Job 24:21
They prey on the barren and childless, and show no kindness to the widow.
BSB
ASV
He devoureth the barren that beareth not, And doeth not good to the widow.
KJV
He evil entreateth the barren that beareth not: and doeth not good to the widow.
He evil entreateth the barren - The woman who has no children to comfort or support her. He increases her calamity by acts of cruelty and oppression. To be without children, as is well known, was regarded, in the patriarchal ages, as a great calamity. And doeth not good to the widow - See the notes at Job 24:3. Notwithstanding all this, he is permitted to live in prosperity, and to die without any visible tokens of the divine displeasure.
The reason given by the friends why the sinner deserves such a fate. barren--without sons, who might have protected her. widow--without a husband to support her.
Rare words are the text's own signal of a deliberate thread: the fewer the occurrences, the more the places it appears belong together.
The walk8
Follow this verse’s cross-references two steps out. Each card is a verse this one points to, and beneath it the verses that one points to in turn. Where several different paths arrive at the same place, that place is listed first: the text keeps returning to it. Every stop shows its own words, and every stop is a page.
Through
Job 22:9You sent widows away empty-handed, and the strength of the fatherless was crushed.
leads to
They drive away the donkey of the fatherless and take the widow’s ox in pledge.
Father and mother are treated with contempt. Within your walls the foreign resident is exploited, the fatherless and the widow are oppressed.
to deprive the poor of fair treatment and withhold justice from the oppressed of My people, to make widows their prey and orphans their plunder.
Through
Job 24:3They drive away the donkey of the fatherless and take the widow’s ox in pledge.
leads to
Do not take a pair of millstones or even an upper millstone as security for a debt, because that would be taking one’s livelihood as security.
Through
Job 29:13The dying man blessed me, and I made the widow’s heart sing for joy.
leads to
You sent widows away empty-handed, and the strength of the fatherless was crushed.
May the Lord grant mercy to the household of Onesiphorus, because he has often refreshed me and was unashamed of my chains.
And in that day a great ram’s horn will sound, and those who were perishing in Assyria will come forth with those who were exiles in Egypt. And they will worship the LORD on…
if I have seen one perish for lack of clothing, or a needy man without a cloak,