The Pulpit Commentary on Job 29:18

The Pulpit Commentary · Joseph S. Exell and contributors · Public domain

Then I said, I shall die in my nest. The metaphor of "nest" for "dwelling-place" occurs in Numbers 24:21; Jeremiah 49:16 : Obadiah 1:4; and Habakkuk 2:9. It is also employed by Healed ('Op. et Di.,' 1.

301). And I shall multiply my days as the sand. Some translate, "I shall multiply my days as the phoenix," the fabulous bird which was supposed to live for five hundred years (Herod; 2:72), to burn itself on a funeral pile of spices, and then to rise again from its ashes.

But the view seems to be a mere rabbinical tradition, and is unsupported by etymology. Khol ( חוֹל) means "sand" in Genesis 22:17; Jeremiah 33:22; and elsewhere. It is taken in this sense by Rosenmuller, Schultens, Professor Lee, Canon Cook, and our Revisers.

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