Bible Strands
Job 21:4
Is my complaint against a man? Then why should I not be impatient?
Berean Standard Bible
Follow its threads on the canvas →
Study note
Setting — Job addresses his friends during a prolonged dialogue, requesting they tolerate his speech before they resume their mockery.
The words — The verse turns on שִׂיחִי (si.Ch/i, my complaint) and תִקְצַר רוּחִי (tik.Tzar ru.Ch/i, will my spirit be short/impatient), posing a rhetorical question about whether human listeners deserve his restraint.
The thread — This pattern of voicing distress amid human provocation appears in the lament tradition where the psalmist pours out trouble before the Lord (Psalms 102:1; 142:2) and questions inner despondency (Psalms 42:11).
Why it lands — It requires the reader to confront the raw tension between enduring hostile company and the natural impulse for impatience, leaving the ultimate audience of the complaint unresolved.
Drafted by a language model from the text, its original words and its cross-references, then checked against them. It can still be wrong: open the verse in the app to report it.
The Hebrew words
King James Version
As for me, is my complaint to man? and if it were so, why should not my spirit be troubled?
Cross-references
- Psalms 42:11 Why are you downcast, O my soul? Why the unease within me? Put your hope in God, for I will yet praise Him, my Savior and my God.
- Psalms 102:1 A prayer of one who is afflicted, when he grows faint and pours out his lament before the LORD. Hear my prayer, O LORD; let my cry for help come before You.
- Psalms 142:2 I pour out my complaint before Him; I reveal my trouble to Him.
- Exodus 6:9 Moses relayed this message to the Israelites, but on account of their broken spirit and cruel bondage, they did not listen to him.
- 1 Samuel 1:16 Do not take your servant for a wicked woman, for all this time I have been praying out of the depth of my anguish and grief.”
- 2 Kings 6:26 As the king of Israel was passing by on the wall, a woman cried out to him, “Help me, my lord the king!”
- Job 6:11 What strength do I have, that I should still hope? What is my future, that I should be patient?
- Job 7:11 Therefore I will not restrain my mouth; I will speak in the anguish of my spirit; I will complain in the bitterness of my soul.
- Job 10:1 “I loathe my own life; I will express my complaint and speak in the bitterness of my soul.
- Psalms 22:1 For the choirmaster. To the tune of “The Doe of the Dawn.” A Psalm of David. My God, my God, why have You forsaken me? Why are You so far from saving me, so far from my words of groaning?