to send away · verb, qal imperfect, 3rd person masculine singular
hand
יָ֑דYad
H3027
a hand (the open one (indicating power · noun, common both genders singular absolute
grave
בְּעִיbᵉʻîy
H1164
a prayer
cry
שֽׁוּעַShu.a'
H7769
a halloo · noun, common masculine singular absolute
destruction
בְּ֝פִיד֗וֹbe.fi.Do
H6365
(figuratively) misfortune · preposition + noun, common masculine singular construct + 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
Judges 5:31 So let all thine enemies perish, O LORD: but let them that love him be as the sun when he goeth forth in his might. And the land had rest fo…
Job 19:7 Behold, I cry out of wrong, but I am not heard: I cry aloud, but there is no judgment.
Psalms 35:25 Let them not say in their hearts, Ah, so would we have it: let them not say, We have swallowed him up.
Matthew 27:39-44 And they that passed by reviled him, wagging their heads,
Cross-references from OpenBible.info (CC BY), in the lineage of the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge (public domain).
Commentary
Matthew Henry on Job 30:15–end
In this second part of Job's complaint, which is very bitter, and has a great many sorrowful accents in it, we may observe a great deal that he complains of and some little that he comforts himself with.
I. Here is much that he complains of.
1. In general, it was a day of great affliction and sorrow. (1.) Affliction seized him, and surprised him. It seized him (Job 30:16): The days of affliction have taken hold upon me, have caught me (so some); they have arrested me, as the bailiff arrests the debtor, claps him on the back, and secures him. When trouble comes with commission it will take fast hold, and not lose its hold. It surprised him (Job 30:27): "The days of affliction prevented me," t…
Expressing Job's faith as to the state after death. Though one must go to the grave, yet He will no more afflict in the ruin of the body (so Hebrew for "grave") there, if one has cried to Him when being destroyed. The "stretching of His hand" to punish after death answers antithetically to the raising "the cry" of prayer in the second clause. MAURER gives another translation which accords with the scope of Job 30:24-31; if it be natural for one in affliction to ask aid, why should it be considered (by the friends) wrong in my case? "Nevertheless does not a man in ruin stretch out his hand" (imploring help, Job 30:20; Lam 1:17)? If one be in his calamity (destruction) is there not therefore a…
Howbeit he will not stretch out his hand to the grave,.... Or, "verily" (h), truly he will not, &c. I am well assured he never will, meaning either he never would stretch out his hand to shut up the grave; or rather keep it shut, and prevent Job from going down into it; or to open it, and fetch him out of it when in it: God is indeed able to do either of these, and has done it; sometimes, when persons are brought as it were to the gates of death and the grave, he says to them, Return; yea, when they are brought to the dust of death, he prevents them going into the grave, by restoring them to life before carried thither, as the Shunammite's son, 2 Kings 4:32; Jairus's daughter, Mark 5:41; and…
The Church Fathers
"What can I not be killed? That I die to this world! "Or conjure another to kill me! An angel better than me, or God to make me better.
Howbeit Thou dost not put forth thine hand for the destroying of them; and if they are brought to the ground, Thou wilt save them Thyself. In which words assuredly this ought to be perceived with penetration, that blessed Job, while he is telling his own circumstances transfers others into himself. For he as it were in a special manner said of himself; Thou liftedst me up, and as it were setting me upon the wind dashedst me down with strength: I know that Thou wilt deliver me to death, where is the house appointed for all living; and yet he adds not concerning himself but others, Howbeit Thou dost not put forth Thine hand for the destroying of them. For whereas whilst speaking of himself in arguing, he subjoins cases applying to others, he shews how many he represents the persons of in himself. Accordingly the Lord 'puts not forth His hand for the destroying' of those that sin, when by striking He reforms from sins, and 'He saves those that are falling to the ground,' when those falling into transgression He wounds as to the health of the body; that being brought low outwardly they should arise inwardly, in order that lying prostrate in the body those should be brought back to the standing of the interior, who whilst standing outwardly lay low to the standing of the soul.
The Church Fathers: public-domain translations (Ante-Nicene and Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers), verse-indexed by SermonIndex (CC BY 4.0).
24 Doth one not, however, stretch out the hand in falling,
Doth he not raise a cry for help on that account in his ruin?
25 Or have I not wept for him that was in trouble,
Hath not my soul grieved for the needy? -
26 For I hoped for good, then evil came;
I waited for light, and darkness came.
27 My bowels boiled without ceasing,
Days of misery met me.
Most of the ancient versions indulge themselves in strange fancies respecting Job 30:24 to make a translatable text, or find their fancies in the text before them. The translation of the Targum follows the fancies of the Midrash, and places itself beyond the range of criticism. The lxx reads בי instead of בעי, and finds in Job 30:24 a longing…
Job felt tossed into the whirlwind and blown about like worthless straw or chaff (9:17; 21:18; 27:21; Ps 1:4; Isa 17:13).
Rashi on Job 30:24
But not with destruction was the Judge accustomed to stretch forth His hand; with destruction, like (Micah 1:6), “into a heap (לעי) in the field.”
if with His misfortune If He would send a misfortune, which is a breach upon His creatures.
He would dandle them He would dandle them with partial consolations. And so did our Sages (Pesikta d’Rav Kahana p. 1 27a) explain it: The Holy One, blessed be He, does not smite a nation and leave it desolate, but He brings misfortune to one and dandles it with its fellow that suffered already, and it is consoled thereby. He brought misfortune upon Assyria and dandled it with Egypt, as it is said (Nahum 3:8): “Are you better than the great No- Amon?” He b…
