What He tears down cannot be rebuilt; the man He imprisons cannot be released.
Parallel translations
- WEB Behold, he breaks down, and it can’t be built again. He imprisons a man, and there can be no release.
- KJV Behold, he breaketh down, and it cannot be built again: he shutteth up a man, and there can be no opening.
- NKJV If He breaks a thing down, it cannot be rebuilt; If He imprisons a man, there can be no release.
- NASB “Behold, He tears down, and it cannot be rebuilt; He imprisons a person, and there is no release.
- NLT What he destroys cannot be rebuilt. When he puts someone in prison, there is no escape.
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
What God tears down cannot be rebuilt, and whom He imprisons cannot be freed. Job stresses the finality of God's sovereign acts.
Overview
Job affirms that God's actions to break down or confine are irreversible by human power. This underscores His absolute and unchallengeable authority over the affairs of men. The same sovereign power that none can resist is exercised by the risen Christ, who holds the keys of death and Hades and opens and shuts as He wills (Revelation 1:18; 3:7).
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 16
- Rev 3:7To the angel of the church in Philadelphia write: These are the words of the One who is holy and true, who holds the key of David. What He opens no one can shut, and what He shuts no one can open.
- Isa 22:22I will place on his shoulder the key to the house of David. What he opens no one can shut, and what he shuts no one can open.
- Mal 1:4Though Edom may say, “We have been devastated, but we will rebuild the ruins,” this is what the LORD of Hosts says: “They may build, but I will demolish. They will be called the Land of Wickedness, and a people with whom the LORD is indignant forever.
- Job 11:10If He comes along to imprison you, or convenes a court, who can stop Him?
- Job 37:7He seals up the hand of every man, so that all men may know His work.
- 1 Sam 26:8Abishai said to David, “Today God has delivered your enemy into your hand. Now, therefore, please let me thrust the spear through him into the ground with one stroke. I will not need to strike him twice!”
- 1 Sam 17:46This day the LORD will deliver you into my hand. This day I will strike you down, cut off your head, and give the carcasses of the Philistines to the birds of the air and the creatures of the earth. Then the whole world will know that there is a God in Israel.
- Job 19:10He tears me down on every side until I am gone; He uproots my hope like a tree.
- Job 9:12–13If He takes away, who can stop Him? Who dares to ask Him, ‘What are You doing?’
- Jer 51:58This is what the LORD of Hosts says: “Babylon’s thick walls will be leveled, and her high gates consumed by fire. So the labor of the people will be for nothing; the nations will exhaust themselves to fuel the flames.”
- Job 16:11God has delivered me to unjust men; He has thrown me to the clutches of the wicked.
- Isa 25:2Indeed, You have made the city a heap of rubble, the fortified town a ruin. The fortress of strangers is a city no more; it will never be rebuilt.
- Jer 51:64Then you are to say, ‘In the same way Babylon will sink and never rise again, because of the disaster I will bring upon her. And her people will grow weary.’” Here end the words of Jeremiah.
- Rom 11:32For God has consigned everyone to disobedience so that He may have mercy on everyone.
- Isa 14:23“I will make her a place for owls and for swamplands; I will sweep her away with the broom of destruction,” declares the LORD of Hosts.
- 1 Sam 24:18And you have shown this day how well you have dealt with me; for when the LORD delivered me into your hand, you did not kill me.
Themes, concepts, people & topics
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Hebrew/Greek interlinear, word definitions, and cross-references for this verse.
Christ at the center
Job's cry for a mediator who can lay his hand on both God and man, and his confidence that 'my Redeemer lives' and will stand on the earth, reaches forward to Jesus the living Redeemer.
How Job 12:14 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
Each word below is tagged with its Strong’s number — tap one to see the underlying Hebrew word, its meaning, and every verse that uses it.