Albert Barnes Commentary Job 7:3

Albert Barnes Commentary

Job 7:3

1798–1870
Presbyterian
Albert Barnes
Albert Barnes

Albert Barnes Commentary

Job 7:3

1798–1870
Presbyterian
SCRIPTURE

"So am I made to possess months of misery, And wearisome nights are appointed to me." — Job 7:3 (ASV)

So am I made to possess - The Hebrew is: "I am made to inherit." The meaning is that such sad and melancholy seasons were now his only portion.

Months of vanity - That is, months which were destitute of comfort; in other words, months of affliction.

How long his trials had continued before this, we have no means of ascertaining. There is no reason, however, to suppose that his bodily sufferings came upon him all at once, or that they had not continued for a considerable period. It is quite probable that his expressions of impatience were the result not only of the intensity, but also the continuance of his sorrows.

And wearisome nights are appointed to me - Even his rest was disturbed. The time when care is usually forgotten and toil ceases, was to him a period of sleepless anxiety and distress - עמל ‛ âmâl. The Septuagint renders it, "nights of pangs" (νύκτες ὀδυνῶν nuktes odunōn), expressing accurately the sense of the Hebrew. The Hebrew word עמל ‛ âmâl is commonly applied to intense sorrow, to trouble and pain of the severest kind, such as the pains of parturition; see the notes on Isaiah 53:11.