17 "I've a thing or two to tell you, so listen up! I'm letting you in on my views; 18 It's what wise men and women have always taught, holding nothing back from what they were taught 19 By their parents, back in the days when they had this land all to themselves: 20 Those who live by their own rules, not God's, can expect nothing but trouble, and the longer they live, the worse it gets. 21 Every little sound terrifies them. Just when they think they have it made, disaster strikes. 22 They despair of things ever getting better - they're on the list of people for whom things always turn out for the worst. 23 They wander here and there, never knowing where the next meal is coming from - every day is doomsday! 24 They live in constant terror, always with their backs up against the wall 25 Because they insist on shaking their fists at God, defying God Almighty to his face, 26 Always and ever at odds with God, always on the defensive. 27 "Even if they're the picture of health, trim and fit and youthful, 28 They'll end up living in a ghost town sleeping in a hovel not fit for a dog, a ramshackle shack. 29 They'll never get ahead, never amount to a hill of beans. 30 And then death - don't think they'll escape that! They'll end up shriveled weeds, brought down by a puff of God's breath. 31 There's a lesson here: Whoever invests in lies, gets lies for interest, 32 Paid in full before the due date. Some investment! 33 They'll be like fruit frost-killed before it ripens, like buds sheared off before they bloom. 34 The godless are fruitless - a barren crew; a life built on bribes goes up in smoke. 35 They have sex with sin and give birth to evil. Their lives are wombs for breeding deceit."
Matthew Henry's Commentary on Job 15:17-35
Commentary on Job 15:17-35
(Read Job 15:17-35)
Eliphaz maintains that the wicked are certainly miserable: whence he would infer, that the miserable are certainly wicked, and therefore Job was so. But because many of God's people have prospered in this world, it does not therefore follow that those who are crossed and made poor, as Job, are not God's people. Eliphaz shows also that wicked people, particularly oppressors, are subject to continual terror, live very uncomfortably, and perish very miserably. Will the prosperity of presumptuous sinners end miserably as here described? Then let the mischiefs which befal others, be our warnings. Though no chastening for the present seemeth to be joyous, but grievous, nevertheless, afterward it yieldeth the peaceable fruits of righteousness to them that are exercised thereby. No calamity, no trouble, however heavy, however severe, can rob a follower of the Lord of his favour. What shall separate him from the love of Christ?