Bible Strands
Job 5:14
They encounter darkness by day and grope at noon as in the night.
Berean Standard Bible
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Study note
Setting — Eliphaz addresses Job, describing the sudden collapse of the arrogant’s plans and the removal of their perceived security.
The words — The text pairs יְפַגְּשׁוּ (ye.fag.gshu, “they encounter”) with יוֹמָם (yo.mam, “by day”), while יְמַשְּׁשׁוּ (ye.ma.sheshu, “they grope”) is paired with בַּצּהֳרַיִם (ba.tzoh.ra.yim, “at noon”).
The thread — This motif of inverted daylight appears in Job 12:25, Deuteronomy 28:29, and Isaiah 59:10.
Why it lands — The verse states that midday will feel like night for those whose schemes are dismantled, demanding acknowledgment that human strategy cannot override divine reversal.
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
They meet with darkness in the daytime, and grope in the noonday as in the night.
Cross-references
- Job 12:25 They grope in the darkness without light; He makes them stagger like drunkards.
- Deuteronomy 28:29 and at noon you will grope about like a blind man in the darkness. You will not prosper in your ways. Day after day you will be oppressed and plundered, with no one to save you.
- Isaiah 59:10 Like the blind, we feel our way along the wall, groping like those without eyes. We stumble at midday as in the twilight; among the vigorous we are like the dead.
- Proverbs 4:19 But the way of the wicked is like the darkest gloom; they do not know what makes them stumble.
- Amos 8:9 And in that day, declares the Lord GOD, I will make the sun go down at noon, and I will darken the earth in the daytime.