Teks -- Job 18:13 (NET)

18:13 It eats away parts of his skin; the most terrible death devours his limbs.

Tafsiran/Catatan -- Catatan Kata/Frasa (per frasa)

Wesley: Job 18:13 - First

born - A terrible kind of death.

Wesley: Job 18:13 - The first

born was the chief of his brethren, and therefore this title is given to things eminent in their kind.

JFB: Job 18:13

UMBREIT has "he" for "it," that is, "in the rage of hunger he shall devour his own body"; or, "his own children" (Lam 4:10). Rather, "destruction" from Job 18:12 is nominative to "devour."

JFB: Job 18:13 - strength

Rather, "members" (literally, the "branches" of a tree).

JFB: Job 18:13 - the first-born of death

A personification full of poetical horror. The first-born son held the chief place (Gen 49:3); so here the chiefest (most deadly) disease that death has ever engendered (Isa 14:30; "first-born of the poor"--the poorest). The Arabs call fever, "daughter of death."

Clarke: Job 18:13 - It shall devour the strength of his skin

It shall devour the strength of his skin - This may refer to the elephant, or to the rhinoceros, whose skin scarcely any dart can pierce: but in the case referred to above, the animal is taken in a pitfall, and then the first-born of death - a sudden and overwhelming stroke - deprives him of life. See the account of hunting the elephant in the East at the end of the chapter, Job 18:21 (note). The Chaldee has: "The strength of his skin shall devour his flesh; and the angel of death shall consume his children."

TSK: Job 18:13 - strength // the firstborn

strength : Heb. bars, Job 17:16; Jon 2:6

the firstborn : Gen 49:3; Isa 14:30; Rev 6:8

Tafsiran/Catatan -- Catatan Kata/Frasa (per Ayat)

Poole: Job 18:13 - The strength of his skin // The first-born of death

The strength of his skin Heb. the bars , or rather, the branches of the skin , i.e. either the veins and sinews, which branch out themselves through the skin as well as elsewhere; or the fat and flesh, which like bars support the skin, and adorn and beautify it, as branches do a tree; without which the skirt is shrivelled up and deformed.

The first-born of death i.e. a most remarkable and terrible kind of death. The first-born was the chief of his brethren, and therefore this title is given to things eminent in their kind, as Isa 14:30 Col 1:18 Heb 12:23 Rev 1:5 .

Haydock: Job 18:13 - First-born // Death

First-born denotes the best, or the worst. (Haydock) ---

Death. Hebrew, "of death," the devil, or a premature death, and most cruel enemy. (Calmet) ---

Septuagint, "But death devours his most beautiful things." (Haydock)

Gill: Job 18:13 - It shall devour the strength of his skin // even the firstborn of death shall devour his strength

It shall devour the strength of his skin,.... Or "the bars of his skin" ^x, the strength and support of his body, for which his skin may be put, as the bones; or "the branches of his skin" ^y, the veins, which like so many branches run under, and may be seen through the skin: now these, it, famine, or want of food, devours, and destroys the strength and beauty of the skin, cause it to be black like an oven, Lam 4:8; bring a man to a mere skeleton, to skin and bones, waste and consume the members of his body, his flesh, and blood, and bones; the Targum, Jarchi, and Aben Ezra, by "his bars" or "branches" understand his children, which are his bars, the strength of him, and are to him as branches to a tree, proceeding from him; and if we render it, as some do, he "shall devour" ^z, or "eat", that is, the wicked man, it points to us the most horrible scene in a famine, which is shocking and shuddering, and yet what has been, as in the sieges of Samaria and Jerusalem, a parent's eating and devouring his own children, 2Ki 6:28; but rather the "it is the firstborn of death", in the next clause, which is to be supplied from thence here:

even the firstborn of death shall devour his strength; and so Mr. Broughton translates the whole verse,

"a strange death shall eat all the branches of his body, all its branches shall it eat;''

which the Targum interprets of the angel of death, him which has the power of death: but rather it signifies not what presides over death, but what death first produces, which are corruption and rottenness, dust and worms; these are the firstborn of death, or the firstfruits and effects of it, and which devour and destroy not the skin only, but the whole body and all its members: or "the firstborn death" ^a; death, which is a firstborn, it is the firstborn of sin; sin is its parent, last conceives sin, and that brings forth death; death is the child of sin, and is its firstborn, and sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and this is what devours and destroys the strength of men. Some understand by firstborn death a premature one, death before the usual time or common course of nature; wicked men do not live out half their days; and when they are taken off in their youth, in the prime of their days and strength, and amidst all their wealth, riches, and pleasures, this is the first, or firstborn death, as that is a secondary one which is late, in the time of old age. This is the ingenious thought of Pineda; but, perhaps, rather, as the firstborn is the chief and principal, so here may be meant the chiefest of deaths, the most hard, cruel, and severe; the first of those, that death has under it, which are principally the sword, famine, pestilence, and the noisome beast, see Rev 6:8; it is commonly thought that famine is intended, spoken of in the context; but why not rather some thing distinct from it, and particularly the pestilence? since that is emphatically called death by the Jews, and in the passage last referred to, and is the terror by night, and the arrow that flies by day, even the pestilence that walks in darkness, and the destruction that wastes at noonday; by means of which thousands and ten thousands of wicked men fall at the sides of good men, when it does not affect them: and so may be the evil particularly threatened to a wicked man here, see Psa 91:5.