And he, as a rotten thing, consumeth, as a garment that is moth eaten.
Parallel translations
- WEB though I am decaying like a rotten thing, like a garment that is moth-eaten.
- BSB So man wastes away like something rotten, like a moth-eaten garment.
- NKJV “Man decays like a rotten thing, Like a garment that is moth-eaten.
- NASB While I am decaying like a rotten thing, Like a garment that is moth-eaten.
- NLT I waste away like rotting wood, like a moth-eaten coat.
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
Job describes himself as decaying like rotten wood or moth-eaten cloth. His frailty makes God's pursuit seem needless.
Overview
Job laments that he is wasting away like a rotten thing or a moth-eaten garment. His body is already crumbling, heightening his bewilderment at God's seeming severity. The image underscores human mortality, a theme he develops further in the following chapter.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 6
- Ps 39:11When thou with rebukes dost correct man for iniquity, thou makest his beauty to consume away like a moth: surely every man is vanity. Selah.
- Job 4:19How much less in them that dwell in houses of clay, whose foundation is in the dust, which are crushed before the moth?
- Hos 5:12Therefore will I be unto Ephraim as a moth, and to the house of Judah as rottenness.
- Num 12:12Let her not be as one dead, of whom the flesh is half consumed when he cometh out of his mother’s womb.
- Job 30:29–30I am a brother to dragons, and a companion to owls.
- Job 30:17–19My bones are pierced in me in the night season: and my sinews take no rest.
Themes, concepts, people & topics
Resources, by level
Commentaries & study tools
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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 13:28 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.