mention of God here was contrary to decorum, trans. ἐξ οἰκίας (read κοιλίας, according to Cod. Alex.) αὐτοῦ ἐξελκύσει αὐτὸν ἄγγελος (Theod. δυνάστης). The perf., Job 20:15, is in Job 20:16 changed into the imperf. fut. יינק, which more strongly represents the past action as that which has gone before what is now described; and the ασυνδέτως, fut. which follows, describes the consequence which is necessarily and directly involved in it. Psa 140:4 may be compared with Job 20:16, Pro 23:32 with Job 20:16. He who sucked in the poison of low desire with a relish, will meet his punishment in that in which he sinned: he is destroyed by the poisonous deadly bite of the serpent, for the punishment of sin is fundamentally nothing but the nature of sin itself brought fully out.
Verses 17-20
Job 20:17-20 17 He shall not delight himself in streams,
Like to rivers and brooks of honey and cream. 18 Giving back that for which he laboured, he shall not swallow it;
He shall not rejoice according to the riches he hath gotten. 19 Because he cast down, let the destitute lie helpless;
He shall not, in case he hath seized a house, finish building it. 20 Because he knew no rest in his craving,
He shall not be able to rescue himself with what he most loveth.
As poets sing of the aurea aetas of the paradise-like primeval age: Flumina jam lactis, jam flumina nectaris ibant, (Note: Ovid, Metam. i. 112, comp. Virgil, Ecl. iv. 30:Et durae quercus sudabant roscida mella; and Horace, Epod. xvi. 47Mella cava manant ex ilice, montibus altisLevis crepante lympha desilit pede.) and as the land of promise is called in the words of Jehovah in
