Albert Barnes Commentary Job 17:14

"If I have said to corruption, Thou art my father; To the worm, [Thou art] my mother, and my sister;" — Job 17:14 (ASV)

I have said—Margin, cried, or called. The sense is, “I say,” or “I thus address the grave.”

To corruption—The word used here (שׁחת shachath) properly means a pit, or pitfall (Psalms 7:15; Psalms 9:15); a cistern, or a ditch (Job 9:31); or the sepulchre, or grave (Psalms 30:9; Job 33:18, 30).

The Septuagint renders it here by θανάτον thanaton—death. Jerome (Vulgate) renders it putredini dixi. According to Gesenius (Lexicon), the word never has the sense of corruption. Schultens, however, Rosenmuller, and others, understand it in the sense of corruption or putrefaction.

This interpretation certainly accords with the other hemistich and better constitutes a parallelism with the word ‘worm’ than the word ‘grave’ would. It seems probable that this is the sense here; and if the proper meaning of the word is a pit, or the grave, it here denotes the grave as containing a dead and mouldering body.

You are my father—“I am nearly allied to it. I have a relationship with it like that of a child to a father.” The idea seems to be that of family likeness, and the object is to present the most striking and impressive view of his sad and sorrowful condition. He was so diseased, so wretched, so full of sores and of corruption , that he might be said to be the child of one mouldering in the grave, and was kindred to a family in the tomb!

To the worm—The worm that feeds upon the dead. He belonged to that sad family where the body was putrefying, and where it was covered with worms (see the notes at Isaiah 14:11).

My mother—I am so nearly allied to the worms that the connection may be compared to that between a mother and her son.

And my sister—“The sister here is mentioned rather than the brother, because the noun rendered ‘worm’ in Hebrew is in the feminine gender,” according to Rosenmuller.

The sense of the whole is that Job felt he belonged to the grave. He was destined for corruption. He was soon to lie down with the dead. His acquaintances and kindred were there. So corrupt was his body, so afflicted and diseased, that he seemed to belong to the family of the putrefying and of those covered with worms!

What an impressive description, and yet how true it is of all! The most vigorous frame, the most beautiful and graceful form, the most brilliant complexion, has a near relationship to the worm and will soon belong to the mouldering family beneath the ground! Christian reader! Such are you; such am I. Well, let it be so.

Let us not be discontented. Let the grave be our home; let the mouldering people there be our parents, and brothers, and sisters. Let our alliance be with the worms. There is a brighter scene beyond—a world where we shall be kindred with the angels, and ranked among the sons of God. In that world we shall be clothed with immortal youth, and shall know corruption no more. Then our eyes will shine with undiminished brilliance forever; our cheeks glow with immortal health; our hearts beat with the pulsations of eternal life.

Then our hands shall no longer be feeble, nor our knees totter with disease or age; and then the current of health and joy shall flow on through our veins forever and ever! Allied now to worms we are, but we are allied to the angels too; the grave is to be our home, but so also is heaven; the worm is our brother, but so also is the Son of God! Such is man; such are his prospects here, such his hopes and destiny in the world to come. He dies here, but he lives in glory and honor hereafter forever.

Shall man, O God of light and life,
Forever moulder in the grave?
Can You forget Your glorious work,
Your promise and Your power to save?
Shall life revisit dying worms,
And spread the joyful insect’s wing;
And O shall man awake no more,
To see Your face, Your name to sing?
Faith sees the bright, eternal doors,
Unfold to make a way for her children;
They shall be clothed with endless life,
And shine in everlasting day.
The trumpet shall sound, the dead shall wake,
From the cold tomb the slumberers spring;
Through heaven with joy these myriads rise,
And hail their Savior and their King.

Dr. Dwight