Job 6:13
in Job 6Is there any help within me now that success is driven from me?
BSB
The same verse in ASV and KJV ▾
ASV
Is it not that I have no help in me, And that wisdom is driven quite from me?
KJV
Is not my help in me? and is wisdom driven quite from me?
⋯
This verse in Job 6
Commentary
9 notes on this verseA commentator
Albert Barnes1798–1870
Notes, Explanatory and Practical, on the Old and New Testaments (1832-1869)
Is not my help in me? - This would be better rendered in an affirmative manner, or as an exclamation. The interrogative form of the previous verses need not be continued in this. The sense is, “alas! there is no help in me!” That is, “I have no strength; I must give up under these sorrows in despair.” So it is rendered by Jerome, Rosenmuller, Good, Noyes, and others.
This site's exposition
What strength do I have
on Job 6:11-13
Job asks: "What strength do I have, that I should still hope". His question, "Is my strength like that of stone, or my flesh made of bronze," denies the very endurance Eliphaz has assumed he has. With "success is driven from me," he finds no help left within himself.
This site's exposition
Is there any help within me now
The word rendered success is tushiyah, which Clarke explains as whatever is solid and lasting. Job has lost it and finds no resource left in himself. Gregory reads the confession as the point where hope turns from self to God.
The record, by era
The Medieval Church2 voices
Lo, there is no help to me in myself. It is now made clear to whom the mind of the stricken man had recourse for hope, seeing that he declares that there was no hope to him in himself; but because he intimates that in himself he was weak, for the earning of yet greater strength, let him add how he was even forsaken by his neighbours, My friends also departed from me. But mark, he that was despised without, is seated within upon the throne of judgment.
Job had shown in the preceding verses that he felt pain and spoke words from his pain in conformity with reason, but yet he was not carried away by his pain in the things which he suffered. But because man, although he suffers some adversities, …
The Puritans and the Awakening2 voices
): Is not my help in me? that is, "Have I not the use of my reason, with which, I thank God, I can help myself, though you do not help me? Do you think wisdom is driven quite from me, and that I am gone distracted?
quarantine:debris (2026-07-29) — leading-punctuation+unbalanced-parens+odd-straight-quotes
Is my help in me?....
The Nineteenth Century1 voice
A commentator
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown1802–1910
Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)
Is not my help in me?--The interrogation is better omitted. "There is no help in me!" For "wisdom," "deliverance" is a better rendering. "And deliverance is driven quite from me."
1 more voice on this verse
The Nineteenth Century1 voice
Is not my help in me? - My help is all in myself; and, alas! that is perfect weakness: and my subsistence, תושיה tushiyah, all that is real, stable, and permanent, is driven quite from me. My friends have forsaken me, and I am abandoned to myself; my property is all taken away, and I have no resources left. I believe Job neither said, nor intended to say, as some interpreters have it, Reason is utterly driven from me. Surely there is no mark in this chapter of his being deranged, or at all impaired in his intellect.
How the passage was read
What the Jewish commentators add
Have I no help This is an expression of wonder. Will this too come upon me, that I have no help? Those friends that I had to help me are not helping me.
This section is reception history: how the passage was read and kept in the Jewish tradition. Where a reading parts from an essential of the Christian faith, the section says so at that point.
Texts and citation data: Sefaria; each excerpt follows its version’s licence. 6 further sources are cited on this chapter that carry no English text this site may quote or only restate the verse.
The words behind it
7 Hebrew wordsEvery Hebrew word of this verse in the order it stands, with what it means and the door to its own study. The last column counts the times a word stands in the whole Bible: the rarer the word, the more the places it appears belong together.
| Hebrew | Sound | Meaning | Word study | In the Bible |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| הַאִ֬ם | haim | ¿ if | H518 → | 1069 times |
| אֵ֣ין | ʾein | not | H369 → | 789 times |
| עֶזְרָתִ֣י | ʾezrati | [is] help my | H5833 → | |
| בִ֑י | vi | in myself | ||
| וְ֝תֻשִׁיָּ֗ה | vetushiyah | and sound wisdom | H8454 → | 12 times |
| נִדְּחָ֥ה | nidechah | it has been banished | H5080 → | |
| מִמֶּֽנִּי׃ | mimeni | from me | H4480 → | 1188 times |
הַאִ֬ם¿ if
haimH518 →1069 times
אֵ֣יןnot
ʾeinH369 →789 times
עֶזְרָתִ֣י[is] help my
ʾezratiH5833 →
בִ֑יin myself
vi
וְ֝תֻשִׁיָּ֗הand sound wisdom
vetushiyahH8454 →12 times
נִדְּחָ֥הit has been banished
nidechahH5080 →
מִמֶּֽנִּי׃from me
mimeniH4480 →1188 times
A shaded row is a word that stands 400 times or fewer in the Bible.
The walk
8 stopsEach card is a verse this one points to, and under it the verses that one points to in turn. Where several paths arrive at the same place, that place is listed first: the text keeps returning to it.
Through
2 Corinthians 1:12And this is our boast: Our conscience testifies that we have conducted ourselves in the world, and especially in relation to you, in the holiness and sincerity that are from God—not in worldly wisdom,…
it leads to
- 2 Corinthians 2:17
For we are not like so many others, who peddle the word of God for profit. On the contrary, in Christ we speak before God with sincerity, as men sent from God.
- 1 Corinthians 2:13
And this is what we speak, not in words taught us by human wisdom, but in words taught by the Spirit, expressing spiritual truths in spiritual words.
- James 3:13–18
Who is wise and understanding among you? Let him show it by his good conduct, by deeds done in the humility that comes from wisdom.
- 1 Thessalonians 2:10
You are witnesses, and so is God, of how holy, righteous, and blameless our conduct was among you who believed.
- 1 Corinthians 15:10
But by the grace of God I am what I am, and His grace to me was not in vain. No, I worked harder than all of them—yet not I, but the grace of…
- 2 Corinthians 2:17
Through
Job 13:2What you know, I also know; I am not inferior to you.
it leads to
- Job 12:3
But I also have a mind; I am not inferior to you. Who does not know such things as these?
- 2 Corinthians 11:16–18
I repeat: Let no one take me for a fool. But if you do, then receive me as a fool, so that I too may boast a little.
- Job 12:3
Through
Job 19:28If you say, ‘Let us persecute him, since the root of the matter lies with him,’
it leads to
- Job 19:22
Why do you persecute me as God does? Will you never get enough of my flesh?
- Job 19:22
Where this verse is studied
On this page
Studies1
About Job
This page draws on 10 works. Open the list of works
This page draws on Adam Clarke, Commentary on the Bible; Albert Barnes, Notes, Explanatory and Practical, on the Old and New Testaments (1832-1869); Franz Delitzsch, Biblical Commentary on the Book of Job; Gregory the Dialogist, Morals on the Book of Job; Gregory the Dialogist, Morals on the Book of Job, Book VII; Jamieson, Fausset & Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible; John Gill, Exposition of the Old Testament; John Gill, Exposition of the Old Testament (1748-1763); Matthew Henry, Commentary on the Whole Bible and Thomas Aquinas, Commentary on Job.