Job 18:4

4 Thou art he who teareth himself in his anger: Shall the earth become desolate for thy sake, And a rock remove from its place? 5 Notwithstanding, the light of the wicked shall be put out, And the glow of his fire shineth not; 6 The light becometh dark in his tent, And his lamp above him is extinguished; 7 His vigorous steps are straitened, And his own counsel casteth him down. The meaning of the strophe is this: Dost thou imagine that, by thy vehement conduct, by which thou art become enraged against thyself, thou canst effect any change in the established divine order of the world? It is a divine law, that sufferings are the punishment of sin; thou canst no more alter this, than that at thy command, or for thy sake, the earth, which is appointed to be the habitation of man (Isa 45:18), will become desolate (tê‛âzab with the tone drawn back, according to Ges. 29, 3, b, Arab. with similar signification in intrans. Kal t‛azibu), or a rock remove from its place (on יעתּק, vid., Job 14:18). Bildad here lays to Job's charge what Job, in Job 16:9, has said of God's anger, that it tears him: he himself tears himself in his rage at the inevitable lot under which he ought penitently to bow. The address, Job 18:4, as apud Arabes ubique fere (Schult.), is put objectively (not: Oh thou, who); comp. what is said on כּלּם, Job 17:10, which is influenced by the same syntactic custom. The lxx transl. Job 18:4: Why! will Hades be tenantless if thou diest (ἐὰν σὺ ἀποθάνῃς)? after which Rosenm. explains: tu caus h. e. te cadente. But that ought to be הבמוּתך. The peopling of the earth is only an example of the arrangements of divine omnipotence and wisdom, the continuance of which is exalted over the human power of volition, and does not in the least yield to human self-will, as…

In this chapter Bildad makes a second assault upon Job. In his first discourse (ch. 8) he had given him encouragement to hope that all should yet be well with him. But here there is not a word of that; he has grown more peevish, and is so far from being convinced by Job's reasonings that he is but more exasperated. I. He sharply reproves Job as haughty and passionate, and obstinate in his opinion (Job 18:1-4). II. He enlarges upon the doctrine he had before maintained, concerning the miser of wicked people and the ruin that attends them (v. 5-21). In this he seems, all along, to have an eye to Job's complaints of the miserable condition he was in, that he was in the dark, bewildered, ensnared, terrified, and hastening out of the world. "This," says Bildad, "is the condition of a wicked man; and therefore thou art one."