His roots shall be dried up beneath, and above shall his branch be cut off.
Job 18:16 belongs to Bildad's second speech, which describes the final doom of the wicked. It stands within the constant accusations, implied and otherwise, that Job's friends bring against Job in Job 8 through Job 27, which Job answers with his own replies. More specifically it is one of the declamations of Job's misguided friends found in Job 4, 5, 8, 11, 15, 18, 20, 22, and 25.
The verse states the friends' general claim that evil is ultimately punished, but as applied to Job it was misapplied, since suffering does not prove that a person is under God's displeasure. Though put on record by inspiration, the misguided friends did not speak the truth about God or about Job. Their words are therefore not correct and reliable and are not rightly dividing the Word unless sustained by inspired declarations given elsewhere in the Bible, and where they contradict the teachings of Scripture they are not verity and truth but must be compared with other portions of the Bible to see if they are sustained.
When so sustained, the verse describes the final doom of the wicked as complete destruction. Its roots dried up beneath and its branch cut off above picture a plant killed from the roots below and stripped of growth above, with nothing left to live. The end of the wicked is to be dried up underneath and cut off above like a dead plant.
The sinner's fate is thus utter destruction, compared to perishable materials that are used up and gone. The wicked do not live on forever in fire but are burned up entirely and cease to exist. The verse is one of many comparisons to the most perishable materials — chaff, stubble, tares, dry branches, fat, thorns, wood, hay — that prove total consumption in the fire that melts the earth.
Job 18:16 belongs to Bildad's second speech, which describes the final doom of the wicked. It stands within the constant accusations, implied and otherwise, that Job's friends bring against Job in Job 8 through Job 27, which Job answers with his own replies. More specifically it is one of the declamations of Job's misguided friends found in Job 4, 5, 8, 11, 15, 18, 20, 22, and 25.
The verse states the friends' general claim that evil is ultimately punished, but as applied to Job it was misapplied, since suffering does not prove that a person is under God's displeasure. Though put on record by inspiration, the misguided friends did not speak the truth about God or about Job. Their words are therefore not correct and reliable and are not rightly dividing the Word unless sustained by inspired declarations given elsewhere in the Bible, and where they contradict the teachings of Scripture they are not verity and truth but must be compared with other portions of the Bible to see if they are sustained.
When so sustained, the verse describes the final doom of the wicked as complete destruction. Its roots dried up beneath and its branch cut off above picture a plant killed from the roots below and stripped of growth above, with nothing left to live. The end of the wicked is to be dried up underneath and cut off above like a dead plant.
The sinner's fate is thus utter destruction, compared to perishable materials that are used up and gone. The wicked do not live on forever in fire but are burned up entirely and cease to exist. The verse is one of many comparisons to the most perishable materials — chaff, stubble, tares, dry branches, fat, thorns, wood, hay — that prove total consumption in the fire that melts the earth.