Job 17:1

My breath is corrupt,.... Through the force of his disease, which made it have an ill smell, so that it was strange and disagreeable to his wife, Job 19:17; passing through his lungs, or other parts,

My breath is corrupt, my days are extinct, the graves are ready for me. Breath ... corrupt - result of elephantiasis. But (Umbreit) 'my strength (spirit) is spent' [ chubaalaah (H2254)] - destroyed. Extinct.

JOB CHAPTER 17 His miserable life; false friends; their punishment, . His contempt, and sorrow, ,7. The righteous should be established, ,9; but he was given over to death, . My breath is corrupt, i.e. it stinks, as it doth in dying persons. Or, my spirit is corrupted, or spent, or lost, i.e. my vital spirits and natural powers are wasted; my soul is ready to leave the body. My days are extinct; the lamp of my life is wasted, and upon the point of going out, and that in a snuff. The graves, i.e. the grave; the plural number being put for the singular, as sepulchres, , cities, , asses, , are put for one of each of these. Are ready for me; open their mouths as ready to receive me. The sense and scope of this verse is the same with the former.

Job 17:1 My breath is corrupt, my days are extinct, the graves [are ready] for me.Ver. 1. My breath is corrupt] Which argueth that my inwards are imposthumated and rotten, so that I cannot in likelihood have long to live; Oh therefore that I might have a day of hearing and clearing before I die! But Job should have remembered that there will be at the last day a resurrection of names as well as of bodies; which he that believeth maketh not haste. Howsoever, it was not amiss for Job, so grievously diseased, and now well in years, to have thought himself to be dying and to discourse about these three particulars, that speak of him as a dying man. In the old the palm tree is full of blooms, the map of age is figured on his forehead, the calendars of death appear in the furrows of his face, the mourners are ready to go about the streets, and he is going to his long home, according to that elegant description, Ecclesiastes 12:1-7 He should therefore say with Varro, Annus octogesimus me admonet, ut farcinas colligam, &c., It is high time for me to pack up, and to be gone out of this life; or rather, as Simeon, Lord, now let thou thy servant depart in peace, &c. My days are extinct] As a candle, Proverbs 13:9. Or cut off, as a web, so some read it. The original word is found only here. The graves are ready for me] Heb. The graves for me; q.d. I bid adieu to all things else, and as the grave gapes for me, so do I gape for the grave, Eιθεμοιτουτογενοιτο. I would it were even so, as Basil said, when Valens, the Arian emperor, threatened him with death. But why doth Job speak of graves in the plural? Surely, to show that he was besieged with many deaths; or else, because the dead are buried (as it were) first in their grave clothes, and then in the coffin, and then in the bier or hearse, and lastly in the sepulchre, which every place did, as it were, proffer to Job, and threaten him with death, in regard to his many pains and pressures, by the scoffs and taunts of his friends. For,

XVII.(1) My breath is corrupt.—As it is said to be in Elephantiasis. Some understand it, “My spirit is consumed.” (See margin.) The graves.—i.e., the grave is mine—my portion. The plural is frequently used for the singular in Hebrew, as, e.g., in the case of the word blood, which is commonly plural, though with us it is never so used.

CHAPTER XVII Job complains of the injustice of his friends, and compares his present state of want and wo with his former honour and affluence, 1-6. God's dealings with him will ever astonish upright men; yet the righteous shall not be discouraged, but hold on his way, 7-9. Asserts that there is not a wise man among his friends, and that he has no expectation but of a speedy death, 10-16. NOTES ON CHAP. XVII Verse 1. My breath is corrupt] Rather, My spirit is oppressed, רוחי חבלה ruchi chubbalah: My days are extinct, and the sepulchral cells are ready for me. - PARKHURST. There is probably a reference here to cemeteries, where were several niches, in each of which a corpse was deposited. See on Job 17:16. For חבלה chubbalah, corrupted or oppressed, some MSS. have חלה chalah, is made weak; and one has is worn down, consumed: this is agreeable to the Vulgate, Spiritus meus attenuebatur; "My spirit is exhausted."

1. my breath] Rather as margin, my spirit is spent, i. e. consumed. The “spirit” is the principle of life. the graves are ready for me] lit. graves are mine; the meaning being: the grave is my portion; cf. Job 17:13 seq. Coverdale: I am harde at deathes dore.

My breath is corrupt - Margin or “spirit is spent.” The idea is, that his vital powers were nearly extinct; his breath failed; his power was weakened, and he was ready to die.

1. Now follow short ejaculatory clauses in which “Job chants his own requiem,” (Delitzsch,) reminding the reader of the requiem chanted by Mozart shortly before his death.