Job 10:19

Job 10:19 I should have been as though I had not been; I should have been carried from the womb to the grave.

Ver. 19. I should have been as though I had not been] Here he sings the same song as Job 3:1-26 Job 4:1-21. It is hard to say how oft a child of God may discover the same infirmity. Our lives are fuller of sins than the firmament is of stars or the furnace of sparks.

I should have been carried from the womb to the grave] He makes mention of the grave as a desirable place, which yet in the two last verses he describeth as a place of darkness and disorder. Thus Job himself was in the dark, and in his passion he throweth out words without wisdom. Itaque solicite orandus est Deus, saith one here, God is therefore to be earnestly entreated, that when we are hard put to it with pain and misery, we may not give way to unruly passion, nor suffer our tongues to outlash, as they will be apt to do. See Psa 39:1; confer Psa 22:1-31 Psa 77:1-20 Psa 88:1-18 Psa 89:1-52., and we shall see David well nigh as far out as Job in his complaints and wishes; but God can put a difference between the godly and sin in them, as between poison and the box that holdeth it. He can also pity them, as we do poison in a man, which yet we hate in a toad, &c.

John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Verse 19. I should have been as though] Had I given up the ghost as soon as born, as I could not then have been conscious of existence, it would have been, as it respects myself, as though I had never been; being immediately transported from my mother's womb to the grave.

Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

Are not my days few?.... They are so, the days of every man are but few; see Job 14:1; the remainder of Job's days were but few; considering the course of nature, and especially the sore afflictions he had on him, it could not be thought his days on earth were many; in all likelihood, according to human probability, he had but a few days to live: or "are not my days a small little thing" (g)? it is as an hand's breadth, as nothing before God, Psa 39:5,

cease then; that is, from afflicting him; since he had so short a time to live, he requests there might be some intermission of his trouble; that he might have some intervals of comfort and refreshment, that not all his days, which were so few, should be spent in grief and sorrow: some connect this with the preceding clause, and which is most agreeable to the accents, "shall not the fewness of my days cease" (h)? I have but a few days, and these few days will soon cease; therefore give me some respite from my afflictions; and so the Targum,"are not my days swift and ceasing?"

and let me alone; do not follow me with afflictions, or disturb and distress me with them; but take off thine hand, that I may have some rest and ease; see Job 7:10; or "put from me"; thine anger, as Kimchi, or thine army, as Junius and Tremellius; or thy camp, as Cocceius; that is, decamp from me, remove thy troops, the changes and war that are against me, by which I am besieged, surrounded, and straitened; let me be delivered from them:

that I may take comfort a little; that he might have some breathing time, some respite from his troubles, some refreshment to his spirit, some reviving to his fainting soul, some renewing of strength, before he departed this life; see Psa 39:13; so Aben Ezra and Gersom render it: "that I may be strengthened"; or that his heart might gather strength.

(g) "nonne parum dies mei?" Montanus, Bolducius, Schmidt; "paucum quid", Vatablus, Beza, Mercerus. (h) "An non param, vel paucitas dierum meorum cessabit?" Cocceius; "annon pauxillulum dierum meorum deficiet?" Schultens.

John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

I should have been carried from the womb to the grave - See the notes at Job 3:16.

Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

I should have been, or, Oh that I had been! and so in the following branch,

Oh that I had been carried! For why should not these verbs of the future tense be so rendered here, as that Job 10:18 is, the reason being wholly the same?

Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

19. Have… carried — אובל, borne with solemn funereal pomp, same as in Job_21:32. A word of honour strangely accorded to nascent humanity, unless it be because of its immortal life. “Here the example of Job teaches us that great and holy men fall easily and sin terribly if God, our Lord, begin a little to withdraw his hand from them.” — H. Weller.

Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

I should have been as though I had not been; I should have been carried from the womb to the grave. So short an existence would have been the next thing to no existence at all, and would have equally satisfied my wishes.

The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

would that I was brought from the womb to the grave Would that I was brought.

Rashi on the Tanakh — English translations: “The Judaica Press complete Tanach with Rashi, translated by A. J. Rosenberg” (CC BY 4.0); “Pentateuch with Rashi's commentary by M. Rosenbaum and A.M. Silbermann, 1929-1934” (public domain); “The Metsudah Tanach series, Lakewood, N.J” (CC BY 4.0); and “The Book of Joshua, Metsudah Publications, 1997” (CC BY 4.0). Text via Sefaria.