Which were cut down out of time, whose foundation was overflown with a flood:
Ver. 16. Which were cut down out of time] Or, Which grew full of wrinkles (as those that have long lain in the water are apt to do), and not time; that is, before that time of life that they had promised themselves on earth; or before they had fulfilled the days of their forefathers, who, though wicked above measure many of them, yet the flood could not come till Methuselah (the last alive of the ten patriarchs) were laid up. God cuts off some notoriously wicked sometimes, Intempeata morte abrepti (Jun.), when in the course of nature they might have lived longer, that they may do no more hurt, as the gardener destroyeth young henbane, and the countryman young vermins.
Whose foundation was overflown with a flood] Heb. A river was poured upon their foundation. This some understand of that river of brimstone and fire poured from heaven upon Sodom and her sisters; but better take it of those in Noah's days, whose foundation (that is, the earth, that foundation of mankind; or their wealth and prosperity, whereon they thought themselves firmly founded, or their lives, &c.), were overflown with a flood; which came rushing in upon them with mighty force, and drowned the universe. And here the Hebrews make to be the middle of this book of Job, wherein they reckon in all one thousand and seventy verses.