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Selected Verse: Job 12:22 - King James
| Verse |
Translation |
Text |
| Job 12:22 |
King James |
He discovereth deep things out of darkness, and bringeth out to light the shadow of death. |
Summary Of Commentaries Associated With The Selected Verse
| A Commentary, Critical, Practical, and Explanatory on the Old and New Testaments, by Robert Jamieson, A.R. Fausset and David Brown [1882] |
| (Dan 2:22). |
| Notes on the Bible, by Albert Barnes, [1834] |
He discovereth deep thirsts out of darkness - That is, God discloses truths which are wholly beyond the power of man to discover - truths that seem to be hidden in profound night. This may refer either to the revelation which God was believed to have furnished, or to his power of bringing out the most secret thoughts and purposes, or to his power of predicting future events by bringing them out of darkness to the clear light of day, or to his power of detecting plots, intrigues, and conspiracies.
And bringeth out to light the shadow of death - On the meaning of the word rendered "shadow of death," see the notes at Job 3:5. It here denotes whatever is dark or obscure. It is rather a favorite expression with the author of this poem (see Job 10:22; Job 16:16; Job 24:17; Job 34:22; Job 38:17), though it occurs elsewhere in the Scriptures. The deepest darkness, the obscurest night, are represented by it; and the idea is, that even from the most dark and impenetrable regions God could bring out light and truth. All is naked and open to the mind of God. |
| Commentary on the Old Testament, by Carl Friedrich Keil and Franz Delitzsch [1857-78] |
22 He discovereth deep things out of darkness,
And bringeth out to light the shadow of death;
23 He giveth prosperity to nations and then destroyeth them,
Increase of territory to nations and then carrieth them away;
24 He taketh away the understanding of the chief people of the land,
And maketh them to wander in a trackless wilderness;
25 They grope in darkness without light,
He maketh them to stagger like a drunken man.
The meaning of Job 12:22 in this connection can only be, that there is nothing so finely spun out that God cannot make it visible. All secret plans of the wicked, all secret sins, and the deeds of the evil-doer though veiled in deep darkness, He bringeth before the tribunal of the world. The form of writing given by the Masora is עמוּקות with koph raphatum, consequently plur. from עמוּק, like ערוּמים, עצוּמים from ערוּם, עצוּם, not from עמק.
(Note: Kimchi in his Wrterbuch adopts the form עמקּות, but gives Abulwalid as an authority for the lengthened form, which, according to the Masora on Lev 13:3, Lev 13:25, is the traditional. The two exceptions where the form occurs with a long vowel are Pro 23:27 and this passage.)
The lxx translates משגיא πλανῶν, as it is also explained in several Midrash-passages, but only by a few Jewish expositors (Jachja, Alschech) by מטעה. The word, however, is not משׁגּיא, but משׂגּיא with ש sinistrum, after which in Midrash Esther it is explained by מגדיל; and Hirzel correctly interprets it of upward growth (Jerome after the Targ. unsuitably, multiplicat), and שׁטח, on the other hand, of growth in extent. The latter word is falsely explained by the Targ. in the sense of expandere rete, and Abenezra also falsely explains: He scatters nations, and brings them to their original peace. The verb שׁטח is here connected with ל, as הפתּה (Gen 9:27); both signify to make a wider and longer space for any one, used here of the ground where they dwell and rule. The opposite, in an unpropitious sense, is הנחה, which is used here, as Kg2 18:11, in a similar sense with הגלה (abducere, i.e., in servitutem). We have intentionally translated גוים nations, עם people; for גּוי, as we shall show elsewhere, is the mass held together by the ties of a common origin, language, and country; (עם) עם, the people bound together by unity of government, whose membra praecipua are consequently called העם ראשׁי. הארץ is, in this connection, the country, although elsewhere, as Isa 24:4, comp. Job 42:5, הארץ עם signifies also the people of the earth or mankind; for the Hebrew language expresses a country as a portion of the earth, and the earth as a whole, by the same name. Job dwells longer on this tragic picture, how God makes the star of the prosperity of these chiefs to set in mad and blind self-destruction, according to the proverb, quem Deus perdere vult prius dementat. This description seems to be echoed in many points in Isaiah, especially in the oracle on Egypt, Job 19 (e.g., כּשּׁכּור, Job 19:14). The connection ברך לא בתהו is not genitival; but דרך לא is either an adverbial clause appended to the verb, as חקר לא, Job 34:24, בנים לא, Ch1 2:30, Ch1 2:32, or, which we prefer as being more natural, and on account of the position of the words, a virtual adjective: in a trackless waste, as אישׁ לא, Job 38:26; עבות לא, Sa2 23:4 (Olsh.).
Job here takes up the tone of Eliphaz (comp. Job 5:13.). Intentionally he is made to excel the friends in a recognition of the absolute majesty of God. He is not less cognizant of it than they. |
| Explanatory Notes on the Whole Bible, by John Wesley [1754-65] |
| Darkness - The most secret counsels of princes, which are contrived and carried on in the dark. |
| Adam Clarke Commentary on the Whole Bible - Published 1810-1826 |
| He discovereth deep things out of darkness - This may refer either to God's works in the great deep, or to the plots and stratagems of wicked men, conspiracies that were deeply laid, well digested, and about to be produced into existence, when death, whose shadow had hitherto concealed them, is to glut himself with carnage. |
22 He revealeth the deep and secret things: he knoweth what is in the darkness, and the light dwelleth with him.
17 Have the gates of death been opened unto thee? or hast thou seen the doors of the shadow of death?
22 There is no darkness, nor shadow of death, where the workers of iniquity may hide themselves.
17 For the morning is to them even as the shadow of death: if one know them, they are in the terrors of the shadow of death.
16 My face is foul with weeping, and on my eyelids is the shadow of death;
22 A land of darkness, as darkness itself; and of the shadow of death, without any order, and where the light is as darkness.
5 Let darkness and the shadow of death stain it; let a cloud dwell upon it; let the blackness of the day terrify it.
13 He taketh the wise in their own craftiness: and the counsel of the froward is carried headlong.
4 And he shall be as the light of the morning, when the sun riseth, even a morning without clouds; as the tender grass springing out of the earth by clear shining after rain.
26 To cause it to rain on the earth, where no man is; on the wilderness, wherein there is no man;
32 And the sons of Jada the brother of Shammai; Jether, and Jonathan: and Jether died without children.
30 And the sons of Nadab; Seled, and Appaim: but Seled died without children.
24 He shall break in pieces mighty men without number, and set others in their stead.
14 My kinsfolk have failed, and my familiar friends have forgotten me.
5 I have heard of thee by the hearing of the ear: but now mine eye seeth thee.
4 The earth mourneth and fadeth away, the world languisheth and fadeth away, the haughty people of the earth do languish.
11 And the king of Assyria did carry away Israel unto Assyria, and put them in Halah and in Habor by the river of Gozan, and in the cities of the Medes:
27 God shall enlarge Japheth, and he shall dwell in the tents of Shem; and Canaan shall be his servant.
27 For a whore is a deep ditch; and a strange woman is a narrow pit.
25 Then the priest shall look upon it: and, behold, if the hair in the bright spot be turned white, and it be in sight deeper than the skin; it is a leprosy broken out of the burning: wherefore the priest shall pronounce him unclean: it is the plague of leprosy.
3 And the priest shall look on the plague in the skin of the flesh: and when the hair in the plague is turned white, and the plague in sight be deeper than the skin of his flesh, it is a plague of leprosy: and the priest shall look on him, and pronounce him unclean.
22 He discovereth deep things out of darkness, and bringeth out to light the shadow of death.