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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.comKeil and Delitzsch Commentary - Job 21:12 - 21:12
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This Chapter Verse Commentaries:
12 They raise their voice with the playing of timbrel aud harp,
And rejoice at the sound of the pipe
13 They enjoy their days in prosperity,
And in a moment they go down to Sehol.
14 And yet they said to God: “Depart from us!
We desire not the knowledge of Thy ways.
15 What is the Almighty, that we should serve Him? -
And what doth it profit us that we should importune Him?” -
16 Lo! they have not their prosperity by their own hand,
The thought of the wicked be far from me!
קֹולָם is to be supplied to יִשְׂאוּ in Isa 42:11, and instead of בְּתֹף with בְּ of the musical accompaniment (as Psa 4:1, Psa 49:5), it is to be read כְּתֹף after the Masora with Kimchi, Ramban, Ralbag, and Farisol,
(Note: The Masora observes לית כותיה (not occuring thus elsewhere), and accordingly this כתף is distinguished in the Masoretic אב מן חד חד נסבין כף ברישׁיה (alphabetic list of words which take at one time the prefix כ and at another the prefix )ב, from בתף, which occurs elsewhere. The Targ. has read בטף; the reading of Raschi and Aben-Ezra is questionable.)
but not with Rosenm. to be explained: personaut velut tympano et cythera, but: they raise their voice as the timbrel and harp sound forth simultaneously; כְּ, as Isa 18:4 (which is to be transl.: during the clear warmth of the sunshine, during the dew-clouds in the heat of harvest). תֹּף (Arabic duff, Spanish adufe) is τύμπανον (τύπανον), כִּנֹּור, (Arab. canare) κινύρα or κιθάρα) Dan 3:5), עוּגָב or עֻגָב, Job 30:31 (from עָגַב, flare; vid., on Gen 4:21), the Pan-pipe (Targ. from a similar root אַבּוּבָא, whence the name of the ambubajae). In Job 21:13 and Keri gives the more usual יְכַלּוּ (Job 36:11) in place of the Chethib יְבַלּוּ, though יְבַלּוּ occurs in Isa 65:22 without this Keri; יכלו signifies consument, and יבלו usu deterent: they use up their life, enjoy it to the last drop. In connection with this one thinks of a coat which is not laid aside until it is entirely worn out. It is therefore not, as the friends say, that the ungodly is swept away before his time (Job 15:32), also a lingering sickness does not hand him over to death (Job 18:13), but בְּרֶגַע, in a moment (comp Job 34:20, not: in rest, i.e., freedom from pain, which רֶגַע never signifies), they sink down to Hades (acc. loci). The matter does not admit of one's deriving the fut. יֵהַתּוּ here, as Job 39:22, Job 31:34, from the Niph. of the verb חָתַת, terrore percelli; it is to be referred to נָחַת or נָחֵת (Aram. for יָרַד), which is the only certain example of a Hebrew verb Pe Nun ending with ת, whose fut. יִנְחַת, Psa 38:3, also יֵחַת (Pro 17:10, Jer 21:13), instead of יִחַת, and in the inflexion its ת sti (after the analogy of יִצַּתּוּ, Isa 33:12) is doubled; as an exception (vid., Psalter, ii. 468), the lengthening of the short vowel (יֵחָֽתוּ, Olsh. §83 b) by Silluk does not take place, as e.g., by Athnach, Job 34:5.
The fut. consec. וַיֹּאמְרוּ, in which Job 21:14 is continued, does not here denote temporally that which follows upon and from something else, but generally that which is inwardly connected with something else, and even with that which is contradictory, and still occurring at the same time, exactly as Gen 19:9, 2Sa 3:8, comp Ew. §231, b: they sink down after a life that is completely consumed away, without a death-struggle, into Hades, and yet they denied God, would not concern themselves about His sways (comp. the similar passage, Isa 58:2), and accounted the service of God and prayer (פָּגַע בְּ, precibus adire) as useless. The words of the ungodly extend to Job 21:15; according to Hirz., Hlgst., Welte, and Hahn, Job 21:16 resumes the description: behold, is not their prosperity in their hand? i.e., is it not at their free disposal? or do they not everywhere carry it away with them? But Job 21:16 is not favourable to this interrogative rendering of לֹא (= הֲלֹא). Schlottm. explains more correctly: behold, their prosperity is not in their power; but by taking not only Job 21:16 (like Schnurrer), but the whole of Job 21:16, as an utterance of an opponent, which is indeed impossible, because the declining of all fellowship with the godless would be entirely without aim in the mouth of the opponent. For it is not the fnends who draw the picture of the lot of the punishment of the godless with the most terrible lines possible, who suggest the appearance of looking wishfully towards the godless, but Job, who paints the prosperity of the godless in such brilliant colours. On the other hand, both sides are agreed in referring prosperity and misfortune to God as final cause. And for this very reason Job thinks that בָּרֵךְ אֶת־הָֽאֱלֹהִים, which he makes the godless, in Job 21:14, Job 21:15, express in their own words, so horrible.
Job 21:16 is therefore to be taken as Job's judgment, and Job 21:16 as the moral effect which it produces upon him. הֵן introduces the true relation of things, טוּבָם signifies, as Job 20:21, their prosperity, and לֹא בְיָדָם (the emphatic position of בידם is to be observed) that this is not in their hand, i.e., arbitrary power, or perhaps better: that it is not by their own hand, i.e.,that it is not their own work but a gift from above, the gift even of the God whom they so shamelessly deny. That God grants them such great and lasting prosperity, is just the mystery which Job is not able to bring forth to view, without, however, his abhorrence of this denying of God being in the slightest degree lessened thereby. Not by their own hand, says he, do they possess such prosperity - the counsel (עֲצַת similar to Job 5:13, Job 10:3, Job 18:7 : design, principle, and general disposition, or way of thinking) of the wicked be far from me, i.e., be it far from me that so I should speak according to their way of thinking, with which, on the contrary, I disavow all fellowship. The relation of the clauses is exactly like Job 22:18, where this formula of detesation is repeated. רָֽחֲקָה is, according to the meaning, optative or precative (Ew. §223, b, and Ges. §126, 4*), which Hahn and Schlottm. think impossible, without assigning any reason. It is the perf. of certainty, which expresses that which is wished as a fact, but with an emotional exclamative accent. In ancient Arabic it is a rule to use the perf. as optative; and also still in modem Arabic (which often makes use of the fut. matead of the perf.), they say e.g., la cân, i.e., he must never have been! The more detestable the conduct of the prosperous towards Him to whom they owe their prosperity is, the sooner, one would think, the justice of God would be called forth to recompense them according to their deeds, but -