Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Job 12:14
Behold, he breaketh down, and it cannot be built again: he shutteth up a man, and there can be no opening.
14. breaketh down ] e.g. fenced cities, devoting them to ruin, cf. ch. Job 15:28.
shutteth up a man ] In prison, as captive kings and the like, cf. Jer 22:24 seq., 2Ki 25:27 seq.
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
Behold, he breaketh down – None can repair what he pulls down. Cities and towns he can devote to ruin by fire, or earthquake, or the pestilence, and so completely destroy them that they can never be rebuilt. We may now refer to such illustrations as Sodom, Babylon, Petra, Tyre, Herculaneum, and Pompeii, as full proof of what is here affirmed.
He shutteth up a man – He can shut up a man in such difficulties and straits that he cannot extricate himself; see Job 11:10. The Chaldee renders this, he shuts up a man in the grave () and it cannot be opened. But the more correct idea is, that God has complete control over a man, and that he can so hedge up his way that he cannot help himself.
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
Verse 14. He breaketh down] He alone can create, and he alone can destroy. Nothing can be annihilated but by the same Power that created it. This is a most remarkable fact. No power, skill, or cunning of man can annihilate the smallest particle of matter. Man, by chemical agency, may change its form; but to reduce it to nothing belongs to God alone. In the course of his providence God breaks down, so that it cannot be built up again. See proofs of this in the total political destruction of Nineveh, Babylon, Persepolis, Tyre, and other cities, which have broken down never to be rebuilt; as well as the Assyrian, Babylonian, Grecian, and Roman empires, which have been dismembered and almost annihilated, never more to be regenerated.
He shutteth up a man] He often frustrates the best laid purposes, so that they can never be brought to good effect.
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
He breaketh down, to wit, houses, castles, cities, which God designeth to destroy utterly.
He shutteth up; if he will shut up a man in prison, or in any straits or troubles.
There can be no opening, without Gods permission and providence.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
14. shutteth up (Isa22:22). Job refers to Zophar’s “shut up” (Job11:10).
Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
Behold, he breaketh down, and it cannot be built again,…. Which some restrain to the tower of Babel; but though the builders of it were obliged to desist from building, it does not appear that it was broken down, but seems to have continued many ages after: others more probably refer it to the destruction of Sodom, as Sephorno, which was an utter destruction, a perpetual desolation, and that city never was rebuilt to this day; and the same may be observed of many other cities that have had their foundations razed up, and have never been rebuilt, Thebes, Tyre, c. and as will be the case of Rome, or the great city of Babylon, when once destroyed yea, this has been true of kingdoms and states, such as Jeremiah was to root out, pull down, and destroy; that is, by prophesying of their destruction, as the Ammonites, Moabites, Edomites, and others, whose names and nations are no more, see Jer 1:10; and the four monarchies broken down and destroyed, and made as the chaff of the summer threshing floor, by the kingdom of Christ, Da 2:35; and may be exemplified in particular persons and families; in Job and his family, the Lord broke him with breach upon breach; he broke him in his estate and substance; he broke down the hedge about him, and exposed him to thieves and robbers that plundered him of his substance; he broke down his family, that had been so largely and happily built up, by taking away his children by death; and he broke his constitution by diseases, afflictions, and sorrows, to which Job may have here respect, when he at this time never expected to have his losses in his substance, and in his family, and in his health, repaired, as they were; nor could it have been done without the will and pleasure of God; and oftentimes, when such breaches are made, there is no reparation; a man’s wealth, and health, and family, are never built up again:
he shutteth up a man, and there can be no opening; if he shut up a man in a prison, there is no opening the doors of it to let out unless he pleases; whether it be the prison of sin, in which all are concluded, in the fetters and with the cords of which they are held, and will continue, unless those shackles are broken off by powerful and efficacious grace, and the Lord proclaims liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to them that are bound, and gives it; or whether it be the prison of the law, in which sinners are shut up, and held as condemned malefactors; there is no deliverance from it but by Christ, who has redeemed his people from the curse and condemnation of it; and by his Spirit, as a spirit of adoption, who delivers them from the bondage of it, and makes them free indeed; or whether it be the prison of afflictions, straits, and difficulties in life, with which even good men are surrounded, being bound in fetters, and holden in cords of affliction; there is no opening for them, or getting out of them, unless the Lord breaks their bands asunder, and brings them out of darkness and distress, as out of prison houses, and so opens and makes a way for their escape; or whether he shuts them up, and they are so straitened in their souls that they cannot come forth in the free exercise of grace, and discharge of duty, as it was with Heman, when he said, “I am shut up, and I cannot come forth”, Ps 88:8; and as it was with David, when he prayed, “bring my soul out of prison, that I may praise thy name”, Ps 142:7; there is no opening for them till the spirit of the Lord opens their hearts and their graces, and brings them forth into exercise; and “where he is there is liberty”, 2Co 3:17; or if he shuts up a man in the grave, as the Targum paraphrases it, brings him to the house appointed for all living, and locks him up in it; there can be no opening for him till the resurrection morn, when Christ, who has the keys of hell and death, will unlock the graves, and the dead shall come forth, as Lazarus did at his call, Joh 11:43: or if “he shuts upon a man” r, as the words may be rendered; shuts the gates of heaven upon a man, as the door into the marriage chamber of the Lamb will be shut upon and against the foolish virgins, as well as profane sinners, there can be no opening, cry as long as they will; see
Mt 25:10; and as God shut the door of Eden, or the earthly paradise, against Adam, when he drove him out, Ge 3:23, to which Sephorno refers this passage; or if the Lord shuts up a man in hell, there is no opening, no way of escape from thence. We read of “spirits in prison”, 1Pe 3:19, which is to be understood not of the limbus or purgatory of the Papists, but of hell; and these “spirits” are the disobedient in the times of Noah, who dying, or being swept away with the flood, were cast into hell, where they have lain ever since, and will lie unto the judgment of the great day; between the place of the damned, and of the happy, in Abraham’s bosom, is a great gulf, that there is no passing from one to the other, which is the immutable and unalterable decree of God, which has fixed the everlasting states of men, Lu 16:26.
r “super virum”, Montanus, Mercerus, Bolducius; “super viro”, Schmidt, Michaelis.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
14 Behold, He breaketh down and it cannot be built again,
He shutteth up, and it cannot be opened.
15 Behold, He restraineth the waters and they dry up,
And He letteth them out and they overturn the earth.
16 With Him is might and existence,
The erring and the deceiver are His.
God is almighty, and everything in opposition to Him powerless. If He break down (any structure whatever), it can never be rebuilt; should He close upon any one (i.e., the dungeon, as perhaps a cistern covered with a stone, Lam 3:53, comp. Jer 38:6; with reference to the depth of the dungeon, instead of the usual ), it (that which is closed from above) cannot be opened again. In like manner, when He desires to punish a land, He disposes the elements according to His will and pleasure, by bringing upon it drought or flood. , coercet, according to the correct Masoretic mode of writing with dagesh in the Ssade, in order clearly to distinguish in the pronunciation between the forms j’a-ssor and jaa’ssor ( );
(Note: Vid., my notice of Br’s Psalter-Ausgabe, Luth. Zeitschr. 1863, 3; and comp. Keil on Lev 4:13 ( Comm on Pent., Clark’s transl.).)
(for which Abulwalid writes ) is a defective form of writing according to Ges. 69, 3, 3; the form with the similarly pointed fut. consec., 1Sa 25:12, form a pair (zuwg) noted by the Masora. By , which is ascribed to God, is here to be understood that which really exists, the real, the objective, knowledge resting on an objective actual basis, in contrast with what only appears to be; so that consequently the idea of Job 12:16 and Job 12:13 is somewhat veiled; for the primary notion of is thickness, solidity, purity, like .
(Note: The primary notion of , Arab. hkm , is, to be thick, firm, solid, as the prim. notion of Arab. sachfa (to be foolish, silly) is to be thin, loose, not holding together (as a bad texture). The same fundamental notions are represented in the expression of moral qualities (in distinction from intellectual) by , Arab. sdq , and , (Arab. rs’ , rsg ).)
This strophe closes like the preceding, which favours our division. The line with is followed by one with , which affirms that, in the supremacy of His rule and the wisdom of His counsels, God makes evil in every form subservient to His designs.
Fuente: Keil & Delitzsch Commentary on the Old Testament
(14) Behold, he breaketh down . . .God has equal power over the moral and physical world.
Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)
14. Shutteth up a man In the sense of closing over. This is explained by the nature of the prisons among the Hebrews, which were subterranean excavations, whose mouth was covered with a stone. Lam 3:53. The Chaldee renders it, “He shuts man up in the grave, and it cannot be opened.”
Saint Gregory moralizes upon this clause: “Evil deeds build a prison for man in the depths of his conscience. Habit bars the doors, and blindness of understanding darkens the windows. Thus God shuts him in. If ever the desire arise to break forth from his dungeon, he is not able.” But all this tends to depreciate the grace of the gospel, which is powerful to break any prison bar that habit or appetite has forged.
Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
Job 12:14 Behold, he breaketh down, and it cannot be built again: he shutteth up a man, and there can be no opening.
Ver. 14. Behold, he breaketh down, and it cannot be built again ] As he did the old world, Sodom and Gomorrah, many monarchies and empires, the tower of Babel, and other castles and houses which now live by fame only, if at all. If God have a mind to ruin these, who shall raise or repair them? Julian, the apostate, in spite of the Christians, set the Jews to work to rebuild the temple at Jerusalem, but they could never effect it by reason of a terrible earthquake, that slew the workmen and marred the materials (Am. Marcel., Socrat. 3, Theod., Ruffin.). The Arian bishops held a second council at Nice, with the purpose of having abolished the memory of the first together with the Nicene Creed, and to have established Arianism (Func.); but God disappointed them, and sent them packing thence by a huge earthquake, which overturned a great part of that city, and killed a number of people. Constans, nephew to Heraclius, the Greek emperor, and (three hundred years after him) Otho, emperor of Germany, endeavoured, but in vain, to make Rome the seat of their empires, as anciently it had been (Theophanes, Zonares, Cedrenus). God would not allow it so to be, saith Genebrard, because the kingdom of the Church, foretold by Daniel, was to have its seat there. If he had said, the kingdom of Antichrist, foretold by Paul and John the divine, he had hit the nail on the very head.
He shutteth up a man, and there can be no opening
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
Behold. Figure of speech Asterismos. App-6.
shutteth . . . opening. Hebrew idiom for exercising authority. Compare Rev 3:7. Figure of speech Paroemia. App-6.
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
he breaketh: Job 9:12, Job 9:13, Job 11:10, Isa 14:23, Jer 51:58, Jer 51:64, Mal 1:4
he shutteth: Job 16:11, 1Sa 17:46, 1Sa 24:18, 1Sa 26:8, *marg. Isa 22:22, Rom 11:32,*marg. Rev 3:7
up: Heb. upon
Reciprocal: Num 26:51 – General 2Ch 7:13 – If I shut up heaven Job 3:23 – hedged in Job 22:23 – built up Job 23:13 – who can Job 34:29 – who then can behold Psa 88:8 – I am shut Ecc 7:13 – who Jer 13:19 – shut Eze 26:14 – be built Hos 5:9 – Ephraim
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
Job 12:14. Behold, he breaketh down Houses, castles, cities; and it cannot be built again It is not in the power of any creature to repair what he designs utterly to destroy. He shutteth up a man In prison, or in straits and troubles; and there can be no opening Without his permission and providence. Yea, he shuts up in the grave, and none can break open those sealed doors. He shuts up in hell, in chains of darkness, and none can pass that great gulf.