Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Job 16:7

But now he hath made me weary: thou hast made desolate all my company.

7. made me weary ] i. e. exhausted me; and now describes the new situation which he realizes. The second clause indicates in what way he had been wearied or exhausted, all his “company,” his familiar friends, all on whom he could rely, or hope in, had been removed from him, and turned into his enemies and haters, cf. ch. Job 19:13-19; every resource was taken from him, cf. ch. Job 15:34. In the first clause he is God, to whom as his emotion rises the speaker turns directly in the second clause thou hast made desolate.

Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

But now he hath made me weary – That is, God has exhausted my strength. This verse introduces a new description of his sufferings; and he begins with a statement of the woes that God had brought on him. The first was, that he had taken away all his strength.

All my company – The word rendered company ( edah) means properly an assembly that comes together by appointment, or at stated times; but here it is evidently used in the sense of the little community of which Job was the head and father. The sense is, that all his family had been destroyed.

Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible

Job 16:7

But now He hath made me weary.

Weariness under affliction

The word he is not in the original. Some understand it of his grief and sorrow, and read thus, And now it hath made me weary, or, my pain hath tired me. Others understand it of what had been spoken by his friends; your tedious discourses, and severer censures, have quite spent my spirits, and made me weary. Our translation leads us to a person, and our interpretation leads us to God. Job everywhere acknowledges that God was the author and orderer of all his sorrows. Weariness of mind is referred to, and it is the most painful weariness.

1. A state of affliction is a wearisome estate. Suffering wearies more than doing; and none are so weary as those who are wearied with doing nothing.

2. Some afflictions are a weariness both to soul and body. There are afflictions which strike right through, and there are afflictions which are only skin deep.

3. Some afflictions do not only afflict, they unsettle the mind. They unsettle not only the comforts, but the powers and faculties of it. A man under some afflictions can scarce speak sense while he acts faith, or do rationally while he lives graciously.

4. A godly man may grow extremely weary of his afflictions. The best cannot always rejoice in temptations, nor triumph under a cross. True believers, as they have more patience in doing, so in suffering; yet even their patience doth not always hold out; they, as Job, speak sometimes mournfully and complainingly. (Joseph Caryl.)

Fuente: Biblical Illustrator Edited by Joseph S. Exell

Verse 7. But now he hath made me weary] The Vulgate translates thus: – Nunc autem oppressit me dolor meus; et in nihilum redacti sunt omnes artus mei; “But now my grief oppresses me, and all my joints are reduced to nothing.” Perhaps Job alluded here to his own afflictions, and the desolation of his family. Thou hast made me weary with continual affliction; my strength is quite exhausted; and thou hast made desolate all my company, not leaving me a single child to continue my name, or to comfort me in sickness or old age. Mr. Good translates: –

“Here, indeed, hath he distracted me;

Thou hast struck apart all my witnesses.”

Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible

But; or, surely, as this Hebrew particle most commonly signifies. He, i.e. God, as appears by the following words and verses.

Hath made me weary; either of complaining, or of my life.

Thou; he speaks in the second person to God, as in the former clause in the third person of God. Such change of persons are very usual in Scripture, and elsewhere.

Hast made desolate all my company; hast turned my society into desolation, by destroying my children and servants.

Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole

7. But nowrather, “ah!”

heGod.

companyrather, “bandof witnesses,” namely, those who could attest hisinnocence (his children, servants, &c.). So the same Hebrewis translated in Job 16:8.UMBREIT makes his “bandof witnesses,” himself, for, alas! he had no otherwitness for him. But this is too recondite.

Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible

But now he hath made me weary,…. Or “it hath made me weary” u, that is, “my grief”, as it may be supplied from Job 16:6; or rather God, as appears from the next clause, and from the following verse, where he is manifestly addressed; who by afflicting him had made him weary of the world, and all things in it, even of his very life,

Job 10:1; his afflictions were so heavy upon him, and pressed him so hard, that his life was a burden to him; they were heavier than the sand of the sea, and his strength was not equal to them; he could scarcely drag along, was ready to sink and lie down under the weight of them:

thou hast made desolate all my company, or “congregation” w; the congregation of saints that met at his house for religious worship, as some think, which now through his affliction was broke up, whom Eliphaz had called a congregation of hypocrites, Job 15:34; which passage Job may have respect unto; or rather his family, his children, which were taken away from him: the Jews say x, ten persons in any place make a congregation; this was just the number of Job’s children, seven sons and three daughters; or it may be he may have respect to his friends, that came to visit him, who were moved and stupefied as it were at the sight of him and his afflictions, as the word y is by some translated, and who were alienated from him; were not friendly to him, nor administered to him any comfort; so that they were as if he had none, or worse.

u “Dolor meus”, V. L. so Aben Ezra Cocceius. w “meam congregationem”, Pagninus “conventum meum”, Montanus, Bolducius. x Vid. Drusium in loc. y “Stupefe isti”, Tigurine version; so Jarchi.

Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible

(7) But now he hath made me weary.He turns again, in his passionate plaint, to God, whom he alternately speaks of in the third person and addresses in the second. Thou hast made desolate all my company, by destroying all his children and alienating the hearts or his friends.

Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)

7. Made me weary Wearied me out.

Company Household. Same word as Eliphaz uses, Job 15:34.

Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

Job Shows The Pitifulness of his Case and Maintains his Innocence

v. 7. But now He hath made me weary, God had brought him to the point of utter exhaustion; Thou hast made desolate all my company, his whole family, the loss of which, together with the estrangement of his wife, was doubly hard to bear, now that his friends had become hostile to him.

v. 8. And Thou hast filled me with wrinkles, which is a witness against me, the fact that God had seized him and placed him in a shriveled and wrinkled condition seemed a witness of his guilt; and my leanness rising up in me beareth witness to my face, his wasted condition appeared against him, accusing him to his face, this also being construed as a proof of his guilt.

v. 9. He teareth me in His wrath, who hateth me, God’s anger had apparently made war upon him, torn him, was pursuing him hard; He gnasheth upon me with His teeth, as though He were truly enraged against Job; mine Enemy, which God now seemed to have become, sharpeneth His eyes upon me, whetting them as though He intended to use them for piercing Job through as with swords.

v. 10. They, the enemies of Job among men, have gaped upon me with their mouth, in a gesture of insolent mockery; they have smitten me upon the cheek reproachfully, to show their contempt of him; they have gathered themselves together against me, coming in ranks and heaps and strengthening one another for the attack.

v. 11. God hath delivered me to the ungodly, exposing him to the attacks of the unrighteous, and turned me over into the hands of the wicked, casting him headlong into the power of knaves and rascals, these harsh expressions being directed also against his professed friends.

v. 12. I was at ease, but He hath broken me asunder, shattering him, dashing him to pieces; He hath also taken me by my neck and shaken me to pieces, like a man who is seized by his head and thrown down over a precipice, where all his limbs are broken, and set me up for His mark, the target at which He directed His shafts.

v. 13. His archers compass me round about, rather, whirred about me His arrows or darts; He cleaveth my reins asunder and doth not spare, cutting open vital organs of his body; He poureth out my gall upon the ground, spoken figuratively of the violent pain which affected his entire being. The picture is now changed to that of a besieged city or fortress.

v. 14. He breaketh me with breach upon breach, like a wall which is being battered down by heavy projectiles; He runneth upon me like a giant, like a mighty warrior striking down everything in his path.

v. 15. I have sewed sackcloth upon my skin, stitching it about his loins as a garment of mourning, and defiled my horn in the dust, all his power and dignity had been covered with the deepest humiliation.

v. 16. My face is foul with weeping, burning, glowing red, almost inflamed with the sharp pain caused by the tears, and on my eyelids is the shadow of death, he had wept himself almost to blindness or out of life.

v. 17. Not for any injustice in mine hands, all this had come upon him although no violence clung to his hands, he was not guilty of gross wickedness; also my prayer is pure, it was made without hypocrisy, in all sincerity of his heart.

v. 18. O earth, cover not thou my blood, so that it might cry to heaven in witness of his innocence, and let my cry have no place, his call for vengeance should not be quieted until an avenger had arisen for his blood; for Job still believed that God would finally avenge the blood which His wrath had shed, as blood which had been innocently poured out.

v. 19. Also now, behold, my Witness is in heaven, and my Record, He who attested to his innocence, is on high, even though all appearances are now against him.

v. 20. My friends scorn me, literally, “although mockers of me my friends”; but mine eye poureth out tears unto God, directing his tearful entreaty to the Lord for justice and help.

v. 21. Oh, that one might plead for a man with God, that God would decide before His own tribunal in favor of Job, that He would pronounce him not guilty, as a man pleadeth for his neighbor, that God would also decide in favor of Job over against his friends, setting him forth as innocent.

v. 22. When a few years are come, the years which are numbered very carefully, the last ones which remain before death, then I shall go the way whence I shall not return, for Job knew that the course of the illness with which he was suffering was rapid and invariably fatal. Some commentators find a reference to the intercessory work of Christ in the words: The Son of Man for His neighbor. The words may surely be taken as typical of the work of the Savior as our Advocate with the Father.

Fuente: The Popular Commentary on the Bible by Kretzmann

Job 16:7. But now he hath made me weary For my trouble hath now weakened all my frame, and brought wrinkles over me, Job 16:8. He is present as a witness, and ariseth against me, who telleth lies concerning me, he openly contradicts me to my face. Houbigant. Heath renders the verses, Only now it reduceth me to the last extremity; thou causest all my company to be in a consternation. Job 16:8. It even wounds me to the heart, that my traitorous false friend should thus turn witness; nay, that he should become my accuser; that he should testify to my face.

Fuente: Commentary on the Holy Bible by Thomas Coke

(7) But now he hath made me weary: thou hast made desolate all my company. (8) And thou hast filled me with wrinkles, which is a witness against me: and my leanness rising up in me beareth witness to my face. (9) He teareth me in his wrath, who hateth me: he gnasheth upon me with his teeth; mine enemy sharpeneth his eyes upon me. (10) They have gaped upon me with their mouth; they have smitten me upon the cheek reproachfully; they have gathered themselves together against me. (11) God hath delivered me to the ungodly, and turned me over into the hands of the wicked. (12) I was at ease, but he hath broken me asunder: he hath also taken me by my neck, and shaken me to pieces, and set me up for his mark. (13) His archers compass me round about, he cleaveth my reins asunder, and doth not spare; he poureth out my gall upon the ground. (14) He breaketh me with breach upon breach, he runneth upon me like a giant. (15) I have sewed sackcloth upon my skin, and defiled my horn in the dust. (16) My face is foul with weeping, and on my eyelids is the shadow of death; (17) Not for any injustice in mine hands: also my prayer is pure. (18) O earth, cover not thou my blood, and let my cry have no place.

Perhaps in no part of Job’s complaints doth the torrent with which his whole frame was overwhelmed rise higher, than in what is contained in this discourse. His heart seemed to have been full, and he gives it vent. How exercised in his family, in his person, by the enemy of souls the unkind and unjust reproaches of his friends; and to sum up all, his GOD looking on, and yet to his earnest cries returning no answer. Job knew not the blessed issue which awaited the whole, and therefore only spoke while under the full pressure of the accumulated burthens. There is a great elegance in the figure of Job’s leanness, when he considered the wrinkles of his wasted body, as carrying about with him an unceasing witness to his grief. And the close of the complaint, in crying to the earth to cover not his blood, but to be above the ground in testimony for him; these are most striking expressions of the mind of Job.

Fuente: Hawker’s Poor Man’s Commentary (Old and New Testaments)

Job 16:7 But now he hath made me weary: thou hast made desolate all my company.

Ver. 7. But now he hath made me weary ] i.e. God, whom he acknowledgeth the author of his afflictions; but he should better have borne up under them than to faint and fret even unto madness, as the Septuagint here translates, Quis eum fatigavit? Dolor, vel Deus ipse? (Lavat.). Job was now not only wet to the skin, but his soul came into iron, as Joseph’s once, Psa 105:18 . Like Ezekiel’s book, Eze 2:10 , he was written quite through with woes and lamentations. And he might say, with Heman, Psa 88:15 , “While I suffer thy terrors I am distracted.” The grief which he here describeth, Maior erat quam ut verbis comprehendi, gravior quam ut ferri, molestior quam ut credi possit, saith Brentius; i.e. was greater than could be uttered, heavier than could be borne, more troublesome than can be believed. He, therefore, sets it out as well as he can, and amplifies it by figures and hyperbole, to move God and his friends to pity him, and to show that he complained not without cause.

Thou hast made desolate all my company ] Heb. Thou hast wonderfully desolated, or wasted, all my company; that is, all my joints and members (so. the Vulgate translateth it, In nihilum redact; sunt omnes artus mei); but they do better that understand it of Job’s family and familiar friends, who were either destroyed, or stood amazed at his so great affliction, and yielded him little comfort. Ne te autem turbet enallage personae, saith Mercer here; the change of person need not trouble us; only the troubled and uneven speech of Job showeth that his spirit was troubled and unsettled. We meet with the like oft in the Psalms.

Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)

he hath: Job 3:17, Job 7:3, Job 7:16, Job 10:1, Psa 6:6, Psa 6:7, Pro 3:11, Pro 3:12, Isa 50:4, Mic 6:13

hast made: Job 1:15-19, Job 29:5-25

Reciprocal: Job 37:23 – he will Lam 3:11 – he hath made

Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge

Job 16:7. But now he Namely, God; hath made me weary Either of complaining, or of my life. He hath long since quite tired me with one trouble upon another. Bishop Patrick. Thou hast made desolate all my company Thou hast not ceased, O God, till thou hast left me neither goods nor children, no, nor a friend to comfort me. He speaks in the second person, to God, as in the former clause in the third person, of God: such a change of persons is very usual in Scripture, and is esteemed, says Chappelow, a singular ornament in poetry.

Fuente: Joseph Bensons Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

16:7 But now {g} he hath made me weary: thou hast made desolate all my {h} company.

(g) Meaning, God.

(h) That is, destroyed most of my family.

Fuente: Geneva Bible Notes