Job 20:21 - Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible

Bible Comments

“There shall none of his meat be left Margin, “or, be none left for his meat.” Noyes renders it, “Because nothing escaped his greatness.” Prof. Lee, “no surviver shall remain for his provision.” But the meaning, probably, is, nothing shall remain of his food, or it shall all be wasted, or dissipated.

Therefore, shall no man look for his goods - Or rather, his goods or his property shall not endure. But a great variety of interpretations has been given to the passage. The Hebrew word rendered “shall look,” יחיל yāchı̂yl, is from חוּל chûl, which means, “to turn round, to twist, to whirl;” and thence, arises the notion of being firm, stable, or strong - as a rope that is twisted is strong. That is the idea here; and the sense is, that his property should not be secure or firm; or that he should not prosper. Jerome renders it, “Nothing shall remain of his goods.” The Septuagint, “Therefore his good things - αὐτοῦ τὰ ἀγκθά autou ta agatha - shall not flourish” - ἀνθήσει anthēsei.

Job 20:21

21 There shall none of his meat be left; therefore shall no man look for his goods.