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Job 21:21

For what pleasure hath he in his house after him, when the number of his months is cut off in the midst?

For what pleasure hath he in his house after him,.... As, on the one hand, the prosperity of his children after his decease gives him no pleasure and delight, so, on the other hand, the calamities and distresses of his family for his sins and theirs give him no pain or uneasiness; he knows nothing that befalls them, and it is no part of his concern; and let what will befall them, he cares not for it; he feels it not, he is not sensible of it; and therefore to object that signifies nothing; see Job 14:21; or, "what business has he with his house after death?" the affairs {d} of his family do not at all concern him, one way or another; he is not affected with them; he can neither consider their happiness as a blessing nor their calamities as a punishment to him:

when the number of his months is cut off in the midst? the years, the months, and the days of the lives of men, are numbered and determined by the Lord, Job 14:5; which, when finished, the thread of life is cut off in the midst, from the rest of the months, which a man or his friends might have expected he would have lived; or rather, "when his number of the months is fully up" {e}; when the calculation of them is complete, and the full number of them is perfected; the sense is, what cares a wicked man for what befalls his family after his death, when he has lived out the full term of life in great outward happiness and prosperity; has lived to be full of days, of months, and years, to a full age, even to an age that may be truly called old age?


{d} So Schultens.
{e} wuux "integro numero calculis ducti sunt", Cocceius; "cumulatam sortem habuerint", Schultens.

 

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