My days are swifter than a runner; they flee without seeing good.
Parallel translations
- WEB “Now my days are swifter than a runner. They flee away, they see no good.
- KJV Now my days are swifter than a post: they flee away, they see no good.
- NKJV “Now my days are swifter than a runner; They flee away, they see no good.
- NASB ¶“Now my days are swifter than a runner; They flee away, they see no good.
- NLT “My life passes more swiftly than a runner. It flees away without a glimpse of happiness.
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 returns to lamenting that his days race by faster than a runner, fleeing without any good. Life rushes toward its end joylessly.
Overview
Shifting from the problem of justice back to his own brevity, Job compares his fleeting days to a swift runner. His remaining time speeds past empty of good. This recurring theme of life's brevity (Job 7:6) underscores his urgency and despair, while quietly pressing toward the hope of a good that outlasts these fleeting days.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 7
- Job 7:6–7My days are swifter than a weaver’s shuttle; they come to an end without hope.
- Jas 4:14You do not even know what will happen tomorrow! What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes.
- Ps 90:9–10For all our days decline in Your fury; we finish our years with a sigh.
- Ps 39:5You, indeed, have made my days as handbreadths, and my lifetime as nothing before You. Truly each man at his best exists as but a breath. Selah
- Ps 89:47Remember the briefness of my lifespan! For what futility You have created all men!
- Ps 39:11You discipline and correct a man for his iniquity, consuming like a moth what he holds dear; surely each man is but a vapor. Selah
- Esth 8:14The couriers rode out in haste on their royal horses, pressed on by the command of the king. And the edict was also issued in the citadel of Susa.
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 9:25 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.