Job 8:4
in Job 8When your children sinned against Him, He gave them over to their rebellion.
BSB
The same verse in ASV and KJV ▾
ASV
If thy children have sinned against him, And he hath delivered them into the hand of their transgression;
KJV
If thy children have sinned against him, and he have cast them away for their transgression;
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This verse in Job 8
Commentary
10 notes on this verseIf thy children have sinned - I know thy children have been cut off by a terrible judgment; but was it not because by transgression they had filled up the measure of their iniquity? And he have cast them away - Has sent them off, says the Targum, to the place of their transgression - to that punishment due to their sins.
This site's exposition
When your children sinned against Him
on Job 8:4-7
True doctrine drives a false inference. "He gave them over to their rebellion" treats the deaths of Job's ten children in chapter 1 as evidence of their sin. Bildad's condition, "if you would earnestly seek God," is a bargain that assumes present guilt is the reason help has not come.
The record, by era
The Church Fathers1 voice
Even Bildad is confused in his speech and is pulled in different directions by various doctrines, when he says, "If you yourself have not sinned, your sons have." Thereby he does not believe one is punished for someone else. But he may be included (in …
The Medieval Church2 voices
A commentator
Gregory the DialogistMorals on the Book of Job, Book VIII · Written before 604.
proposed
Even if thy children have sinned against Him, and He have left them in the hand of their transgression; yet if thou wilt seek to God at dawn, and make thy supplication to the Almighty; if thou wilt walk pure and upright; surely now He will awake for thee, and make the habitation of thy righteousness at peace. As if the preachers of falsities were to say to afflicted Catholics, 'Provide for your lives, and learn what wrong things ye maintain from the condemnation of those that are dead from among you.
There were two things which seemed to keep Job from being restored to his former prosperity even if he were converted to God as Eliphaz advised. One of these was the fact that the children which he lost were dead and he could not expect …
The Puritans and the Awakening2 voices
If - If thou wast innocent, thy children, upon whom a great part of these calamities fell, might be guilty; and therefore God is not unrighteous in these proceedings.
If thy children have sinned against him,....
3 more voices on this verse
The Puritans and the Awakening1 voice
He put Job in hope that, if he were indeed upright, as he said he was, he should yet see a good issue of his present troubles: " Although thy children have sinned against him, and are cast away in their transgression (they have died in their own sin), yet if thou be pure and upright thyself, and as an evidence of that wilt now seek unto God and submit to him, all shall be well yet,"
The Nineteenth Century2 voices
A commentator
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown1802–1910
Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)
proposed
Thy children have sinned; God leaves them to the consequence of their sin; most cutting to the heart of the bereaved father.
A commentator
Albert Barnes1798–1870
Notes, Explanatory and Practical, on the Old and New Testaments (1832-1869)
proposed
If thy children have sinned against him - Bildad here assumes that the children of Job had been wicked, and had been cut off in their sins. This must have cut him to the quick, for there was nothing which a bereaved father would feel more acutely than this. The meaning here is somewhat weakened by the word “if.” The Hebrew אם 'ı̂m is rather to be taken in the sense of “since” - assuming it as an indisputable point, or taking it for granted. It was not a supposition that if they should now do it, certain other consequences would follow; but the idea is, that since they had been cut off in their sins, if Job would even now seek God with a proper spirit, he might be restored to prosperity, though his beginning should be small; Job 8:7. And he have cast them away - Bildad supposes that they had been disowned by God, and had been put to death. For their transgression - Margin, in the hand of their. The Hebrew is, by the hand of their transgression; i. e, their sin has been the cause of it, or it has been by the instrumentality of their sin. What foundation Bildad had for this opinion, derived from the life and character of the sons of Job, we have no means of ascertaining. The probability is, however, that he had learned in general that they had been cut off; and that, on the general principle which he maintained, that God deals with men in this life according to their character, he inferred that they must have been distinguished for wickedness. Men not unfrequently argue in this way when sudden calamity comes upon others.
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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| אִם־ | ʾim- | if | H518 → | 1069 times |
| בָּנֶ֥יךָ | baneikha | children your | H1121 → | 4930 times |
| חָֽטְאוּ־ | chateu- | they sinned | H2398 → | 238 times |
| ל֑וֹ | lo | to him | ||
| וַֽ֝יְשַׁלְּחֵ֗ם | vayshalechem | and he sent them | H7971 → | 845 times |
| בְּיַד־ | beyad- | in [the] hand of | H3027 → | 1618 times |
| פִּשְׁעָֽם׃ | pisham | transgression their | H6588 → | 93 times |
אִם־if
ʾim-H518 →1069 times
בָּנֶ֥יךָchildren your
baneikhaH1121 →4930 times
חָֽטְאוּ־they sinned
chateu-H2398 →238 times
ל֑וֹto him
lo
וַֽ֝יְשַׁלְּחֵ֗םand he sent them
vayshalechemH7971 →845 times
בְּיַד־in [the] hand of
beyad-H3027 →1618 times
פִּשְׁעָֽם׃transgression their
pishamH6588 →93 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
Job 1:5And when the days of feasting were over, Job would send for his children to purify them, rising early in the morning to offer burnt offerings for all of them. For Job thought, “Perhaps…
it leads to
- Job 42:8
So now, take seven bulls and seven rams, go to My servant Job, and sacrifice a burnt offering for yourselves. Then My servant Job will pray for you, for I will accept his prayer…
- Genesis 8:20
Then Noah built an altar to the LORD. And taking from every kind of clean animal and clean bird, he offered burnt offerings on the altar.
- 1 Samuel 16:5
“In peace,” he replied. “I have come to sacrifice to the LORD. Consecrate yourselves and come with me to the sacrifice.” Then he consecrated Jesse and his sons and invited them to the sacrifice.
- Genesis 35:2–3
So Jacob told his household and all who were with him, “Get rid of the foreign gods that are among you. Purify yourselves and change your garments.
- Ephesians 6:18
Pray in the Spirit at all times, with every kind of prayer and petition. To this end, stay alert with all perseverance in your prayers for all the saints.
- Job 42:8
Through
Job 5:4His sons are far from safety, crushed in court without a defender.
it leads to
- Psalms 127:5
Blessed is the man whose quiver is full of them. He will not be put to shame when he confronts the enemies at the gate.
- Job 18:16–19
The roots beneath him dry up, and the branches above him wither away.
- Psalms 119:155
Salvation is far from the wicked because they do not seek Your statutes.
- Psalms 127:5
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 on the Book of Job; Albert Barnes, Notes, Explanatory and Practical, on the Old and New Testaments (1832-1869); Didymus the Blind, COMMENTARY ON JOB 8:4; Gregory the Dialogist, Morals on the Book of Job, Book VIII; Jamieson, Fausset & Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible; John Gill, Exposition of the Old Testament (1748-1763); John Wesley, Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament; Matthew Henry, Commentary on the Whole Bible and Thomas Aquinas, Commentary on Job.