If I have eaten the fruits thereof without money, or have caused the owners thereof to lose their life:
Ver. 39. If I have eaten the fruits thereof without money] i.e. Not paying the labourers their wages, which is a bony sin, Amos 5:12,13, crying cruelty, James 5:4, such as hath a woe hanging on the heels of it, Jeremiah 22:17. See what sins it is set among, and what punishment is awarded to it, Malachi 3:5. Let Laban be guilty of it, Genesis 31:7, but Job protesteth against it here with an imprecation.
Or have caused the owners thereof to lose their life] That is, the occupiers thereof, the poor rent holders (by racking their rents), to miss subsistence, so that they could not make a living of it with all their labour. Owners of the land he calleth them improperly; since the land was his, as in the former verse; but if he had the propriety, they had the pains, and theretbro should have a livelihood, as Solomon's vinedressers had, Song of Solomon 8:12; but so had not Pharaoh's labourers, the oppressed Israelites, who toiled like horses, and yet were held to so hard allowance, that they were weary of their lives, and their souls were ready to expire, as the Hebrew here hath it. Prisoners' pittance many poor tenants have, such as will neither keep them alive nor suffer them to die.