Job 10:8–12

Context

Chapters 9–10 of the Book of Job contain Job's reply to the first speech of Bildad the Shuhite (chapter 8). In chapter 9, Job laments that no one can contend with God. In chapter 10, he addresses God directly: "Do not condemn me" (Job 10:2). In verses 8–12, Job recalls that God fashioned him with his own hands, gave him life, and cared for him. Job offers these words not so much as praise but as grounds for a protest: why would God now destroy the one he made with such care? In verse 13 Job goes on to suspect that God had harbored a different purpose from the beginning. In verse 18 he asks, "Wherefore then hast thou brought me forth out of the womb?"

Interpretation

• As the logic of lament: Many commentators read the passage as a plea that appeals to God on the basis of the care the Creator has shown. On this reading, Job is trying to persuade God by appealing to the expectation that the Maker will not carelessly cast off what he has made.
• As a confession of creation and providence: Sermons and devotional materials across denominational lines often focus on the word "visitation" in verse 12. Read this way, the passage becomes a confession that a person's birth and continued life rest under God's care, that is, his providence. This reading emphasizes that even in deep suffering Job never ceased to call on God as Creator.
• As a text about life in the womb: This reading takes verses 10–11 as a description of the body being formed in the womb. Together with Psalm 139, it treats the passage as support for the claim that the unborn child, too, is a life that God is forming, and the passage is cited in this way in discussions of abortion and the church.

Questions of Application

• Context: Some point out that lifting these verses out of their setting of protest and using them only as words of comfort or praise obscures Job's anguished questions. Others regard the passage as a model showing that lament, too, is a prayer that may be brought before God.
• Citation regarding the unborn: The image of being "curdled like cheese" (the Hebrew word denotes cheese) is a poetic expression reflecting how ancient people understood the formation of life. For this reason, some urge caution in using the passage as though it were biological evidence. Others respond that the passage offers not medical information but a confession of faith that God is involved in life in the womb, and so citing it is not problematic.
• Translation: In the second half of verse 8, the Hebrew text uses words meaning "together, round about," and interpretations differ. The Korean Revised Version renders the phrase "formed my whole body," while some modern translations, following the Septuagint (the ancient Greek translation), render it with the sense "afterward you turn and destroy me." The Korean term rendered "visitation" in verse 12 (gwongo, 眷顧) means "watchful care"; it is a different word from the modern Korean homonym gwongo (勸告), meaning "advice" or "admonition." The word "favour" in the same verse translates the Hebrew hesed, which other versions render as "love" or "lovingkindness."

Related Passages

• Psalm 139:15–16
• Genesis 2:7
• Genesis 3:17–19
• Isaiah 49:1