“Were you the first person ever born? Were you born before the hills were made?
Parallel translations
- WEB “Are you the first man who was born? Or were you brought out before the hills?
- KJV Art thou the first man that was born? or wast thou made before the hills?
- BSB Were you the first man ever born? Were you brought forth before the hills?
- NKJV “Are you the first man who was born? Or were you made before the hills?
- NASB ¶“Were you the first person to be born, Or were you brought forth before the hills?
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
Eliphaz mocks Job, asking if he is the first, oldest man alive. He ridicules any claim to special wisdom.
Overview
Eliphaz sarcastically asks whether Job was 'the first man who was born' or brought forth before the hills, as if Job claimed primeval wisdom. The taunt aims to puncture what Eliphaz sees as Job's pride. Ironically, only God possesses the wisdom that precedes creation, a wisdom no mortal can claim.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 6
- Ps 90:2Before the mountains were born, before you had formed the earth and the world, even from everlasting to everlasting, you are God.
- Job 12:12With aged men is wisdom, in length of days understanding.
- Prov 8:22–25“Yahweh possessed me in the beginning of his work, before his deeds of old.
- Job 38:4–41“Where were you when I laid the foundations of the earth? Declare, if you have understanding.
- Job 15:10With us are both the gray-headed and the very aged men, much elder than your father.
- Gen 4:1The man knew Eve his wife. She conceived, and gave birth to Cain, and said, “I have gotten a man with Yahweh’s help.”
Themes, concepts, people & topics
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Commentaries & study tools
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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 15:7 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.