The house he built is like a moth’s cocoon, like a hut set up by a watchman.
Parallel translations
- WEB He builds his house as the moth, as a booth which the watchman makes.
- KJV He buildeth his house as a moth, and as a booth that the keeper maketh.
- NKJV He builds his house like a moth, Like a booth which a watchman makes.
- NASB “He has built his house like the spider’s web, Or a hut which the watchman has made.
- NLT The wicked build houses as fragile as a spider’s web, as flimsy as a shelter made of branches.
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's house is as flimsy as a moth's cocoon or a watchman's hut. It matters because his security is fragile and temporary.
Overview
Job compares the house the wicked builds to the frail nest of a moth or the temporary booth of a watchman. However impressive it seems, it offers no lasting shelter and will soon collapse. The flimsiness of the godless man's foundation contrasts with the one who builds his house on the rock of Christ's words (Matt. 7:24-27).
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 5
- Isa 1:8And the Daughter of Zion is abandoned like a shelter in a vineyard, like a shack in a cucumber field, like a city besieged.
- Job 8:14–15His confidence is fragile; his security is in a spider’s web.
- Isa 51:8For the moth will devour them like a garment, and the worm will eat them like wool. But My righteousness will last forever, My salvation through all generations.”
- Isa 38:12My dwelling has been picked up and removed from me like a shepherd’s tent. I have rolled up my life like a weaver; He cuts me off from the loom; from day until night You make an end of me.
- Lam 2:6He has laid waste His tabernacle like a garden booth; He has destroyed His place of meeting. The LORD has made Zion forget her appointed feasts and Sabbaths. In His fierce anger He has despised both king and priest.
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 27:18 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.