Whose hope shall be cut off, and whose trust [shall be] a spider's web.
Ver. 14. Whose hope (or whose folly, that is, whose foolish hope) shall be cut off] The Latin translation hath it, his folly shall not please him, sc. when once he seeth, by the disappointment of his high hopes, what a fool's paradise he had wrought himself into, what pains he hath taken to go to hell, his hope shall be cut off; and that is the greatest cut in the world, Hypocritis nihil stupidius. This Bildad telleth the hypocrite twice over; because he will hardly be drawn to believe it. But that he telleth Job so, as if he were this hopeless hypocrite, he is quite beside the cushion, as we say.
And whose trust shall be a spider's web] Wherein there is much artifice, but no strength. Trust is somewhat more than hope; it is a bearing a man's self bold upon the assurance that all shall be well. Such was that of Babylon in their provision laid in to hold out a siege of twenty years' length. Such also is that of mystical Babylon, who saith, "I shall see no sorrow," Revelation 18:7. But this trust never triumpheth. It is (by a second comparison) here fitly set forth by a spider's web, Heb. a spider's house, Isaiah 59:5, so called because therein the spider lodgeth herself, as if safe, and out of harm's way, which is nothing so. A reverend man cleareth the comparison thus: first, the spider's web is made out of her own bowels (her motto was mihi soli debeo I owe it to myself only), so is the hypocrite's hope merely from his own brain and imagination. Secondly, though this web be curiously framed, yet it only catcheth flies; so do hypocrites look after ceremonies, and not substance. Thirdly, the spider is full of poison, and remaineth in a dusty nasty hole, though she work never so curiously; so doth the hypocrite abide in his unregeneracy, &c. Fourthly, she gets to the top of the window, as high as she can; and then when she falls, she falls to the bottom, for nothing stays her: so here. Fifthly, when the besom comes, she and her web are swept away, and she is trodden under foot; so are all presumptuous hypocrites. Becket's friends advised him (for his security) to have a mass in honour of St Stephen, (to keep him from the hands of his enemies): he did so, but it saved him not. Contrarily, a poor persecuted Huguenot in the Massacre at Paris had crept into a hole, a spider comes and weaves a cobweb over it; the murderers therefore presumed him not there; and so he was preserved. What cannot the Lord do by the weakest means that may be?