In his hand is the life of every living thing and the breath of all mankind.
Job's friends insist that suffering always proves guilt. He answers by pointing to the animals, the earth and the sea. Every creature alive holds its life at God's disposal. Few verses say so plainly that life is not owned but only held. The harder question is whether Job says it in worship or in protest.
The argument Job is making
Job begins this argument back in verse 6.
F. B. HoleIn verse 6 Job challenged the main position that his friends had taken. They said that God always rewards godly people with prosperity here, and brings disaster on the wicked. He said this was not true. There were cases where robbers prospered, and where people who provoked God were safe. To prove it he pointed to what we can see in the lower creation — beasts, birds and fishes. He was pointing, we suppose, to the disorder that man's sin has brought in even there. The weaker meet disaster and destruction from the stronger, and God permits all of it.
What the beasts and birds teach
Job tells his friends to ask the animals. What they show is a world not yet running the way God will have it.
William Kelly"Why," he says, "the very beasts know more than you, and prove more than all your speeches!"… The whole creation — the lower creation of God upon the earth — is a proof that things are not yet according to God. Do they not prey on one another? Do not the great swallow up the small? And is not man the great bringer of death to beasts, birds and fishes, and to everything else, for his own pleasure?… "In whose hand is the soul of every living thing, and the breath of all mankind" — and yet He allows them to break forth in this lawless way.
Two different words
Job uses two different Hebrew words in one line. Older translations show this by reading "soul" where the ESV reads "life."
The Christian's FriendOther passages in the Old Testament show us that soul and spirit were not confused. They were known and kept apart… Job also contrasts soul and spirit. The first belongs to every living thing. The second is found in man alone. He asks, "In whose hand is the soul (nephesh) of every living thing, and the breath (rooagh) of all mankind?"
Why man's breath stands apart
If God holds animal life and human breath alike, what makes the human case different? Commentators trace it back to how man received life in the first place.
William KellyGod did not only put the rest of the animal kingdom under man here below. Man alone also had his life direct from above. "The LORD God breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living creature." No other animal became a living soul in this way… This is why man alone stands in direct moral responsibility to God. He must give account for the things done in the body to the God who gave him his soul and spirit in this way.
(The older translation Kelly quotes reads "man became a living soul.")
Where Job's reasoning goes wrong
The statement itself is true. But commentators note that Job is pressing it in a direction that begins to accuse the One who holds the breath.
Samuel RidoutCreation — in earth and air and sea — will confirm him in witnessing that God is everywhere and does everything. His conclusion from this, however, leads him dangerously near charging God with being the author of evil… If he means only that God is all-powerful, everyone would agree at once. But the words that follow show his gloomy mind and distorted vision are dwelling on the dark side of nature. It is in this that his danger lies.
Breath on loan
Away from the debate, the verse tests an assumption most people live by.
J. T. MawsonMen delight in the thought that they are independent of God, but it is a delusion, they are not, for in Him we live and move and have our being. He is the faithful Creator, giving to all life and breath, and all things. His mercies preserve us. Every breath of our nostrils and every throb of our feeble hearts is by God's power and ordering.
Another writer turns the verse on the reader as a warning: "'And the God in whose hand your breath is'… 'Your breath' too is in His hand. The little string of life only has to break, and you pass from time into eternity." (W. T. P. Wolston)
Summary
- One hand. Job's whole case rests on one fact. Every creature's life and every person's breath sit in God's hand, not their own.
- Creation testifies. Ask the animals and the friends' tidy rule falls apart. The strong devour the weak, and God allows it. So suffering today is no proof of guilt.
- Two words. "Soul" covers every living thing. "Breath" belongs to mankind alone. Job marks the difference with two words.
- One responsibility. Man alone received life breathed from God. So man alone must give account to Him for what he does in the body.
- One warning. Job held this truth bitterly and came close to blaming God. Hold it humbly instead. Nobody lives a day free of the hand that holds the string of life.