to overpower · verb, qal imperfect, 2nd person masculine singular + pronominal suffix, 3rd person masculine singular
ever
לָ֭נֶצַחLa.ne.tzach
H5331
properly · preposition + noun, common masculine singular absolute
passeth
וַֽיַּהֲלֹ֑ךְvai.ya.ha.Lokh
H1980
to walk (in a great variety of applications · conjunction + verb, qal sequential imperfect, 3rd person masculine singular
changest
מְשַׁנֶּ֥הme.sha.Neh
H8138
to fold · verb, piel active participle, masculine singular absolute
countenance
פָ֝נָ֗יוfa.Nav
H6440
the face (as the part that turns) · noun, common masculine plural construct + pronominal suffix, 3rd person masculine singular
away
וַֽתְּשַׁלְּחֵֽהוּVa.te.sha.le.Che.hu
H7971
to send away · conjunction + verb, piel sequential imperfect, 2nd person masculine singular + pronominal suffix, 3rd person masculine singular
Strong's Exhaustive Concordance (James Strong, 1890/1894), public domain; digitized by Open Scriptures (CC BY-SA). KJV word tagging: eBible.org (public domain). Original-language text, parsing and brief lexicon: STEPBible.org data from Tyndale House, Cambridge (CC BY 4.0).
Cross-references
Job 2:12 And when they lifted up their eyes afar off, and knew him not, they lifted up their voice, and wept; and they rent every one his mantle, and…
Job 14:14 If a man die, shall he live again? all the days of my appointed time will I wait, till my change come.
Ecclesiastes 8:8 There is no man that hath power over the spirit to retain the spirit; neither hath he power in the day of death: and there is no discharge i…
Lamentations 4:8 Their visage is blacker than a coal; they are not known in the streets: their skin cleaveth to their bones; it is withered, it is become lik…
Cross-references from OpenBible.info (CC BY), in the lineage of the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge (public domain).
Commentary
Matthew Henry on Job 14:16–end
Job here returns to his complaints; and, though he is not without hope of future bliss, he finds it very hard to get over his present grievances.
I. He complains of the particular hardships he apprehended himself under from the strictness of God's justice, Job 14:16, Job 14:17. Therefore he longed to go hence to that world where God's wrath will be past, because now he was under the continual tokens of it, as a child, under the severe discipline of the rod, longs to be of age. "When shall my change come? For now thou seemest to me to number my steps, and watch over my sin, and seal it up in a bag, as bills of indictment are kept safely, to be produced against the prisoner." See Deu 32:34. "T…
prevailest--dost overpower by superior strength.
passeth--dieth.
changest countenance--the change in the visage at death. Differently (Dan 5:9).
John Gill on Job 14:20
Thou prevailest for ever against him,.... God is a more than a match for man, in anything, in everything; there is no contending with him, or standing against him, he is stronger than he, and always prevails; there is no withstanding any disease, and the force of it, when he sends it; it is a messenger and servant of his, it goes at his command, and does what he bids it do; and all the art and power of man cannot resist it, or hinder what God would have done by it; and so death itself is irresistible; what is stronger than death? it is a king that reigns with a despotic power; it reigns irresistibly, victoriously, and triumphantly; it prevails over all men, in all ages, and will do to the en…
20 Thou siezest him for ever, then he passeth away;
Thou changest his countenance and castest him forth.
21 If his sons come to honour, he knoweth it not;
Or to want, he observeth them not.
22 Only on his own account his flesh suffereth pain,
And on his own account is his soul conscious of grief.
The old expositors thought that תּתקפהוּ must be explained by תתקף נמנו (Thou provest thyself stronger than he, according to Ges. 121, 4), because תּקף is intrans.; but it is also transitive in the sense of seizing forcibly and grasping, Job 15:24; Ecc 4:12, as Talm. תּקף (otherwise commonly אתקף as החזיק), Arab. taqifa, comprehendere. The many sufferings which God inflicts on him in the course of h…
The Church Fathers
"You have shaken it forever," so that it will perish. to annihilate those hopes which delight the carnal man. "You changed his face and moved him away from you. The image of God was destroyed in him.
"A person is punished," Job says, "and, even if he has many descendents, he does not know them. In fact, after his death, he is often deprived of the pleasures that he was accustomed to enjoy while alive. What is the pleasure of leaving children after one who has departed?" You see, everywhere Job emphasizes the ephemeral character of life. It is impossible to come back and to return down here. Even if he leaves children after him, he does not know how they will prosper. He does not know at all whether his descendants will be numerous or scarce. What is more painful than to ignore one's successes and to go away alone by only knowing one's afflictions? Even if something good happens to him after his death, he does not know, nor will he ever know it [in this life]; but what he surely knows now is that "his flesh is in pain and his soul mourns."
Ver. 20. Thou hast strengthened him for a little space, that he might pass by for ever. LITERAL INTERPRETATION Man has been 'strengthened here for a little space,' in that he has received here powers of living for a while, that he should for ever pass away thither, where no end should bound and shut in his life, but in this moment's space where he has been 'strengthened,' he extracts that wherefrom in the everlasting world he may either find how always to have joy, or not ever escape the punishments he has entered upon. And for this reason, that 'he has been strengthened for a little space,' to 'pass away for everlasting,' it is fitly added immediately; Thou wilt change his countenance, and send him away. 'The face of man is changed,' when his form is wasted by death; but 'he is sent away,' in that from those things which he kept willingly he is necessitated to pass away to the eternal world against his will, and while he is brought thereunto, these things which he held long and thought on, how it will be with them now left behind him he knows nothing.
The Church Fathers: public-domain translations (Ante-Nicene and Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers), verse-indexed by SermonIndex (CC BY 4.0).
