Job 11:20

World English Bible

Contextual Overview

¹³ "If you set your heart aright, Stretch out your hands toward him. ¹⁴ If iniquity is in your hand, put it far away, Don't let unrighteousness dwell in your tents. ¹⁵ Surely then shall you lift up your face without spot; Yes, you shall be steadfast, and shall not fear: ¹⁶ For you shall forget your misery; You shall remember it as waters that are passed away, ¹⁷ Life shall be clearer than the noonday; Though there is darkness, it shall be as the morning. ¹⁸ You shall be secure, because there is hope; Yes, you shall search, and shall take your rest in safety. ¹⁹ Also you shall lie down, and none shall make you afraid; Yes, many shall court your favor. ²⁰ But the eyes of the wicked shall fail, They shall have no way to flee; Their hope shall be the giving up of the spirit."

Bible Verse Review
  from Treasury of Scripure Knowledge

the eyes: Job 31:16, Leviticus 26:16, Deuteronomy 28:65, Psalms 69:3, Lamentations 4:17

they shall not escape: Heb. flight shall perish from them, Amos 2:14, Amos 5:19, Amos 5:20, Amos 9:1-3, Hebrews 2:3

their hope: Job 8:13, Job 8:14, Job 18:14, Job 27:8, Proverbs 10:24, Proverbs 20:20, Luke 16:23-26

the giving up of the ghost: or, a puff of breath

Reciprocal: Exodus 14:25 - Let us flee Deuteronomy 28:32 - fail Joshua 8:20 - and they had Job 10:18 - given up Job 14:10 - man Proverbs 10:28 - but Proverbs 11:7 - General Proverbs 12:7 - wicked Jeremiah 25:35 - the shepherds

Cross-References

Luke 3:35
the son of Serug, the son of Reu, the son of Peleg, the son of Eber, the son of Shelah

Gill's Notes on the Bible

But the eyes of the wicked shall fail,.... Either through grief and envy at Job's prosperity, and with looking for his fall into troubles again; or rather through expectation of good things for themselves, and for deliverance out of trouble, but all in vain; see Lamentations 4:17;

and they shall not escape; afflictions and calamities in this life, nor the righteous judgment, nor wrath to come: or, "refuge shall perish from them" a; there will be none to betake themselves unto for safety; in vain will they seek it from men; refuge will fail them, and no man care for them; and in vain will they fly to rocks and mountains to fall upon them:

and their hope [shall be as] the giving up of the ghost; it is with them as when a man is just expiring, and it is all over with him, and there is no hope of his reviving; so the hope of wicked men is a dying hope, a lost hope; it is not hope, but despair; their hope is gone, and they are lost and undone; and if they retain their hope in life, when they come to die they have none; though the righteous has hope in his death, their hope dies with them, if not before them: or, "their hope is the giving up of the ghost" b; all they have to hope and wish for is death, to relieve them from their present troubles and agonies they are in; and sometimes are left amidst their guilt, despair, and horror, to destroy themselves: now Zophar by all this would suggest, that should not Job take his advice, he would appear to be such a wicked man, whose eyes would fail for his own help, and would not escape the judgments of God here and hereafter, and would die without hope, in black despair; or at least without any hope that would be of any avail.

a ומנוס אבד מנהם "et refugium peribit ab eis", Pagninus, Montanus, Bolducius; "perfugium", Junius Tremellius "effugium", Mercerus, Cocceius, Schmidt, Schultens. b "Spes vel expectatio eorum est, vel erit efflatio animae", Mercerus, Cocceius.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

But the eyes of the wicked shall fail - That is, they shall be wearied out by anxiously looking for relief from their miseries. “Noyes.” Their expectation shall be vain, and they shall find no relief. Perhaps Zophar here means to apply this to Job, and to say to him that with his present views and character, his hope of relief would fail. His only hope of relief was in a change - in turning to God - since it was a settled maxim that the wicked would look for relief in vain. This assumption that he was a wicked man, must have been among the most trying things that Job had to endure. Indeed nothing could he more provoking than to have others take it for granted as a matter that did not admit of argument, that he was a hypocrite, and that God was dealing with him as an incorrigible sinner.

And they shall not escape - Margin, “Flight shall perish from them.” The margin is a literal translation of the Hebrew. The sense is, escape for the wicked is out of the question. They must be arrested and punished.

And their hope shall be as the giving up of the ghost - literally, “the breathing out of the life or soul.” Their hope shall leave them as the breath or life does the body. It is like death. The expression does not mean that their hope would always expire at death, but that it would certainly expire as life leaves the body. The meaning is, that whatever hope a wicked man has of future happiness and salvation, must fail. The time must come when it will cease to comfort and support him. The hope of the pious man lives until it is lost in fruition in heaven. It attends him in health; supports him in sickness; is with him at home; accompanies him abroad; cheers him in solitude; is his companion in society; is with him as he goes down into the shades of adversity, and it brightens as he travels along the valley of the shadow of death. It stands as a bright star over his grave - and is lost only in the glories of heaven, as the morning star is lost in the superior brightness of the rising sun. Not so the hypocrite and the sinner. His hope dies - and he leaves the world in despair. Sooner or later the last ray of his delusive hopes shall take its departure from the soul, and leave it to darkness. No matter how bright it may have been; no matter how long he has cherished it; no matter on what it is founded - whether on his morals, his prayers, his accomplishments, his learning; if it be not based on true conversion, and the promised mercy of God through a Redeemer, it must; soon cease to shine, and will leave the soul to the gloom of black despair.

Clarke's Notes on the Bible

Verse Job 11:20. The eyes of the wicked shall fail — They shall be continually looking out for help and deliverance; but their expectation shall be cut off.

And they shall not escape — They shall receive the punishment due to their deserts; for God has his eye continually upon them. מנהם ומנוס אבד umanos abad minnehem, literally, "And escape perishes from them." Flight from impending destruction is impossible.

And their hope shall be as the giving up of the ghost. — ותקותם מפח נפש vethikratham mappach naphesh, "And their hope an exhalation of breath," or a mere wish of the mind. They retain their hope to the last; and the last breath they breathe is the final and eternal termination of their hope. They give up their hope and their ghost together; for a vain hope cannot enter into that place where shadow and representation exist not; all being substance and reality. And thus endeth Zophar the Naamathite; whose premises were in general good, his conclusions legitimate, but his application of them to Job's case totally erroneous; because he still proceeded on the ground that Job was a wicked man, if not ostensibly, yet secretly; and that the sufferings he was undergoing were the means by which God was unmasking him to the view of men.

But, allowing that Job had been a bad man, the exhortations of Zophar were well calculated to enforce repentance and excite confidence in the Divine mercy. Zophar seems to have had a full conviction of the all-governing providence of God; and that those who served him with an honest and upright heart would be ever distinguished in the distribution of temporal good. He seems however to think that rewards and punishments were distributed in this life, and does not refer, at least very evidently, to a future state. Probably his information on subjects of divinity did not extend much beyond the grave; and we have much cause to thank God for a clearer dispensation. Deus nobis haec otia fecit. God grant that we may make a good use of it!