Job 21:7

Wherefore do the wicked live, become old, yea, are mighty in power?

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Benson Commentary

Job 21:7. Wherefore do the wicked live? — That is, long and happily: become old? — Namely, in their prosperous state: yea, are mighty in power? — Are preferred to places of authority and trust, and not only make a great figure, but bear a great sway? Now, if things be as you say, how comes this to pass? Wherefore does the righteous God distribute things so unequally? “The description, which follows, of a prosperous estate is such as might, indeed, justly create envy, were a wicked man, in any state, to be envied; for we have here the chief ingredients of human happiness, as it respects this life, brought together and described in terms exactly suiting the simplicity of manners, and the way of living in Job’s time and country, as, first, security and safety to themselves and families; Job 21:9. Their houses are safe from fear — Of the incursions of robbers, we may suppose, or the depredations of the neighbouring clans, so usual in those ancient times, and of which Job had felt the mischievous effects. Next health, or a freedom from diseases, called in the language of that age, the rod of God. See 1 Samuel 26:10. To this is added plenty of cattle, the riches of those times; Job 21:10. Next comes a numerous and hopeful offspring; and what a rural picture has he drawn of them! Job 21:11. They send forth their little ones like a flock — Of sheep or goats, as the word signifies, in great numbers, and with sweet concord, which is a singular delight to them and their parents. They take the timbrel and harp, and rejoice at the sound of the pipe; Job 21:12. Lastly, and to crown all, after a prosperous and pleasant life comes an easy death. They spend their days in wealth, and in a moment go down to the grave — That is, their days pass on in a continual flow of prosperity, till they drop into the grave without a groan. As every thing in this divine poem is wonderful, there is scarce any thing more to be admired in it than the variety of descriptions which are given us of human life, in its most exalted prosperity, on the one hand, and its deepest distress on the other: for this is what their subject led them to enlarge upon on both sides; with this only difference, that the three friends were for limiting prosperity to the good, whereas Job insists upon a mixed distribution of things from the hand of Providence; but as all of them, in every speech almost, enlarge upon one or other of these topics, the variety of imagery and colouring in which they paint to us these different estates, all drawn from nature, and suiting the simplicity of those ancient times, is inexpressibly amusing and entertaining: then their being considered as the dispensations of Providence, and it being represented that we can receive neither good nor evil but from God, the judge of all, a point acknowledged on both hands, is what renders these descriptions interesting and affecting to us in the highest degree; and the whole affords no contemptible argument of the antiquity of the book. See Peters and Dodd.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

21:7-16 Job says, Remarkable judgments are sometimes brought upon notorious sinners, but not always. Wherefore is it so? This is the day of God's patience; and, in some way or other, he makes use of the prosperity of the wicked to serve his own counsels, while it ripens them for ruin; but the chief reason is, because he will make it appear there is another world. These prospering sinners make light of God and religion, as if because they have so much of this world, they had no need to look after another. But religion is not a vain thing. If it be so to us, we may thank ourselves for resting on the outside of it. Job shows their folly.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

Wherefore do the wicked live? - Job comes now to the main design of his argument in this chapter, to show that it is a fact, that the wicked often have great prosperity; that they are not treated in this life according to their character; and that it is not a fact that men of eminent wickedness, as his friends maintained, would meet, in this life, with proportionate sufferings. He says, that the fact is, that they enjoy great prosperity; that they live to a great age; and that they are surrounded with the comforts of life in an eminent degree. The meaning is, "If you are positive that the wicked are treated according to their character in this life - that great wickedness is followed by great judgments, how is it to be accounted for that they live, and grow old, and are mighty in power?" Job assumes the fact to be so, and proceeds to argue as if that were indisputable. It is remarkable, that the fact was not adverted to at an earlier period of the debate. It would have done much to settle the controversy. The "question," "Why do the wicked live?" is one of great importance at all times, and one which it is natural to ask, but which it is not even yet always easy to answer. "Some" points are clear, and may be easily suggested. They are such as these - They live

(1) to show the forbearance and long suffering of God;

(2) to furnish a full illustration of the character of the human heart;

(3) to afford them ample space for repentance, so that there shall not be the semblance of a ground of complaint when they are called before God, and are condemned;

(4) because God intends to make some of them the monuments of his mercy, and more fully to display the riches of his grace in their conversion, as he did in the case of Paul, Augustine, John Bunyan, and John Newton;

(5) they may be preserved to be the instruments of his executing some important purpose by them, as was the case with Pharaoh, Sennacherib, and Nebuchadnezzar; or,

(6) he keeps them, that the great interests of society may be carried on; that the affairs of the commercial and the political world may be forwarded by their skill and talent.

For some, or all of these purposes, it may be, the wicked are kept in the land of the living, and are favored with great external prosperity, while many a Christian is oppressed, afflicted, and crushed to the dust. Of the "fact," there can be no doubt; of the "reasons" for the fact, there will be a fuller development in the future world than there can be now.

Become old - The friends of Job had maintained that the wicked would be cut off. Job, on the other hand, affirms that they live on to old age. The "fact" is, that many of the wicked are cut off for their sins in early life, but that some live on to an extreme old age. The argument of Job is founded on the fact, that "any" should live to old age, as, according to the principles of his friends, "all" were treated in this life according to their character.

Yea, are mighty in power - Or, rather, "in wealth" - חיל chayı̂l. Jerome, "Are comforted in riches" - "confortatique divitiis." So the Septuagint, ἐν πλούτῳ en ploutō. The idea is, that they become very rich.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

7. The answer is Ro 2:4; 1Ti 1:16; Ps 73:18; Ec 8:11-13; Lu 2:35-end; Pr 16:4; Ro 9:22.

old—in opposition to the friends who asserted that sinners are "cut off" early (Job 8:12, 14).

Matthew Poole's Commentary

He expostulates this matter partly with his friends, If things be as you say, how comes this to pass, &c? partly with God himself, Wherefore doth the righteous God distribute things so unequally?

The wicked live, to wit, long and happily; as living is oft taken, as Leviticus 18:5 1 Samuel 10:24 25:6 Psalm 38:19; a painful and afflicted life being a kind of death, and oft so called, as Deu 30:15,19 Pr 15:10 19:16 1 Corinthians 3:22 15:31.

Become old, to wit, in their prosperous estate.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

Wherefore do the wicked live,.... Which question is put either to God himself, as not knowing ow to account for it, or to reconcile it to his divine perfections; that he, a holy, just, and righteous Being, should suffer such wretches to live upon his earth, who had been, and still were, continually sinning against him, transgressing his law, and trampling under foot his power and authority; when he, a man that feared the Lord, as God himself had borne witness of him, laboured under such heavy affliction, that he seemed rather to die than live: or else it is put to his friends, to whom he appeals for the truth of it, as Zophar had to him, about the short time of the prosperity of the wicked, Job 10:4; and desires them to try how they could make such undeniable facts comport with their own principles, that wicked men are always and only afflicted to any great degree, and not holy and good men; but if so, it is asked, why do they "live", even live at all? why is not their breath stopped at once, that breathe out nothing but sin and wickedness? or why are they "lively?" as Mr. Broughton renders the word; that is, brisk, cheerful, and jocund, live merrily, having an abundance of this world's good things; call upon themselves to eat, drink, and be merry, and indulge themselves in all the gratifications of sensual pleasures and delights; live at ease, in peace and outward comfort, and are not in trouble as other men, having nothing to disturb, disquiet, and distress them; nay, not only live comfortably, but live long: while a righteous man perishes or dies in his righteousness, the wicked man prolongs his life in his wickedness, Ecclesiastes 7:15, as it follows:

become old; live to a considerable old age, as Ishmael did, to whom he may have respect, as well as to some others within his knowledge; or are "durable" (n), not only in age, as the sinner is supposed to die, and sometimes does die an hundred years old, or more, but in wealth and riches, in outward prosperity; for though spiritual riches are only durable riches, in opposition to temporal ones, yet these sometimes endure with a wicked man, and he endures with them as long as he lives, as may be seen in the instances of wicked rich men in Luke 12:16; with which agrees what follows:

yea, are mighty in power? are in great authority among men, being kings, princes, civil magistrates, see Psalm 37:35; are advanced to great dignity and honour, as the twelve princes that sprung from Ishmael, and the race of kings and dukes that came from Esau. Mr. Broughton renders it, "be mighty in riches", greatly increase in them; and so the Targum, possess substance or riches.

(n) "durant", Mercerus, Cocceius, Michaelis; "edurant", Schultens.

Geneva Study Bible

Wherefore do the wicked {d} live, become old, yea, are mighty in power?

(d) Job proves against his adversaries that God does not punish the wicked immediately, but often gives them long life and prosperity, so we must not judge God just or unjust by the things that appear to our eyes.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

7. Wherefore do the wicked live] The question scarcely means, How is it, if your principles be true, that the wicked live? Job’s mind is engrossed with the great problem itself, and he asks, Why in the government of a righteous God do the wicked live? They not only live, they live to old age, and wax mighty in the earth.

7–16. The mystery is, Why do the wicked prosper? They live long, they see their children grow up, and their homes are peaceful (Job 21:7-9). Their cattle thrives (Job 21:10). Their children and they pass a mirthful life with music and dance (Job 21:11-12). And with no pain at last they die, though they had openly renounced God (Job 21:13-15). Yet it is God who bestows this prosperity upon them (Job 21:16).

7–21. This great mystery of the prosperity of the wicked in God’s providence Job now unfolds on both its sides: first, they and all belonging to them prosper, and they die in peace, although in conscious godlessness they bade the Almighty depart from them, Job 21:7-16; and second, negatively, examples of calamity befalling them are few, Job 21:17-21.

Pulpit Commentary

Verse 7. - Wherefore do the wicked live, become old, yea, are mighty in power? Job asks for an explanation of the facts which his own experience has impressed upon him. He has seen that "the wicked live" quite as long as the righteous, that in many cases they attain to a ripe old age, and become among the powerful of the earth. The great "pyramid kings" of Egypt, whose cruel oppressions were remembered down to the time of Herodotus (Herod., 2:124-128), reigned respectively, according to Egyptian tradition, sixty-three and sixty-six years(Manetho ap. Euseb., 'Chronicles Can.,' pars 2.). Rameses II., the cruel oppressor of the Jews, and the Pharaoh from whom Moses fled, had a reign of sixty-seven years ('Hist. of Ancient Egypt,' vol. 2. p. 301). Job 21:7

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

7 Wherefore do the wicked live,

Become old, yea, become mighty in power?

8 Their posterity is established before them about them,

And their offspring before their eyes.

9 Their houses have peace without fear,

And the rod of Eloah cometh not upon them.

10 His (the evil-doer's) bull gendereth and faileth not;

His cow calveth easily, and casteth not her calf.

11 They let their little ones run about as a flock,

And their children jump about.

The question in Job 21:7 is the same as that which Jeremiah also puts forth, Job 12:1-3. It is the antithesis of Zophar's thesis, Job 20:5, and seeks the reason of the fact established by experience which had also well-nigh proved the ruin of Asaph (Psalm 73:comp. Malachi 3:13-15), viz., that the ungodly, far from being overtaken by the punishment of their godlessness, continued in the enjoyment of life, that they attain to old age, and also a proportionately increasing power and wealth. The verb עתק, which in Job 14:18; Job 18:4 (comp. the Hiph. Job 9:5; Job 32:15), we read in the signification promoveri, has here, like the Arabic ‛ataqa, ‛atuqa, the signification to become old, aetate provehi; and גּבר חיל, to become strong in property, is a synonym of השׂגּה חיל, to acquire constantly increasing possessions, used in a similar connection in Psalm 73:12. The first feature in the picture of the prosperity of the wicked, which the pang of being bereft of his own children brings home to Job, is that they are spared the same kind of loss: their posterity is established (נכון, constitutus, elsewhere standing in readiness, Job 12:5; Job 15:23; Job 18:12, here standing firm, as e.g., Psalm 93:2) in their sight about them (so that they have to mourn neither their loss by death nor by separation from their home), and their offspring (צאצאים, a word common only to the undisputed as well as to the disputed prophecies of Isaiah and the book of Job) before their eyes; נכון must be carried over to Job 21:8 as predicate: they are, without any loss, before their eyes. The description passes over from the children, the corner-stones of the house (vid., Ges. Thes., s.v. בנה), to the houses themselves. It is just as questionable here as in Job 5:24; Isaiah 41:3, and elsewhere, whether שׁלום is a subst. ( equals בשׁלום) or an adj.; the substantival rendering is at least equally admissible in such an elevated poetic speech, and the plur. subject בּתּיהם, which, if the predicate were intended to be taken as an adj., leads one to expect שׁלומים, decides in its favour. On מפּחד, without (far from) terrifying misfortune, as Isaiah 22:3, מקשׁת, without a bow, vid., on Job 19:26. That which is expressed in Job 21:9, according to external appearance, is in Job 21:9 referred to the final cause; Eloah's שׁבט, rod, with which He smites in punishment (Job 9:34; Job 37:13, comp. Isaiah 10:24-26, where שׁוט, scourge, interchanges with it), is not over them, i.e., threatens and smites them not.

Job 21:10 comes specially to the state of the cattle, after the state of the household in general has been treated of. Since שׁורו and פּרתו are interchangeable, and are construed according to their genus, the former undoubtedly is intended of the male, not also epikoi'noos of the female (lxx ἡ βοῦς, Jerome, Saadia), as Rosenm., after Bochart, believes it must be taken, because `br is never said de mare feminam ineunte, but always de femina quae concipit. In reality, however, it is with עבר otherwise than with עדה, whose Pael and Aphel certainly signify concipere (prop. transmittere sc. semen in a passive sense). On the other hand, עבר, even in Kal, signifies to be impregnated (whence עובר, the embryo, and the biblical אבוּר, like the extra-biblical עבּוּר, the produce of the land), the Pael consequently to impregnate, whence מעבּרא (from the part. pass. מעבּר) impregnated (pregnant), the Ithpa. to be impregnated, as Rabb. Pual מעבּרת, impregnated (by which עברת also signifies pregnant, which would be hardly possible if עבר in this sexual sense were not radically distinct from עבר, περ-ᾶν). Accordingly the Targ. translates עבּר by מבטין (impraegnans), and Gecatilia translates שׁורו by Arab. fḥlhm (admissarius eorum), after which nearly all Jewish expositors explain. This explanation also suits לא יגעל, which lxx translates οὐκ οὀμοτόκησε (Jer. non abortivit), Symm. in a like sense οὐκ ἐξέτρωσε, Aq. οὐκ εξέβαλε, Saad. la julziq. The reference of שׁורו to the female animal everywhere assumed is incorrect; on the contrary, the bullock kept for breeding is the subject; but proceeding from this, that which is affirmed is certainly referred to the female animal. For גּעל signifies to cast out, cast away; the Hiph. therefore: to cause to cast out; Rabb. in the specified signification: so to heat what has sucked in that which is unclean, that it gives it back or lets it go (לפלוט הבלוע). Accordingly Raschi explains: "he injects not useless seed into her, which might come back and be again separated (נפלט) from her inward part, without impregnation taking place." What therefore עבּר says positively, ולא יגעיל says negatively: neque efficit ut ejiciat.

(Note: The Aruch under גּעל, quotes a passage of the Tosefta: מוזרות נפשׁ היפה תאכלם גיעולי ביצים מותרים באכילה, the cast away (Wrflinge) eggs (i.e., such as have fallen away from the hen from a stroke on the tail of some other cause, and which are not completely formed) are allowed as food; he may eat them who does not loathe them.)

It is then further, in Job 21:9, said of the female animal which has been impregnated that she does not allow it to glide away, i.e., the fruit, therefore that she brings forth (פּלּט as מלּט, המליט), and that she does not cause or suffer any untimely birth.

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