Thomas Aquinas Commentary Job 7:5-10

"My flesh is clothed with worms and clods of dust; My skin closeth up, and breaketh out afresh. My days are swifter than a weaver`s shuttle, And are spent without hope. Oh remember that my life is a breath: Mine eye shall no more see good. The eye of him that seeth me shall behold me no more; Thine eyes shall be upon me, but I shall not be. As the cloud is consumed and vanisheth away, So he that goeth down to Sheol shall come up no more. He shall return no more to his house, Neither shall his place know him any more." — Job 7:5-10 (ASV)

The blessed Job has previously demonstrated that the comfort Eliphaz offered, which promised happiness in this earthly life, was unsuitable. He first showed this based on the general condition of human life on earth. Now, he intends to demonstrate that this same comfort is unsuitable for his own individual condition.

He presents two points that prevent him from hoping for prosperity on earth. The first is the severe physical weakness he was suffering. When someone is afflicted by such weakness, nothing can happen to make them happy in this life. Thus, he says, Decay clothes my flesh, as if to say, “My body is covered on all sides with infectious sores, just as a body is covered by a garment.” Since wounds that are tended to from the beginning usually heal, he shows that his sores were neglected when he says, and the filth of dust. This is because they were not cared for properly, as he was literally sitting on a dung heap, as the text has already shown (Job 2:8).

A person might sometimes hope for health even if their sores are neglected, provided they have a strong constitution. But Job lacked this natural strength, and so he says, my skin is dried up and wrinkled, because its natural moisture had been exhausted, either by old age or by his weakness. Therefore, there seems to be no opportunity left in this life for him to expect any happiness.

The second point is that the greater part of his life was already past. Therefore, with so little time remaining, he could not hope for much happiness. For this reason, he says, My days have passed swifter than a warp is cut off by a weaver. Human life is, in a sense, like something woven. Just as a weaver joins thread to thread to produce a cloth, and then cuts it from the loom when it is finished, so days are added to days to complete a person's life. When a life is complete, it is taken away. Yet he says that a person's days pass more swiftly than the cloth is cut away, because while the weaver rests from time to time, the time of a person's life slips away continuously, without interruption.

But one might object that even though the greater part of his life has passed, Job could still hope to return to his former state. Some have advanced the theory that after death, once many years have passed, a person returns to the same stages of life they had lived before. For example, a future Plato will lecture in Athens and do the same things he did before. Therefore, even if a person has lived most of their life, they could hope to be restored to happiness in this earthly life.

To eliminate this possibility, Job continues, and they have vanished, leaving no hope behind—that is, no hope of returning to his former days. He had already seemed to address God when he said, The life of man on earth is combat (Job 7:1). Now, to prove his point, he adds, Remember that my life is but a breath, like the wind. For just as the wind passes by and does not return, so a person's life does not return once it has passed. He continues in this vein: and my eye will not turn back to look on good things—that is, the good things of the earth which he once possessed but has now lost.

Just as he will not return to see earthly goods after his life has passed, so too he will not be seen by any eyes on earth. Thus, he continues, Nor will the eye of man look on me. He presents these two points to show that he will not return to human society, which consists chiefly in seeing and being seen. Since sight is the most acute of the senses, it holds a primary position in our sensory life. Although he says that after death he will not be seen by human eyes, he confesses that he will be seen by God's eye, saying, Your eyes will be on me. For the dead are seen by God, who observes spiritual things, because the dead live according to the spirit, not according to the flesh, which is what humans can see with their eyes.

One could interpret this to mean that God's eyes consider the dead not in their present state, but with regard to future things, as if a dead person were going to return to the life they lost. Therefore, to exclude this possibility, he continues, and I shall not endure, as if to say, “I say that Your eyes will be on me after death, but I will not be present again in this earthly state.” He proves this with a comparison, adding, As a cloud dissolves and is gone, so he who goes down below, will not ascend. The dead are said to go down to the underworld either because, before the death of Christ, all souls descended to Sheol, or because their bodies are buried under the earth. The specific interpretation here does not change the meaning of the present text, for he only wants to say that the dead do not return to their past life, and he proves this with a sufficient comparison.

As Aristotle says in On Generation, a kind of circular motion appears in both corruptible and incorruptible bodies. But there is a difference. In heavenly bodies, the very same object returns in the circular motion; for example, the same sun that sets returns at dawn. This is because the substance is not corrupted in such a change; only its location changes. However, in the motion of generation and corruption, the same individual does not return, but only the same species. It is clear that corresponding to the sun's annual circular motion, a type of circulation occurs in the atmosphere. For instance, in winter there are clouds, which are later dispersed in the summer. When winter returns, clouds return—yet not the identical clouds, but only clouds of the same kind, because the previous clouds perished completely. The same is true of humans. The same individuals who formerly existed do not return through generation, but only others of the same species.

From this, the solution to the argument of those who proposed a return to the same life and the same actions becomes clear. They believed that earthly matters are arranged according to the motion of the heavenly spheres; therefore, they thought that when the same constellation returned after a very long time, the same individual things would also return. But, as has been said, it is not necessary that the same individuals return, but only things of the same kind. Those thinkers believed that after a certain span of time, a dead person not only returned to life but also possessed the same belongings and houses as before. To disprove this, Job says, He will never return home again. They also held that he would perform the same works he had done before and hold the same offices and dignities. To exclude this position, he adds, and his place will know him no more, meaning he will not return to his former position. Here, the term “place” refers to a person's status, in the same way we might say, “He has a great place in this community.”

It is clear from these verses that Job is not denying the resurrection that our faith affirms, but rather a return to this carnal life—a view held by some Jews and certain philosophers. Nor does this contradict the scriptural accounts that state some people were brought back to this present life. For the one is done miraculously, while the other occurs according to the natural course of things, and it is the latter that Job is addressing here. Consider also that in saying, Remember that my life is but a breath, he was not suggesting that God could forget. Instead, he was speaking hypothetically, putting himself in the position of his adversaries. For if God were to promise the good things of this earthly life to a man whose life has, so to speak, already passed, it would almost seem as if God had forgotten that human life passes away like the wind, never to return.