Lectionary Calendar
Tuesday, November 26th, 2024
the Week of Christ the King / Proper 29 / Ordinary 34
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Read the Bible

King James Version

Job 17:16

They shall go down to the bars of the pit, when our rest together is in the dust.

Bible Study Resources

Concordances:

- Nave's Topical Bible - Afflictions and Adversities;   Dead (People);   Death;   Despondency;  

Dictionaries:

- Bridgeway Bible Dictionary - Sheol;   Baker Evangelical Dictionary of Biblical Theology - Burial;   Sheol;   Charles Buck Theological Dictionary - Greatness of God;   Hypocrisy;   Holman Bible Dictionary - Death;   Dust;   Hell;   Pit;   Sheol;   Morrish Bible Dictionary - Pit;  

Encyclopedias:

- International Standard Bible Encyclopedia - Bar (2);   Eschatology of the Old Testament (with Apocryphal and Apocalyptic Writings);   Sheol;   Staves;  

Parallel Translations

New Living Translation
No, my hope will go down with me to the grave. We will rest together in the dust!"
English Revised Version
It shall go down to the bars of Sheol, when once there is rest in the dust.
Update Bible Version
You shall go down with me to Sheol. Shall we not go down together to the dust?
New Century Version
Will hope go down to the gates of death? Will we go down together into the dust?"
New English Translation
Will it go down to the barred gates of death? Will we descend together into the dust?"
Webster's Bible Translation
They shall go down to the bars of the pit, when [our] rest together [is] in the dust.
World English Bible
Shall it go down with me to the gates of Sheol, Or descend together into the dust?"
Amplified Bible
"Will my hope go down with me to Sheol (the nether world, the place of the dead)? Shall we go down together in the dust?"
English Standard Version
Will it go down to the bars of Sheol? Shall we descend together into the dust?"
Wycliffe Bible (1395)
Alle my thingis schulen go doun in to deppeste helle; gessist thou, whether reste schal be to me, nameli there.
Berean Standard Bible
Will it go down to the gates of Sheol? Will we go down together into the dust?"
Contemporary English Version
Will it keep me company in the world of the dead?
American Standard Version
It shall go down to the bars of Sheol, When once there is rest in the dust.
Bible in Basic English
Will they go down with me into the underworld? Will we go down together into the dust?
Complete Jewish Bible
Only those who go down with me to the bars of Sh'ol, when we rest together in the dust."
Darby Translation
It shall go down to the bars of Sheol, when [our] rest shall be together in the dust.
Easy-to-Read Version
Will hope go down with me to the place of death? Will we go down into the dirt together?"
JPS Old Testament (1917)
They shall go down to the bars of the nether-world, when we are at rest together in the dust.
King James Version (1611)
They shall goe downe to the barres of the pit, when our rest together is in the dust.
New Life Bible
Will it go down with me to the place of the dead? Will we go down together into the dust?"
New Revised Standard
Will it go down to the bars of Sheol? Shall we descend together into the dust?"
Geneva Bible (1587)
They shal goe downe into the bottome of the pit: surely it shall lye together in the dust.
George Lamsa Translation
They shall go down to the bottom of Sheol; they shall descend together into the dust.
Good News Translation
Hope will not go with me when I go down to the world of the dead.
J.B. Rotherham Emphasized Bible
With me to hades, would they go down, If, wholly - into the dust, is the descent!
Douay-Rheims Bible
All that I have shall go down into the deepest pit: thinkest thou that there at least I shall have rest?
Revised Standard Version
Will it go down to the bars of Sheol? Shall we descend together into the dust?"
Bishop's Bible (1568)
These shall go downe with me into the pit, and lye with me in the dust.
Brenton's Septuagint (LXX)
Will they go down with me to Hades, or shall we go down together to the tomb?
Christian Standard Bible®
Will it go down to the gates of Sheol,or will we descend together to the dust?
Hebrew Names Version
Shall it go down with me to the gates of She'ol, Or descend together into the dust?"
Lexham English Bible
Will they go down to the bars of Sheol? Or shall we descend together into the dust?"
Literal Translation
They shall go down to the bars of Sheol, when our descent together is in the dust.
Young's Literal Translation
[To] the parts of Sheol ye go down, If together on the dust we may rest.
Miles Coverdale Bible (1535)
All that I haue, shall go downe in to the pytt, & lye with me in the dust.
New American Standard Bible
"Will it go down with me to Sheol? Shall we together go down into the dust?"
New King James Version
Will they go down to the gates of Sheol? Shall we have rest together in the dust?"
New American Standard Bible (1995)
"Will it go down with me to Sheol? Shall we together go down into the dust?"
Legacy Standard Bible
Will it go down with me to Sheol?Shall we together go down into the dust?"

Contextual Overview

10 But as for you all, do ye return, and come now: for I cannot find one wise man among you. 11 My days are past, my purposes are broken off, even the thoughts of my heart. 12 They change the night into day: the light is short because of darkness. 13 If I wait, the grave is mine house: I have made my bed in the darkness. 14 I have said to corruption, Thou art my father: to the worm, Thou art my mother, and my sister. 15 And where is now my hope? as for my hope, who shall see it? 16 They shall go down to the bars of the pit, when our rest together is in the dust.

Bible Verse Review
  from Treasury of Scripure Knowledge

the bars of the pit: Job 18:13, Job 18:14, Job 33:18-28, Psalms 88:4-8, Psalms 143:7, Isaiah 38:17, Isaiah 38:18, Jonah 2:6

rest: Job 3:17-19, Ezekiel 37:11, 2 Corinthians 1:9

Reciprocal: Job 33:28 - will deliver Ezekiel 28:8 - shall bring

Cross-References

Genesis 1:28
And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth.
Genesis 12:2
And I will make of thee a great nation, and I will bless thee, and make thy name great; and thou shalt be a blessing:
Genesis 17:6
And I will make thee exceeding fruitful, and I will make nations of thee, and kings shall come out of thee.
Genesis 17:10
This is my covenant, which ye shall keep, between me and you and thy seed after thee; Every man child among you shall be circumcised.
Genesis 17:14
And the uncircumcised man child whose flesh of his foreskin is not circumcised, that soul shall be cut off from his people; he hath broken my covenant.
Genesis 17:26
In the selfsame day was Abraham circumcised, and Ishmael his son.
Genesis 24:60
And they blessed Rebekah, and said unto her, Thou art our sister, be thou the mother of thousands of millions, and let thy seed possess the gate of those which hate them.
Genesis 35:11
And God said unto him, I am God Almighty: be fruitful and multiply; a nation and a company of nations shall be of thee, and kings shall come out of thy loins;
Isaiah 49:23
And kings shall be thy nursing fathers, and their queens thy nursing mothers: they shall bow down to thee with their face toward the earth, and lick up the dust of thy feet; and thou shalt know that I am the Lord : for they shall not be ashamed that wait for me.
Romans 9:9
For this is the word of promise, At this time will I come, and Sarah shall have a son.

Gill's Notes on the Bible

They shall go down to the bars of the pit,.... He himself, and his friends, and the hopes they would have him entertain; these should all go down together to the grave, and there lie barred and locked up; these hopes, so as never to rise anymore, and the bodies of himself, and his friends, till loosed by him who has the keys of hell and death: or "the bars shall go down to the grave"; the members of his body, as Jarchi, which are the bars of it, as some in Bar Tzemach; the strength and support of it, as particularly the bones, these shall go down to the grave, and there turn to rottenness and dust; and therefore, as if he should say, as he elsewhere does, "what is my strength, that I should hope?" Job 6:11;

when [our] rest together [is] in the dust; which is man's original, and to which he returns, and in which the dead lie and sleep until the resurrection; and where they are at rest from all adversity and affliction of body, mind, and estate; from all the troubles and vexations occasioned by wicked men, and from all disputes, wranglings, contentions, and animosities among friends, which would be the case of Job, and his friends, when their heads were laid in the dust, and which he supposed would quickly be; and therefore it was in vain for them to feed him with hopes of outward happiness, and for him to entertain them; it best came them both to think of death and the grave as near at hand, where their controversies would be buried, and they would be good friends, and lie quietly together, and take their rest until they should awake and rise to everlasting life.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

They shall go down - That is, my hopes shall go down. All the expectations that I have cherished of life and happiness, will descend there with me. We have a similar expression when we say, that a man “has buried his hopes in the grave,” when he loses an only son.

To the bars of the pit - “Bars of Sheol” - שׁאול בד bad she'ôl. Vulgate, “Profoundest deep.” Septuagint, εἰς ᾅδην eis hadēn - to Hades. Sheol, or Hades, was supposed to be under the earth. Its entrance was by the grave as a gate that led to it. It was protected by bars - as prisons are - so that those who entered there could not escape; see the notes at Isaiah 14:9. It was a dark, gloomy dwelling, far away from light, and from the comforts which people enjoy in this life; see Job 10:21-22. To that dark world Job expected soon to descend; and though he did not regard that as properly a place of punishment, yet it was not a place of positive joy. It was a gloomy and wretched world - the land of darkness and of the shadow of death; and he looked to the certainty of going there not with joy, but with anguish and distress of heart. Had Job been favored with the clear and elevated views of heaven which we have in the Christian revelation, death to him would have lost its gloom.

We wonder, often, that so good a man expressed such a dread of death, and that he did not look more calmly into the future world. But to do him justice, we should place ourselves in his situation. We should lay aside all that is cheerful and glad in the views of heaven which Christianity has given us. We should look upon the future world as the shadow of death; a land of gloom and spectres; a place beneath the ground - dark, chilly, repulsive; and we shall cease to wonder at the expressions of even so good a man at the prospect of death. When we look at him, we should remember with thankfulness the different views which we have of the future world, and the source to which we owe them. To us, if we are pious in any measure as Job was, death is the avenue, not to a world of gloom, but to a world of light and glory. It opens into heaven. There is no gloom, no darkness, no sorrow. There all are happy; and there all that is mysterious in this life is made plain - all that is sad is succeeded by eternal joy. These views we owe to that gospel which has brought life and immortality to light; and when we think of death and the future world, when from the midst of woes and sorrows we are compelled to look out on eternity, let us rejoice that we are not constrained to look forward with the sad forebodings of the Sage of Uz, but that we may think of the grave cheered by the strong consolations of Christian hope of the glorious resurrection.

When our rest together is in the dust - The rest of me and my hopes. My hopes and myself will expire together.

Clarke's Notes on the Bible

Verse Job 17:16. They shall go down to the bars of the pit — All that I have must descend into the depths of the grave. Thither are we all going; and there alone can I rest.

בדי baddey, which we translate bars, signifies also branches, distended limbs, or claws, and may here refer either to a personification of the grave, a monster who seizes on human bodies, and keeps them fast in his deadly gripe; or to the different branching-off-alleys in subterranean cemeteries, or catacombs, in which niches are made for the reception of different bodies.

When our rest together is in the dust. — That is, according to some critics, My hope and myself shall descend together into the grave. It shall never be realized, for the time of my departure is at hand.

IN those times what deep shades hung on the state of man after death, and on every thing pertaining to the eternal world! Perplexity and uncertainty were the consequences; and a corresponding gloom often dwelt on the minds of even the best of the Old Testament believers. Job's friends, though learned in all the wisdom of the Arabians, connected with the advantages derivable from the Mosaic writings, and perhaps those of the earlier prophets, had little clear or distinct in their minds relative to all subjects post mortem, or of the invisible world. Job himself, though sometimes strongly confident, is often harassed with doubts and fears upon the subject, insomuch that his sayings and experience often appear contradictory. Perhaps it could not be otherwise; the true light was not then come: Jesus alone brought life and immortality to light by his Gospel.


 
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