Job 14:4

The question of astonishment in Job 14:3 supported by reference to the universal sinfulness of man. The verse reads,

Oh that a clean might come out of an unclean!

There is not one.

The phrase who will give(as margin) is a mere optative expression. Job throws his idea of the universal uncleanness of man, and that there is not one without sin, into the form of a wish that it were otherwise. If the race of men were not universally infected with sin, which each individual inherits by belonging to the race, God's stringent treatment of the individuals would not be so hard to understand. For similar ideas of the universality of the sinfulness of mankind cf. Genesis 6:5; Isaiah 6:5; Psalms 51:5, also the words of Eliphaz ch. Job 4:17 seq. Job urges the admitted fact as a plea for forbearance on the side of God.