He wanders about as food for vultures; he knows the day of darkness is at hand.
Parallel translations
- WEB He wanders abroad for bread, saying, ‘Where is it?’ He knows that the day of darkness is ready at his hand.
- KJV He wandereth abroad for bread, saying, Where is it? he knoweth that the day of darkness is ready at his hand.
- NKJV He wanders about for bread, saying, ‘Where is it?’ He knows that a day of darkness is ready at his hand.
- NASB “He wanders about for food, saying, ‘Where is it?’ He knows that a day of darkness is at hand.
- NLT They wander around, saying, ‘Where can I find bread?’ They know their day of destruction is near.
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
The wicked man wanders in want, scavenging for bread, knowing a day of darkness is at hand. He lives in insecurity and impending doom.
Overview
Eliphaz pictures the godless reduced to homeless hunger, conscious that disaster is ready to overtake him. The reversal from prosperity to destitution dramatizes divine judgment on sin. The portrait is theologically sound regarding the ultimate fate of the unrepentant, but unjust as a diagnosis of Job, whose losses are part of a contest in heaven he cannot see.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 15
- Ps 59:15They scavenge for food, and growl if they are not satisfied.
- Job 18:12His strength is depleted, and calamity is ready at his side.
- Ps 109:10May his children wander as beggars, seeking sustenance far from their ruined homes.
- Amos 5:20Will not the Day of the LORD be darkness and not light, even gloom with no brightness in it?
- Eccl 11:8So if a man lives many years, let him rejoice in them all. But let him remember the days of darkness, for they will be many. Everything to come is futile.
- Job 18:5–6Indeed, the lamp of the wicked is extinguished; the flame of his fire does not glow.
- Heb 11:37–38They were stoned, they were sawed in two, they were put to death by the sword. They went around in sheepskins and goatskins, destitute, oppressed, and mistreated.
- Lam 5:6We submitted to Egypt and Assyria to get enough bread.
- Job 30:3–4Gaunt from poverty and hunger, they gnawed the dry land, and the desolate wasteland by night.
- Heb 10:27but only a fearful expectation of judgment and of raging fire that will consume all adversaries.
- Gen 4:12When you till the ground, it will no longer yield its produce to you. You will be a fugitive and a wanderer on the earth.”
- Joel 2:2a day of darkness and gloom, a day of clouds and blackness. Like the dawn overspreading the mountains a great and strong army appears, such as never was of old, nor will ever be in ages to come.
- Zeph 1:15That day will be a day of wrath, a day of trouble and distress, a day of destruction and desolation, a day of darkness and gloom, a day of clouds and blackness,
- Job 18:18He is driven from light into darkness and is chased from the inhabited world.
- Lam 5:9We get our bread at the risk of our lives because of the sword in the wilderness.
Themes, concepts, people & topics
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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 15:23 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.