The cloud consumeth and vanisheth away; so he that goeth down to Sheol shall not come up.
Sick, sleepless and worn out, Job reaches for the plainest picture he can find: a cloud that thins out until nothing is left. Is he saying that a man ends altogether, or only that his place in this world ends?
Every image in this part of Job's speech shows how fast a life runs out. One commentator lists them in order — the pain, the sores, the weaving loom — and ends with the cloud.
Job now returns to dwell on his sufferings in view of the brevity of life. His sleepless nights of "tossings to and fro" run through months of unrelieved pain. They make him long for that "appointed time" for all flesh. He wants it as eagerly as a hired worker waiting for the end of his working day. Already the signs of the grave are on him: the worm and the clod. Any slight healing of his sores only signals a fresh, disgusting outbreak. Like the swift passing of the shuttle in the weaver's loom, so his painful days pass. Soon they will see him no more, and his life will melt away like the cloud in the blue sky.
Read on its own, the verse sounds like a man frightened of dying. In fact the one-way road down is what Job asks for.
"As the cloud fades and vanishes" — that is what he compared himself to — "so he who goes down to Sheol does not come up" — that is what he wanted, that it should end. "He returns no more to his house, nor does his place know him anymore."
(Kelly is working from an older translation, which reads "the grave" where the ESV has "Sheol".)
Sheol is the Old Testament word for the place of the dead. The verse tells us nothing about what happens there, and that silence runs right through the older Scriptures.
As to Sheol, see how vague it is in Scripture… It meets sight at the grave, and all is dark and silent beyond. In Job 7:9 you see nothing beyond it.
Some have used this verse to argue that death is the end of a person. Job is describing what death takes away for good, not what God may still give afterwards.
Job's words are absolutely true here, without bringing in the God-dishonouring thought of annihilation in any way… God's grace may give him another and a better thing, but it does not reverse the first judgment.
Job was right about what death takes away. He was wrong about what still lay ahead of him.
To him his future appeared bleak and hopeless. How wrong he was! God had designed greater blessing for him in the future than he had ever known before. And eternity holds blessing infinitely greater still. But meanwhile Job felt defeated and miserable. He thought of his life as a cloud that appears and vanishes away… He wanted to die. Why then did he think so hopelessly about what death would bring? But our feelings often make us inconsistent.
Behind the misery there was a purpose.
God was putting him into the furnace so that he might come out purer than ever.
Job had to reason his way through death in the dark. Commentators point to the change that came with Christ's resurrection.
Have we ever given enough weight in our souls to what the Apostle Paul says in 2 Timothy 1:10? He speaks of "our Saviour Christ Jesus, who abolished death and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel." … That the soul of man survived death, and that resurrection lay ahead, was believed in Old Testament times, as Job's words here show. What was not made known was that for the believer resurrection will mean entrance on a new and incorruptible order of things. Our Lord showed this when He rose from the dead. So we have no need to discuss the matter and reason it out, as Job does here.
(Hole's translation of 2 Timothy 1:10 reads "incorruptibility" rather than "immortality" — hence his point about a new and incorruptible order.)
- Cloud. Job's own chosen image for himself: a life thinning out over months of pain until nothing of it is left in the sky.
- Wish. The one-way descent is not what he fears but what he asks for — he wants the whole thing to end.
- Dark. Sight stops at the grave. In the older Scriptures everything beyond Sheol stays dark and silent.
- Limit. What the words rule out is a return to this house and this place. Grace may give something better, but it does not reverse that judgment.
- Light. Job reasoned in the dark and misjudged his own future. Christ's resurrection has since brought life and incorruptibility into the open, so we no longer have to guess.
He shall return no more to his house, neither shall his place know him again.
Job is answering his friends. By chapter 7 his grief has narrowed to one thought: his life is nearly over, and when it ends, everything he knows on earth ends with it. If death wipes a man out of his own home, is that the whole story?
Around this verse Job piles up images of how fast life runs out:
Job now returns to dwell on his sufferings, in view of how short life is. Sleepless nights of "tossings to and fro" run through months of unrelieved pain. They make him long for that "appointed time" set for all flesh, with the eager desire of a hired worker waiting for the end of his day's work. His painful days pass like the swift shuttle in a weaver's loom. Soon they will see him no more, and his life will melt away like a cloud in the blue sky.
The vanishing cloud is not only a description. It is a wish. Job is not dreading the end; he is asking for it. But God had a purpose in the pain he wanted stopped:
But God was putting him into the furnace so that he might come out purer than ever... He compared himself to a cloud that fades and vanishes away. The one who goes down to the grave comes up no more. That is what he wanted — that it should end.
Another part of Scripture uses the same picture — a life gone, its place knowing it no more. But it does not stop there. Job does:
This is beautiful poetry, and true as far as man's view goes: "he flourishes like a flower of the field; for the wind passes over it, and it is gone, and its place knows it no more." It is the funeral song of human existence since sin brought in death. "But the steadfast love of the LORD is from everlasting to everlasting on those who fear him" (Ps. 103:15-18). Job sees only the dark side, for while he does turn to God here, he speaks not of mercy but of wrath.
Some read this verse as proof that a person stops existing at death. It describes what happens to a man's place on earth, not what happens to him:
When we say that a man has died, we mean he has stopped existing on earth. His place here knows him no more (Job 7:10). Yet we are assured from Scripture that his spirit does not die. The body can, and does; death claims it; the grave holds it. The person, however, lives to God, as the Lord told the Sadducees in the temple at Jerusalem (Luke 20:38). Death sets the soul free from the body... We look at the person as a whole and say what is only true of a part: he is dead, because his body is dead.
Job's complaint carries a weight no dying animal feels. One writer traces that weight to what God made man for:
The beasts do perish. They were made for a temporary purpose only. They enjoy life while it lasts, with no sorrow for the past and no fear for the future. But man is not a beast: he is the offspring of God, meant to know and enjoy communion with Him forever... He, like them, passes away and is not found; his place knows him no more forever. But he is not like them. He has "thoughts" that perish with him: unfulfilled plans and purposes, affections that cling to what they cannot hold, and a dread on his soul that hints at a life to come.
Job's words can be taken at full strength without denying life beyond death. The same writer holds both together:
Such is death for man; and being such, it is the wages of sin. In death, man — the creature God made for Adam's paradise — perishes forever. He is set aside completely. And I do not forget resurrection when I say so. Resurrection does not restore him to this life. Job's words are true here, and we need not bring in the God-dishonouring idea that man is wiped out of existence... God's grace may give him another and a better thing, but it does not reverse the first judgment.
- Breath. Job's days run like a weaver's shuttle and melt like a cloud. The verse comes out of months of pain that made him long for the end.
- Wish. He is not dreading the grave; he is asking for it. Yet the furnace he wanted stopped was the very thing to bring him out purer.
- Place. What ends is his standing on earth: the house, the familiar spot. His spirit does not die; the person lives to God.
- Weight. God made man to know Him forever, unlike an animal. So man's passing leaves unfinished plans and a dread of what lies beyond.
- Grace. Resurrection does not hand back the old life; it gives another and better thing. Job saw only the dark half — mercy is the half he had not yet reached.