Job 26:5 - Joseph Benson’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

Dead things, &c. That is, according to several interpreters, those seeds which are sown and die in the earth quicken again and grow. Or, as R. Levi rather thinks, an allusion is made to those vegetables, stones, or metals, which are found in the earth under the waters. The Hebrew word here for dead things is רפאים, rephaim, which is generally rendered dead men; thus, Psalms 88:10, we read, Wilt thou show wonders to methim, the dead? Shall rephaim, the dead, arise and praise thee? Isaiah 26:14. The dead, methim, shall not live: the deceased, rephaim, shall not rise. In these passages, therefore, and many others that might be produced, methim and rephaim are both translated dead or deceased. Instead of this, however, the LXX., the Vulgate Latin, and the Targum, render rephaim, giants, or mighty men. “Their interpretation is very just,” says Chappelow, “if, as R. Bechai writes, they were so named because their countenance was so austere, that whoever looked on them, manus ejus remissæ fuerunt, his hands were weakened with the terror that was upon him, (Buxtorf in rapha.) From hence it is that our learned Mede explains rephaim, in Proverbs 21:16, not of the dead, but of the giants or rebels against God, of whom we read, Genesis 6., namely, those mighty men of the old world, whose wickedness was so great as to occasion the deluge. Therefore, to ‘remain in the congregation of rephaim,' is the same as to go and keep them company; that is, to go to that accursed place and condition in which they are. Thus, S. Jarchi's gloss is, In cœtu rephaim, that is, in cœtu gehinnom, the congregation of those in hell. His gloss is the very same on our text here in Job. Again, Proverbs 9:17-18, ‘He knoweth not that rephaim, the dead, (the mighty ones,) are there, and that her (the harlot's) guests are in the depths of hell,' that is, she will bring them, who frequent her, to hell, to keep the apostate giants company. From all which we conclude, with the ingenious author above mentioned, that the place before us, and the verse following, seem to be no other than a description of hell.” Peters, Dodd, and many other critics, view the passage in the same light. Houbigant renders it, Behold the giants tremble beneath the waters in their habitations; and, he says, “Job means those giants who were overwhelmed with the flood; having their overthrow as immediately present before his eyes, because the deluge at this time was fresh in the memory of men.” Poole, whose note on the passage is well worth the reader's attention, comprehends all the forementioned particulars in his interpretation, thus: Job, having censured Bildad's discourse, proceeds to show how little he needed his information in that point. He shows that the power and providence of God reach not only to the things we see, but also to the invisible parts of the world; not only to the heavens above and their inhabitants, and to men upon earth, of which Bildad discoursed, Job 25:2-3, but also to such persons or things as are under the earth, or under the waters; which are out of our sight and reach, yet not out of the view of Divine Providence: including, 1st, dead or lifeless things, such as amber, pearl, coral, metals, or other minerals, which are formed or brought forth, by the almighty power of God, from under the waters; either in the bottom of the sea, or within the earth, which is the lowest element, and in the Scripture and other authors spoken of as under the waters. And, 2d, dead men, and the worst of them, such as died in their sins, and after death were condemned to further miseries; of whom this very word seems to be used, (Proverbs 2:18; Proverbs 9:18,) who are here said to mourn or groan from under the waters, from the lower parts of the earth; or from under those subterranean waters which are supposed to be within and under the earth; and from under the inhabitants thereof; either of the waters or of the earth, under which these waters are; or with the other inhabitants thereof; of that place under the waters; namely, the apostate spirits. So the sense is, that God's dominion is over all men, yea, even the dead, and the worst of them, who, though they would not own God, nor his providence, while they lived, yet now are forced to acknowledge and feel that power which they despised, and bitterly mourn under the sad effects of it in their infernal habitations.