Job 17 His miserable life; false friends; their punishment, Job 17:1–5. His contempt, and sorrow, Job 17:6–7. The righteous should be established, Job 17:8–9; but he was given over to death, Job 17:11–16.

My breath is corrupt, i.e. it stinks, as it doth in dying persons. Or, my spirit is corrupted, or spent, or lost, i.e. my vital spirits and natural powers are wasted; my soul is ready to leave the body.

Do not my friends, instead of comforting, mock and abuse me, as if I had made use of religion only as a cloak to my wickedness? Heb. If there be not mockers with me, understand, let God do so or so to me. It is a form of an oath, which is defectively expressed, after the manner of the Hebrews.

He turneth his speech either to Eliphaz, who spoke last; or rather to God, as is evident from the matter and scope of the words, and from the next verse. These words contain either, 1.

Thou hast blinded the minds of my friends, that they can not see those truths which are most plain and evident to all men of sense and experience; therefore I desire a more wise and able judge. Therefore shalt thou not exalt them, i.e.

Hereby Job chargeth them, either, 1. With flattering him with vain hopes, and promises of the return of his former prosperity, when he knew that his case was desperate. Or, 2.

He, i.e. God, who is oft designed by this pronoun in this book. A by-word, or proverb, or common talk. My calamities are so great and prodigious, that they fill all people with discourse, and are become proverbial to express extreme miseries. Compare Num. 21:27–28, Deut. 28:37.

By reason of sorrow; through excessive weeping and decay of spirits, which cause a dimness in the sight. All my members are as a shadow; my body is so consumed, and my colour so wan and ghastly, that I look more like a ghost, or a shadow, than like a man.

Wise and good men, when they shall see and consider my calamities, will not be so forward to censure and condemn me as you are, but will rather stand and wonder at the depth and mysteriousness of God’s counsels and judgments, which fall so heavily upon innocent men, while the worst of men prosper.

Shall hold on his way, i.e. shall persist in that good way into which he hath entered, and not be turned from it by any afflictions which may befall himself or any other good men, nor by any contempt or reproach cast upon them by the ungodly by reason thereof. He that hath clean hands, i.e.

Return, and come now, i.e. come now again, (as this phrase is oft used,) and renew the debate, as I see you are prepared and resolved to do, and I am ready to receive you. Or, return into yourselves, and consider my cause again; peradventure your second thoughts may be wiser.

My days; the days of my life. I am a lost and dying man, and therefore the hopes you give me of the bettering of my condition are vain and groundless. My purposes; or, my designs, or thoughts, to wit, which I had in my prosperous days, concerning myself and children, and the continuance of my…

They; either, 1. My friends. Or, 2. My sorrows, of which he is here speaking. Or, 3. My thoughts, last mentioned. Possibly these words may be joined with them thus, The thoughts of my heart change the night into day.

If I wait; if I should give way to those hopes of my deliverance and restoration which you suggest to me. The grave is mine house: I should be sadly disappointed; for I am upon the borders of the grave, which is the only house appointed for me, instead of that goodly house which you promise to me…

To corruption, Heb. to the pit of corruption, the grave. Thou art my father; I am near akin to time, as being taken out of thee; and thou wilt receive and embrace me, and keep me in thy house, as parents do their children.

Where is now my hope? and what then is become of that hope which you advised me to entertain? My hope, i.e. the fulfilling of my hope, or the happiness which you would have me expect; hope being put for the thing hoped for, as Prov. 13:12, 1 Cor. 9:10.

They; either, 1. They that would see my hope, they must go into the grave to behold it. Or rather, 2. My hopes; of which he spoke in the singular number, Job 17:15, which he here changeth into the plural, as is very usual in these poetical books. To the bars of the pit, i.e.