What Does Job 8:20 Mean?
Behold, God does not cast off a whole man, nor does he grip the hand of evildoers.
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
Behold, God will not cast away a perfect man, neither will he help the evil doers:THE KEY
God’s hand refuses both to discard what is whole and to strengthen what does harm.
THE MEANING
God does not cast away the person whose life is whole, and does not reinforce the hand of those who do harm. The verse holds these two actions together: what is intact is not discarded, and what harms is not strengthened.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that a person must be flawless to be worth keeping, and that those who do harm are entitled to divine support.
THE ROOT
תָּם
tam
GROWS FROM
תמם
to be complete, whole, or finished
“a whole man” in this verse is tam. The word translated “perfect” carries the sense of wholeness and integrity, not necessarily flawlessness. The root’s branches show that the verse speaks of a life undivided, not a person without any fault.
ALSO GROWS
tamim: whole, sound, blameless
תָּמִים
The same root describes Noah as “perfect” in Genesis 6:9, joining wholeness with walking with God.
tom: integrity, completeness
תֹּם
This noun names the quality of an upright life, making integrity visible beneath the English word “perfect”.
יַחֲזִיק
yachazik
GROWS FROM
חזק
to be strong, make firm, or strengthen
“grip the hand of” in this verse is yachazik. The Hebrew says God will not “take hold of the hand” of evildoers; “help” carries the concrete image of lending strength. The verse is about where divine strength does and does not take hold.
ALSO GROWS
chazaq: be strong, grow firm
חָזַק
This basic form reveals the strength contained in the verb translated “help”.
chizzeq: strengthen, reinforce
חִזֵּק
This form makes clear that taking someone’s hand can mean reinforcing their power.
יִמְאָס
yim'as
GROWS FROM
מאס
to reject, refuse, or spurn
“cast off” in this verse is yim'as. The verb translated “cast away” means to reject or spurn. This is the same root used for the builders’ rejected stone in Psalm 118:22, where rejection does not determine what the stone becomes.
ALSO GROWS
ma'us: rejected, despised
מָאוּס
This form names what has been rejected, showing the root’s force beyond the act of casting something away.
ma'asu: they rejected
מָאֲסוּ
Psalm 118:22 uses this form for the builders’ rejection of the stone, echoing Job’s word directly.
THE PATTERN
The divine hand preserves what is whole and withholds its strength from what does harm.
Though he falls, he will not be hurled down, for the LORD props him up with his hand.The way of the LORD is a stronghold to the whole; but shattering is for the workers of crookedness.The Lord knows how to bring the reverent out of trial, and to keep the unaligned for the day of judgment, to be cut back.THE THREAD
The stone the builders push away becomes the head of the corner.Job’s “cast away” and Psalm’s “refused” come from מאס (ma’as), meaning to reject or spurn. The same rejection-word Job says God will not enact appears where a rejected stone becomes the cornerstone, so rejection does not define the wholeness or worth of what is rejected.
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