“What is man, that thou shouldest magnify him? and that thou shouldest set thine heart upon him?”
Job questions God: What is man that you make so much of him and that you turn your mind toward him? The rhetorical question inverts the traditional psalm language (Psalm 8) to suggest that God's intense attention to humanity is not a sign of blessing but of curse. The turning of the divine mind toward Job has resulted in affliction rather than care. Job's question suggests that human insignificance might be preferable to such divine attention.
Church Fathers on Job 7:17
I have given over hope, I will not live any longer. There be some of the righteous, who so entertain the desire of heavenly things, that, notwithstanding this, they are not broken off from the hope of things earthly. The inheritance bestowed on them by God they keep for the supply of necessities, the honours awarded them on a temporal footing they retain; they do not covet the things of others, they make a lawful use of their own. Yet these are strangers to those same things…
Nicene & Post-Nicene / Ante-Nicene Fathers translations · public domain
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