Job 14:11

11 Like rivers that stop running, and lakes that go dry,

Job 14:11 Meaning and Commentary

Job 14:11

[As] the waters fail from the sea
the words may be rendered either without the as, and denote dissimilitude, and the sense be, that the waters go from the sea and return again, as with the tide:

and the flood decays and dries up;
and yet is supplied again with water: "but man lieth down, and riseth not again", ( Job 14:12 ) ; or else with the as, and express likeness; as the waters when they fail from the sea, or get out of lakes, and into another channel, never return more; and as a flood, occasioned by the waters of a river overflowing its banks, never return into it more; so man, when he dies, never returns to this world any more. The Targum restrains this to the Red sea, and the parting of that and the river Jordan, and the drying up of that before the ark of the Lord, and the return of both to their places again.

Job 14:11 In-Context

9 with water it will sprout like a young plant.

10 But we die, and that is the end of us; we die, and where are we then?

11 Like rivers that stop running, and lakes that go dry,

12 people die, never to rise. They will never wake up while the sky endures; they will never stir from their sleep.

13 I wish you would hide me in the world of the dead; let me be hidden until your anger is over, and then set a time to remember me.