Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Job 12:2
No doubt but ye [are] the people, and wisdom shall die with you.
2. ye are the people ] Sarcastic admiration of the wisdom of his three friends, cf. ch. Job 11:6. “The people” does not seem to mean the right people, persons worthy of the name of “people;” rather “the people” is used as three other persons, well known to history, employed it, when they said, “We, the people of England.” It means the whole people; hence Job adds, “Wisdom will die with you.”
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
No doubt but ye are the people – That is, the only wise people. You have engrossed all the wisdom of the world, and all else are to be regarded as fools. This is evidently the language of severe sarcasm; and it shows a spirit fretted and chafed by their reproaches. Job felt contempt for their reasoning. and meant to intimate that their maxims, on which they placed so much reliance, were common-place, and such as every one was familar with.
And wisdom shall die with you – This is ironical, but it is language such as is common perhaps every where. The people of the East, says Roberts, take great pleasure in irony, and some of their satirical sayings are very cutting. When a sage intimates that he has superior wisdom or when he is disposed to rally another for his meagrc attainments, he says, Yes, yes, you are the man! Your wisdom is like the sea. When you die, whither will wisdom go? In a serious sense, language like this is used by the Classical writers to describe the death of eminently great or good men. They speak of wisdom, bravery, piety, or music, as dying with them. Thus, Moschus, Idyll. iii. 12.
,
, .
Hotti bion tethneken ho bokolos, esti sun auto
Kai to melos tethnake, kai oleto Doris aeidos.
Bion the swain is dead, and with him song
Has died, and the Doric muse has perished.
Expressions like these are common. Thus, in the Pleasures of Hope it is said:
And Freedom shrieked when Kosciusko fell.
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
Verse 2. No doubt but ye are the people] Doubtless ye are the wisest men in the world; all wisdom is concentrated in you; and when ye die, there will no more be found on the face of the earth! This is a strong irony.
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
Ye are the people; you three, and you only, are the people, i.e. people of all people for eminency of wisdom, the only company of reasonable creatures; all others are but fools or beasts: you have engrossed all the reason of mankind; and each of you have as much wisdom as a whole people put together. It is an ironical expression, as the next verse showeth.
Wisdom shall die with you; all the wisdom and knowledge of Divine things which is in the world lives in you, and will die and be utterly lost when you die. This you think of yourselves; and this makes you so confidently and peremptorily deliver your opinions, and give laws to me and all mankind, and even to God himself.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
2. wisdom shall die withyouIronical, as if all the wisdom in the world wasconcentrated in them and would expire when they expired. Wisdom makes”a people:” a foolish nation is “not a people”(Ro 10:19).
Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
No doubt but ye [are] the people,…. Which is said not seriously, meaning that they were but of the common people, that are generally ignorant, and have but little knowledge, at least of things sublime, especially in matters of religion; wherefore, though they took upon them to be his teachers and dictators to him, and censors of him, they were not above the rank, but in the class of people of low and mean understandings; see Joh 7:49; this sense indeed agrees with what is after said, “who knoweth not such things as these?” but since Job compares himself with them, and asserts he is not inferior to them, it supposes them to have a degree of knowledge and understanding of things somewhat above the common people; wherefore these words are to be taken ironically, exposing their vanity and self-conceit: “ye are the people”; the only, and all the people in the world of importance and consequence for good sense and wisdom; the only wise and knowing folk, the men of reason and understanding; all the rest are but fools and asses, or like the wild ass’s colt, as Zophar had said, and which Job took as pointing to him; so the word in the Arabic language c signifies the more excellent and better sort of people; or, ye are the only people of God, his covenant people, his servants; that are made acquainted with the secrets of wisdom, as none else are:
and wisdom shall die with you; you have all the wisdom of the world, and when you die it will be all gone; there will be none left in the world: thus he represents them as monopolizers and engrossers of wisdom and knowledge, full of it in their conceit, allowing none to have any share with them: and by all this he not only upbraids them with their vanity and self-conceit, but puts them in mind, that, as wise as they were, they must die; and that, though their wisdom with respect to them, or any use they could make of it in the grave, where there is none, would die too; or that their wisdom was but the wisdom of the world, which comes to nought; yet there would be wisdom still in the world, and that which is true, which God makes known to men, even the wisdom of God in a mystery, the wisdom hid in himself; and who has the residue of the Spirit and his gifts to instruct men in it, and qualify them to be teachers of others; by which means, though men, even the best of men, die, yet the word of God, the means of true wisdom and knowledge, will always abide.
c Golii Lex. Ar. Col. 1743. Vid. Lud. Capell. in loc.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
Section 1: SARCASTIC COMMENDATION OF THAT WISDOM WHICH FAILS TO RECOGNIZE THE SECURITY OF THE WICKED, Job 12:2-12.
a. Piety in straits is an object of derision; while robbers (such as the Sabeans and Chaldaeans) are at peace, Job 12:2-6.
2. Wisdom shall die with you The people of the East take great pleasure in irony, and some of their satirical sayings are very cutting. When a sage intimates that he has superior wisdom, of when he is disposed to rally another for his meagre attainments, he says, “Yes, yes; you are the man! Your wisdom is like the sea. When you die, whither will wisdom go! When gone, alas! what will become of wisdom?” ROBERTS’S Oriental Illustrations. Moschus thus laments the death of Bion:
“Bion, the swain, and all with him, is dead;
Song lives no more, the Doric muse is fled.”
Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
Job 12:2. No doubt but ye are the people No doubt knowledge is yours; perfect wisdom dwells with you!
Fuente: Commentary on the Holy Bible by Thomas Coke
Job 12:2 No doubt but ye [are] the people, and wisdom shall die with you.
Ver. 2. No doubt but ye are the people ] The select peculiar people, the only ones, as a man is put for a good man, Jer 5:1 , a wife for a good wife, Pro 18:22 , a name for a good name, Ecc 7:1 . As Athens was said to be the Greece of Greece, and as one promising to show his friend all Athens at once, showed him Solon; or as the Latin poet, saying of Fabius Maximus,
Hic patria est, murique urbis stant pectore in uno (Silius).
So saith Job by a holy jeer (not to disgrace his friends, but to bring them to more modesty and moderation, if it might be), Certes, ye are not one or two men, but specimen totius orbis, an epitome of the world, or at least the representative of some whole people (Vatablus); ye have got away all the wit from myself and others, whom ye look upon as so many wild ass’s colts in comparison of yourselves. Thus the pope (Simon Magus like) pretends to be some great thing, Act 8:9 , even the Church virtual; and that in his breast, as in Noah’s ark, is comprehended all wisdom and worth. Ye know nothing at all, saith he (Caiaphas-like), to all others, Joh 11:49 . So do his janizaries, the Jesuits, who will needs be taken for the only scholars, politicians, and orators of the world. The Church, say they, is the soul of the world; the clergy, of the Church; and we, of the clergy; the empire of learning is ours, &c.
And wisdom shall die with you
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
No doubt, &c. Figure of speech Eironeia. App-6.
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
ye are the people: Job 6:24, Job 6:25, Job 8:8-10, Job 11:2, Job 11:6, Job 11:12, Job 15:2, Job 17:4, Job 20:3, Job 32:7-13, Pro 28:11, Isa 5:21, 1Co 4:10, 1Co 6:5
Reciprocal: Exo 4:10 – eloquent Job 5:27 – we have searched Job 6:13 – and is wisdom Job 15:8 – thou restrain Job 26:2 – How hast thou Job 32:13 – We 2Co 10:12 – we dare not
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
Job 12:2. No doubt but ye are the people You, of all people, are the most eminent for wisdom; the only men living of distinguished knowledge and prudence. You have engrossed all the reason of mankind, and each of you has as much wisdom as a whole people put together. And wisdom shall die with you All the wisdom which is in the world lives in you, and will be utterly lost when you die. When wise and good men die, it is a comfort to think that wisdom and goodness do not die with them: it is folly to think that there will be a great, irreparable loss of us when we are gone, since God has the residue of the Spirit, and can raise up others more fit to do his work.
Fuente: Joseph Bensons Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
12:2 No doubt but ye [are] the people, and {a} wisdom shall die with you.
(a) Because you do not feel what you speak, you think the whole stands in words, and so flatter yourselves as though no one else knew anything, or could know except you.