a pace or regular step · noun, common masculine plural construct
strength
אוֹנ֑וֹ'o.No
H202
ability · noun, common masculine singular construct + pronominal suffix, 3rd person masculine singular
straitened
יֵֽ֭צְרוּYe.tze.ru
H3334
to press (intransitive) · verb, qal imperfect, 3rd person masculine plural
counsel
עֲצָתֽוֹa.tza.To
H6098
advice · noun, common feminine singular construct + pronominal suffix, 3rd person masculine singular
down
וְֽתַשְׁלִיכֵ֥הוּve.tash.li.Khe.hu
H7993
to throw out · conjunction + verb, hiphil, 3rd person feminine 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
Proverbs 4:12 When thou goest, thy steps shall not be straitened; and when thou runnest, thou shalt not stumble.
Psalms 18:36 Thou hast enlarged my steps under me, that my feet did not slip.
Psalms 33:10 The LORD bringeth the counsel of the heathen to nought: he maketh the devices of the people of none effect.
2 Samuel 15:31 And one told David, saying, Ahithophel is among the conspirators with Absalom. And David said, O LORD, I pray thee, turn the counsel of Ahit…
2 Samuel 17:14 And Absalom and all the men of Israel said, The counsel of Hushai the Archite is better than the counsel of Ahithophel. For the LORD had app…
Job 5:12-13 He disappointeth the devices of the crafty, so that their hands cannot perform their enterprise.
Job 15:6 Thine own mouth condemneth thee, and not I: yea, thine own lips testify against thee.
Job 20:22 In the fulness of his sufficiency he shall be in straits: every hand of the wicked shall come upon him.
Cross-references from OpenBible.info (CC BY), in the lineage of the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge (public domain).
Commentary
Matthew Henry on Job 18:5-10
The rest of Bildad's discourse is entirely taken up in an elegant description of the miserable condition of a wicked man, in which there is a great deal of certain truth, and which will be of excellent use if duly considered - that a sinful condition is a sad condition, and that iniquity will be men's ruin if they do not repent of it. But it is not true that all wicked people are visibly and openly made thus miserable in this world; nor is it true that all who are brought into great distress and trouble in this world are therefore to be deemed and adjudged wicked men, when no other proof appears against them; and therefore, though Bildad thought the application of it to Job was easy, yet it…
steps of his strength--Hebrew, for "His strong steps." A firm step marks health. To be straitened in steps is to be no longer able to move about at will (Pro 4:12).
his own counsel--Plans shall be the means of his fall (Job 5:13).
John Gill on Job 18:7
The steps of his strength shall be straitened,.... As a man in health can take large and strong steps, and travel in the greatness of his strength; so in prosperity he can and does take large steps in obtaining fame and reputation among men, in amassing substance to himself, and towards settling his family in the world; he is like one in a large place, and walks at liberty, goes in and out at pleasure, and none can control him; he walks in pride, and with an high and lifted up head, and with contempt of others, and his will is his law, and he does as he pleases; but in adversity, as his strength is weakened in the way, he cannot take the strides he did, his way is hedged up with thorns, he i…
4 Thou art he who teareth himself in his anger:
Shall the earth become desolate for thy sake,
And a rock remove from its place?
5 Notwithstanding, the light of the wicked shall be put out,
And the glow of his fire shineth not;
6 The light becometh dark in his tent,
And his lamp above him is extinguished;
7 His vigorous steps are straitened,
And his own counsel casteth him down.
The meaning of the strophe is this: Dost thou imagine that, by thy vehement conduct, by which thou art become enraged against thyself, thou canst effect any change in the established divine order of the world? It is a divine law, that sufferings are the punishment of sin; thou canst no more alter this, than that at th…
The Church Fathers
"Let his fortune be given to the last of men," Let the humble possess what he wanted to possess.
Bildad says these things using the metaphor of the birds or the animals that are captured in the hunt. In fact, as they can no longer escape after falling into snares and nets, so the impious are caught by inevitable calamities that overwhelm them. And what is worse, after all their schemes have been overturned and reversed, their riches are taken away from them not by the powerful but by people of the lowest class.
The steps of his strength shalt be straitened. For now as it were he puts forth 'the steps of his strength,' as often as he executes the violent acts of his power. But 'the steps of his strength shall be straitened,' in that the resources of his wickedness, which he now displays in his own gratification, punishment hereafter binds fast. It goes on; And his own counsel shall cast him down. Every bad man makes it his counsel now to aim at present things, to abandon the things of eternity, to do what is unjust, to sneer at what is just; but when the Judge of the just and unjust shall come, every ungodly person is 'cast down by his counsel,' in that for this that he chose to go after here with bad intent, he is drowned in the darkness of eternal woe. For that man whom temporal glory uplifts here, punishment without end there sinks down. He who here revels in self-gratification, is there tortured with everlasting vengeance. And it often happens that the very prosperity of this life, which is so eagerly hankered after by the ungodly, so clogs their steps, that even when they have the mind to return to good works, they are scarcely able: in that they have not the power to do what is right, while they fear to displease the lovers of this world. Whence it is brought to pass, that through that glory which the ungodly man derives from sin, his sins are yet further doubled and redoubled.
The Church Fathers: public-domain translations (Ante-Nicene and Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers), verse-indexed by SermonIndex (CC BY 4.0).
The stride that is shortened is the opposite of walking and running in the blessed life (Prov 4:12).
Rashi on Job 18:7
shall be straitened They shall be short. The steps of The steps of his strength.
shall cast him down His counsel that he advised, which will not be fulfilled [will cast him down].