Job 20:7

_YET HE SHALL PERISH FOR EVER LIKE HIS OWN DUNG: THEY WHICH HAVE SEEN HIM SHALL SAY, WHERE IS HE?_ Dung - in contrast to the haughtiness of the sinner (Job 20:6); this strong term expresses disgust and the lowest degradation (Psalms 83:10; 1 Kings 14:10)....

1-9 Zophar's discourse is upon the certain misery of the wicked. The triumph of the wicked and the joy of the hypocrite are fleeting. The pleasures and gains of sin bring disease and pain; they end in remorse, anguish, and ruin. Dissembled piety is double iniquity, and the ruin that attends it will be accordingly....

Verse Job 20:7. _HE SHALL PERISH FOR EVER_] He is _dust_, and shall return to the dust from which he was taken. Zophar here hints his disbelief in that doctrine, the resurrection of the body, which Job had so solemnly asserted in the preceding chapter. Or he might have been like some in the present day, who believe that the wicked shall be annihilated, and the bodies of the righteous only be raised from the dead; but I know of no scripture by which such a doctrine is confirmed. _LIKE HIS OWN DUNG_] His reputation shall be abominable, and his putrid carcass shall resemble his own excrement. A speech that partakes as much of the malevolence as of the asperity of Zophar's spirit....

EXPOSITION JOB 20:1 Zophar's second speech is even more harsh than his first (Job 11:1.). He adds coarseness and rudeness to his former vehement hostility (Job 20:7, Job 20:15). His whole discourse is a covert denunciation of Job as a wicked man and a hypocrite (verses 5, 12, 19, 29), deservedly punished by God for a life of crime. He ends by prophesying Job's violent death, the destruction of his house, and the rising up of heaven and earth in witness against him (verses 24-28). JOB 20:1,...

[YET] HE SHALL PERISH FOR EVER LIKE HIS OWN DUNG,.... Not only in this world, but in the world to come, both in his outward substance here, and in his body in the grave, and in his soul to all eternity, and that in the most shameful and disgraceful manner; he shall perish in his own corruption, and like his own dung inevitably, which is never returned to its place again: dead bodies were reckoned by the ancients as dung, and the carcasses of men are rather to be cast out than dung i; and the Arabians used, to bury in dunghills even their kings k; to which some l think the allusion is: THEY WHICH HAVE SEEN HIM SHALL SAY, WHERE [IS] HE? such as formerly gazed at him, in his prosperity, with wonder and amazement at his grandeur and greatness, now being removed from his outward splendour, or from the world, by death, ask where he is, not being able to see him in his former lustre, nor in th...

CHAPTER 20 THE SECOND ADDRESS OF ZOPHAR _ 1. Zophar's swift reply (Job 20:1)_ 2. Another description of the life and fate of the wicked (Job 20:4) Job 20:1. Zophar, the twitterer, begins his reply to Job with impatient haste. Job's words, probably those found in chapter 19:2-3, and the last two verses, have made him angry. He boils over with indignation. He is ready now to confirm the testimony already given and wound the suffering servant of God still more. Job 20:4. He follows the same path and there is again nothing new in his argument. The description of the wicked is great; no fault can be found with what he says about those who

JOB 20. SECOND SPEECH OF ZOPHAR. Zophar helps the return to the wider problem by appearing once more with a strong doctrine as to the shortness of the prosperity of the wicked. His theme is, Sin brings its own reward. JOB 20:1. Zophar replies to Job's exasperating words (Job 19:1). In Job 20:2 b _mg._ is probably to be followed. In Job 20:3 b Duhm, on the basis of LXX, reads, and with wind void of understanding thou answerest me. JOB 20:4. The portion of the wicked. How short is his joy, how utter his destruction! In...

The prosperity of the wicked is brief 4. _Knowest thou not this old_ i. e. knowest thou not this to be or to have been of old, lit. _from for ever_. "This" which is from of old and from the time man has been upon the earth is the fact that the felicity of the wicked is brief (Job 20:5). On "hypocrite" see ch. Job 8:13....

DISCOURSE: 470 AGAINST HYPOCRISY Job 20:4. _Knowest thou not this of old, since man was placed upon earth, that the triumphing of the wicked is short, and the joy of the hypocrite but for a moment? Though his excellency mount up to the heavens, and his head reach unto the clouds; yet he shall perish for ever like his own dung: they which have seen him shall say, Where is he?_ PREJUDICE or passion will miserably warp the judgment. It will hide from us what we might know, and cause us to pervert what we do know. Never was this more strongly exemplified than in the friends of Job. Had they calmly considered, they might have comforted him in his affliction; but, by a hasty misapplication of acknowledged truths, they most unjustly and cruelly condemned him. Job had hinted to them the evil and danger of their conduct [Note:...

KNOWEST THOU NOT, &C.— The latter clause of Job 20:4 might as well have been rendered, _Since Adam was placed on the earth._ There is no reason to doubt but that this passage refers to the fall, and the first sin of man; the date agrees; for the knowledge here taught is said to arise from facts as old as the _first placing man upon earth:_ the sudden punishment of the iniquity corresponds to the Mosaic account; _the triumphing of the wicked is short, his joy but for a moment._ Above all, the nature of the crime, and of the punishment here described, are strong presumptions on this side: Adam's ambition was, _to be like God,_ and he had the tempter's word to assure him that he should be so: how aptly is this ambition described in the passage before us: _Though his excellency mount up to the heavens, and his head reach unto the clouds!_ that is, as the Syriac and Arabic ver