Bible Commentary

Job 14:4

Job 14:4

John Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible · John Gill (1697–1771) · Public Domain

but the weakness and frailty of man; as is the creature that generates, such is that that is generated; creatures born of strong ones are strong, and of weak ones weak; a creature born of a lion is a strong one; and man, born of a woman, must be weak and feeble, and no wonder he is short lived, as follows:[is] of few days; or "short of days" ; comes short of the days he might have lived, if man had never sinned, and comes short of the days the first man did live, and which those before the flood generally lived, who most of them lived upwards of nine hundred years; whereas now, and ever since the times of Moses, and about which Job lived, the days of the years of man are but threescore and ten; and such are shorter of days still, who live not more than half this time, who are cut off in the bloom and prime of life, the days of whose youth are shortened, who die in their youth, or in their childhood and infancy; and such especially are short of days who are carried from the womb to the grave, or die as soon as born; and those that live the longest, their days are but few, when compared with the days of eternity, or with those men shall live in another world, either good men in heaven, or wicked men in hell, which will be for ever; and especially with respect to God, with whom one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day, and therefore the days and age of man are as nothing before him.

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Job 14 — OverviewJob 14 · Matthew Henry's Commentary on the Whole BibleJob had turned from speaking to his friends, finding it to no purpose to reason with them, and here he goes on to speak to God and himself. He had reminded his friends of their frailty and mortality (ch. xiii.…Job 14 — OverviewJob 14 · Treasury of Scripture KnowledgeJob 14:1, Job entreats God for favour, by the shortness of life, and certainty of death; Job 14:7, He waits for his change; Job 14:16, By sin the creature is subject to corruption.Job 14 — OverviewJob 14 · John Gill's Exposition of the Entire BibleJob, having turned himself from his friends to God, continues his address to him in this chapter; wherein he discourses of the frailty of man, the shortness of his life, the troubles that are in it, the sinfulness of…Job 14:1-6Job 14:1-6 · Matthew Henry's Commentary on the Whole BibleWe are here led to think, I. Of the original of human life. God is indeed its great original, for he breathed into man the breath of life and in him we live; but we date it from our birth, and thence we must date…Job 14:1-6Job 14:1-6 · The Pulpit CommentaryJob to God: 2. The death-wail of humanity. I. THE WAIL OF HUMANITY IN THE EAR OF GOD. 1. The constitutional frailty of man. Moses, in the Book of Genesis (Genesis 1:26; Genesis 2:7), sets forth the dignity of man…Job 14:1-12Job 14:1-12 · The Pulpit Commentary1. Self-defence before God: 2. Plaint of the weakness and vanity of mankind. Job's troubles are typical of the common doom of mankind—the "subjection, to vanity." And again (comp. Job 3:7; Job 7:1-5) he bursts forth…