Job 14:18-22

10. But hope is destroyed in Sheol. (Job 14:18-22)

TEXT 14:18-22

18 Bat the mountain falling cometh to nought;

And the rock is removed out of its place;

19 The waters wear the stones;

The overflowings thereof wash away the dust of the earth:
So thou destroyeth the hope of man.

20 Thou prevailest for ever against him, and he passeth;

Thou changest his countenance, and sendest him away.

21 His sons come to honor, and he knoweth it not;

And they are brought low, but he perceiveth it not of them.

22 But his flesh upon him hath pain,

And his soul within him mourneth.

COMMENT 14:18-22

Job 14:18How can man hope to escape destruction, since the greatest mountains can be leveled, and the deepest valleys covered over. Impermanence is the central theme.

Job 14:19As water erodes the stones, so God is destroying (eroding) man's hope. Job here dismisses the very possibility of life after death. We can hopeuntil that ultimate levelerdeath smashes our last moment of life.

Job 14:20In man's last moment of struggle against death, he is defeated by the despair of finality.[169] Death is extreme and permanent in its conflict with human hope. The phrase sends them away is a verb used euphemistically of dyingThe land from whose borne no traveler has returnedJob 10:21; 2 Samuel 12:23; Ecclesiastes 1:4; Ecclesiastes 3:20; and Psalms 39:13.

[169] D. W. Thomas, Journal of Semitic Studies, 1, 1956, p. 107 - for translation of superlative of nesah - Thou prevailest utterly against him.

Job 14:21The dead have no knowledgeEcclesiastes 9:5. This is the fate of all mankind. Even children, who think only of life, also share in this fateJob 1:9. Consciousness in death is limited only to the dead individual, so claims Job. Those who come to honor are also brought low. The sense of R. S. V. is more in line with the text than that of the A. V.

Job 14:22Job now abandons the traditional resolution of man's troubles, that of leaving a prosperous family behind. But Job has no family. Whether the source be Job or classical naturalistic liberals, it is not very exciting to hope only in the survival of humanityJob 18:13 and Isaiah 66:24.

The first series of speeches is ended. Job is enslaved more deeply in despair than in the initial lament. The slough of despond is deeper than his pain. There he was -half in love with easeful death-'here he stands alone before the grisly terror (Job, Interpreters Bible, Vol. III, p. 1015). But Death Be Not Proud for The Shattering of Silence is yet to come.