New Living Translation
Job 27:18
18The wicked build houses as fragile as a spider’s web, as flimsy as a shelter made of branches.
Job 27:18 in other versions
- King James Version (KJV)He buildeth his house as a moth, and as a booth that the keeper maketh.
- New International Version (NIV)The house he builds is like a moth’s cocoon, like a hut made by a watchman.
- English Standard Version (ESV)He builds his house like a moth's, like a booth that a watchman makes.
- New King James Version (NKJV)He builds his house like a moth, Like a booth which a watchman makes.
Context of Job 27:18
16“Evil people may have piles of money and may store away mounds of clothing. 17But the righteous will wear that clothing, and the innocent will divide that money. The wicked build houses as fragile as a spider’s web, as flimsy as a shelter made of branches. 19The wicked go to bed rich but wake to find that all their wealth is gone. 20Terror overwhelms them like a flood, and they are blown away in the storms of the night.
Read all of Job 27Job 27:18 word by word
בָּנָ֣ה כָעָ֣שׁ בֵּית֑וֹ וּ֝כְסֻכָּ֗ה עָשָׂ֥ה נֹצֵֽר׃Read the interlinear
Words taken from the KJV.
Cross-references for Job 27:18
- Job 8:14Their confidence hangs by a thread. They are leaning on a spider’s web.
- Isaiah 51:8For the moth will devour them as it devours clothing. The worm will eat at them as it eats wool. But my righteousness will last forever. My salvation will continue from generation to generation.”
- Isaiah 1:8Beautiful Jerusalem stands abandoned like a watchman’s shelter in a vineyard, like a lean-to in a cucumber field after the harvest, like a helpless city under siege.
- Isaiah 38:12My life has been blown away like a shepherd’s tent in a storm. It has been cut short, as when a weaver cuts cloth from a loom. Suddenly, my life was over.
- Lamentations 2:6He has broken down his Temple as though it were merely a garden shelter. The Lord has blotted out all memory of the holy festivals and Sabbath days. Kings and priests fall together before his fierce anger.
Commentaries on Job 27:18
- Adam Clarke Bible Commentary · v. 18He buildeth his house as a moth - With great skill, great pains, and great industry; but the structure, however skillful, shall be dissolved; and the materials, however costly, shall be brought to corruption. To its owner it shall be only a temporary habitation, like that which the moth makes in its larve or caterpillar state, during its change from a chrysalis to a winged insect. As a booth that the keeper maketh - A shed which the watchman or keeper of…Read the comment
- Barnes’ Notes on the Bible · v. 18He buildeth his house as a moth - The house which the moth builds is the slight fabric which it makes for its own dwelling in the garment which it consumes. On this verse compare Job 8:14. The dwelling of the moth is composed of the materials of the garment on which it feeds, and there may be an allusion here not only to the fact that the house which the wicked reared for themselves would be temporary, and that it would soon pass away like the dwelling of…Read the comment
- Matthew Henry Concise Commentary · v. 11-23Verses 11-23 Job's friends, on the same subject, spoke of the misery of wicked men before death as proportioned to their crimes; Job considered that if it were not so, still the consequences of their death would be dreadful. Job undertook to set this matter in a true light. Death to a godly man, is like a fair gale of wind to convey him to the heavenly country; but, to a wicked man, it is like a storm, that hurries him away to destruction. While he lived…Read the comment
- Tyndale Open Study Notes · v. 9-23Some interpreters think this is a new speech by Zophar. Without it, Zophar has no speech in this cycle.Read the comment
- Jamieson–Fausset–Brown Commentary · v. 11-2311-23. These words are contrary to Job's previous sentiments (see on Job 21:22-33; Job 24:22-25). Job 21:22-33; 24:22-25). They therefore seem to be Job's statement, not so much of his own sentiments, as of what Zophar would have said had he spoken when his turn came (end of the twenty-sixth chapter). So Job stated the friends' opinion (Job 21:17-21; 24:18-21). The objection is, why, if so, does not Job answer Zophar's opinion, as stated by himself? The…Read the comment
Topics related to Job 27:18
In the dictionaries
Commentaries on Job 27
- Adam Clarke Bible Commentary
- Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
- Matthew Henry Concise Commentary
- Tyndale Open Study Notes
- Jamieson–Fausset–Brown Commentary
- Rashi on Tanakh
- Keil & Delitzsch Commentary
- John Wesley’s Notes
- Darby Translation Notes
- Geneva Bible Translation Notes
- Kingcomments
- Matthew Henry’s Complete Commentary
- Matthew Henry’s Modern English Commentary
- Scofield Reference Notes, 1917 Edition
- Seventh-day Adventist Bible Commentary
- EGW Writings
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