Job 30:19

Job 30:19 He hath cast me into the mire, and I am become like dust and ashes.

Ver. 19. He hath cast me into the mire] My disease hath, so Vatablus senseth it. Others, God hath as it were trampled me to dirt, thrown me into the kennel, and so done me the greatest disgrace that can be.

And I am become like dust and ashes] Like a dust head behind the door, cadaverosus et semimortuus, saith Mercer; being covered all over (saith Beza) with the scales and scrapings that fall from my scabs; I am become more like unto the unprofitable dust and ashes, than unto a living man. Dust and ashes are not more like one another than their names are in the original; sic κονις, cinis. See Gen 3:19; Gen 18:27.

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.

30:19 dust and ashes: Earlier, Job was sitting “among the ashes” in anguish (2:8); later, he would “sit in dust and ashes to show . . . repentance” (42:6).

Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

That is, God hath brought me into contempt.

Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain. Text via Bolls.life.

God is poetically said to do that which the mourner had done to himself (Job 2:8). With lying in the ashes he had become, like them, in dirty color.

Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

(19) He hath cast me into the mire.—He now turns more directly to God, having in Job_30:16 turned from man to his own condition—dust and ashes. This latter phrase is used but three times in Scripture: twice by Job (here and Job_42:6), and once by Abraham (Gen_18:27).

A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

19. The verse probably refers to the appearance which Job’s body presented in its leprous condition; this was due to God, who is represented as causing it by plunging Job as it were into the mire.

19–23. God’s great severity.

The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

He hath cast me into the mire,.... As Jeremiah was literally; here it is to be understood in a figurative sense; not of the mire of sin, into which God casts none, men fall into it of themselves, but of the mire of affliction and calamity; see Psa 40:2; and which Job here ascribes to God; and whereby he was in as mean, abject, and contemptible a condition, as if he had been thrown into a kennel, and rolled in it; and he speaks of it as an act of God, done with contempt of him, and indignation at him, as he apprehended it. Some Jewish writers (e) interpret it, "he taught me in the mire", or "it taught me"; his disease, his ulcers taught him to sit down in the mire, or in the midst of ashes, Job 2:8; but though this reading might admit of a good sense, as that Job was taught, as every good man is, many useful lessons in and by afflictions; yet it seems to be a sense foreign from the words:

and I am become like dust and ashes; a phrase by which Abraham expresses his vileness, meanness, and unworthiness in the sight of God, Gen 18:27; Job, through the force of his disease, looked like a corpse, or one half dead, and was crumbling and dropping into the dust of death and the grave, and looked livid and ash coloured; and even in a literal sense was covered with dust and ashes, when he sat among them, Job 2:8; though here it chiefly respects the miserable, forlorn, and contemptible condition in which he was.

(e) Vid. Jarchi & Bar Tzemach in loc.

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

He hath cast me into the mire - That is, God has done it. In this book the name of God is often understood where the speaker seems to avoid it, in order that it may not be needlessly repeated. On the meaning of the expression here, see the notes at Job 9:31.

And I am become like dust and ashes - Either in appearance, or I am regarded as being as worthless as the mire of the streets. Rosenmuller supposes it means, “I am more like a mass of inanimate matter than a living man.”

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

I am. Hebrew, "He hat cast me into the mire;" (Protestants) or, "He regards me as dirt; my portion is on the earth and dust." (Haydock) --- All look upon me with horror and contempt. (Calmet)

George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).

He hath made me contemptible and filthy, and loathsome for my sores, my whole body being a kind of quagmire, in regard of the filth breaking forth in all its parts;

and I am become like dust and ashes, like one dead and turned to dust; more like a rotten carcass than a living man.

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

19. As in Job_9:31. Like dust and ashes — In elephantiasis the skin is at first intensely red, and afterward black.

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

He (i.e. God) hath cast me into the mire. "The mire" here is the lowest depth of misery and degradation. (comp. Psa_40:2 Psa_69:2, Psa_69:14) Job feels himself cast into it by God, but nevertheless does not forsake him nor cease to call upon him (vers. 20-23). And I am become like dust and ashes; i.e. unclean, impure, offensive to my fellow-men, an object of dislike and disdain.

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

It directed me to the mud These boils directed me and taught me to sit in the mud, as we said above (2:8). “and he sat down in the ashes.” Another explanation: הוֹרַנִי means: it cast me, an expression of (Exod. 15:4), “He cast (ירה) into the sea.”

and I was compared Was likened. And in the Midrash of Rabbi Tanchuma (Buber, Vayishlach 8): Said Rabbi Berechiah, “Transpose the verse.” I was compared to Abraham in my righteousness, who called himself dust and ashes (Gen.18:27), and He judges me like the wicked of the Generation of the Dispersion (who rebelled against Him by building the tower), concerning whom it is written (Gen. 11:3): “and the mortar served them as clay.”

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.