What is the meaning of Job 7:15? Context - Job 7 sits in the middle of Job’s first reply to his friends. He has lost children, possessions, health, and public respect (Job 1:13-19; 2:7-8; 30:9-10). - He tells God that his nights are filled with tossing and terrifying dreams (Job 7:4, 14). The buildup of misery explains the outburst of verse 15. - Honest lament is nothing new in Scripture; compare Psalm 6:6 or Lamentations 3:1-18, where faithful people voice real anguish while still turning to God. I would prefer - “Prefer” signals deliberate comparison. Job weighs two options—continued existence in suffering or immediate release—and judges the latter “better.” - Similar statements of yearning for release appear in Jonah 4:3, Jeremiah 20:18, and even Paul’s tension in Philippians 1:23-24. - Job is not prescribing suicide; he is laying bare his heart before the Lord, echoing Psalm 142:2, “I pour out my complaint before Him.” Strangling and death - “Strangling” paints a graphic, literal picture of breath cut off. Coupled with “death,” it stresses how badly Job wants the pain to stop (Job 3:20-22). - Ancient examples of deliberate strangling—Ahithophel in 2 Samuel 17:23—show the imagery was recognizable and shocking. - Other saints reached similar lows: Moses begged God to end his life (Numbers 11:14-15), and Elijah did the same (1 Kings 19:4). Yet each was met by God’s sustaining grace (Psalm 103:13-14). Over my life in this body - Job’s skin is covered with worms and scabs, his flesh festers, and his days pass in hopelessness (Job 7:5-6). Physical torment drives his comparison. - Paul calls the human frame an “earthly tent” groaning for release (2 Corinthians 5:1-4) and cries, “Who will rescue me from this body of death?” (Romans 7:24). - Scripture upholds the sanctity of the body (Genesis 2:7; Psalm 139:13-16); Job’s words reveal pain’s power, not a denial of life’s value. Suffering in a fallen world can distort perspective (Romans 8:20-22), yet God remains the “Father of compassion and God of all comfort” (2 Corinthians 1:3-4). summary Job 7:15—“so that I would prefer strangling and death over my life in this body”—is a literal, anguished confession of a righteous man pushed to the brink. The verse demonstrates: - the depth of real human suffering, - the honesty God invites in prayerful lament, and - the truth that, even when death looks preferable, hope ultimately rests in the Lord who will redeem and restore (Job 19:25-27; Romans 8:18; James 5:11). |
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