Job 3:10 Komentář

"You have heard of the patience of Job," says the apostle, Jam 5:11. So we have, and of his impatience too. We wondered that a man should be so patient as he was (ch. 1 and Job 2:1-13), but we wonder also that a good man should be so impatient as he is in this chapter, where we find him cursing his day, and, in passion, I. Complaining that he was born (Job 3:1-10). II. Complaining that he did not die as soon as he was born (Job 3:11-19). III. Complaining that his life was now continued when he was in misery (Job 3:20-26). In this it must be owned that Job sinned with his lips, and it is written, not for our imitation, but our admonition, that he who things he stands may take heed lest he fall.

INTRODUCTION TO JOB 3 In this chapter we have an account of Job's cursing the day of his birth, and the night of his conception; Job 3:1; first the day, to which he wishes the most extreme darkness, Job 3:4; then the night, to which he wishes the same and that it might be destitute of all joy, and be cursed by others as well as by himself, Job 3:6; The reasons follow, because it did not prevent his coming into the world, and because he died not on it, Job 3:10; which would, as he judged, have been an happiness to him; and this he illustrates by the still and quiet state of the dead, the company they are with, and their freedom from all trouble, oppression, and bondage, Job 3:13; but however, since it was otherwise with him, he desires his life might not be prolonged, and expostulates about the continuance of it, Job 3:20; and this by reason of his present troubles, which were many and great, and came upon him as he feared they would, and which had made him uneasy in his prosperity, Job 3:24.

Because it shut not up the doors of my mother's womb,.... Or "of my belly" (m), or "womb"; which Aben Ezra interprets of the navel, by which the infant receives its food and nourishment before it is born, and which, if closed, he must have died in embryo; but rather it is to be understood of his mother's womb, called his, because he was conceived and bore in it, and was brought forth from it; and the sense is, that he complains of the night, either that it did not close his mother's womb, and hinder the conception of him, as Gersom, Sephorno, Bar Tzemach, and others, and is the usual sense of the phrase of closing the womb, and which is commonly ascribed to God, Gen 20:17 Sa1 1:5; which Job here attributes to the night, purposely avoiding to make mention of the name of God, that he might not seem to complain of him, or directly point at him; or else the blame laid on that night is, that it did not so shut up the doors of his mother's womb, that he might not have come out from thence into the world, wishing that had been his grave, and his mother always big with him, as Jarchi, and which sense is favoured by Jer 20:17; a wish cruel to his mother, as well as unnatural to himself: nor hid sorrow from mine eyes; which it would have done, had it done that which is complained of it did not; had it he could not have perceived it experimentally, endured the sorrows and afflictions he did from the Chaldeans and Sabeans, from Satan, his wife, and friends; and had never known the trouble of loss of substance, children, and health, and felt those pains of body and anguish of mind he did; these are the reasons of his cursing the day of his birth, and the night of his conception. (m) "ventris mei", Mercerus, Piscator, Schmidt, Schuitens, Michaelis; "uteri mei", Pagninus, Montanus, Junius & Tremellius, Cocceius.

ALLEGORICAL INTERPRETATION. Because it shut not up the doors of my mother's womb, nor hid sorrow from mine eyes. What the womb of his mother is to each individual man, that the primary abode in Paradise became to the whole human race. For from it came forth the family of man as it were from the womb, and tending to the increase of the race, as if to the growth of the body, it issued forth without. There our conception was cemented, where the Man, the origin of mankind, had his abode, but the serpent opened the mouth of this womb, in that by his cunning persuading he broke asunder the decree of heaven in man's heart. The serpent opened the mouth of this womb, in that he burst the barriers of the mind which were fortified with admonitions from above. Let the holy man then in the punishment which he suffers, cast the eyes of his mind far back to the sin. Let him mourn for this, which the neglect of darkness, that is, the dark suggestions of our old enemy lodged in man's mind; for this, that man's mind consented to his cunning suggestions to his own betrayal, and let him say, Because it shut not up the doors of my mother's womb, nor hid sorrow from mine eyes. Nor let this disturb us, that he complains that he only did not shut up, whom he abhors for having opened the gate of Paradise. For 'he opened,' he calls shut not up; and 'he entailed it,' nor hid sorrow from me. For he would as it were have 'hid sorrow,' if he had kept quiet, and have 'shut up,' if he had forborne from bursting in. For he is weighing well who it is he speaks of, and he reckons that it would have been as if the evil spirit had bestowed gains upon us if he had only not entailed losses upon our heads. Thus we say of robbers that they give their prisoners their lives, if they do not take them.

MORAL INTERPRETATION. Because it shut not up the doors of my mother's womb, nor took away sorrow from mine eyes. As has been likewise remarked above, the words, it shut not up, are 'it opened,' and it took not away, 'it brought upon me.' So that this night, i.e. sin, opened the door of the womb, in that to man, conceived unto sin, it unsealed the lust of concupiscence, whereof the Prophet says, Enter thou into thy chambers, and shut thy doors. For we 'enter our chambers,' when we go into the recesses of our own hearts. And we 'shut the doors,' when we restrain forbidden lusts; and so whereas our consent set open these doors of carnal concupiscence, it forced us to the countless evils of our corrupt state. And so now we henceforth groan under the weight of mortality, though we came thereunto by our own free will, in that the justice of the sentence against us requires thus much, that what we have done willingly, we should bear with against our will.

But since what he had said seemed impossible, namely, for day and dawn not to succeed night, he shows how his words should be interpreted saying, "because it did not shut the doors of my mother's womb." For the life of man is a hidden life in the womb of his mother, and so is compared to the darkness of night. However, when one appears in the open in birth, then it is like bright day. For this reason he said that night should not be followed by either dawn or by day to show that he wanted his conception to come never to birth or to childhood, which is understood by dawn, or youth which is designated the full light of day. He says, "Because it did not shut the doors of my mother's womb," not because this night should close the womb, that is, prevent his birth, but because this is done at night. For from conception itself, an impediment can stand out which does not allow conception to issue into birth. But since it also seems irrational for someone to detest life, when being and living are desirable for all, he shows the reason why he has said this. "Nor hide trouble from my eyes," as if to say: I do not detest living because of life itself, but from the evil which I suffer. For although life itself is desirable, yet a life subject to misery is not. Here note that everything which he has said in metaphor above, he clarifies plainly in the final clause, a principle which will be observed in his other discourses.

Every thing has its time and season, Ecc 3:1-8. Men are exercised with labor, Ecc 3:9, Ecc 3:10. Every thing is beautiful in its season, Ecc 3:11. Men should enjoy thankfully the gifts of God, Ecc 3:12, Ecc 3:13. What God does is for ever, Ecc 3:14. There is nothing new, Ecc 3:15. The corruption of judgment; but the judgments of God are right, Ecc 3:16, Ecc 3:17. Man is brutish, and men and brutes die in like manner, Ecc 3:18-21. Man may enjoy the fruit of his own labors, Ecc 3:22.

Because it shut not up the doors - Here is the reason why he curses the day and the night in which he was conceived and born; because, had he never been brought into existence, he would never have seen trouble. It seems, however, very harsh that he should have wished the destruction of his mother, in order that his birth might have been prevented; and I rather think Job's execration did not extend thus far. The Targum understands the passage as speaking of the umbilical cord, by which the fetus is nourished in its mother's womb: had this been shut up, there must have been a miscarriage, or he must have been dead born; and thus sorrow would have been hidden from his eyes. This seeming gloss is much nearer the letter and spirit of the Hebrew than is generally imagined. I shall quote the words: כי לא סגר דלתי בטני ki lo sagar dalthey bitni, because it did not shut up the doors of my belly. This is much more consistent with the feelings of humanity, than to wish his mother's womb to have been his grave.

JOB CURSES THE DAY OF HIS BIRTH AND WISHES FOR DEATH. (Job 3:1-19) opened his mouth--The Orientals speak seldom, and then sententiously; hence this formula expressing deliberation and gravity (Psa 78:2). He formally began. cursed his day--the strict Hebrew word for "cursing:" not the same as in Job 1:5. Job cursed his birthday, but not his God.

10 Because it did not close the doors of my mother's womb, Nor hid sorrow from my eyes. 11 Why did I not die from the womb, Come forth from the womb and expire? 12 Why have the knees welcomed me? And why the breasts, that I should suck? The whole strophe contains strong reason for his cursing the night of his conception or birth. It should rather have closed (i.e., make the womb barren, to be explained according to Sa1 1:5; Gen 16:2) the doors of his womb (i.e., the womb that conceived concepit him), and so have withdrawn the sorrow he now experiences from his unborn eyes (on the extended force of the negative, vid., Ges. 152, 3). Then why, i.e., to what purpose worth the labour, is he then conceived and born? The four questions, Job 3:11., form a climax: he follows the course of his life from its commencement in embryo (מרהם, to be explained according to Jer 20:17, and Job 10:18, where, however, it is מן local, not as here, temporal) to the birth, and from the joy of his father who took the new-born child upon his knees (comp. Gen 50:23) to the first development of the infant, and he curses this growing life in its four phases (Arnh., Schlottm.). Observe the consecutio temp. The fut. אמוּת has the signification moriebar, because taken from the thought of the first period of his conception and birth; so also ואגוע, governed by the preceding perf., the signification et exspirabam (Ges. 127, 4, c). Just so אינק, but modal, ut sugerem ea.