Doth not their excellency which is in them go away? they die, even without wisdom.
The saying stands in Eliphaz's speech inside the debate between Job and his three friends over his afflictions, in which they charged that his suffering came from sin and pressed him to confess so he might be pardoned. That debate runs from chapters 4 to 31 and is made up of three rounds of speeches. Its larger setting brings forward the great problems of overruling providence and of sin and suffering, with God disciplining Job by bringing him through the fire of affliction while his three friends accuse him of sin and declare his sufferings are on account of that sin, showing how humanity misjudges its fellows. Eliphaz's counsel rests on human wisdom and observation, setting forth the passing away of human excellence and death without wisdom as a general truth.
The friends' general statements about affliction and sin were often true in the general case but were wrongly applied to Job, since suffering does not prove that a person is under God's displeasure. Because the saying is Eliphaz's speech, its being found in Scripture does not by itself make it reliable truth, and its claims are to be tested against other inspired teachings. Its meaning is that human excellence and wisdom are fleeting, for people die and their abilities pass away. The Hebrew word nephesh here means breath, referring to breath or mortal life rather than to an immortal soul, and the mention of death agrees with that mortal sense.
At death man is unconscious, sleeping in the grave and returned to earth, and therefore does not behold God's face as the angels do, but remains in that condition until Christ comes to raise him, when he will see God's face. The saying applies to frail mortals who presume to command in God's name what God has not commanded.
The saying stands in Eliphaz's speech inside the debate between Job and his three friends over his afflictions, in which they charged that his suffering came from sin and pressed him to confess so he might be pardoned. That debate runs from chapters 4 to 31 and is made up of three rounds of speeches. Its larger setting brings forward the great problems of overruling providence and of sin and suffering, with God disciplining Job by bringing him through the fire of affliction while his three friends accuse him of sin and declare his sufferings are on account of that sin, showing how humanity misjudges its fellows. Eliphaz's counsel rests on human wisdom and observation, setting forth the passing away of human excellence and death without wisdom as a general truth.
The friends' general statements about affliction and sin were often true in the general case but were wrongly applied to Job, since suffering does not prove that a person is under God's displeasure. Because the saying is Eliphaz's speech, its being found in Scripture does not by itself make it reliable truth, and its claims are to be tested against other inspired teachings. Its meaning is that human excellence and wisdom are fleeting, for people die and their abilities pass away. The Hebrew word nephesh here means breath, referring to breath or mortal life rather than to an immortal soul, and the mention of death agrees with that mortal sense.
At death man is unconscious, sleeping in the grave and returned to earth, and therefore does not behold God's face as the angels do, but remains in that condition until Christ comes to raise him, when he will see God's face. The saying applies to frail mortals who presume to command in God's name what God has not commanded.