Online Bible 1995 March/ROM-1025.iso/olb/gill/4_600.lzh/4_601.TXT

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be inflicted on delinquents, either by God or men;
and therefore is careful_ to keep the commandment,
and avoid it: and especially he remembers there is
a judgment to come, when every thing will be
brought to an accotmt; and, though he does not
know the precise day and hour, yet he knows there will
be such a time; so some render it, the time of judg-
ment {a}: the Targum is, "and the time of prayer, and
· ' of judgment, and of truth, is known by the heart
"of the wise."
Ver. 6. Because to every purpose there is time and
judgment, &c.] There is a fit season, and a right and
proper manner of doing every thing that is to be done;
see ch. iii. 1--8. which a wise man discerns; and which
when a man hits upon, it prevent. s a great deal of mis-
chief, which for want of it comes upon men, as the fol-
lowing clause shews; some refer this to the punishment
of the wicked, and to a future judgment. So the Tar-
gum," to every business there is a time good and
"evil, and according to the judgment of truth the
"whole world is judged ;" and to the same purpose
Jarcbi," there is a time fixed for the visitation of the
"wicked, and there is judgment before the Lord; this
"is vengeance or punishment." Therefore the misery
of man is great upon him; he not observing the right
time and manner of doing what he ought, brings much
trouble upon himself; his days are few and full~
trouble, and every day has a sufficiency of evil in
because of the evil of sin, the evil of misery presses
upon. him, and is a heavy burden on him. Jarchi's
note is," when the wickedness of a man is great, then
"cometh his visitation."
Vet. 7. For he knoweth not that which shall be, &c.]
Or that it shall be {b}; that he ever shall have the op-
portunity again he has lost, nor what is to come here-
after; what shall be on the morrow, or what shall
befall him in the remaining part of his days; what
troubles and sorrows he shall meet with, or what will
be the case and circumstances of his family after his
death. For who can tell him when it shall be ? or how
it shall be {}? how it will be with him or his; no one
that pretends to.judicial astrology, or to the art of di-
vination, or any such devices, can tell him what is to
come; future things are only certainly known by God;
none but he can tell what w ill certainly come to pass;
see oh. iii. 22. and vi. l2. Jarchi interprets it of a
man's not considering for what God will bring him to
judgment, and that no man can tell him the vengeance
and punishment that will be inflicted.
Vet. 8. There is no man that hath power over the
spirit to retain the spirit, &c.] Which is not to bc
understood of the wind, which the word used some-
times signifies, and of men's having no power to re-
strain that, or hinder it from blowing; for to what
purpose should Solomon mention this ? rather k mav
be considered as a check upon despotic and arbitrary
princes not to stretch their power too far; since they
had none over the spirits or minds of men, and could
not hinder them from thinking ill or' them, and wish-
ing ill to them, nor restrain their hatred or' them; what-
ever power they had or exercised over their bodies and
estates, they had none over their spirits, or their con-
sciences; riolawful power to restrain them from their
to God, nor to oblige them to do that which he
; nor to compel them to any thing against
conscience; nor to bind their consciences in matters
indifferent: or as an argument with subjects to obey
the commands of their sovereign; since it is not in their
power to restrain the spirit and wrath of princes, which
is as the roaring of a lion, and as :.he messengers of
death, Prov. xvi. 14. and xix. lc2.. particularly to be
careful that they do not commit any capital offence.
for which sentence may be passed to take away life;
when it will not be in their power to retain it; nor
rescue themselves out of the hands o. fjustice and the
civil magistrate, but must submit. Ur else it is to be
understood 6t' every n;an's spirit at the hour of deatl:,
and of the unavoidableness of it, as the next clause
explains it; and by spirit is meant, either the sensitive
soul, the same with the spirit of a beast, without which
the body is dead, and is like the wind that pusseth
away, and ceaseth when the breath is stopped; or the
rational soul, the spirit that is committed to God, and
returns to him at death, Luke xxiii. 4(3. Acts vii. 59.
Eccl. xii. 7. This a man has not power over to dismiss
or retain at pleasure; he cannot keep it one moment
longer when it is called for and required by the Father
of spirits, the Creator of it; he has not power to restrain {d}
it, as in a prison, as the word signifies, as Alshech
observes; whence Aben Ezra says, that the spirit or
soul in the body is like a prisoner in a prison; but no-
thing, that attends a man in this life, or he is in pos-
session of, can keep the soul iu this prison, when the
time of its departure is come; not riches, nor honours,
nor wisdom and leaning, nor strength and youth, nor
all the force of medicine; the time is fixed, it is the
appointment of God, the bounds set by him cannot be
passed, Eccl. iii. o_. Heb. ix. 27. Gen. xlvii. c29. Job
xiv. 5. The Targum is," no man has power over
"the spirit of the soul to rest rain the soul of life, that
"it might not cease from the body of man ;" and to
the same sense Jarchi," to restrain the spirit in his
"body, that the angel of death should not take him."
Neither hath he power in the day/ofdeatlt; or dominion {};
death strips a man of all power and authority, the
power that the husband has over the wife, or parents
over their children, or the master over his servant, or
the king over his subjects; death puts down all power
and authority: it is an observation of Jarchi's, that
I)avid after he came to the throne is everywhere called
King David, but, when he came to die, only David,
1 Kings i;. 1. no king nor ruler can stand against death
any more thaN a beggar; np man is lord of death any
more than of life, but death is lord of all; all must and
do submit to it, high and low, rich and poor; there is
a day fixed for it, and that day can never be adjourned,
or put off to another; and as man has not
power to deliver himself in the day of death, so neither
his friend, as the Targum, nor any relation whatever.
And there is no discharge in that war; death is a war-

{a} \^jpvmw tew\^ \~kairon krisewv\~, Sept.; so some in Drusius.
{b} \^hyhyv hm\^ quod futurum est, Pagninus, Montanus.
{c} \^hyhy rvak\^ quo modo, Junius & Tremellius, Gejerus, Ramba-
chius, so Broughton.
{d} \^awlkl\^ ut coerceat, Piscator; ad coercendum, Cocceius.
{e} \^Nwjlv\^ dominatio, Junius & Tremellius, Vatablus; dominium,
Rambachius.