his days as few at the age of 130. The longest life only a speck in comparison with eternity. A northern winter’s day, when the sun has scarcely risen before it sets again. The sun of many sets while it is yet noon. Job, like most others, had counted on a long life (ch. Job_29:18). Now the grave seems to open its mouth for him (ch. Job_17:1). “Though death be before the old man’s face, it may be behind the young man’s back” [Seneca.] Hence the vanity of earthly pleasures and enjoyments. Like Jonah’s gourd, these spring up in a night and perish in a night. But “for a season,” and that a very short one. Earthly pleasures are, according to one who deeply plunged into them,—
“Like the snow-falls in the river,
A moment white, then melt for ever;
Or like the rainbow’s lovely form,
Evanishing amid the storm.”
2. The value of time. Time the short seedtime for eternity. Bound up with eternal destinies. Its value seldom realised. No note taken of it but as the clock tells of its departure. Men speak of killing time. To destroy time is “suicide, where more than blood is spilt.” Greater folly to throw away hours than empires. The value of time realised on a dying bed. “Millions of money for an inch of time” [Queen Elizabeth on her deathbed]. Time ceases at death, and gives place to eternity. “No clock strikes in hell, to say, Thank God, another hour is past. One gigantic clock there, without a dial-plate; its pendulum eternally vibrating, Ever, Never; Damnation ever, Redemption never” [Krummacher].
3. The danger of delay in securing the soul’s salvation. Madness to put off till to-morrow what ought to be done to-day. “Serious things to-morrow”—cost both Cæsar and Archias their life. Procrastination the death of souls. Men “resolve and re-resolve, and die the same.” Augustine was kept seven years from closing with Christ by the temptation, Time enough yet. When Hannibal could have taken Rome, he would not, and when he would, he could not. “What thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might.” The soul’s salvation the one thing needful. Sad to be sowing our seed when we should be reaping our harvest [Brooks]. Cæsar Borgia on his deathbed said: While I lived, I provided for everything but death, and now death comes and I am unprovided for it. A promise made to late repentance, but no promise of late repentance.
“Alas, that men should lightly spend
In godless mirth or prayerless toil unblest,
Their brief inestimable day of proof,
Till the last golden sands run out.”
IV. Job turns imploringly to God (Job_7:7)
“O remember,” &c. Better in trouble to cry to God than to complain to man. God sometimes appears to His suffering people to forget them and their case (Psa_13:1; Psa_44:24; Isa_49:14). The contrary affirmed by God for their comfort (Isa_49:15). Job pleads for mitigation of His sufferings on the ground—
(1) Of the frail and fleeting nature of his earthly life. “My life is wind”—a breath or puff of air; a “cloud” or smoke; unsubstantial and evanescent (Psa_78:39;
(2) Its speedy termination (Job_7:8). “Thine eyes are upon me, and I am not.” Speaks of himself as already dead, or soon to be,—a living corpse, (a) Life terminated by a look from the Almighty. His glance our death. So those sent to apprehend Jesus fell backward to the ground at his mere look; (b) Life, compared with God’s eternity, only a moment—the glance or twinkling of an eye.
(3) The impossibility of its recall (Job_7:9-10). “He that goeth down to the grave shall come up no more.” The emitted breath, the cloud or smoke disappearing from the sky, never more to be recalled. Death, “the bourne from which no traveller returns.” Only one life on earth. A few special exceptions to prove the rule. Men die but once. Solemn responsibility connected with our one life. No second to correct the errors, undo the mischief, or make up for the negligence, of the first. An egress from the grave in reserve for each, but no return to a mortal life. A resurrection to come, both of the just and the unjust. That resurrection, however, not in the course of nature, but by the special command and power of God (Joh_5:28; 1Th_4:16). Christ Himself the Resurrection and the Life. Resurrection committed to His hands (Joh_11:25; Joh_6:54). Resurrection not unknown to the patriarchs, but seldom referred to by Job. Enoch’s translation a testimony to the early ages of the existence of the body in an invisible state. His prophecy a distinct revelation of resurrection (Jud_1:14-15). God’s relation to the godly dead as their God, a guarantee both of the separate existence of their spirits and the future resurrection of their bodies (Mat_22:31-32). The doctrine of the resurrection, as well as of the state after death, one of gradual development. Job’s age the twilight of revelation.
V. Job’s resolution to give way to complaint. Occasioned by the consideration of his misery in the world, and his anticipated speedy, untimely, and irrevocable departure out of it (Job_7:11). “Therefore I will not refrain my mouth,” &c. Falls again into his former temptation. His spirit like a surging sea, quiet for a little, then heaving again its angry billows. His present resolution the worst thing he could do. Tended to a continually increasing strife with God. Satan doubtless now rejoiced in his apparent advantage. So far his scheme likely to succeed. Probably thought the next thing would be that Job would “curse God to his face.” Job preserved from this only by imparted and indwelling grace. Perilous to advance so near the brink of the precipice. Dangerous to indulge in bitter language in reference to our lot. Safest when God’s hand is on our back, to keep our hand on our mouth. David’s resolution in similar circumstances much wiser than Job’s (Psa_39:1). Free utterance to excited feelings only adds fuel to the fire. Grace shutting the lips raises up a barrier to the tempest of the spirit. Passion acquires strength by indulgence and free expression. “Anguish of spirit” a very unsafe guide to speech. Only turbid streams likely to flow from a turbid fountain.
The result of Job’s resolution, petulant and unbecoming expostulation with God. (Job_7:12). “Am I a sea (or a desolating inundation, as of the Nile), or a whale (or sea-monster, as the crocodile), that Thou settest a watch over me (to restrain me by these terrible sufferings from doing injury)?” Very erroneous thoughts often suggested in trouble as to God’s motive in sending it. We may sympathize with Job’s sufferings without imitating his language. His language, however, indicates—
(1) A believer readily ascribing all in his lot to God;
(2) A soul moving always in the Divine presence;
(3) The frequent and familiar intercourse of a child of God with his Heavenly Father.
VI. Enlarges farther on his affliction (Job_7:13-14)
1. His distressing nights (Job_7:13). “When I say, My bed shall ease my complaint, then thou scarest me with dreams and terrifiest me with visions” (images presented to the imagination while half-sleeping, half-waking). These probably a natural symptom of Job’s disease. A grievous aggravation of the affliction. Night, the period of rest to others, made more distressing than the day. The blessing of “tired Nature’s sweet restorer, balmy sleep,” seldom duly appreciated and acknowledged. Our minds accessible to Satan as well as God and good angels during sleep. Dreams either natural or supernatural; as supernatural, either diabolical or Divine. Job, in ignorance, ascribes to God what was properly due to Satan. Satan cruelly skilful in adopting suitable means to accomplish his purpose. His object to exhaust the energies of Job’s body and spirit, and by representing God as his enemy, to bring him to despair and to curse or renounce Him. For this, he employs a filthy disease and frightful dreams, and tempts him to believe them both from God. Satan a merciless tormentor. Possesses a terrible power of inflicting pain. Job’s case a picture of the misery of falling into Satan’s hands. Still more fearful to fall into the hands of the living God (Heb_10:31). God able to make every organ of the body and every faculty of the mind the seat of intolerable suffering.—Earnest desire for death the effect of these sufferings on the mind of Job (Job_7:15). “So that my soul chooseth strangling and death rather than life” (margin, “than my bones,”—all that is left of me). The “soul,” or mere fleshly nature, may choose death as a release from suffering; the “spirit” or renewed nature says—“Not my will but thine be done;” “All the days of my appointed time will I wait,” &c. (ch. Job_14:14). Grace the truest heroism. Brave in the battle-field, a man may yet fly in the battle of life. Suicide at best but moral cowardice. To be only accounted for by the absence or the eclipse of faith. Faith in God alone gives true courage. The strongest mind weak when left to itself under depressing thoughts or a disturbed brain. “Do thyself no harm,” a timely voice to harassed and despairing souls.
2. The extremely reduced state of his body and the certainty of a speedy death (Job_7:16). “I loathe it (i.e., my life; or, ‘I am wasting away’); I would not (or, ‘I shall not’) live always (i.e., I shall soon die at any rate); let me alone (leave me to die, or cease to harass me with bodily and mental suffering), for my days are vanity” [and will soon come to an end]. Job’s spirit tossed between two desires—either an immediate death as a release from his continued misery, or a relief from suffering for the few days that remained to him. The troubled and agitated spirit seldom long in one stay.
VII. Man’s insignificance urged by Job as a plea for deliverance or relief (Job_7:17).
“What is man (Heb., ‘wretched man,’ enosh) that, thou,” &c. Same question asked by David from an entirely different consideration (Psa_8:4). The same truth often viewed in different aspects and with different feelings by different persons, and by the same person at different times. The truth, dark to one or at one time, is bright to another or to the same person at another time. Truth, like the cloud that followed Israel, presents both a dark side and a bright one. Happy, like Israel, to be on the bright side. God’s great attention to man produced in David admiration and praise; in Job displeasure and complaint. To the Psalmist God appears amiable as a Father delighting in blessing His children; to the Patriarch, stern as a judge, constantly examining into men’s actions. Faith’s office is to view the truth as it is, apart from personal feeling. Feeling, in Job, asks with petulance—“Why doth He visit men every morning?” Faith, in Jeremiah, exclaims with thankfulness, amid the desolations of a sacked and burned city—“His mercies are new every morning” (2Sa_3:23). God’s morning visitation a mercy, and should—
(1) Impart comfort;
(2) Awaken praise. Opens our eyes to the grateful light of day, the beauties of nature, and the faces of relatives and friends. Imparts to us health of body, soundness of mind, comfort of spirit. Continues to us day after day food, raiment, home, society of friends. Invites us every morning afresh to communion with Himself as our Father in Christ.
Important and suggestive question,
What is Man?
At once the least and the greatest of God’s creatures. Lower than the angels in creature-position, immensely higher in Redemption-privilege. Lives one life on earth consisting of a few months or years; a second in another sphere, which shall last for ever. Has a body that allies him to the ground on which he walks; and a spirit that connects him to the God that made him. A reed, but a reed that thinks [Pascal]. A worm, but a worm capable of measuring, the distances of the stars and of grasping the universe. Made in the image of his Creator as to moral nature, intelligence, immortality, and dominion. Through disobedience and rebellion, reduced below the level of the brutes. Mercifully provided, with deliverance from his fallen condition through the substituted obedience and death of his incarnate Creator.—Man “magnified” by God,
1. In Creation; his place above all the creatures around him, and second only to that of the angels that surround the Eternal’s throne.
2. In Providence; the attention originally paid to his comfort, and the care continually exercised over him.
3. In Redemption; the highest possible proof of Divine regard afforded in the life, sufferings, and death of God’s own Son for his deliverance and happiness.
4. In his Glorification; united to the Son of God and made like Him in spirit, soul, and body; exalted as His spouse to sit with Him on His throne, and with Him to judge angels.
5. In the Assumption of his nature by the Son of God. Christ the man, the second Adam and Head of the race. In Christ man’s nature taken into mysterious, intimate, and indissoluble union with the Divine. Man exalted in Christ to the throne of the universe.
VIII. Conclusion of Job’s speech (Job_7:19-21). Contains—
1. A peevish prayer (Job_7:19) “How long wilt thou not depart (Heb., ‘look away’) from me? nor let me alone that I may swallow down my spittle” (even for the shortest period)? Prayers in time of trial are sometimes—
(1) Ignorant;
(2) Injurious;
(3) Requiring repentance. The flesh incapable of judging aright of God and His dealings. God viewed by Job as an adversary intent only on overthrowing him. Yet His removal, or the withdrawing of His eyes from us, our certain ruin. The same spirit moved the Gadarenes to beseech Christ to depart out of their coasts. Prayer often unanswered in compassion to the offerer. Grace needed to know what to pray for (Luk_11:1). The Holy Spirit’s office (Rom_8:26).
2. A partial confession (Job_7:20). “I have sinned; what shall I do (or, ‘What have I [thereby] done’) unto thee?” A confession, but neither frank nor free. Made rather hypothetically,—“granting I have sinned,” or, “If I have.” Job’s conscience not yet sufficiently enlightened nor his soul sufficiently subdued to make the Publican’s confession. The confession rather extorted by the fact of suffering than the consciousness of sin. Job free from life sins; heart sins not yet sufficiently discovered to him. This discovery and his consequent humble confession not made till Jehovah has revealed Himself (ch. Job_40:4; Job_42:5-6). Compare Isa_6:5; Luk_5:8.—In order to be acceptable,
Confession of Sin
must be—
(1) Free; spontaneous, unconstrained; not extorted by suffering, or merely in order to deliverance from it, as in the case of Pharaoh (Exo_9:27; Exo_10:16);
(2.) Frank; open and sincere; without guile or desire of concealment (Psa_32:5);
(3.) Full; thorough and without reservation (Jos_7:19-21);
(4.) Particular; not merely of sin in general, or as common to the race; “I have sinned and done this evil in thy sight” (Psa_51:4;
(5.) Serious and heartfelt; with sense of the heinousness and demerit of the sin confessed (Psa_51:3; Luk_18:13). In true confession the heart is both affected with the sin, and engaged against it. Confession of sin needful in the holiest saint. Sin cleaves to the believer as ivy to the wall. The strongest believer not above the actings of sin, the weakest not under the power of it. The more we realize God’s spotlessness, the more we discern our own spots. Sweet to confess sin in sight of the laver of a Saviour’s blood. Confession of sin with the lips enhances the preciousness of Christ in the heart. Concealed sin grows—
(1) In strength;
(2) In guilt;
(3) In terror (Psa_32:3-4). Job’s confession, such as it was, one rather of the mere fact of sin. Acknowledges no evil connected with it, or demerit attached to it. Its heinousness and malignity as against God, yet to be discovered. “What have I done unto thee?” The idea: What wrong have I done thee by my sin, that thou shouldst thus treat me as thine enemy? Sin to be viewed as an injury, not merely to our neighbour or ourselves, but more especially against God.
Sin
Is injury done to God, as—
(1.) It robs Him of the honour due to Him (Mal_1:6). Man’s sin may not take from God’s happiness, but it takes from God’s honour. Every sin strikes as truly at God’s honour as at our peace.
(2.) It tramples under foot His authority. Says with Pharaoh: “Who is the Lord that I should obey His voice?” (Exo_5:2).
(3.) It breaks His laws.
(4.) It disturbs the harmony and happiness of His universe.
(5.) It introduces disorder into His government, and, if not arrested and punished, would bring it to an end.
(6.) It interrupts and would terminate His enjoyment of His own works (Gen_1:31; Psa_104:24).
(7.) It obliterates His image in His intelligent creatures, and substitutes that of His adversary. Treasonably effaces His image and superscription from His own coin.
Job, in his confession, petulantly addresses God as the watcher and observer of His creatures—“Oh, thou preserver of men.” Same word denotes “guardian” and “observer” (chap, Job_27:18). Latter sense here favoured by the context (so chap. Job_14:16). God viewed as if carefully marking men’s faults in order to punish them. Only perverted and dishonouring views of God taken by the flesh, especially under trouble. Satan’s aim to foster such views in Job in order to gain his object. Job’s complaint in keeping with this view. “Why hast Thou set me as a mark against Thee?” (to shoot at, or make an attack upon). The supposed result of God’s close inspection of his conduct, and as in revenge for the injury done to him. Already viewed himself as shot at by the Almighty’s arrows (chapter Job_6:4). Speaks according to sense and appearance. God’s choicest saints often appear to be the butt of his sharpest arrows.—The effect and meaning of these arrows; “So that I am a burden to myself” or, “and I am become a burden to thee” (both readings found, the latter probably the true one). The sinner, a burden to God through his sin, and a burden to himself through his suffering. When sin makes a man a burden to God, he is likely to become a burden to himself. A sinner left to himself the greatest burden that can be laid upon him. Suffering often a heavy burden; sin a thousand times more so. “I had rather go into hell without sin, than into heaven with it” [Luther]. Cain said, my punishment is greater than I can bear: the same word generally rendered “iniquity,” as in Job_7:20. Judas thought to throw off the burden by hanging himself, but only made it faster and heavier. Sin makes men a burden to the Creator as well as to themselves. God wearied with men’s iniquities (Isa_43:24). Pressed under them as a cart full of sheaves (Amo_2:13). That Job was a burden to himself was his own feeling; that he was a burden to God, was Satan’s suggestion.
3. A passionate question and a plaintive appeal (Job_7:20). “And why dost thou not pardon (Heb. ‘take away’ or remit, as a debt) my transgression, and take away (Heb. ‘cause to pass away’ as a cloud) mine iniquity?” “Transgression” and “iniquity” embrace all kinds of sin, those of commission and omission, presumption and ignorance, life and heart. The question not that of a humble penitent asking forgiveness. Job yet to be made a poor sinner. Pardon of sin a favour, not an obligation, or matter of course.
Pardon of Sin
Often, as here, desired rather as the removal of suffering than of guilt. Only not bestowed, because the sinner is not prepared to receive it. Pride, impenitence, and unbelief shut out forgiveness as the window-shutters exclude the sun. Pardon only vouchsafed—
(1) When sin is realised and sincerely confessed (1Jn_1:9; Psa_32:5; Psa_25:7);
(2) When its demerit and hell-deservingness is acknowledged (Psa_51:4; Psa_51:11);
(3) When deliverance is desired from its practice and power as well as from its punishment (Psa_51:10);
(4) When pardon is humbly sought as a matter of pure mercy (Psa_51:1; Luk_18:13);
(5) When it is accepted as only bestowed in virtue of the suffering and death of God’s Son as the sinner’s Substitute (Heb_9:15; Heb_9:22; Heb_9:28; 1Jn_1:7; 1Jn_1:9; 1Jn_2:1-2; Rom_3:24-26).
The reason of Job’s passionate question the prospect of a speedy death. “For now shall I sleep in the dust.” Idea: I shall soon die, and Thou must either pardon and heal me speedily or not at all. Death to the believer a sleep. The thought of it not unpleasant to Job. A blessed awaking the hope of the Church (Psa_17:15; Isa_26:19; Dan_12:2; 1Th_4:14-16). Job’s hope (ch. Job_14:12-15; Job_19:25-27). He can calmly lay his head in the dust, whose heart is already in heaven.—Job believes in a time of Divine relenting towards him. “Thou shalt seek me in the morning (i.e., diligently), but I shall not be”—(thy desire to do me good will be too late). The picture that of a father relenting towards a suffering child. Exhibited also in Jer_31:18-20; Jer_44:6-10. God’s love to His people unchanging and everlasting (Jer_31:3; Joh_13:1). His dealings with them may change, but not his delight in them. The believer, however tried, still unwilling to quit his hold of God’s fatherly relationship. Faith says, “Though His hand be against me, His heart is still towards me.” Job’s comfort too at times (ch. Job_13:15-16; Job_14:15; Job_19:25-27; Job_23:10).
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary (gen. ed. Joseph S. Exell; Funk & Wagnalls, c. 1892) — public domain (pre-1929). A full-Bible homiletical/sermon-outline anthology covering 65 of 66 books (2 John is absent from the source module). Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Sermon Bible1900 · Public DomainOn v1The peculiar circumstances of Job had, no doubt, something…
Job 7:16
The peculiar circumstances of Job had, no doubt, something to do with eliciting from him this aspiration, otherwise its spirit would scarcely accord with the general tone of the patriarchs and of the saints of the Old Testament dispensation. For they evidently, as in the case of Hezekiah, had a great desire for long life. And it was no wonder, for it was held out as a special token of God’s favour and a reward for upright conduct, and was therefore highly estimated and greatly coveted among the ancient pious Jews.
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I. Life should be considered by the Christian as a possession greatly to be cherished. To esteem lightly and wish to abridge life is wrong. The desire to be with Christ—the attractive end of the magnet—cannot be too strong; but the weariness of this world, the longing to escape from it—the repulsive end—may easily run into excess. The present state of existence is the only one in which we shall ever glorify God by patience and the resistance of evil, or, as far as we know, by extending His kingdom upon earth. And therefore let us not be in haste to quit the field; for it may be the only field we shall ever have where we can glorify God for these high ends.
II. To the majority of people, however, the danger lies on the other side. They are unwilling to die. Notwithstanding all warnings and preparations which God is sending every day, the real spirit of their mind is, "I would live alway." It is because they are so encased and absorbed with the present life that they have no room for another.
III. When our sins are once cancelled, our nature spiritualised, ourselves "meetened for the inheritance of the saints in light," who would not say, with the patriarch, "I would not live alway"? We know and are sure that another life is awaiting us, to which this life is but as death" and our arms stretch out to that life. "We would not live alway."
J. Vaughan, Fifty Sermons, 10th series, p. 168.
References: Job 7:17.—J. H. Evans, Thursday Penny Pulpit, vol. xiii., p. 397; G. Brooks, Outlines of Sermons, p. 20. Job 7:17, Job 7:18.—J. Keble, Sermons for the Christian Year: Christmas and Epiphany, p. 170.
Job 7:20
The great design of the book of Job, leaving out all detail and the undercurrents of the story, appears to be twofold: (1) to show that a good man, and because he is good, may yet receive at the hand of the God he loves and serves the severest discipline of pain and sorrow; (2) to illustrate that, however high the moral level of a man may be, he needs further sanctification, and specially that nothing avails before God, nothing has reached its necessary standard, without great humiliation and a very deep sense of sin.
I. There is no doubt that Job was a good man. He was a man of prayer. He had attained a spiritual knowledge far beyond his age, and he had many direct revelations from heaven. His want was a clearer insight into his own heart; juster views of the holiness of God; a truer estimate of sin, its nature and its vileness; a more personal conviction of the wickedness which, nothwithstanding all his virtues, still lived and reigned in him.
II. We see in the history of Job God’s method by which He gives penitence to a good, but not yet humbled, man: the school of suffering, the greatnesses of His own majesty and power, the inworking of the convicting Spirit, revelations of Jesus, and the ministrations of His messenger.
III. Why is it needful for a good man to say, "I have sinned"? (1) Because it is true; (2) because it places him in a right relation to God; (3) because it puts Jesus in His proper place. The Cross is the centre of God’s universe. Everything revolves around the Cross. Everything must minister to the Cross.
J. Vaughan, Sermons, 7th series, p. 104.
References: Job 7:20.—Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. iii., p. 113; Expositor, 3rd series, vol. iv., p. 284; Spurgeon, My Sermon Notes: Genesis to Proverbs, p. 121. Job 8:4.—Homiletic Quarterly, vol. iv., p. 129.
The Sermon Bible, ed. William Robertson Nicoll (1888–1900) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
J. R. Dummelow1909 · Public DomainOn v1Job's First Speech (concluded)
Job's First Speech (concluded)
1-10. Job laments the hardship and misery of his destiny.
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1. Man's life is a lot of hardship. Appointed time] RM 'time of service.'
2, 3. As the labourer longs for the weary day to end and to receive his wages, so Job bemoans the length of his sufferings and sighs for death to end them.
3. Months of vanity] so called because they were unsatisfactory, hopeless. 'Months' imply that Job's sufferings had lasted a considerable time.
5. Worms] from the diseased flesh. Clods of dust] the crust of his sores. These symptoms are found in leprosy, though they are not peculiar to it.
6. Weaver's shuttle] the implement which carries the thread swiftly backwards and forwards in weaving. Job has just been longing for death, but yet he feels that length of days is desirable in itself if freed from so much misery. Without hope] of recovery.
7. Good] i.e. happiness.
8. Thine eyes, etc.] render, 'Thine (God's) eyes shall look for me, but I shall be no more.'
9. Grave] better, as RV, 'Sheol,' the place of the departed: see on Job_3:15-19. Note how hopeless is the outlook here and elsewhere towards the future.
11-21. He appeals to God, complaining of the undeserved severity of his treatment. He demands why God concerns Himself to interfere with so insignificant a being as man.
12. 'Am I so dangerous a character that I need such persistent persecution?.' Whale] rather, 'sea monster,' perhaps the personification of the sea, the mythical dragon of the ancients. The Babylonians told the myth of the dragon Tiâmat, who waged war against heaven and was slain by the God Marduk. (See art. 'Genesis and the Babylonian Inscriptions.') This myth is referred to here, but in a form which represented the monster, not as slain, but imprisoned and kept under strict observation. The sea needs to be held down lest it flood the earth or smite the sky (cp. Job_38:8-11), the dragon must be watched lest it bursts its bonds. Is Job as formidable as they that God should watch him as closely?
14. Dreams] the bad dreams of the sick.
15. Strangling] or, suffocation. Job longs for the arrival of this sign of approaching death. My life] RV 'these my bones.' He was reduced to a skeleton. Possibly we should read 'my pains.'
16. RV 'I loathe my life: I would not live alway.' Vanity] RM 'as a breath.'
17. Magnify] i.e. consider of such importance. Set thine heart] or 'fix thy thoughts.' The thought of Job_7:17. is 'Surely man is too insignificant for such constant persecution. Even Ins sins are hardly worth heeding.' Cp. Psa_8:4-5, of which these vv. seem to be a bitter parody.
19. Till I swallow, etc.] i.e. for a moment.
20. RV 'If I have sinned, what do I unto thee, O thou watcher of men?': i.e. granting that I have sinned (which Job does not), how can it affect Thee who art so great? Against thee] RV 'for thee.'
21. In the morning] RV 'diligently.' Job believes that one day God will turn to him once more in love, but then it will be too late. The faint hope expressed here gradually becomes a conviction: cp. Job_13:15-18; Job_14:13-15; Job_16:19-21; Job_19:23-27.
The speech of Eliphaz, while considerate in tone, yet took Job's guilt for granted. This shows the sufferer that he can expect no sympathetic insight from the friends, and the shock of the disappointment drives him not simply to scornful attack on them, but to bitter accusation of God, whom he regards as the direct author of his troubles. He thinks of Him as petty and spiteful, yet he cannot forget the blessed communion of happier days, and ends with the thought that when His present anger is passed, He will desire a renewal of that fellowship.
J. R. Dummelow, A Commentary on the Holy Bible (Macmillan, 1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Paul E. Kretzmann1924 · Public DomainOn v1The General Misery of Human Life
The General Misery of Human Life
v. 1. Is there not an appointed time, warfare, a fixed and wearing service, to man upon earth? Are not his days also like the days of an hireling, one who works for wages? The figure is that of a man drafted for military service, and then of a man who has hired out to perform a certain task, the idea being that in either case man longs for the end of the labor appointed to him.
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v. 2. As a servant earnestly desireth the shadow, as the slave eagerly looks forward to the rest after the completion of his work, and as an hireling looketh for the reward of his work, for he also, after receiving his wages, may rest,
v. 3. so am I, instead of enjoying the expected rest, spoken in irony, made to possess months of vanity, this time of wretchedness was allotted to him, and wearisome nights are appointed to me, they have been dealt out to him without his desire, although he has not done anything to merit them to this degree.
v. 4. When I lie down, I say, When shall I arise and the night be gone? The sleeplessness caused by his terrible illness made him wish that the night would soon flyaway. And I am full of tossings to and fro unto the dawning of the day, weary with his restless rolling about in the endeavor to find rest.
v. 5. My flesh is clothed with worms, maggots breeding in the ulcers, and clods of dust, the crust of dried filth covering his entire body; my skin is broken and become loathsome, whenever the skin made an attempt to heal, to come together, to become hard and stiff, the festering sores broke open again.
v. 6. My days are swifter than a weaver’s shuttle and are spent without hope, vanish without hope of deliverance, just as the web on the loom of the weaver is cut off.
v. 7. O remember that my life is wind, his days are like a breath of air, which is soon wafted away, Psa 78:39; mine eye shall no more see good, will not return to see good fortune or prosperity; an early death would put an end to his chances of happiness in this life.
v. 8. The eye of him that hath seen me shall see me no more, he would soon pass from the circle of those whom he had formerly considered his friends; Thine eyes are upon me, namely, those of the Lord, and I am not; even if He should turn to Job in sympathy in order to help him, it would be too late, since he knew he would soon be removed from the land of the living. Such bitterness of soul as here shown by Job is not compatible with true trust in the Lord.
Paul E. Kretzmann, Popular Commentary of the Bible (1921–1924) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
unfoldingWord translationNotes2017 · CC BY-SA 4.0On v1General Information:
General Information:
The writer continues to use parallelism in each of these verses, conveying a single idea using two different statements to emphasize that his personal suffering is part of the universal suffering which all people experience. (See: Parallelism)
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Does not man have hard labor on earth?
Job poses this negative question to emphasize his awareness that all people experience hard work. It can be translated as a positive statement. AT: "There is hard labor for every person on earth." (See: Rhetorical Question)
on earth
This is a generalization that means for the time people are living on the earth. AT: "while he lives on the earth" (See: Hyperbole and Generalization)
Are not his days like the days of a hired man?
Job poses this negative question to emphasize his awareness that all people struggle in life. AT: "And their days are like the days of a hired man." (See: Rhetorical Question and Simile)
Like a slave ... like a hired man ... so I have been ... given trouble-filled nights
Job compares his misery and trouble to that of the slave and hired man. (See: Simile)
the shadows of evening
"cool shade." The implied information is that the shadows of evening provide coolness and shade from the sun (See: Assumed Knowledge and Implicit Information)
a hired man
"a day laborer." This is a man who worked jobs one day at a time and was paid at the end of every day.
looks for his wages
"waits for his pay"
so I have been made to endure months of misery; I have been given trouble-filled nights
This can be translated in active form. AT: "so I endure months of misery; I get trouble-filled nights" (See: Active or Passive)
months of misery
The abstract noun "misery" can be translated as the adjective "miserable." AT: "miserable months" or "empty months" (See: Assumed Knowledge and Implicit Information)
GEBible — Godless Engineer's Bible App
Geneva Bible translators 1599 · Public Domain On vv1, 3 Hath not an hired servant some rest and ease?…
Hath not an hired servant some rest and ease? then in this my continual torment I am worse than an hireling.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain On vv1–3 Job 7:1 [Is there] not an appointed time to…
Job 7:1 [Is there] not an appointed time to man upon earth? [are not] his days also like the days of an hireling?
Ver. 1. Is there not an appointed time to man upon the earth?] There is, certainly. Our bounds are prescribed us, and a pillar set by him who bears up the heavens, which we are not to transpass. Stat sua cuique dies, said the heathen poet (Virg. Aeneid 10), our last day stands, the rest run. It is said of the Turks, that they shun not the company of those that have the plague, but pointing upon their foreheads, say, it was written there at their birth when they should die. Now if there be an appointed time, &c., what mean the Lutherans to teach that God hath not determined the period of men’s days, but it is in man’s power to lengthen or shorten them, Humanae vitae terminus non est decreto simplici et absoluto constitutus (Homing). In this one verse we have two metaphors, both which do evince the contrary. The first is from soldiers, implied in the word צבא translated an appointed time, or a warfare, because there was a set time for soldiers to fight, and a set time also for them to serve. The second is from a hireling.
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Are not his days also like the days of an hireling?] Describit humanae vitro brevitatem, saith Vatablus. Here he describeth the shortness of man’s life, and with it that his days are determined; for with a hireling we agree to work with us for a certain time, and usually for a day, or by the day; and hence we call them day labourers. It importeth then that the time of man’s life is short and set; for hirelings are appointed to an hour. See Job 14:14; Ecc 2:3; Joh 7:30; Isa 38:5. Fifteen years just were added to Hezekiah’s life. Our hairs are numbered, much more our days. This Job allegeth to set forth his own extreme misery, as one condemned to perpetual torments without any respite or refreshing; and therefore in a worse case than any soldier or servant.
John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Poole 1685 · Public Domain On vv1–3 Is there not a certain and short time limited…
Is there not a certain and short time limited by God wherein man shall live in this sinful, and vain, and miserable world, after which he shall live in a holier and happier place and state? and is it a crime in me to desire that God would give me some ease and respite for the present, and bring me to that blessed and joyful period?
Like the days of an hireling; whose time is limited and short, being but for a few years, Isa 16:14; 21:16, and sometimes but for days, Job 14:6; Mat 20:1,2, and whose condition is full of toil and hardship.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Matthew Henry 1710 · Public Domain On v1 Job is here excusing what he could not justify,…
Job is here excusing what he could not justify, even his inordinate desire of death. Why should he not wish for the termination of life, which would be the termination of his miseries? To enforce this reason he argues,
I. From the general condition of man upon earth (Job 7:1): "He is of few days, and full of trouble. Every man must die shortly, and every man has some reason (more or less) to desire to die shortly; and therefore why should you impute it to me as so heinous a crime that I wish to die shortly?" Or thus: "Pray mistake not my desires of death, as if I thought the time appointed of God could be anticipated: no, I know very well that that is fixed; only in such language as this I take the liberty to express my present uneasiness: Is there not an appointed time (a warfare, so the word is) to man upon earth? and are not his days here like the days of a hireling?" Observe, 1. Man's present place. He is upon earth, which God has given to the children of men, Psa 115:16. This bespeaks man's meanness and inferiority. How much below the inhabitants of yonder elevated and refined regions is he situated! It also bespeaks God's mercy to him. He is yet upon the earth, not under it; on earth, not in hell. Our time on earth is limited and short, according to the narrow bounds of this earth; but heaven cannot be measured, nor the days of heaven numbered. 2. His continuance in that place. Is there not a time appointed for his abode here? Yes, certainly there is, and it is easy to say by whom the appointment is made, even by him that made us and set us here. We are not to be on this earth always, nor long, but for a certain time, which is determined by him in whose hand our times are. We are not to think that we are governed by the blind fortune of the Epicureans, but by the wise, holy, and sovereign counsel of God. 3. His condition during that continuance. Man's life is a warfare, and as the days of a hireling. We are every one of us to look upon ourselves in this world, (1.) As soldiers, exposed to hardship and in the midst of enemies; we must serve and be under command; and, when our warfare is accomplished, we must be disbanded, dismissed with either shame or honour, according to what we have done in the body. (2.) As day-labourers, that have the work of the day to do in its day and must make up their account at night.
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II. From his own condition at this time. He had as much reason, he thought, to wish for death, as a poor servant or hireling that is tired with his work has to wish for the shadows of the evening, when he shall receive his penny and go to rest, Job 7:2. The darkness of the night is as welcome to the labourer as the light of the morning is to the watchman, Psa 130:6. The God of nature has provided for the repose of labourers, and no wonder that they desire it. The sleep of the labouring man is sweet, Ecc 5:12. No pleasure more grateful, more relishing, to the luxurious than rest to the laborious; nor can any rich man take so much satisfaction in the return of his rent-days as the hireling in his day's wages. The comparison is plain, the application is concise and somewhat obscure, but we must supply a word or two, and then it is easy: exactness of language is not to be expected from one in Job's condition. "As a servant earnestly desires the shadow, so and for the same reason I earnestly desire death; for I am made to possess, etc." Hear his complaint.
1. His days were useless, and had been so a great while. He was wholly taken off from business, and utterly unfit for it. Every day was a burden to him, because he was in no capacity of doing good, or of spending it to any purpose. Et vitae partem non attigit ullam - He could not fill up his time with any thing that would turn to account. This he calls possessing months of vanity, Job 7:3. It very much increases the affliction of sickness and age, to a good man, that he is thereby forced from his usefulness. He insists not so much upon it that they are days in which he has no pleasure as that they are days in which he does not good; on that account they are months of vanity. But when we are disabled to work for God, if we will but sit still quietly for him, it is all one; we shall be accepted.
2. His nights were restless, Job 7:3, Job 7:4. The night relieves the toil and fatigue of the day, not only to the labourers, but to the sufferers: if a sick man can but get a little sleep in the night, it helps nature, and it is hoped that he will do well, Joh 11:12. However, be the trouble what it will, sleep gives some intermission to the cares, and pains, and griefs, that afflict us; it is the parenthesis of our sorrows. But poor Job could not gain this relief. (1.) His nights were wearisome, and, instead of taking any rest, he did but tire himself more with tossing to and fro until morning. Those that are in great uneasiness, through pain of body or anguish of mind, think by changing sides, changing places, changing postures, to get some ease; but, while the cause is the same within, it is all to no purpose; it is but a resemblance of a fretful discontented spirit, that is ever shifting, but never easy. This made him dread the night as much as the servant desires it, and, when he lay down, to say, When will the night be gone? (2.) These wearisome nights were appointed to him. God, who determines the times before appointed, had allotted him such nights as these. Whatever is at any time grievous to us, it is good to see it appointed for us, that we may acquiesce in the event, not only as unavoidable because appointed, but as therefore designed for some holy end. When we have comfortable nights we must see them also appointed to us and be thankful for them; many better than we have wearisome nights.
3. His body was noisome, Job 7:5. His sores bred worms, the scabs were like clods of dust, and his skin was broken; so evil was the disease which cleaved fast to him. See what vile bodies we have, and what little reason we have to pamper them or be proud of them; they have in themselves the principles of their own corruption: as fond as we are of them now, the time may come when we may loathe them and long to get rid of them.
4. His life was hastening apace towards a period, Job 7:6. He thought he had no reason to expect a long life, for he found himself declining fast (Job 7:6): My days are swifter than a weaver's shuttle, that is, "My time is now but short, and there are but a few sands more in my glass, which will speedily run out." Natural motions are more swift near the centre. Job thought his days ran swiftly because he thought he should soon be at his journey's end; he looked upon them as good as spent already, and he was therefore without hope of being restored to his former prosperity. It is applicable to man's life in general. Our days are like a weaver's shuttle, thrown from one side of the web to the other in the twinkling of an eye, and then back again, to and fro, until at length it is quite exhausted of the thread it carried, and then we cut off, like a weaver, our life, Isa 38:12. Time hastens on apace; the motion of it cannot be stopped, and, when it is past, it cannot be recalled. While we are living, as we are sowing (Gal 6:8), so we are weaving. Every day, like the shuttle, leaves a thread behind it. Many weave the spider's web, which will fail them, Job 8:14. If we are weaving to ourselves holy garments and robes of righteousness, we shall have the benefit of them when our work comes to be reviewed and every man shall reap as he sowed and wear as he wove.
Matthew Henry's Commentary on the Whole Bible (1708–1710) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain On vv1–3 Is there not an appointed time to man upon…
Is there not an appointed time to man upon earth?.... There is a set time for his coming into the world, for his continuance in it, and for his going out of it; this is to man "on earth", with respect to his being and abode here, not in the other world or future state: not in heaven; there is no certain limited time for man there, but an eternity; the life he will enter into is everlasting; the habitation, mansion, and house he will dwell in, are eternal; saints will be for ever with Christ, in whose presence are pleasures for evermore: nor in hell; the punishment there will be eternal, the fire will be unquenchable and everlasting, the smoke of the torments of the damned will ascend for ever and ever; but men's days and time on earth are but as a shadow, and soon gone; they are of the earth, earthly, and return unto it at a fixed appointed time, time, the bounds of which cannot be passed over: this is true of mankind in general, and of Job in particular; see Job 14:1; the word "Enosh" (i), here used, signifies, as is commonly observed, a frail, feeble, mortal man; Mr. Broughton renders it "sorrowful man"; as every man more or less is; even a man of sorrows, and acquainted with griefs, is attended with them, has an experience of them: this is the common lot of mankind; and if anything more than ordinary is inflicted upon them, they are not able to bear it; and these sorrows death at the appointed time puts an end to, which makes it desirable; now, seeing there is a set time for every man's life on earth, and there was for Job's, of which he was well assured; and, by all appearance of things, and by the symptoms upon him, this time was near at hand; therefore it should not be thought a criminal thing in him, considering his extraordinary afflictions, and which were intolerable, that he should so earnestly wish the time was come; though in his more serious thoughts he determined to wait for it: some render the words, "is there not a warfare are for men on earth?" (k) the word being so rendered elsewhere, particularly in Isa 40:2; every man's state on earth is a state of warfare; this is frequently said by the stoic philosophers (l); even so is that of natural and unregenerate men, who are often engaged in war with one another, which arise from the lusts which war in their members; and especially with the people of God, the seed of the woman, between whom and the seed of the serpent there has been an enmity from the beginning; and with themselves, with the troubles of life, diseases of body, and various afflictions they have to conflict and grapple with: and more especially the life of good men here is a state of warfare, not only of the ministers of the word, or persons in public office, but of private believers; who are good soldiers of Christ, enter volunteers into his service, fight under his banners, and themselves like men; these have many enemies to combat with; some within, the corruptions of hearts, which war against the spirit and law of their minds, which form a company of two armies in militating against each other; and others without, as Satan and his principalities and powers, the men the world, false teachers, and the like: and these are properly accoutred for such service, having the whole armour of God provided for them; and have great encouragement to behave manfully, since they may be sure of victory, and of having the crown of righteousness, when they have fought the good fight of even though they are but frail, feeble, mortal, sinful men, but flesh and blood, and so not of themselves a match for their enemies; but they are more than so through the Lord being on their side, Christ being the Captain of their salvation, and the Spirit of God being in them greater than he that is in the world; and besides, it is only on earth this warfare is, and will soon be accomplished, the last enemy being death that shall be destroyed: now this being the common case of man, to be annoyed with enemies, and always at war with them, if, besides this, uncommon afflictions befall him, as was Job's case, this must make life burdensome, and death, which is a deliverance from them, desirable; this is his argument: some choose to render the words, "is there not a servile condition for men on earth" (m) the word being used of the ministry and service of the Levites, Num 4:3; all men by creation are or ought to be the servants of God; good men are so by the grace of God, and willingly and cheerfully serve him; and though the great work of salvation is wrought out by Christ for them, and the work of grace is wrought by the Spirit of Christ in them, yet they have work to do in their day and generation in the world, in their families, and in the house of God; and which, though weak and feeble in themselves, they are capable of doing, through Christ, his Spirit, power, and grace: and this is only on earth; in the grave there is no work, nor device, nor knowledge; when the night of death comes, no man can work; his service, especially his toilsome service, is at an end; and as it is natural for servants to wish for the night, when their labours end, Job thought it not unlawful in him to wish for death, which would put an end to his toils and labours, and when he should have rest from them:
are not his days also like the days plan hireling? the time for which a servant is hired, whether it be for a day or for a year, or more, it is a set time; it is fixed, settled, and determined in the agreement, and so are the days of man's life on earth; and the of an hireling are few at most, the time for which he is hired is but and as the days of an hireling are days of toil, and labour, and sorrow, so are the days of men evil as well as few; his few days are full of trouble, Gen 47:9; all this and what follows is spoken to God, and not to his friends, as appears from Job 7:7.
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(i) "mortali", Junius & Tremellius, Piscator; "misero et aerumnoso homini", Michaelis. (k) "militia", Montanus, Tigurine version, Schultens; so V. L. Targum. (l) Vid. Gataker. Anotat. in M. Antonin. de seipso, p. 77, 78. (m) "Conditio servilis", Schmidt.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Wesley 1765 · Public Domain On vv1–3 Job bemoans himself to his friends, ver. 1-6. To…
Job bemoans himself to his friends, ver. 1-6. To God, ver. 7- 16. Begs for pardon and death, ver. 17-21.
Is there not - Job is here excusing what he cannot justify, his passionate longing for death. A time - Is there not a time limited by God, wherein man shall live in this sinful, and miserable world? And is it a crime in me, to desire that God would bring me to that joyful period? Our time on earth is limited and short, according to the narrow bounds of this earth. But heaven cannot be measured, nor the days of heaven numbered. Hireling - Whose time is short, being but a few years, or days, whose condition is full of toil and hardship.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain On vv1–3 Job continues to deplore his helpless and afflicted state,…
CHAPTER VII
Job continues to deplore his helpless and afflicted state, 1-6.
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He expostulates with God concerning his afflictions, 7-12;
describes the disturbed state of his mind by visions in the
night season; abhors life, 13-16;
and, showing that he is unworthy of the notice of God, begs
pardon and respite, 17-21.
NOTES ON CHAP. VII
Verse 1. Is there not an appointed time to man] The Hebrew, with its literal rendering, is as follows: הלא צבא לאנוש עלי ארץ halo tsaba leenosh aley arets, "Is there not a warfare to miserable man upon the earth?" And thus most of the versions have understood the words. The SEPTUAGINT: Ποτερον ουχι πειρατηριον εστι ὁ βιος ανθρωπου επι της γης; "Is not the life of man a place of trial upon earth?" The VULGATE: Militia est vita hominis super terram, "The life of man is a warfare upon earth?" The CHALDEE is the same. N'y a-t-il pas comme un train de guerre ordonne aux mortels sur la terre? "Is there not a continual campaign ordained for mortals upon the earth?" FRENCH BIBLE. The GERMAN and DUTCH the same. COVERDALE: Is not the life off man upon earth a very batayle? CARMARDEN, Rouen, 1566: Hath man any certayne tyme upon earth? SYRIAC and ARABIC: "Now, man has time upon the earth." Non e egli il tempo determinato a l'huomo sopra la terra?" "Is there not a determined time to man upon the earth?" BIB. ITAL., 1562. All these are nearer to the true sense than ours; and of a bad translation, worse use has been made by many theologians. I believe the simple sentiment which the writer wished to convey is this: Human life is a state of probation; and every day and place is a time and place of exercise, to train us up for eternal life. Here is the exercise, and here the warfare: we are enlisted in the bands of the Church militant, and must accomplish our time of service, and be honourably dismissed from the warfare, having conquered through the blood of the Lamb; and then receive the reward of the heavenly inheritance.
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Joseph Benson 1811 · Public Domain On vv1–3 Job 7:1. Is there not, &c. — Job is…
Job 7:1. Is there not, &c. — Job is here excusing what he cannot justify, his passionate longing for death. An appointed time for man upon earth — Hebrews צבא, tzaba, a warfare; or, time of warfare. The Targum is, Chela, militia. The Vulgate, militia est vita hominis, The life of man is a warfare. The heathen had the same thoughts of life: ο δε βιος πολεμος, M. Anton. 50. 2. sec. 17. Comp. Job 14:14. All the days, tzebai, of my appointed time; militiæ meæ, of my warfare. But our own translation appears to be as agreeable to the Hebrew, and to contain as good sense, as any other. Job seems to mean, Is there not a short time, limited by God, wherein man shall live in this sinful and miserable world; that afterward he may live in a more holy and happy place and state? And is it a crime in me to desire that God would bring me to that joyful period? Our time on earth is limited and short, according to the narrow bounds of this earth. But heaven cannot be measured, nor the days of heaven numbered. Reader, consider this! Are not his days also like the days of a hireling? — Whose time is short, being but a few years or days, and whose condition is full of toil and hardship.
Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Albert Barnes 1834 · Public Domain On vv1–3 Is there not an appointed time to man upon…
Is there not an appointed time to man upon earth? - Margin, or, warfare. The word used here צבא tsâbâ' means properly a host, an army, see the notes, Isa 1:9; then it means warfare, or the hard service of a soldier; notes, Isa 40:2. Here it means that man on the earth was enlisted, so to speak, for a certain time. He had a certain and definite hard service to perform, and which he must continue to discharge until he was relieved by death. It was a service of hazard, like the life of a soldier, or of toil, like that of one who had been hired for a certain time, and who anxiously looked for the period of his release. The object of Job in introducing this remark evidently is, to vindicate himself for the wish to die which he had expressed. He maintains that it is as natural and proper for man in his circumstances to wish to be released by death, as for a soldier to desire that his term of service might be accomplished, or a weary servant to long for the shades of the evening. The Septuagint renders it, “Is not the life of man upon the earth peirateerion “ - explained by Schleusner and rendered by Good, as meaning a band of pirates. The Vulgate renders it, militia - miltary service. The sense is, that the life of man was like the hard service of a soldier; and this is one of the points of justification to which Job referred in Job 6:29-30. He maintains that it is not improper to desire that such a service should close.
The days of an hireling - A man who has been hired to perform some service with a promise of a reward, and who is not unnaturally impatient to receive it. Job maintained that such was the life of man. He was looking forward to a reward, and it was not unnatural or improper to desire that that reward should be given to him.
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary 1859 · Public Domain On vv1, 3 Warfare. Hebrew, "is it not determined" (Haydock) for some…
Warfare. Hebrew, "is it not determined" (Haydock) for some short space, as the Levites had to serve from 30 to 50 years of age; (Numbers iv. 3., and viii. 25.) and the days of a hireling are also defined and short, Isaias xvi. 14. (Amama) --- No soldier or hireling was ever treated so severely as Job. Yet they justly look for the term of their labours. Septuagint have Greek: peiraterion. Old Vulgate tentatio. "Is not the life of man a temptation?" (Calmet) --- Palæstra, school, or time given to learn the exercise of a soldier and wrestler; or of one who has to prepare himself for a spiritual warfare, and for heaven. (Haydock) --- Are we not surrounded with dangers? and may we not desire to be set at liberty? The Vulgate is very accurate, (Calmet) and includes all these senses. (Haydock) --- A soldier must be obedient even unto death, and never resist his superior. (Worthington) --- Hireling, who has no rest till the day is spent. (Calmet)
George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).
Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset & David Brown 1871 · Public Domain On vv2–3 earnestly desireth--Hebrew, "pants for the [evening] shadow." Easterners measure…
earnestly desireth--Hebrew, "pants for the [evening] shadow." Easterners measure time by the length of their shadow. If the servant longs for the evening when his wages are paid, why may not Job long for the close of his hard service, when he shall enter on his "reward?" This proves that Job did not, as many maintain, regard the grave as a mere sleep.
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain On vv1–3 Fourth long strophe — JOB BEWAILS THE VANITY OF…
Fourth long strophe — JOB BEWAILS THE VANITY OF LIFE, Job_7:1-11.
a. Eliphaz had drawn a glowing picture of justice and mercy as blended together in the divine ordering of human life. On the contrary, Job shows life to be a mingled scene of vanity and misery, Job_6:1-6. “Job’s inflamed eye throws up against the sky, in gigantic outline, an omnipotent slave driver, who fills the earth with miserable wretches overworked by day and shaken by feverish weariness and dreams of torture by night.” — Davidson.
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1. An appointed time — צבא, (Job_14:14; Isa_40:2,) a warfare. The word is properly used of military service, and is rendered by the Septuagint πειρατηριον, “a state of trial.” Life means service — the hard service of a soldier. “Life,” says Zoroaster, “is the post of man. It is forbidden to quit a post without the permission of the commander.” (Maxims.) “The fact that Job, in Job_7:1, brings his suffering into connexion with the misery of the whole race, indicates progress in relation to chapter iii, where, predominantly at least, he limited himself to the representation of his individual condition. By this advance, the question concerning God’s righteousness and love receives a much more forcible significance. The question is no longer about a solitary exception, which may have a secret personal reason for its existence. Job now stands forth as representative of the whole of suffering, oppressed humanity, arraigning God because of his injustice.” — Hengstenberg.
Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain On vv1–3 1. The connexion is with the preceding verses ch.…
1. The connexion is with the preceding verses ch. Job_6:28-30, which express the thought of Job’s innocence, and the thought that in spite of his innocence he is miserably plagued. Under this feeling he throws his eye over all mankind, and sees them also doomed by an inexorable destiny to a life that is brief and filled with pain.
an appointed time] Or, a time of service. The reference is to the hard service of the soldier, in which there are two elements, the fixed period and the hard toil of the campaign. Both are laid on man by a power to which he is subject; cf. Isa_40:2; Job_14:14.
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days of a hireling] The “hireling” might be the mercenary soldier, whose fate, far from home and at the disposal of an alien power, might be thought harder even than that of the ordinary soldier. The word is used in this sense, Jer_46:21, and the verb, 2Sa_10:6. In Job_7:2, however, the word has its ordinary sense of a hired labourer, and this is probably its meaning here.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Pulpit Commentary 1880 · Public Domain On vv1–3 Vers. 1-21. In this chapter Job first bewails his…
Vers. 1-21. In this chapter Job first bewails his miserable fate, of which he expects no alleviation (vers. 1-10); then claims an unlimited right of complaint (ver. 11); and finally enters into direct expostulation with God an expostulation which continues from ver. 12 to the end of the chapter. At the close, he admits his sinfulness (ver. 20), but asks impatiently why God does not pardon it instead of visiting it with such extreme vengeance (ver. 21). Is there not an appointed time to man upon earth? rather, Is there not a warfare (or, a time of service) to man upon earth? Has not each man a certain work appointed for him to do, and a certain limited time assigned him within which to do it? And thus, Are not his days also like the days of a hireling? Since the hireling is engaged to do a certain work in a certain time.
Vers. 1-10. Job to God: 1. The soliloquy of sorrow.
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I A PATHETIC REPRESENTATION OF HUMAN LIFE. In contrast to the fascinating picture sketched by Eliphaz, (Job_5:17-27) Job depicts human life in general, and his own sorrowful existence in particular, as:
1. A term of hard service. "Is there not an appointed time literally, "a warfare, a term of hard service on the earth?" like that of a mercenary soldier hired out for military purposes to a foreign despot; and "are not his days like the days of a hireling?" i.e. a hired slave who has been let out to some pitiless taskmaster; both of whom, the soldier and the slave, "pant for the shadow" on the dial, and "long for their wages," to give them a release from their heavy toils. The language suggests:
(1) That the period of human life is in every instance fixed, the Almighty having not only determined the bounds of our habitation, (Act_17:26) but the number of our months, (Job_14:5) retaining in his own hand our, (Psa_31:15) and measuring out our days. (Psa_39:4)
(2) That the allotted space of human life is in every instance designed to be a season of service, not of ease, enjoyment, or indulgence, but of labour, endurance, and fatigue; not always hard in the sense alluded to by Job, viz. exacting, oppressive, exhausting, pitiless, but ever hard in the sense of being earnest, arduous, and continuous. Life was never meant for idleness. If God promises strength for the day, he first assigns work to the day. (Deu_33:25) Christ recognized that the day of life was designed for toil. (Joh_9:4)
(3) That faithful work performed in time will in every instance meet with a just reward. As the hired soldier received his pay, and the slave obtained his wages, so will every one on earth be recompensed at last according to his works. (Pro_24:12 Mat_16:27 2Ti_4:14) In particular every faithful labourer in Christ"s vineyard will receive his "penny". (Mat_20:9) The doctrine of heavenly rewards is not inconsistent with the idea of free grace. (Heb_11:26 Heb_12:2)
(4) That good men may sometimes long to be released from their labours, not, however, like the bondman or the mercenary soldier, because they serve an exacting and alien taskmaster, who grinds them to the dust with oppression, but because, though not weary of their labours, they are weary in them, and would fain be at rest (cf. Paul, Php_1:2:3 2Ti_4:6).
2. A heritage of incessant misery. As realized in the experience of Job, this misery was:
(1) Heaven-imposed in its origin; he having been made to possess (literally, "caused to inherit") it by compulsion, through the stern will of an unseen but relentless taskmaster, without himself having done anything to either originate or merit it. (ver. 3) a mode of representing human life which has a superficial truthfulness about it in so far as it asserts that affliction is the almost uniform experience of man on earth, that nothing enters into the composition of human history, either collectively or individually, without the expressly given sanction of God, and that no amount of wisdom or endeavour on the part of man will enable him to escape that particular earth-experience which by Divine wisdom and love has been assigned him as his inheritance, but is radically false in insinuating that God acts capriciously and tyrannically, and alleging that man neither shapes nor deserves his particular lot, since no fact is more apparent than that man, as a sinful being, deserves more affliction than he gets, and that, to a large extent at least, every individual is the master of his own destiny.
(2) Tedious in its continuance; Job characterizing his days of affliction as months of vanity; i.e. months which come without bringing relief to the sufferer, and go leaving nothing in their trail but disappointed hopes, each day seeming like a month in duration, and his sleepless nights as "nights of weariness," measured out to him one by one in slow and solemn regularity, each one appearing to interminably lengthen itself out as if it would never come to an end. Behold the subtle alchemy of grief, which can change the pace of time, and make that go with leaden feet which mostly flies with lightning wing.
(3) Painful in its character; arising from a combination of troubles not often meeting in the same individual.
(a) Extinction of hope by day; the absolute expiry of everything like expectation of betterment, which must have been a greater burden to the heart of Job than ever the elephantiasis was to his body: "We are kept alive by hope"; (Rom_8:24) but within the soul of Job the principle of life was gone.
(b) Want of sleep by night. As sleep is one of God"s best gifts to man, (Psa_127:2) restoring nature"s exhausted powers, refreshing mind and body both, (Ecc_5:12 Jer_31:26; cf. Shakespeare, "Henry IV," Part 2 Act 3: So 1) so is the want of it one of the heaviest afflictions that can befall a sufferer, arising sometimes from excessive labour, as with Jacob; (Gen_31:40) sometimes from intense bodily pain, as in the case of Job (ver. 5); sometimes from disturbed thoughts, as with Nebuchadnezzar, (Dan_2:1) Ahasuerus, (Est_6:1) and wicked men; (Pro_4:16) the restless tossings to and fro of the body keeping time with the inward agitations of the mind.
(c) Bodily pain both day and night, springing from a loathsome malady, detailed (ver. 5) as breeding worms in his flesh, covering his skin with earth-coloured scales, causing it to stiffen and emit a purulent discharge, and commonly believed to be elephantiasis. (see homiletics on Job_2:7)
3. A period of exceeding brevity. "My days are swifter than a weaver"s shuttle, and vanish without hope" (ver. 8); i.e. they flee more rapidly than the shuttle passes backwards and forwards in the warp of the weaver"s web, and vanish without hope of any to succeed themi.e. of any days of happiness on earthman affecting emblem of the vanity and shortness of life.
II A PITIFUL SUPPLICATION FROM HUMAN SORROW.
1. The Being addressed. "Oh, remember!" Though not named, God is meant. It is well, though not always necessary, to invoke God by name in our prayers; but certainly it is better to leave God"s name out altogether than to introduce it too frequently into our devotions. That Job called on God in his calamity was a sign that his faith was not yet extinguished, and that he still retained his hold upon the God whom he had formerly professed to serve. It was likewise a more hopeful way of obtaining relief from, or support under, his troubles, since it is always better in our distresses "to cry to God than to complain to creatures" (Caryl).
2. The prayer presented. "Oh, remember!" As applied to God, the word signifies
a. to take notice, to observe, to bear in mind; (Psa_78:39) hence
b. to regard with pity; (Psa_132:1) and
c. to interpose with help. (Gen_8:1)
God remembers when, so to speak, he allows an object to remain in the contemplation of his infinite mind so as to be suitably affected thereby.
Job desires that God would
(1) consider his case;
(2) commiserate his person; and
(3) commute his sorrow.
This, however, does not imply that God ever forgets his people, (Isa_49:15) though he may sometimes appear to do so; (Psa_13:1) or fails to sympathize with them in trouble,though (Psa_103:13 Isa_66:13) afflicted saints may sometimes imagine so; (Psa_44:24 Isa_49:14) or is indisposed to succour them, (1Sa_2:9 Psa_31:23 Psa_91:1) though he frequently, for wise and good reasons, delays his intervention. (Exo_14:13 Mat_14:25 Mat_15:23)
3. The plea offered. The irrevocableness of life which Job depicts by means of two impressive images, comparing his sorrowful existence to:
(1) A passing wind. "Oh, remember that my life is wind!" a breath, a puff of air (Psa_78:39 Psa_103:16) an emblem suggestive of the frailty, the rapidity, and (more especially here) the irrevocability of life. Job interprets the metaphor with regard to himself by saying that when once he had departed this life:
(a) His eye should never more see good (ver. 7); i.e. it should never more return to enjoy the things that constitute (or are supposed to constitute) earthly felicity. (cf. the language of Hezekiah, Isa_38:11) Life"s pleasures, opportunities, privileges, can only be enjoyed once. Yet good in the highest sense does not terminate with death. When a saint departs from this mortal scene he enters upon the chief good, the experience of nobler pleasures and loftier privileges than ever he possessed on earth. (Php_1:21)
(b) Men"s eyes should never see him (ver. 8); i.e. he should never more mingle in the society of the living, never more participate in the friendships and associations of time, having bid farewell to all companions and loved ones (cf. Ecc_9:9, Ecc_9:10) an argument for living peacefully and lovingly amongst friends, companions, and neighbours, since we must soon be parted from them and they from us.
(c) Even God"s eye should fail to see him (ver. 8); i.e. God would not be able to do him good after he was dead, the present life being the only season in which man has an opportunity of receiving "gracious" visitation from God. It is too late to give a man a cordial when he is in his grave; and much more is it post horam to look for salvation when life is ended. (2Co_6:2)
(2) A vanishing cloud. "The cloud dissolves and disappears" (ver. 9). The metaphor is appropriate, as setting forth the unsubstantial, transitory, and irrevocable character of human life. (cf. Jam_4:14) Like the cloud which is quickly dispersed (often by a gentle puff of wind), vanishing into a realm where human vision cannot follow it, so man goeth down into Sheol, the unseen abode of departed spirits. And as the scattered cloud never again gathers itself upon the face of heaven, so never more does man revisit the upper air when once he has descended into "that undiscovered country from whose bourne no traveller returns." In particular, he never again returns to his house, neither shall his place in the family circle, at the social banquet, on change, and in the public assembly, know him any more (ver. 10). Though the doctrine of immortality and the hope of a resurrection am not here insisted on, it does not follow that they were unknown to either Eliphaz or Job. (Job_19:26)
Learn:
1. Since life, and especially the Christian life, is a war-service, (1Ti_6:12) it becomes saints not unnecessarily to entangle themselves with the affairs of this world, (2Ti_2:4) but to endure hardness as good soldiers of Jesus Christ. (2Ti_2:3)
2. Since God will faithfully recompense his servants, (Pro_12:14 Rom_2:10 1Co_3:8) they whom he has hired should be faithful in the rendering of service to him. (Rom_12:11 Eph_6:6, Eph_6:7)
3. Since the natural life of man, even when taken at its best estate, is altogether vanity, (Psa_39:5, Psa_39:11) it is the part of wisdom to aspire after that life which will never disappoint, (Joh_4:14) never know affliction, (Rev_7:16, Rev_7:17) and never pass away. (1Jn_2:17)
4. Since it is certain that we must all go down into the grave, (Psa_89:48 Joh_9:4 Heb_9:27) it becomes us to prepare for that event. (Psa_39:4 2Ki_20:1 1Pe_1:17)
5. Since it is equally certain that we shall all come up again out of our graves, (Job_19:26 Dan 12:2Jo Dan_11:23, 24 Act_24:15) it is folly not to seek before we die the sure and certain hope of a glorious resurrection. (Php_3:11)
HOMILIES BY E. JOHNSON Vers. 1-10. The weakness of man"s appeal to the clemency of God.
I GENERAL VIEW OF MAN"S MISERY AND HIS OWN. (Vers. 1-5) Man is compared to a hireling with an appointed time of service, the end of which is wearily and wistfully looked for. The ideas suggested are
(1) toilsomeness;
(2) fatigue and exhaustion;
(3) intense longing for rest.
As the slave longs for the lengthening shadows of evening, the hired labourer for pay-time, so the oppressed sufferer, toiling beneath a load of pain, longs for the welcome end of death. He "would "twere bedtime, and all well." Voluntary and moderate labour is one of the keenest delights of life; but forced and prolonged toll exhausts the very springs of enjoyment. Rest is the reward of moderate exertion, but to the excessive toiler or sufferer it is denied. We have a picture here of the extreme misery of sleeplessness, than which none can be more acute; the tossing through the wakeful hours of darkness, the mind travelling over and over again the same weary track of its melancholy contemplations. It may be appropriate here to think of the great blessing of sleep. Homer termed it "ambrosial." It was one of the great boons of Heaven to suffering mortals. It is "the season of all natures," as Shakespeare beautifully says. It is the preservation of sanity. Connected with this, the lesson of moderate exertion is one needed by many in these busy, striving days; and no less the fault of over-anxiety, and the duty of casting care upon God. on which the gospel insists so strongly. It is the life according to our true nature, and according to simple piety, which brings sound sleep by night, and healthy thought by day.
II REFLECTION ON THE BREVITY OF LIFE, AND PRAYER. (Vers. 6-10) The mood of self-pity continues. Then follows a lament on the shortness of life. It is compared to a weaver"s shuttle, to smoke, to the vanishing of a cloud, as it is elsewhere compared (Job_9:25) to the hasty passage of a courier, or, in the well-known old story of English history, to the flight of a bird through a hall and out into the darkness again. We may compare the following plaintive passage from the Greek poet Aeschylus:Ah! friend, behold and see What"s all the beauty of humanity? Can it be fair? What"s all the strength? can it be strong And what hope can they bear, These dying livers living one day long? Ah! seest thou not, my friend, How feeble and slow And like a dream doth go This poor blind manhood, drifted from its end? (Mrs. E. B. Browning"s translation.)
We may draw from this passage the following lessons:
1. There is a constant sense of infirmity in human nature, and of the inexorable law of death.
2. The mind cannot submit patiently to this doom. Dear earthly affections (ver. 8) cry out against it, and unconsciously witness for the immortality of the soul.
3. The thought of utter extinction cannot be endured by an awakened and elevated spirit (ver. 10). These impotences and reluctances in the presence of decay and death are really tokens of immortality. We see them to be so in this instance, in an age when life and immortality were not brought to light.
4. The natural relief from all such sorrows and perplexities is in prayer (ver. 7). The cry, "Oh, remember!" is not unheard by him who knows our frame and remembers that we are dust. There may be the clear consciousness of God where there is not the definite assurance of immortality. But a firm faith in him, when cherished and educated, leads ultimately to the conviction that the soul cannot perish. J.
HOMILIES BY R. GREEN Vers. 1-6. The days of the hireling.
Job speaks from the depth of suffering, and as yet he has no clear light upon the Divine purpose concerning him. God, who is his true Refuge, appears to be his Enemy; and he likens his miserable days to those of the oppressed slave. This he urges as a justification of the longing for rest which he has expressed. For him there is no prospect of that rest but in the grave. It is the cry of bitter subjection.
I THE COMPARISON OF HUMAN LIFE TO THAT OF THE HIRELING. It is an appointed lot. It is a lot of subjection. It is a life of toil and weariness. In Job"s case the comparison is most apt. But his thought is especially upon the longing of the hireling for the close of the day. For this the toil, the heat, the weariness, prepare him. Job"s condition is one of hard toil. He is weary even of his life. And his longing for the rest which death alone can bring is the precise point of his comparison. How often does life present no brighter or more beauteous aspect! Its many cares, its disappointments, its multiplied sorrows and keen, penetrating pains make life to many to be as the hard drudgery of the hireling. How many long for death as the hireling for night I In a true sense life is the life of a hireling, and the good Master who has sent us into his vineyard to toil will reward the faithful labourer with his sufficient hire.
II THE AGGRAVATIONS OF JOB"S LOT. He is to his own view as one whose toil is a grievous one. He is more than weary; and his longing for the shadows of evening is justified by what seems to him to be the hardness of his taskmaster. Earnestly he "desireth the shadow;" for long "months of vanity" he is "made to possess," and "wearisome nights are appointed" to him. When the tired labourer lies down to rest in unconscious sleep, and to gain strength for the toil of the morrow, Job is "full of tossings to and fro." The dawn brings him no refreshment. The fevered night leaves him to encounter unprepared the enemy of the day. His poor afflicted body presents the saddest picture; "worms and clods of dust" clothe it, His "skin is broken;" his sores make his flesh "loathsome" to him, and his "days are spent without hope." From such a sufferer comes the word of complaining. It is little to be wondered at by one who remembers his own frailty. The picture of Job is a lesson for us, and, turning our thoughts from our own healthy life to the sufferings of the afflicted, let us learn our duty, and cherish:
1. The pitifulness of spirit which is due to all sufferers.
2. Their claim upon our help and sympathy.
3. The forbearance with which we should hear their complainings.
4. We also may, in our turn, become the sufferers, and need the comfort we now give to others.
Thus may each man see himself in every sufferer, and learn to give that consolation he himself so soon may need. R.G.
Vers. 1-6. The weariness of sorrow.
Expressing Itself
I IN A DESIRE FOR THE CLOSE OF LIFE. (Ver. 2)
II As A CONTINUOUS DISAPPOINTMENT. (Ver. 3)
III As A CEASELESS RESTLESSNESS. (Ver. 4)
IV AS A REVOLT FROM THE PAINFULNESS OF ITS CIRCUMSTANCES. (Ver. 5)
V AS A CONDITION OF HOPELESSNESS. (Ver. 6) R.G.
HOMILIES BY W.F. ADENEY Vers. 1-3. The days of a hireling.
Job compares himself to a mercenary in war and to a hired servant at work. As these men have little interest in what they are doing, partly because the masters who hire them take little interest in them, Job feels his life but a weariness, and longs for the term of his service to expire.
I LIFE MAY APPEAR LIKE THE DAYS OF A HIRELING.
1. It involves hard toil. The lot of most men is not easy; but some find life a grinding servitude.
2. Its labour is often weary and unattractive. Many people have to work at uninteresting tasks, and only regard their labour as drudgery. There is neither pleasure in the work nor pride in the result of it. If men could all choose their lots, many of the most necessary industries would be entirely abandoned.
3. It is only undertaken for the sake of its rewards. Men work for wages, and, needing the wages, they endure the toil which they detest. This is not only true of what is called the wage-earning portion of the community. It applies also to many who seem to be their own masters, but whose work is undertaken solely for the remuneration which it brings in.
4. The supreme Muster is not seen to take interest in his servants. The laws of life are inexorable. There is no evading the rules of God"s great factory in which we are all set to work. Men fall and die at their tasks without visible signs of compassion from their Lord. Thus faith is severely tried, and some weakly ones sink to low views of life and of man"s relations to God.
II IT IS NEITHER HELPFUL NOR RIGHT TO REGARD LIFE AS THE DAYS OF A HIRELING.
1. It is not helpful. Hireling service is never of any great value. The work that is only done for pay is apt to be done hastily if by the piece, and in a wastefully slow and slovenly fashion if by the hour. Until a man puts his heart into his task, he cannot put good work into it. No one can live a worthy life chiefly in the hope of its rewards. The service of God which is only undertaken that good things may be obtained from God is degrading and of little worth. The Christian who lives solely on the hope of heaven is spending a poor life on earth. We have to discover higher motives and to serve God joyfully and lovingly, because his service is delightful, and because we love him.
2. It is not right. The hireling idea of life is delusively suggested to us by a superficial view of facts and by a low tone in our own minds. But it is completely false, for God does not treat us as hirelings. He knows our frame, and remembers that we are dust. He is our Father, and he pities us as his children. And therefore we owe to him more than a hired servants drudgery we owe filial obedience and the rich service of love. Now, when we have learnt to take right views of God and his service, the miserable, degrading idea of the hireling"s lot drops off, and a much nobler and happier conception of life dawns upon us. Then the most common task ceases to be a piece of drudgery and becomes a labour of love. By a gracious law of providence it seems to be ordered that any duty which is undertaken conscientiously and heartily becomes interesting and even a source of pleasure. So while the hireling longs for the shadow that tells of the declining day and of the end of his task, the faithful Christian makes the most of his day of service, knowing "that the night cometh, wherein no man can work. W.F.A.
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Biblical Illustrator 1887 · Public Domain On vv1–3 Is there not an appointed time to man upon…
Job_7:1
Is there not an appointed time to man upon earth?
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An appointed time
I. The nature of the fact which is here affirmed.
1. That the existence of man will be terminated by death. When sin was committed, the order and harmony of the universe was disturbed, and then the solemn and awful sentence was pronounced. What is the world itself, but a vast charnel house, to be filled with the ashes of innumerable dead?
2. The existence of man is confined to a narrow compass. There has been a serious abridgment of the average length of life. All the Scripture representations describe the extreme brevity of human life. We are pushed on by the hand of time, from the various objects we meet with in our course, wondering at the swiftness with which they are taken from our vision, and astonished at the destiny which winds up the scene and ratifies our doom.
3. The existence of man is, as to its precise duration, uncertain and unknown. We know not the day of our departure. There is an impervious gloom about our final departure which no man can penetrate. But all is well known to the wisdom of God. With Him all is fixed--to us, all is uncertain.
4. Our departure from this world is for the purpose of our mingling in scenes which are beyond the grave. We do not depart and sink into the dulness of annihilation. This life is but the threshold of eternity; we are placed here as probationers for eternity.
II. The feelings which arise from the contemplation of it. There is a universal inclination to avoid these truths; they are regarded in general as merely professional; and there is much in the world to counteract their influence. All this can only be removed by the Spirit of God.
1. We ought to make our final departure the subject of habitual contemptation.
2. We should be induced to moderate our attachment to the world, from which we shall so soon be separated.
3. You should be induced to seek an interest in that redeeming system by which you may depart in peace, with the prospect of eternal happiness.
4. We should be induced to pursue with Christian diligence those great employments which the Gospel has proposed. (James Parsons.)
Life as a clock
Our brains are seventy year clocks. The angel of life winds them up at once for all, then closes the cases, and gives the key into the hand of the angel of resurrection. Tic-tac, tic-tac! go the wheels of thought. Our will cannot stop them, madness only makes them go faster. Death alone can break into the case, and, seizing the ever-swinging pendulum which we call the heart, silence at last the clicking of the terrible escapement we have carried so long beneath our aching foreheads. If we could only get at them as we lie on our pillows, and count the dead beats of thought after thought, and image after image, jarring through the overtired organ. Will nobody block those wheels, uncouple their pinion, cut the string which holds those weights? What a passion comes over us sometimes for silence and rest, that this dreadful mechanism, unwinding the endless tapestry of time, embroidered with spectral figures of life and death, might have but one brief holiday! (J. Holmes.)
The hand of God in the history of a man
I. There is a Divine appointment ruling all human life. Not that I single out mans existence as the sole object of Divine forethought, far rather do I believe it to be but one little corner of illimitable providence. A Divine appointment arranges every event, minute or magnificent. As we look out on the world from our quiet room it appears to be a mass of confusion. Events happen which we deeply deplore--incidents which appear to bring evil, and only evil, and we wonder why they are permitted. The picture before us, to the glance of reason, looks like a medley of colour. But the affairs of this world are neither tangled, nor confused, nor perplexing to Him who seeth the end from the beginning. God is in all, and rules all. In the least as well as in the greatest, Jehovahs power is manifested. It is night, but the watchman never sleepeth, and Israel may rest in peace. The tempest rages, but it is well, for our Captain is governor of storms. Our main point is that God rules mortal life; and He does so, first, as to its term, Is there not an appointed time to man upon earth? He rules it, secondly, as to its warfare, for so the text might most properly be read, Is there not an appointed warfare for man upon earth? And, thirdly, He rules it as to its service, for the second clause of the text is, Are not his days as the days of an hireling?
1. First, then, Gods determination governs the time of human life.
(1) We shall all acknowledge this as to its commencement. Not without infinite wisdom did any infants life commence there and then, for no man is the offspring of chance. Who would wish to have first seen the light at the era when our naked forefathers sacrificed to idols? Our presence on earth in this day of grace was a matter altogether beyond our control, and yet it involves infinite issues; therefore let us with deepest gratitude bless the Lord, who has cast our lot in such an auspicious season.
(2) The continuance of life is equally determined of God. He who fixed our birth has measured the interval between the cradle and the grave, and it shall not be a day longer or a day shorter than the Divine decree.
(3) So, too, has He fixed lifes termination. Is there not an appointed time for man upon earth? a time in which the pulse must cease, the blood stagnate, and the eye be closed. Moreover, how consoling is this truth; for, if the Father of our Lord Jesus arranges all, then our friends do not die untimely deaths. The beloved of the Lord are not cut off before their time; they go into Jesus bosom when they are ready to be received there.
2. But we must now consider the other translation of our text. It is generally given in the margin of the Bibles. Is there not an appointed warfare to man upon earth? which teaches us that God has appointed life to be a warfare. To all men it will be so, whether bad or good. Every man will find himself a soldier under some captain or another. Alas for those men who are battling against God and His truth, they will in the end be clothed with dishonour and defeat. No Christian is free to follow his own devices; we are all under law to Christ. A soldier surrenders his own will to that of his commander. Such is the Christians life--a life of willing subjection to the wilt of the Lord Jesus Christ. In consequence of this we have our place fixed and our order arranged for us, and our lifes relative positions are all prescribed. A soldier has to keep rank and step with the rest of the line. As we have a warfare to accomplish, we must expect hardships. A soldier must not reckon upon ease. If life be a warfare, we must look for contests and struggles. The Christian man must not expect to go to heaven without opposition. It is a warfare, for all these reasons, and yet more so because we must always be upon the watch against danger. In a battle no man is safe. Blessed be God that the text says Is there not an appointed warfare? Then, it is not our warfare, but one that God has appointed for us, in which He does not expect us to wear out our armour, or bear our own charges, or find our own rations, or supply our own ammunition. The armour that we wear we have not to construct, and the sword we wield we have not to fabricate.
3. The Lord has also determined the service of our life. All men are servants to some master or another, neither can any of us avoid the servitude. The greatest men are only so much the more the servants of others. If we are now the servants of the Lord Jesus, this life is a set time of a labour and apprenticeship to be worked out. I am bound by solemn indentures to my Lord and Master till my term of life shall run out, and I am right glad to have it so. Now, a servant who has let himself out for a term of years has not a moment that he can call his own, nor have any of us, if we are Gods people. We have not a moment, no, not a breath, nor a faculty, nor a farthing that we may honestly reserve. You must expect to toil in His service till you are ready to faint, and then His grace will renew your strength. A servant knows that his time is limited. If it is weekly service, he knows that his engagement may be closed on Saturday; if he is hired by the month, he knows how many days there are in a month, and he expects it to end; if he is engaged by the year, he knows the day of the year when his service shall be run out. As for us, we do not know when our term will be complete. The hireling expects his wages; that is one reason for his industry. We, too, expect ours--not of debt truly, but of grace, yet still a gracious reward. God does not employ servants without paying them wages, as many of our merchants now do.
II. Secondly, the inferences to be drawn from this fact.
1. First, there is Jobs inference. Jobs inference was that as there was only an appointed time, and he was like a servant employed by the year, he might be allowed to wish for lifes speedy close, and therefore he says, As a servant earnestly desireth the shadow, and as an hireling looketh for the reward of his work. Job was right in a measure, but not altogether so. There is a sense in which every Christian may look forward to the end of life with joy and expectancy, and may pray for it. At the same time, there are needful modifications to this desire to depart, and a great many of them; for, first, it would be a very lazy thing for a servant to be always looking for Saturday night, and to be always sighing and groaning because the days are so long. The man who wants to be off to heaven before his lifes work is done does not seem to me to be quite the man that is likely to go there at all. Besides, while our days are like those of a hireling, we serve a better master than other servants do.
2. I will tell you the devils inference. The devils inference is that if our time, warfare, and service are appointed, there is no need of care, and we may cast ourselves down from the pinnacle of the temple, or do any other rash thing, for we shall only work out our destiny. Oh, say they, we need not turn to Christ, for if we are ordained to eternal life we shall be saved. Yes, sirs, but why will you eat at meal time today? Why, sirs, nothing in the world more nerves me for work than the belief that Gods purposes have appointed me to this service. Being convinced that the eternal forces of immutable wisdom and unfailing power are at my back, I put forth all my strength as becometh a worker together with God.
3. I will now give you the sick mans inference. Is there not an appointed time to men upon earth? Are not his days also like the days of an hireling? The sick man, therefore, concludes that his pains will not last forever, and that every suffering is measured out by love Divine. Therefore, let him be patient, and in confidence and quietness shall be his strength.
4. Next comes the mourners inference--one which we do not always draw quite so readily as we should. It is this: My child has died, but not too soon. My husband is gone; ah, God, what shall I do? Where shall my widowed heart find sympathy? Still he has been taken away at the right time. The Lord has done as it pleased Him, and He has done wisely.
5. Furthermore, let us draw the healthy mans inference. I have no end of business--too much, a great deal; and I resolved I will get, all square and trim as if I were going off, for perhaps I am. You are a healthy man, but be prepared to die.
6. Lastly, there is the sinners inference. My time, my warfare, and my service are appointed, but what have I done in them? I have waged a warfare against God, and have served in the pay of the devil; what will the end be? Sinner, you will run your length, you will fulfil your day to your black master; you will fight his battle and earn your pay, but what will the wages be? (C. H. Spurgeon.)
The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary 1892 · Public Domain On v1 Job ceases to altercate with Eliphaz and to defend…
CONTINUATION OF JOB’S SPEECH
Job ceases to altercate with Eliphaz and to defend himself. Resumes his complaints, and ends by addressing himself to God.
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I. Complains of the general lot of humanity (Job_7:1)
“Is there not an appointed time (margin, a warfare,’ or war-service) to man (properly, to wretched man, Heb., ‘Enosh,’—man viewed as fallen, and therefore miserable) upon earth? Are not his days also as the days of an hireling?” Wishes to show—
(1) His desire for death excusable;
(2) Suffering not peculiar to the bad. Suggests instructive views of
Human Life
1. As an appointed period. War-service, and the time of a hired labourer’s employment, limited. The term used also to express the time of a Levite’s service at the tabernacle, namely, twenty years (Num_4:23). Doctrine: The bounds of man’s life appointed (ch. Job_14:5). Our days measured out by Him who created us (Psa_39:4). Our times in His hand (Psa_31:15). Not without respect to the means necessary for life’s continuance. God’s predestination neither interferes with the human will nor the operation of second causes, but embraces both. The means taken into view along with the appointment of the end. The crop not appointed without the ploughing and sowing. If the passengers’ lives are to be preserved, the sailors are to do their duty (Act_27:22-31). The elect saved, but not without regeneration, repentance, and faith. If a man is to reach his “threescore years and ten,” he is not to shorten them by neglect, intemperance, or crime. The wicked often do not “live out half their days,”—the days they might and should have lived. Disease as much appointed as the death it occasions. Lessons: Life an appointed period. Hence—
(1.) Bear meekly its trials; they are but for a limited time;
(2.) Wait patiently for its termination: it will come in God’s time. Neither greatly desire nor hasten it;
(3.) Carefully improve its continuance. Much to be done, and but a short time to do it in (Ecc_9:10).
2. As a war-service. Such a period not one of ease, enjoyment, or indulgence; but of hardship, privation, unrest. Job’s reason for desiring its termination. Life a war-service—
(1) As a time of trouble and suffering. Man born to trouble (ch. Job_5:7);
(2) As a time of conflict. Sin and Satan our great enemies;
(3) As a time of service. Man bound to serve God as his rightful sovereign. Lessons:
(1) Be patient of hardship, and prepared for trial and suffering. Man’s, and especially a Christian’s, is a soldier’s, life. “Endure hardness” (2Ti_2:3). Tedious marches, camp discomforts, field duties.
(2) Be careful to be on the right side. We must serve; but it may be either under Christ’s banner or the devil’s.
(3) Be faithful, obedient, and active; faithful to your King, obedient to your Captain, active in discharge of your duty.
(4) Be hopeful, courageous, and enduring. With Christ as our captain victory is certain; and, after short and faithful service, comes long and honourable reward (2Ti_4:7-8).
3. As the term of a hired servant. We may have a hireling’s post, without a hireling’s spirit. Salvation by grace not inconsistent with “respect to the recompense of reward.” Each believer has his work in the vineyard, and each receives “his penny.” A hired labourer has—
(1) Painful and self-denying labour to undergo;
(2) A short and limited time to do it in;
(3) Due wages to receive when it is done. Life such a service. Man must serve—either God or Satan, righteousness or sin (Rom_6:16-22). Each thought, word, and action, a service to one or other of these two masters. Hence—
(1) “Choose the best master. God’s service is—(i.) Honourable; (ii.) Pleasant; (iii.) Satisfying to the conscience. Has along with it—(a) Kind treatment; (b) Comfortable provision; (c) Liberal remuneration.—
(2) Be diligent in doing the Master’s work and watchful in looking for the Master’s coming (Mar_13:34-37.)
II. Renews his complaint and describes his sad condition. Mention of the “hireling” in verse I suggests to him the comparison of himself to a slave or a day-labourer who longs for the evening rest (Job_7:2). “As the servant (or slave) earnestly desireth (margin—‘gapeth’ or pants after) the shadow [of evening], and as a hireling (hired servant, as distinguished from a slave) looketh for the reward (or finishing) of his work, so,” &c.
Describes his afflicted condition in three particulars:—
1. Comfortless days and painful nights (Job_7:3). “So am I made to possess (Heb. ‘to inherit’) months of vanity (without comfort or relief to myself, and without profit either to myself, or others), and wearisome nights (Heb. ‘nights of labour or trouble’) are appointed (Heb. ‘numbered’) to me.” Such days and nights the result—
(1) Of his disease;
(2) Of his bereavement;
(3) Of spiritual darkness. Says not days, but “months” of vanity, each day appearing a month. So Jonah speaks of his three days in the fish’s belly as an eternity,—“for ever” (Jon_2:6). “A man in great misery may so far lose his measure as to think a minute an hour” [Locke]. On the other hand, as grief retards, so joy hastens time. The bliss of heaven makes “eternity seem as a day.” Job’s troubles, however, may now have probably lasted some months. These painful days and nights spoken of as an inheritance. A bitter irony, yet true. Trouble handed down to us with sin as its consequence. “A sad inheritance of woe.” Adheres to us as our ancestral possession. “Made to possess” them, as against his will. “The creature made subject to vanity, not willingly” (Rom_8:20). Blessed contrast to this inheritance is that found in Christ (Rom_8:17; Heb_9:15; 1Pe_1:4). Yet months of suffering not necessarily “months of vanity.” These, to a child of God, among the all things working together for his good (Rom_8:24). Times of affliction are made times of profit, to ourselves, through spiritual teaching and Divine communion; to others, by the example afforded of patience and Divine support.
“In all my list of blessings infinite
Stands this the foremost, that my heart has bled.”
2. Rest lessness of mind and body (Job_7:4). “When I lie down, I say, when shall I arise, and the night be gone? (or, ‘but the night is extended;’ margin, ‘and the evening be measured?’) And I am full of tossings,” &c. The distressing nights dwelt upon rather than the days. Long, weary, sleepless nights among the most painful circumstances connected with sickness or sorrow. Such nights contrasted with the refreshing rest of the worn-out slave and weary labourer. These wearisome and restless nights, however, counted out by God to his people. (Job_7:3). Not one too many, or more than He will over-rule for our good. God an accurate dispenser of His people’s sufferings and sorrow (Isa_27:8). Connected with the long sleepless nights are the “tossings to and fro upon the bed.” “We change the place, but keep the pain.” The nocturnal tossings in mind often more painful than those of the body (Psa_77:2-9; Isa_38:13). Sleep God’s gift to his beloved (Psa_127:2). Its absence in sickness or trouble itself no small affliction.
“Nature’s soft nurse, how have I frighted thee,
That thou no more wilt weigh my eyelids down?”
3. Loathsomeness of body (Job_7:5). “My flesh is clothed with worms and clods of dust (literally, or in appearance); my skin is broken and become loathsome;” (or, breaks [in ulcers] and dissolves [in matter]). Corruption breeding worms, ulcerous running sores, and rough ashy scales covering the body, prominent features in Job’s disease. The Elephantiasis a species of leprosy (Lev_13:9-17). Renders the patient loathsome to look at, and forbids contact or near approach. Similar revolting picture probably presented in Lazarus (Luk_16:20), and in Herod (Act_12:23). Some thing like it complained of by David (Psa_38:3; Psa_38:5; Psa_38:7; Psa_38:11), and by Heman (Psa_88:8; Psa_88:18). A sad aggravation of our affliction when it renders us loathsome to our friends.
Lessons from Job’s Disease
(1) Terrible power of Satan. Satan the immediate author of Job’s disease.
(2) Dreadful effects of sin. But for sin there had been no disease. Sin turns our comeliness into corruption, and covers a formerly fair and healthy body with foul putridity and worm-breeding sores.
(3) Character of our mortal body. Soon reduced to loathsome putrefaction even while alive. “Our vile body,”—the “body of our humiliation” (Php_3:21).
(4) The saint as liable to the most loathsome diseases as the sinner. Witness Job and Lazarus.
(5.) The love of Christ in assuming a body with such liabilities. Made “in the likeness of sinful flesh” (Rom_8:2). “Took our infirmities and bare our sicknesses” (Mat_8:17, quoted from Isa_53:4). From the same prophecy, the Messiah said by the Jews to have his place among the lepers.
(6.) Preciousness of a glorious resurrection. Our vile body changed and fashioned like to Christ’s glorious body (Php_3:21.)
(7.) Affecting picture of the loathsomeness of sin. Leprosy the most loathsome of all bodily diseases. Sin symbolized by it as the most loathsome thing in the universe. The only truly loathsome thing in the eyes of God and holy beings. Makes the soul infinitely more loathsome than Job’s disease did his body. The godless rich man loathsome with his plump, well-fed, and richly-clad body; godly Lazarus beautiful and comely in his sores.
4. The prematureness of his anticipated death (Job_7:6). “My days are swifter than a weaver’s shuttle (or, ‘come more quickly to an end than the weaving of a web’), and are spent without hope,” (viz., of extension or relief; or, ‘are finished for want of thread’) so Isa_38:12. Job anticipated death as the certain and not distant result of his affliction (ch. Job_9:25-26; Job_17:11). Himself, as life was then, still comparatively young. Probably not more than seventy,—only a third of the age then usually attained and actually attained by himself (ch. Job_42:16). A premature death, especially in Old Testament times, viewed as a grievous calamity (Isa_6:5; Isa_30:9; Isa_38:10-19. The language suggestive in regard to
Time
1. Its rapid flight and short duration. Set forth in Scripture under various comparisons:—a flower, a vapour, a dream, a watch of the night, a tale that has been told, & Here, either a weaver’s shuttle passing quickly to and fro, or a web, speedily and perhaps suddenly finished from want of thread. Time represented by the ancients with wings, as not running but flying. Jacob speaks of his days as few at the age of 130. The longest life only a speck in comparison with eternity. A northern winter’s day, when the sun has scarcely risen before it sets again. The sun of many sets while it is yet noon. Job, like most others, had counted on a long life (ch. Job_29:18). Now the grave seems to open its mouth for him (ch. Job_17:1). “Though death be before the old man’s face, it may be behind the young man’s back” [Seneca.] Hence the vanity of earthly pleasures and enjoyments. Like Jonah’s gourd, these spring up in a night and perish in a night. But “for a season,” and that a very short one. Earthly pleasures are, according to one who deeply plunged into them,—
“Like the snow-falls in the river,
A moment white, then melt for ever;
Or like the rainbow’s lovely form,
Evanishing amid the storm.”
2. The value of time. Time the short seedtime for eternity. Bound up with eternal destinies. Its value seldom realised. No note taken of it but as the clock tells of its departure. Men speak of killing time. To destroy time is “suicide, where more than blood is spilt.” Greater folly to throw away hours than empires. The value of time realised on a dying bed. “Millions of money for an inch of time” [Queen Elizabeth on her deathbed]. Time ceases at death, and gives place to eternity. “No clock strikes in hell, to say, Thank God, another hour is past. One gigantic clock there, without a dial-plate; its pendulum eternally vibrating, Ever, Never; Damnation ever, Redemption never” [Krummacher].
3. The danger of delay in securing the soul’s salvation. Madness to put off till to-morrow what ought to be done to-day. “Serious things to-morrow”—cost both Cæsar and Archias their life. Procrastination the death of souls. Men “resolve and re-resolve, and die the same.” Augustine was kept seven years from closing with Christ by the temptation, Time enough yet. When Hannibal could have taken Rome, he would not, and when he would, he could not. “What thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might.” The soul’s salvation the one thing needful. Sad to be sowing our seed when we should be reaping our harvest [Brooks]. Cæsar Borgia on his deathbed said: While I lived, I provided for everything but death, and now death comes and I am unprovided for it. A promise made to late repentance, but no promise of late repentance.
“Alas, that men should lightly spend
In godless mirth or prayerless toil unblest,
Their brief inestimable day of proof,
Till the last golden sands run out.”
IV. Job turns imploringly to God (Job_7:7)
“O remember,” &c. Better in trouble to cry to God than to complain to man. God sometimes appears to His suffering people to forget them and their case (Psa_13:1; Psa_44:24; Isa_49:14). The contrary affirmed by God for their comfort (Isa_49:15). Job pleads for mitigation of His sufferings on the ground—
(1) Of the frail and fleeting nature of his earthly life. “My life is wind”—a breath or puff of air; a “cloud” or smoke; unsubstantial and evanescent (Psa_78:39;
(2) Its speedy termination (Job_7:8). “Thine eyes are upon me, and I am not.” Speaks of himself as already dead, or soon to be,—a living corpse, (a) Life terminated by a look from the Almighty. His glance our death. So those sent to apprehend Jesus fell backward to the ground at his mere look; (b) Life, compared with God’s eternity, only a moment—the glance or twinkling of an eye.
(3) The impossibility of its recall (Job_7:9-10). “He that goeth down to the grave shall come up no more.” The emitted breath, the cloud or smoke disappearing from the sky, never more to be recalled. Death, “the bourne from which no traveller returns.” Only one life on earth. A few special exceptions to prove the rule. Men die but once. Solemn responsibility connected with our one life. No second to correct the errors, undo the mischief, or make up for the negligence, of the first. An egress from the grave in reserve for each, but no return to a mortal life. A resurrection to come, both of the just and the unjust. That resurrection, however, not in the course of nature, but by the special command and power of God (Joh_5:28; 1Th_4:16). Christ Himself the Resurrection and the Life. Resurrection committed to His hands (Joh_11:25; Joh_6:54). Resurrection not unknown to the patriarchs, but seldom referred to by Job. Enoch’s translation a testimony to the early ages of the existence of the body in an invisible state. His prophecy a distinct revelation of resurrection (Jud_1:14-15). God’s relation to the godly dead as their God, a guarantee both of the separate existence of their spirits and the future resurrection of their bodies (Mat_22:31-32). The doctrine of the resurrection, as well as of the state after death, one of gradual development. Job’s age the twilight of revelation.
V. Job’s resolution to give way to complaint. Occasioned by the consideration of his misery in the world, and his anticipated speedy, untimely, and irrevocable departure out of it (Job_7:11). “Therefore I will not refrain my mouth,” &c. Falls again into his former temptation. His spirit like a surging sea, quiet for a little, then heaving again its angry billows. His present resolution the worst thing he could do. Tended to a continually increasing strife with God. Satan doubtless now rejoiced in his apparent advantage. So far his scheme likely to succeed. Probably thought the next thing would be that Job would “curse God to his face.” Job preserved from this only by imparted and indwelling grace. Perilous to advance so near the brink of the precipice. Dangerous to indulge in bitter language in reference to our lot. Safest when God’s hand is on our back, to keep our hand on our mouth. David’s resolution in similar circumstances much wiser than Job’s (Psa_39:1). Free utterance to excited feelings only adds fuel to the fire. Grace shutting the lips raises up a barrier to the tempest of the spirit. Passion acquires strength by indulgence and free expression. “Anguish of spirit” a very unsafe guide to speech. Only turbid streams likely to flow from a turbid fountain.
The result of Job’s resolution, petulant and unbecoming expostulation with God. (Job_7:12). “Am I a sea (or a desolating inundation, as of the Nile), or a whale (or sea-monster, as the crocodile), that Thou settest a watch over me (to restrain me by these terrible sufferings from doing injury)?” Very erroneous thoughts often suggested in trouble as to God’s motive in sending it. We may sympathize with Job’s sufferings without imitating his language. His language, however, indicates—
(1) A believer readily ascribing all in his lot to God;
(2) A soul moving always in the Divine presence;
(3) The frequent and familiar intercourse of a child of God with his Heavenly Father.
VI. Enlarges farther on his affliction (Job_7:13-14)
1. His distressing nights (Job_7:13). “When I say, My bed shall ease my complaint, then thou scarest me with dreams and terrifiest me with visions” (images presented to the imagination while half-sleeping, half-waking). These probably a natural symptom of Job’s disease. A grievous aggravation of the affliction. Night, the period of rest to others, made more distressing than the day. The blessing of “tired Nature’s sweet restorer, balmy sleep,” seldom duly appreciated and acknowledged. Our minds accessible to Satan as well as God and good angels during sleep. Dreams either natural or supernatural; as supernatural, either diabolical or Divine. Job, in ignorance, ascribes to God what was properly due to Satan. Satan cruelly skilful in adopting suitable means to accomplish his purpose. His object to exhaust the energies of Job’s body and spirit, and by representing God as his enemy, to bring him to despair and to curse or renounce Him. For this, he employs a filthy disease and frightful dreams, and tempts him to believe them both from God. Satan a merciless tormentor. Possesses a terrible power of inflicting pain. Job’s case a picture of the misery of falling into Satan’s hands. Still more fearful to fall into the hands of the living God (Heb_10:31). God able to make every organ of the body and every faculty of the mind the seat of intolerable suffering.—Earnest desire for death the effect of these sufferings on the mind of Job (Job_7:15). “So that my soul chooseth strangling and death rather than life” (margin, “than my bones,”—all that is left of me). The “soul,” or mere fleshly nature, may choose death as a release from suffering; the “spirit” or renewed nature says—“Not my will but thine be done;” “All the days of my appointed time will I wait,” &c. (ch. Job_14:14). Grace the truest heroism. Brave in the battle-field, a man may yet fly in the battle of life. Suicide at best but moral cowardice. To be only accounted for by the absence or the eclipse of faith. Faith in God alone gives true courage. The strongest mind weak when left to itself under depressing thoughts or a disturbed brain. “Do thyself no harm,” a timely voice to harassed and despairing souls.
2. The extremely reduced state of his body and the certainty of a speedy death (Job_7:16). “I loathe it (i.e., my life; or, ‘I am wasting away’); I would not (or, ‘I shall not’) live always (i.e., I shall soon die at any rate); let me alone (leave me to die, or cease to harass me with bodily and mental suffering), for my days are vanity” [and will soon come to an end]. Job’s spirit tossed between two desires—either an immediate death as a release from his continued misery, or a relief from suffering for the few days that remained to him. The troubled and agitated spirit seldom long in one stay.
VII. Man’s insignificance urged by Job as a plea for deliverance or relief (Job_7:17).
“What is man (Heb., ‘wretched man,’ enosh) that, thou,” &c. Same question asked by David from an entirely different consideration (Psa_8:4). The same truth often viewed in different aspects and with different feelings by different persons, and by the same person at different times. The truth, dark to one or at one time, is bright to another or to the same person at another time. Truth, like the cloud that followed Israel, presents both a dark side and a bright one. Happy, like Israel, to be on the bright side. God’s great attention to man produced in David admiration and praise; in Job displeasure and complaint. To the Psalmist God appears amiable as a Father delighting in blessing His children; to the Patriarch, stern as a judge, constantly examining into men’s actions. Faith’s office is to view the truth as it is, apart from personal feeling. Feeling, in Job, asks with petulance—“Why doth He visit men every morning?” Faith, in Jeremiah, exclaims with thankfulness, amid the desolations of a sacked and burned city—“His mercies are new every morning” (2Sa_3:23). God’s morning visitation a mercy, and should—
(1) Impart comfort;
(2) Awaken praise. Opens our eyes to the grateful light of day, the beauties of nature, and the faces of relatives and friends. Imparts to us health of body, soundness of mind, comfort of spirit. Continues to us day after day food, raiment, home, society of friends. Invites us every morning afresh to communion with Himself as our Father in Christ.
Important and suggestive question,
What is Man?
At once the least and the greatest of God’s creatures. Lower than the angels in creature-position, immensely higher in Redemption-privilege. Lives one life on earth consisting of a few months or years; a second in another sphere, which shall last for ever. Has a body that allies him to the ground on which he walks; and a spirit that connects him to the God that made him. A reed, but a reed that thinks [Pascal]. A worm, but a worm capable of measuring, the distances of the stars and of grasping the universe. Made in the image of his Creator as to moral nature, intelligence, immortality, and dominion. Through disobedience and rebellion, reduced below the level of the brutes. Mercifully provided, with deliverance from his fallen condition through the substituted obedience and death of his incarnate Creator.—Man “magnified” by God,
1. In Creation; his place above all the creatures around him, and second only to that of the angels that surround the Eternal’s throne.
2. In Providence; the attention originally paid to his comfort, and the care continually exercised over him.
3. In Redemption; the highest possible proof of Divine regard afforded in the life, sufferings, and death of God’s own Son for his deliverance and happiness.
4. In his Glorification; united to the Son of God and made like Him in spirit, soul, and body; exalted as His spouse to sit with Him on His throne, and with Him to judge angels.
5. In the Assumption of his nature by the Son of God. Christ the man, the second Adam and Head of the race. In Christ man’s nature taken into mysterious, intimate, and indissoluble union with the Divine. Man exalted in Christ to the throne of the universe.
VIII. Conclusion of Job’s speech (Job_7:19-21). Contains—
1. A peevish prayer (Job_7:19) “How long wilt thou not depart (Heb., ‘look away’) from me? nor let me alone that I may swallow down my spittle” (even for the shortest period)? Prayers in time of trial are sometimes—
(1) Ignorant;
(2) Injurious;
(3) Requiring repentance. The flesh incapable of judging aright of God and His dealings. God viewed by Job as an adversary intent only on overthrowing him. Yet His removal, or the withdrawing of His eyes from us, our certain ruin. The same spirit moved the Gadarenes to beseech Christ to depart out of their coasts. Prayer often unanswered in compassion to the offerer. Grace needed to know what to pray for (Luk_11:1). The Holy Spirit’s office (Rom_8:26).
2. A partial confession (Job_7:20). “I have sinned; what shall I do (or, ‘What have I [thereby] done’) unto thee?” A confession, but neither frank nor free. Made rather hypothetically,—“granting I have sinned,” or, “If I have.” Job’s conscience not yet sufficiently enlightened nor his soul sufficiently subdued to make the Publican’s confession. The confession rather extorted by the fact of suffering than the consciousness of sin. Job free from life sins; heart sins not yet sufficiently discovered to him. This discovery and his consequent humble confession not made till Jehovah has revealed Himself (ch. Job_40:4; Job_42:5-6). Compare Isa_6:5; Luk_5:8.—In order to be acceptable,
Confession of Sin
must be—
(1) Free; spontaneous, unconstrained; not extorted by suffering, or merely in order to deliverance from it, as in the case of Pharaoh (Exo_9:27; Exo_10:16);
(2.) Frank; open and sincere; without guile or desire of concealment (Psa_32:5);
(3.) Full; thorough and without reservation (Jos_7:19-21);
(4.) Particular; not merely of sin in general, or as common to the race; “I have sinned and done this evil in thy sight” (Psa_51:4;
(5.) Serious and heartfelt; with sense of the heinousness and demerit of the sin confessed (Psa_51:3; Luk_18:13). In true confession the heart is both affected with the sin, and engaged against it. Confession of sin needful in the holiest saint. Sin cleaves to the believer as ivy to the wall. The strongest believer not above the actings of sin, the weakest not under the power of it. The more we realize God’s spotlessness, the more we discern our own spots. Sweet to confess sin in sight of the laver of a Saviour’s blood. Confession of sin with the lips enhances the preciousness of Christ in the heart. Concealed sin grows—
(1) In strength;
(2) In guilt;
(3) In terror (Psa_32:3-4). Job’s confession, such as it was, one rather of the mere fact of sin. Acknowledges no evil connected with it, or demerit attached to it. Its heinousness and malignity as against God, yet to be discovered. “What have I done unto thee?” The idea: What wrong have I done thee by my sin, that thou shouldst thus treat me as thine enemy? Sin to be viewed as an injury, not merely to our neighbour or ourselves, but more especially against God.
Sin
Is injury done to God, as—
(1.) It robs Him of the honour due to Him (Mal_1:6). Man’s sin may not take from God’s happiness, but it takes from God’s honour. Every sin strikes as truly at God’s honour as at our peace.
(2.) It tramples under foot His authority. Says with Pharaoh: “Who is the Lord that I should obey His voice?” (Exo_5:2).
(3.) It breaks His laws.
(4.) It disturbs the harmony and happiness of His universe.
(5.) It introduces disorder into His government, and, if not arrested and punished, would bring it to an end.
(6.) It interrupts and would terminate His enjoyment of His own works (Gen_1:31; Psa_104:24).
(7.) It obliterates His image in His intelligent creatures, and substitutes that of His adversary. Treasonably effaces His image and superscription from His own coin.
Job, in his confession, petulantly addresses God as the watcher and observer of His creatures—“Oh, thou preserver of men.” Same word denotes “guardian” and “observer” (chap, Job_27:18). Latter sense here favoured by the context (so chap. Job_14:16). God viewed as if carefully marking men’s faults in order to punish them. Only perverted and dishonouring views of God taken by the flesh, especially under trouble. Satan’s aim to foster such views in Job in order to gain his object. Job’s complaint in keeping with this view. “Why hast Thou set me as a mark against Thee?” (to shoot at, or make an attack upon). The supposed result of God’s close inspection of his conduct, and as in revenge for the injury done to him. Already viewed himself as shot at by the Almighty’s arrows (chapter Job_6:4). Speaks according to sense and appearance. God’s choicest saints often appear to be the butt of his sharpest arrows.—The effect and meaning of these arrows; “So that I am a burden to myself” or, “and I am become a burden to thee” (both readings found, the latter probably the true one). The sinner, a burden to God through his sin, and a burden to himself through his suffering. When sin makes a man a burden to God, he is likely to become a burden to himself. A sinner left to himself the greatest burden that can be laid upon him. Suffering often a heavy burden; sin a thousand times more so. “I had rather go into hell without sin, than into heaven with it” [Luther]. Cain said, my punishment is greater than I can bear: the same word generally rendered “iniquity,” as in Job_7:20. Judas thought to throw off the burden by hanging himself, but only made it faster and heavier. Sin makes men a burden to the Creator as well as to themselves. God wearied with men’s iniquities (Isa_43:24). Pressed under them as a cart full of sheaves (Amo_2:13). That Job was a burden to himself was his own feeling; that he was a burden to God, was Satan’s suggestion.
3. A passionate question and a plaintive appeal (Job_7:20). “And why dost thou not pardon (Heb. ‘take away’ or remit, as a debt) my transgression, and take away (Heb. ‘cause to pass away’ as a cloud) mine iniquity?” “Transgression” and “iniquity” embrace all kinds of sin, those of commission and omission, presumption and ignorance, life and heart. The question not that of a humble penitent asking forgiveness. Job yet to be made a poor sinner. Pardon of sin a favour, not an obligation, or matter of course.
Pardon of Sin
Often, as here, desired rather as the removal of suffering than of guilt. Only not bestowed, because the sinner is not prepared to receive it. Pride, impenitence, and unbelief shut out forgiveness as the window-shutters exclude the sun. Pardon only vouchsafed—
(1) When sin is realised and sincerely confessed (1Jn_1:9; Psa_32:5; Psa_25:7);
(2) When its demerit and hell-deservingness is acknowledged (Psa_51:4; Psa_51:11);
(3) When deliverance is desired from its practice and power as well as from its punishment (Psa_51:10);
(4) When pardon is humbly sought as a matter of pure mercy (Psa_51:1; Luk_18:13);
(5) When it is accepted as only bestowed in virtue of the suffering and death of God’s Son as the sinner’s Substitute (Heb_9:15; Heb_9:22; Heb_9:28; 1Jn_1:7; 1Jn_1:9; 1Jn_2:1-2; Rom_3:24-26).
The reason of Job’s passionate question the prospect of a speedy death. “For now shall I sleep in the dust.” Idea: I shall soon die, and Thou must either pardon and heal me speedily or not at all. Death to the believer a sleep. The thought of it not unpleasant to Job. A blessed awaking the hope of the Church (Psa_17:15; Isa_26:19; Dan_12:2; 1Th_4:14-16). Job’s hope (ch. Job_14:12-15; Job_19:25-27). He can calmly lay his head in the dust, whose heart is already in heaven.—Job believes in a time of Divine relenting towards him. “Thou shalt seek me in the morning (i.e., diligently), but I shall not be”—(thy desire to do me good will be too late). The picture that of a father relenting towards a suffering child. Exhibited also in Jer_31:18-20; Jer_44:6-10. God’s love to His people unchanging and everlasting (Jer_31:3; Joh_13:1). His dealings with them may change, but not his delight in them. The believer, however tried, still unwilling to quit his hold of God’s fatherly relationship. Faith says, “Though His hand be against me, His heart is still towards me.” Job’s comfort too at times (ch. Job_13:15-16; Job_14:15; Job_19:25-27; Job_23:10).
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary (gen. ed. Joseph S. Exell; Funk & Wagnalls, c. 1892) — public domain (pre-1929). A full-Bible homiletical/sermon-outline anthology covering 65 of 66 books (2 John is absent from the source module). Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Sermon Bible 1900 · Public Domain On v1 The peculiar circumstances of Job had, no doubt, something…
Job 7:16
The peculiar circumstances of Job had, no doubt, something to do with eliciting from him this aspiration, otherwise its spirit would scarcely accord with the general tone of the patriarchs and of the saints of the Old Testament dispensation. For they evidently, as in the case of Hezekiah, had a great desire for long life. And it was no wonder, for it was held out as a special token of God’s favour and a reward for upright conduct, and was therefore highly estimated and greatly coveted among the ancient pious Jews.
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I. Life should be considered by the Christian as a possession greatly to be cherished. To esteem lightly and wish to abridge life is wrong. The desire to be with Christ—the attractive end of the magnet—cannot be too strong; but the weariness of this world, the longing to escape from it—the repulsive end—may easily run into excess. The present state of existence is the only one in which we shall ever glorify God by patience and the resistance of evil, or, as far as we know, by extending His kingdom upon earth. And therefore let us not be in haste to quit the field; for it may be the only field we shall ever have where we can glorify God for these high ends.
II. To the majority of people, however, the danger lies on the other side. They are unwilling to die. Notwithstanding all warnings and preparations which God is sending every day, the real spirit of their mind is, "I would live alway." It is because they are so encased and absorbed with the present life that they have no room for another.
III. When our sins are once cancelled, our nature spiritualised, ourselves "meetened for the inheritance of the saints in light," who would not say, with the patriarch, "I would not live alway"? We know and are sure that another life is awaiting us, to which this life is but as death" and our arms stretch out to that life. "We would not live alway."
J. Vaughan, Fifty Sermons, 10th series, p. 168.
References: Job 7:17.—J. H. Evans, Thursday Penny Pulpit, vol. xiii., p. 397; G. Brooks, Outlines of Sermons, p. 20. Job 7:17, Job 7:18.—J. Keble, Sermons for the Christian Year: Christmas and Epiphany, p. 170.
Job 7:20
The great design of the book of Job, leaving out all detail and the undercurrents of the story, appears to be twofold: (1) to show that a good man, and because he is good, may yet receive at the hand of the God he loves and serves the severest discipline of pain and sorrow; (2) to illustrate that, however high the moral level of a man may be, he needs further sanctification, and specially that nothing avails before God, nothing has reached its necessary standard, without great humiliation and a very deep sense of sin.
I. There is no doubt that Job was a good man. He was a man of prayer. He had attained a spiritual knowledge far beyond his age, and he had many direct revelations from heaven. His want was a clearer insight into his own heart; juster views of the holiness of God; a truer estimate of sin, its nature and its vileness; a more personal conviction of the wickedness which, nothwithstanding all his virtues, still lived and reigned in him.
II. We see in the history of Job God’s method by which He gives penitence to a good, but not yet humbled, man: the school of suffering, the greatnesses of His own majesty and power, the inworking of the convicting Spirit, revelations of Jesus, and the ministrations of His messenger.
III. Why is it needful for a good man to say, "I have sinned"? (1) Because it is true; (2) because it places him in a right relation to God; (3) because it puts Jesus in His proper place. The Cross is the centre of God’s universe. Everything revolves around the Cross. Everything must minister to the Cross.
J. Vaughan, Sermons, 7th series, p. 104.
References: Job 7:20.—Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. iii., p. 113; Expositor, 3rd series, vol. iv., p. 284; Spurgeon, My Sermon Notes: Genesis to Proverbs, p. 121. Job 8:4.—Homiletic Quarterly, vol. iv., p. 129.
The Sermon Bible, ed. William Robertson Nicoll (1888–1900) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
J. R. Dummelow 1909 · Public Domain On v1 Job's First Speech (concluded)
Job's First Speech (concluded)
1-10. Job laments the hardship and misery of his destiny.
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1. Man's life is a lot of hardship. Appointed time] RM 'time of service.'
2, 3. As the labourer longs for the weary day to end and to receive his wages, so Job bemoans the length of his sufferings and sighs for death to end them.
3. Months of vanity] so called because they were unsatisfactory, hopeless. 'Months' imply that Job's sufferings had lasted a considerable time.
5. Worms] from the diseased flesh. Clods of dust] the crust of his sores. These symptoms are found in leprosy, though they are not peculiar to it.
6. Weaver's shuttle] the implement which carries the thread swiftly backwards and forwards in weaving. Job has just been longing for death, but yet he feels that length of days is desirable in itself if freed from so much misery. Without hope] of recovery.
7. Good] i.e. happiness.
8. Thine eyes, etc.] render, 'Thine (God's) eyes shall look for me, but I shall be no more.'
9. Grave] better, as RV, 'Sheol,' the place of the departed: see on Job_3:15-19. Note how hopeless is the outlook here and elsewhere towards the future.
11-21. He appeals to God, complaining of the undeserved severity of his treatment. He demands why God concerns Himself to interfere with so insignificant a being as man.
12. 'Am I so dangerous a character that I need such persistent persecution?.' Whale] rather, 'sea monster,' perhaps the personification of the sea, the mythical dragon of the ancients. The Babylonians told the myth of the dragon Tiâmat, who waged war against heaven and was slain by the God Marduk. (See art. 'Genesis and the Babylonian Inscriptions.') This myth is referred to here, but in a form which represented the monster, not as slain, but imprisoned and kept under strict observation. The sea needs to be held down lest it flood the earth or smite the sky (cp. Job_38:8-11), the dragon must be watched lest it bursts its bonds. Is Job as formidable as they that God should watch him as closely?
14. Dreams] the bad dreams of the sick.
15. Strangling] or, suffocation. Job longs for the arrival of this sign of approaching death. My life] RV 'these my bones.' He was reduced to a skeleton. Possibly we should read 'my pains.'
16. RV 'I loathe my life: I would not live alway.' Vanity] RM 'as a breath.'
17. Magnify] i.e. consider of such importance. Set thine heart] or 'fix thy thoughts.' The thought of Job_7:17. is 'Surely man is too insignificant for such constant persecution. Even Ins sins are hardly worth heeding.' Cp. Psa_8:4-5, of which these vv. seem to be a bitter parody.
19. Till I swallow, etc.] i.e. for a moment.
20. RV 'If I have sinned, what do I unto thee, O thou watcher of men?': i.e. granting that I have sinned (which Job does not), how can it affect Thee who art so great? Against thee] RV 'for thee.'
21. In the morning] RV 'diligently.' Job believes that one day God will turn to him once more in love, but then it will be too late. The faint hope expressed here gradually becomes a conviction: cp. Job_13:15-18; Job_14:13-15; Job_16:19-21; Job_19:23-27.
The speech of Eliphaz, while considerate in tone, yet took Job's guilt for granted. This shows the sufferer that he can expect no sympathetic insight from the friends, and the shock of the disappointment drives him not simply to scornful attack on them, but to bitter accusation of God, whom he regards as the direct author of his troubles. He thinks of Him as petty and spiteful, yet he cannot forget the blessed communion of happier days, and ends with the thought that when His present anger is passed, He will desire a renewal of that fellowship.
J. R. Dummelow, A Commentary on the Holy Bible (Macmillan, 1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Paul E. Kretzmann 1924 · Public Domain On v1 The General Misery of Human Life
The General Misery of Human Life
v. 1. Is there not an appointed time, warfare, a fixed and wearing service, to man upon earth? Are not his days also like the days of an hireling, one who works for wages? The figure is that of a man drafted for military service, and then of a man who has hired out to perform a certain task, the idea being that in either case man longs for the end of the labor appointed to him.
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v. 2. As a servant earnestly desireth the shadow, as the slave eagerly looks forward to the rest after the completion of his work, and as an hireling looketh for the reward of his work, for he also, after receiving his wages, may rest,
v. 3. so am I, instead of enjoying the expected rest, spoken in irony, made to possess months of vanity, this time of wretchedness was allotted to him, and wearisome nights are appointed to me, they have been dealt out to him without his desire, although he has not done anything to merit them to this degree.
v. 4. When I lie down, I say, When shall I arise and the night be gone? The sleeplessness caused by his terrible illness made him wish that the night would soon flyaway. And I am full of tossings to and fro unto the dawning of the day, weary with his restless rolling about in the endeavor to find rest.
v. 5. My flesh is clothed with worms, maggots breeding in the ulcers, and clods of dust, the crust of dried filth covering his entire body; my skin is broken and become loathsome, whenever the skin made an attempt to heal, to come together, to become hard and stiff, the festering sores broke open again.
v. 6. My days are swifter than a weaver’s shuttle and are spent without hope, vanish without hope of deliverance, just as the web on the loom of the weaver is cut off.
v. 7. O remember that my life is wind, his days are like a breath of air, which is soon wafted away, Psa 78:39; mine eye shall no more see good, will not return to see good fortune or prosperity; an early death would put an end to his chances of happiness in this life.
v. 8. The eye of him that hath seen me shall see me no more, he would soon pass from the circle of those whom he had formerly considered his friends; Thine eyes are upon me, namely, those of the Lord, and I am not; even if He should turn to Job in sympathy in order to help him, it would be too late, since he knew he would soon be removed from the land of the living. Such bitterness of soul as here shown by Job is not compatible with true trust in the Lord.
Paul E. Kretzmann, Popular Commentary of the Bible (1921–1924) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
unfoldingWord translationNotes 2017 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On v1 General Information:
General Information:
The writer continues to use parallelism in each of these verses, conveying a single idea using two different statements to emphasize that his personal suffering is part of the universal suffering which all people experience. (See: Parallelism)
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Does not man have hard labor on earth?
Job poses this negative question to emphasize his awareness that all people experience hard work. It can be translated as a positive statement. AT: "There is hard labor for every person on earth." (See: Rhetorical Question)
on earth
This is a generalization that means for the time people are living on the earth. AT: "while he lives on the earth" (See: Hyperbole and Generalization)
Are not his days like the days of a hired man?
Job poses this negative question to emphasize his awareness that all people struggle in life. AT: "And their days are like the days of a hired man." (See: Rhetorical Question and Simile)
Like a slave ... like a hired man ... so I have been ... given trouble-filled nights
Job compares his misery and trouble to that of the slave and hired man. (See: Simile)
the shadows of evening
"cool shade." The implied information is that the shadows of evening provide coolness and shade from the sun (See: Assumed Knowledge and Implicit Information)
a hired man
"a day laborer." This is a man who worked jobs one day at a time and was paid at the end of every day.
looks for his wages
"waits for his pay"
so I have been made to endure months of misery; I have been given trouble-filled nights
This can be translated in active form. AT: "so I endure months of misery; I get trouble-filled nights" (See: Active or Passive)
months of misery
The abstract noun "misery" can be translated as the adjective "miserable." AT: "miserable months" or "empty months" (See: Assumed Knowledge and Implicit Information)
translationWords
labor
earth
servant
shadow
endure
unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.
Tyndale Open Study Notes 2022 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv1–3 7:1 Human life has been a struggle since the…
7:1 Human life has been a struggle since the Fall (Gen 3:17; 5:29; Eccl 1:2, 13-14; 2:11, 17; Rom 8:20-22).
Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.