What Does Job 8:13 Mean?
So are the paths of all who forget God, and the cord of the soiled one perishes.
Key words are shown with the Hebrew or Greek and what each word meant.
Selah Decoded Version The Selah Decoded Version renders what the Hebrew and Greek words meant to the people who first heard them.
King James wording
King James Version
So are the paths of all that forget God; and the hypocrite’s hope shall perish:THE KEY
The “hope” in this warning is also a cord: when God slips from remembrance, the life’s tether to its future gives way.
THE MEANING
The verse speaks a present warning: a path that forgets God cannot keep the future it leans on, and the hope it treats as secure can perish. Hardship alone does not prove that someone has forgotten God; the same words elsewhere promise that the needy are not forgotten and their expectation will not perish.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
Hope can carry itself forever after its life has turned away from God.
THE ROOT
שֹׁכְחֵי
shokhechei
GROWS FROM
שכח
sh-kh-ḥ
To forget, overlook, or cease to remember.
“forget” in this verse is shokhechei. Here the verse names people by what they fail to keep in remembrance. The same root appears in Psalm 9:18, where the needy are not forgotten, turning this warning into a live contrast.
ALSO GROWS
shakhach: To forget or fail to remember.
שָׁכַח
The root concerns what remains in active remembrance, which is the point of “forget God.”
nishkach: To be forgotten or pass from memory.
נִשְׁכַּח
Psalm 9:18 uses this form for the needy who will not be forgotten, showing how the same root can name either absence from memory or protection from it.
hishkiach: To cause to forget.
הִשְׁכִּיחַ
The root can describe forgetfulness as something that happens to memory, not merely a label for a person.
תִּקְוַת
tiqvat
GROWS FROM
קוה
q-w-h
To wait for, expect, or look toward.
The noun here is tiqvah, hope or expectation; the same word also names the scarlet cord in Joshua 2:18. That overlap makes the warning tactile: this expectation is a line of attachment, and the verse says it can perish.
ALSO GROWS
qavah: To wait for, hope, or expect.
קָוָה
The verb frames hope as an orientation toward what is still awaited.
tiqvah: Hope or expectation; also a cord or thread, as in Joshua 2:18.
תִּקְוָה
The word joins expectation with a tangible line, illuminating the verse’s image of hope that can be lost.
תֹּאבֵד
toʾved
GROWS FROM
אבד
ʾ-b-d
To be lost, perish, or disappear.
“perishes” in this verse is toʾved. The same root moves from being lost to outright destruction. The hope here does not simply disappoint; it is described as something that cannot be found or endure.
ALSO GROWS
avad: To perish or become lost.
אָבַד
This is the base verb behind the warning that the hope will not endure.
oved: One who is perishing or lost.
אֹבֵד
The root can describe a person as well as a hope becoming lost; Deuteronomy 26:5 uses it for one “ready to perish.”
avaddon: Destruction or ruin.
אֲבַדּוֹן
This branch shows the root’s reach from loss toward destruction.
THE PATTERN
Hope disconnected from God cannot sustain its promised future; hope rooted in God endures.
And it shall be, if you do at all let the LORD your God slip from you, and walk after other gods, and serve them, and bow down to them; I bear witness against you this day that you shall surely perish.The waiting of the aligned is gladness; the cord of the restless perishes.And may the God of hope fill you with all joy and wholeness in leaning your full weight, so that you may overflow in hope through the power of the Set-Apart Breath.THE THREAD
For the needy is not always forgotten; the hope of the bowed ones does not perish forever.Psalm 9:18 repeats all three roots, forget, expectation, and perish, while turning their force around: the needy are not forgotten, and their expectation does not perish. The shared wording makes Job’s line a specific warning about a God-forgetting path, not a verdict that people who suffer are forgotten or doomed.
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