Job 10:22, commentary and pictures

Job speaks of his own coming death as going to a dark land from which he will not return, longing for a little comfort before he goes. The land is the grave, the common state of all the dead, described as utter darkness and the shadow of death without order, where even what should be light is as darkness. It is a state of complete unconsciousness and silence, with no awareness, activity, remembrance, work, knowledge, praise, or repentance. Therefore the dead do not pass at death into heaven to be with Christ and see God, nor do they live on consciously in torment, and there is no hearing or repenting there afterward. Though gloomy and ruinous, this sleep in the dust looks forward to the resurrection, when Christ will come as the light to raise the dead and free His captives.

Setting and Language

The words belong to the extended exchange in Job 3-31 between Job and his three friends on the cause and object of human suffering. In that immediate setting Job is answering Bildad and insisting that affliction does not prove sin. He speaks as one enduring intense suffering and darkness while longing for God to explain his afflictions.

That the book is inspired guarantees that Job actually spoke these words, not that every sentiment uttered in the debate is true. Job spoke from his own limited standpoint, knowing his integrity yet unable to understand God's dealings with him, without charging God foolishly. God, by contrast, saw the end from the beginning and was working through the trial for what would glorify Himself forever, for comfort and hope to thousands of suffering ones, and for blessing to Job himself.

The verse records Job's expectation for himself, the place to which he goes and from which he will not return. He longs for a little comfort before going there. He contrasts that going with the ordered, radiant Paradise that people imagine the dead enter.

The land described is Sheol in Hebrew and hades in Greek, properly translated the grave. It is a vast subterranean realm of deepest darkness, in fulfillment of the return to dust. It is the destination and state of all the dead, both good and bad, both righteous and wicked, from which no one can deliver the soul. The only exceptions are those translated like Enoch and Elijah, who were taken bodily while alive.

Its imagery means profound darkness as darkness itself, the shadow of death, without any order. Even what would ordinarily be light is there as darkness, with no light and no order. Since the righteous Job expects this place for himself, the description does not describe heaven. The conscious person who had been able to take comfort can take no more comfort there, because the dead are unconscious and rest hidden in silence and stillness until the resurrection.

Death and Resurrection

Death is a state of blank unconsciousness and forgetfulness, the exact opposite of life. The dead rest hidden from the troubles of life in silence and stillness, able to take no more comfort where before they could take comfort. There they have no awareness or activity, no remembrance, no work or device, no knowledge or wisdom, no hearing or thought, no praise of God or remembrance of Him, and no repentance, for their thoughts perish. Job expected that had he died he would have been as though he had not been, returned to the earth in a condition of unconsciousness, not in a conscious comfortable state.

Because even the righteous Job expects this darkness, it proves that people do not go to heaven at death. They do not become angels or see God, do not enter an ordered radiant Paradise, do not pass immediately to bliss or conscious joy in God's presence, and do not go to Christ. Paul will be with Christ when Christ returns and the living are caught up, not by dying. Job describes where he is going as a realm of darkness and disorder, not as the dawning of an eternal day or a home among the angels, even though he has a lively hope.

The dead also do not go consciously to a burning hell or live in happiness or misery. Sheol is not a place of active reward or punishment and contains no hell-fire, but is a state of silence, darkness, and inactivity without order or awareness. Any representation of its inhabitants as living, knowing, acting, conversing, or speaking is only a figure of speech by which unconscious and inanimate things are made to live, act, and speak to bring future retribution vividly before the mind.

Since the grave is silence and forgetfulness with no hearing, thought, praise, or repentance, it would be hopeless and impossible for Christ to go there to preach to the dead for them to hear, repent, and give glory to God, proving there is no probation after death. Since both the rich man and Lazarus died and went to hades, the grave where all the dead go both righteous and wicked, their conscious comfort and torment and conversation cannot be an actual occurrence immediately after death. There in the land of forgetfulness the dead know nothing, perceive nothing of the living, and have no work, device, knowledge, or wisdom, and no one can deliver the soul from it.

Death is thus a fearful, gloomy state of decay and ruin, not a pleasant prospect. Because Satan has the power of death it is also called the enemy's land, and without a resurrection it is destruction. Yet even with lively hope Job describes it as darkness, for the dead sleep unconscious in the dust awaiting the resurrection. When Christ, who brings life to light, comes as the light answering this darkness, He will free the captives, raise the dead, and let them see God.

The same imagery applies figuratively to the utter spiritual darkness Israel entered by hardening their hearts and rejecting God to be like the nations. It was a complete disordered shadow of death where even what passes for light is darkness. The people sat in that state when the great light of God shone upon them.