Thou liftest me up to the wind; thou causest me to ride upon it, and dissolvest my substance.
Parallel translations
- WEB You lift me up to the wind, and drive me with it. You dissolve me in the storm.
- BSB You snatch me up into the wind and drive me before it; You toss me about in the storm.
- NKJV You lift me up to the wind and cause me to ride on it; You spoil my success.
- NASB “You lift me up to the wind and make me ride it; And You dissolve me in a storm.
- NLT You throw me into the whirlwind and destroy me in the storm.
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 feels lifted into the wind and driven about, dissolved in the storm. It pictures his life as helplessly tossed and destroyed by overwhelming forces.
Overview
Job describes himself as a weightless thing caught up by the wind and scattered, melted away in the tempest of his troubles. The storm imagery conveys total loss of control and stability. Ironically, God will later answer Job out of a whirlwind, transforming the storm of his suffering into the place where he meets the Lord, a pattern fulfilled when Christ stills storms and brings peace to the troubled.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 11
- Job 27:21The east wind carrieth him away, and he departeth: and as a storm hurleth him out of his place.
- Ps 1:4The ungodly are not so: but are like the chaff which the wind driveth away.
- Job 9:17For he breaketh me with a tempest, and multiplieth my wounds without cause.
- Job 21:18They are as stubble before the wind, and as chaff that the storm carrieth away.
- Hos 13:3Therefore they shall be as the morning cloud, and as the early dew that passeth away, as the chaff that is driven with the whirlwind out of the floor, and as the smoke out of the chimney.
- Hos 4:19The wind hath bound her up in her wings, and they shall be ashamed because of their sacrifices.
- Ezek 5:2Thou shalt burn with fire a third part in the midst of the city, when the days of the siege are fulfilled: and thou shalt take a third part, and smite about it with a knife: and a third part thou shalt scatter in the wind; and I will draw out a sword after them.
- Ps 18:10And he rode upon a cherub, and did fly: yea, he did fly upon the wings of the wind.
- Jer 4:11–12At that time shall it be said to this people and to Jerusalem, A dry wind of the high places in the wilderness toward the daughter of my people, not to fan, nor to cleanse,
- Ps 104:3Who layeth the beams of his chambers in the waters: who maketh the clouds his chariot: who walketh upon the wings of the wind:
- Isa 17:13The nations shall rush like the rushing of many waters: but God shall rebuke them, and they shall flee far off, and shall be chased as the chaff of the mountains before the wind, and like a rolling thing before the whirlwind.
Resources, by level
Commentaries & study tools
Free animated overview and word-study videos for this book.
Sermons and teaching on this passage from across YouTube.
Clear, readable, conservative exposition — the best free place to start on any passage.
Matthew Henry, Barnes, Gill, the Pulpit Commentary, Ellicott, Cambridge, and more — stacked on one page for this exact verse.
The beloved Puritan exposition of this whole book — warm, devotional, and verse by verse (free, CCEL).
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 30:22 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.