22 For when a few years are come, I shall go the way whence I shall not return.
But man dieth, and is laid low: Yea, man giveth up the ghost, and where is he?
If a man die, shall he live `again'? All the days of my warfare would I wait, Till my release should come.
Seeing his days are determined, The number of his months is with thee, And thou hast appointed his bounds that he cannot pass;
yea, they shall be afraid of `that which is' high, and terrors `shall be' in the way; and the almond-tree shall blossom, and the grasshopper shall be a burden, and desire shall fail; because man goeth to his everlasting home, and the mourners go about the streets:
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Commentary on Job 16 Matthew Henry Commentary
Chapter 16
This chapter begins Job's reply to that discourse of Eliphaz which we had in the foregoing chapter; it is but the second part of the same song of lamentation with which he had before bemoaned himself, and is set to the same melancholy tune.
Job 16:1-5
Both Job and his friends took the same way that disputants commonly take, which is to undervalue one another's sense, and wisdom, and management. The longer the saw of contention is drawn the hotter it grows; and the beginning of this sort of strife is as the letting forth of water; therefore leave it off before it be meddled with. Eliphaz had represented Job's discourses as idle, and unprofitable, and nothing to the purpose; and Job here gives his the same character. Those who are free in passing such censures must expect to have them retorted; it is easy, it is endless: but cui bono?-what good does it do? It will stir up men's passions, but will never convince their judgments, nor set truth in a clear light. Job here reproves Eliphaz,
Job 16:6-16
Job's complaint is here as bitter as any where in all his discourses, and he is at a stand whether to smother it or to give it vent. Sometimes the one and sometimes the other is a relief to the afflicted, according as the temper or the circumstances are; but Job found help by neither, v. 6.
Here is a doleful representation of Job's grievances. O what reason have we to bless God that we are not making such complaints! He complains,
Job 16:17-22
Job's condition was very deplorable; but had he nothing to support him, nothing to comfort him? Yes, and he here tells us what it was.