Job 7:6

6 My days have passed swifter than a web is cut down from the looms; and those days be wasted without any hope of coming again.

Job 7:6 Meaning and Commentary

Job 7:6

My days are swifter than a weaver's shuttle
Which moves very swiftly, being thrown quick and fast to and fro; some versions render it "a racer" F2 one that runs a race on foot, or rides on horseback, agreeably to ( Job 9:25 ) ; where, and in ( Job 7:7 ) ; to it, other similes are used, to set forth the swiftness and fleetness of man's days; as they also are elsewhere represented, as swift as a tale told, a word expressed, or a thought conceived, ( Psalms 90:9 ) ; and so here, by the Septuagint, are said to be "swifter than speech", though wrongly translated: this is to be understood, not of his days of affliction, distress, and sorrow; for these in his apprehension moved but slowly, and he could have been, glad that they had gone on faster; but either his days in common, or particularly his days of prosperity and pleasure, these were soon over with him; and which he sometimes wished for again, see ( Job 29:1-5 ) ;

and are spent without hope;
not without hope of happiness in another world, but without hope of being restored to his outward felicity in this; which Eliphaz had given him some him of, but he had no hope concerning it; see ( Job 5:24-26 ) ( Job 6:11 Job 6:19 ) ( 19:10 ) .


FOOTNOTES:

F2 (dromewv) , Aquila, Symmachus, Theodotion in Drusius.

Job 7:6 In-Context

4 If I shall sleep, I shall say, When shall I rise? and again I shall abide the eventide, and I shall be full-filled with sorrows unto darknesses come (and I shall be filled full with sorrow until the darknesses come).
5 My flesh is clothed with rot, and filths of dust; my skin dried up, and is drawn together (my skin is dried up, and is altogether drawn/and my skin is covered with running sores).
6 My days have passed swifter than a web is cut down from the looms; and those days be wasted without any hope of coming again.
7 God, have thou mind, for my life is wind, and mine eye shall not turn again, that it see goods. (God, remember that my life is but a breath, and I shall no longer see any good days.)
8 Neither the sight of man shall behold me; but thine eyes be in me (but thy eyes be upon me), and I shall not be in deadly life, that is, I shall not abide (alive).
Copyright © 2001 by Terence P. Noble. For personal use only.