Job 30:29

_I AM A BROTHER TO DRAGONS, AND A COMPANION TO OWLS._ Dragons ... owls - rather, jackals, ostriches, both of which utter dismal screams (Micah 1:8); in which respect, as also in their living amidst solitudes, the emblem of desolation, Job is their brother and companion - i:e., resembles them. "Dragon," Hebrew Tannim, usually means the crocodile; so perhaps here, its open jaws lifted toward heaven, and its noise, making it seem as if it mourned over its fate (Bochart)....

15-31 Job complains a great deal. Harbouring hard thoughts of God was the sin which did, at this time, most easily beset Job. When inward temptations join with outward calamities, the soul is hurried as in a tempest, and is filled with confusion. But woe be to those who really have God for an enemy! Compared with the awful state of ungodly men, what are all outward, or even inward temporal afflictions? There is something with which Job comforts himself, yet it is but a little. He foresees that death will be the end of all his troubles. God's wrath might bring him to death; but his soul would be safe and happy in the world of spirits. If none pity us, yet our God, who corrects, pities us, even as a father pitieth his own children. And let us look more to the things of eternity: then the believer will cease from mourning, and joyfully praise redeeming love....

Verse Job 30:29. _I AM A BROTHER TO DRAGONS_] By my mournful and continual cry I resemble תנים _tannim_, the _jackals_ or _hyenas_. _AND A COMPANION TO OWLS._] בנות יענה _benoth yaanah_, to the _daughters of howling_: generally understood to be the _ostrich_; for both the _jackal_ and the _female ostrich_ are remarkable for their mournful cry, and for their attachment to desolate places.-_Dodd_....

I AM A BROTHER TO DRAGONS - That is, my loud complaints and cries resemble the doleful screams of wild animals, or of the most frightful monsters. The word “brother” is often used in this sense, to denote similarity in any respect. The word “dragons” here (תנין _tannı̂yn_), denotes properly a sea-monster, a great fish, a crocodile; or the fancied animal with wings called a dragon; see the notes at Isaiah 13:22. Gesenius, Umbreit, and Noyes, render this word here jackals - an animal between a dog and a fox, or a wolf and a fox; an animal that abounds in deserts and solitudes, and that makes a doleful cry in the night. So the Syriac renders it an animal resembling a dog; a wild dog. Castell. This idea agrees with the scope of the passage better than the common reference to a sea-monster or a crocodile. “The Deeb, or Jackal,” says

EXPOSITION JOB 30:1 The contrast is now completed. Having drawn the portrait of himself as he was, rich, honoured, blessed with children, flourishing, in favour with both God and man, Job now presents himself to us as he is, despised of men (verses 1-10), afflicted of God (verse 11), a prey to vague terrors (verse 15), tortured with bodily pains (verses 17, 18), cast off by God (verses 19, 20), with nothing but death to look for (verses 23-31). The chapter is the most touching in the whole book. JOB 30:1 BUT NOW THEY THAT ARE YOUNGER THAN I HAVE ME IN DERISION. As Job had been speaking last of the honour in which he was once held, he beans his contrast by chewing how at present he is disgraced and derided. Men who are outcasts and solitar

I AM A BROTHER TO DRAGONS, AND A COMPANION TO OWLS. Or ostriches, as the Targum, Septuagint, Vulgate Latin, Syriac, and Arabic versions; either he was obliged to dwell with such persons as were comparable to these creatures for their devouring words, hissing noise, and venomous speeches, or for want of compassion, and for their cruelty, as David is said to be among lions, Psalms 57:4; or also, he was like unto them, being solitary and alone, all his friends and acquaintance standing at a distance from him, as these creatures love lonesome and desolate places; or because of the wailing and howling noise they make, to which his mournful notes bore some resemblance, Micah 1:8; or because, when these creatures cry and howl, and make a noise, no mercy is shown to them, none pities or regards them; and so it wa

CHAPTER 30 _ 1. His present humiliation and shame (Job 30:1)_ 2. No answer from God: completely forsaken (Job 30:20) Job 30:1. He had spoken of his past greatness and now he describes his present misery. Ah! the bitterness if it--those younger than I have me in derision! Alas! through it all we hear nothing but pride. He scorns those who were so much beneath him. And those who were scourged out of the land, these children of fools and base men, mock him, the former prince among men. “I am become their song; I am a byword to them; they abhor me; they spit in my face.” Then he describes his affliction. “Days of affliction have taken hold upon me--the pains that gnaw me take no rest.” He is in the mire and has become

JOB 30. JOB'S PRESENT MISERY. As the text stands at present, Job begins by complaining that the very abjects of society now despise him. Many scholars, however, detach Job 30:2 as a misplaced section of the description of the outcasts, which we have already met in Job 24:5 f. When we look at the passage apart from Job 30:1, the impression it makes is not one of contempt for their abject condition, but of pity for their misery. Hence the greater part would have been better suited to one of Job's delineations of human wretchedness than to the picture he is painting of his own distress, from which he is diverted at a surprisingly early point (Peake). Duhm, followed by Strahan, treats...

I AM A BROTHER TO DRAGONS, &C.— _I am a brother to jackals, and a companion to ostriches._ See Bochart Hieroz. lib. 2: cap. 14. The _jackal_ and the _female ostrich_ are both remarkable for their mournful cry, and for their inhabiting desolate places....

c. The disappointment of all his hopes (Job 30:24-31) TEXT 30:24-31 24 HOWBEIT DOTH NOT ONE STRETCH OUT THE HAND IN HIS FALL: Or in his calamity therefore cry for help? 25 Did not I weep for him that was in trouble? Was not my soul grieved for the needy? 26 When I looked for good, then evil came; And when I waited for light, there came darkness. 27 My heart is troubled, and resteth not; Days of affliction are come upon me. 28 I go mourning without the sun: I stand up in the assembly, and cry for help. 29 I am a brother to jackals, And a companion to ostriches. 30 My skin is black, _and falleth_ FROM ME, And my bones are burned with heat. 31 Therefore is my harp _turned_ TO MOURNING, And my pipe into the voice of them that weep....