Job 20:19 - Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible

Bible Comments

By his oppression he brought men to utter poverty, and then forsook or left them in that forlorn estate, affording no mercy nor help to them. Or, some he made poor by his oppression, and others that were poor he suffered to perish for want of that relief which he should and might have afforded them; which is a crying sin in God's sight, and one of those sins for which God destroyed Sodom, Ezekiel 16:49, and therefore fitly mentioned here as one of the sins for which God punished this wicked man. Or, he oppresseth and leaveth poor, as Broughton renders it. An house which he built not, i.e. which was none of his. Heb. he hath violently taken away an house, and (or but) did not build (or repair, as building is oft used) it, to wit, that house for his own use, i.e. he did not build or possess that house, as he intended to do, but was cut off by God's hand before he could enjoy the fruit of his oppressions.

Job 20:19

19 Because he hath oppressedf and hath forsaken the poor; because he hath violently taken away an house which he builded not;