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Job 21:20

Adam Clarke
Bible Commentary

His eyes shall see his destruction - He shall perceive its approach, and have the double punishment of fearing and feeling; feeling a Thousand deaths in fearing One.

He shall drink of the wrath - The cup of God's wrath, the cup of trembling, etc., is frequently expressed or referred to in the sacred writings, Deuteronomy 32:33; Isaiah 51:17-22; Jeremiah 25:15; Revelation 14:8. It appears to be a metaphor taken from those cups of poison which certain criminals were obliged to drink. A cup of the juice of hemlock was the wrath or punishment assigned by the Athenian magistrates to the philosopher Socrates.

Albert Barnes
Notes on the Whole Bible

His eyes shall see his destruction - That is, his own eyes shall see his destruction, or the calamities that shall come upon him. That is, “You maintain that, or this is the position which you defend.” Job designs to meet this, and to show that it is not always so.

And he shall drink of the wrath of the Almighty - Wrath is often represented as a cup which the wicked are compelled to drink. See the notes, Isaiah 51:17.

Matthew Henry
Concise Bible Commentary
Job had described the prosperity of wicked people; in these verses he opposes this to what his friends had maintained about their certain ruin in this life. He reconciles this to the holiness and justice of God. Even while they prosper thus, they are light and worthless, of no account with God, or with wise men. In the height of their pomp and power, there is but a step between them and ruin. Job refers the difference Providence makes between one wicked man and another, into the wisdom of God. He is Judge of all the earth, and he will do right. So vast is the disproportion between time and eternity, that if hell be the lot of every sinner at last, it makes little difference if one goes singing thither, and another sighing. If one wicked man die in a palace, and another in a dungeon, the worm that dies not, and the fire that is not quenched, will be the same to them. Thus differences in this world are not worth perplexing ourselves about.