Job 8:12

12 While it [is] in its budding -- uncropt, Even before any herb it withereth.

Job 8:12 Meaning and Commentary

Job 8:12

Whilst it [is] yet in its greenness
Before it is come to its full height, or to a proper ripeness; when as yet it has not flowered, or is about it; before the time usual for it to turn and change; it being without moisture, water, or watery clay, will change;

[and] not cut down;
by the scythe, or cropped by the hand of man,

it withereth before any [other] herb;
of itself; rather sooner than such that do not require so much moisture; or in the sight and presence of them, they looking on as it were, and deriding it; a poetical representation, as Schultens observes: next follows the accommodation of these similes to wicked and hypocritical men.

Job 8:12 In-Context

10 Do they not shew thee -- speak to thee, And from their heart bring forth words?

11 `Doth a rush wise without mire? A reed increase without water?

12 While it [is] in its budding -- uncropt, Even before any herb it withereth.

13 So [are] the paths of all forgetting God, And the hope of the profane doth perish,

14 Whose confidence is loathsome, And the house of a spider his trust.