Charles Ellicott Commentary Job 30:2

"Yea, the strength of their hands, whereto should it profit me? Men in whom ripe age is perished." — Job 30:2 (ASV)

To what purpose might the strength of their hands profit me? This is the description of the fathers; Job 30:3 and following describes their children.

The people spoken of here seem to have been somewhat similar to those known to the ancients as Troglodytes (Herodotus 4.183, etc.). These were inhabitants of caves who lived an outcast life and had their own manners and customs.

They are desolate with want and famine. They flee into the wilderness when facing impending barrenness and desolation, or when all is dark (like last night), waste, and desolate.

It is evident that Job must have been familiar with a people of this kind: an alien and proscribed race, living in the way he describes.