Job 14:11

“[As] the waters fail from the sea, etc.] the words may be rendered either without the as, and denote dissimilitude, and the sense be, that the waters go from the sea and return again, as with the tide: and the flood decays and dries up; and yet is supplied again with water: “but man lieth down, and riseth not again”, (<181412>Job 14:12); or else with the as, and express likeness; as the waters when they fail from the sea, or get out of lakes, and into another channel, never return more; and as a flood, occasioned by the waters of a river overflowing its banks, never return into it more; so man, when he dies, never returns to this world any more. The Targum restrains this to the Red sea, and…”

“sea--that is, a lake, or pool formed from the outspreading of a river. Job lived near the Euphrates: and "sea" is applied to it (Jer 51:36; Isa 27:1). So of the Nile (Isa 19:5). fail--utterly disappeared by drying up. The rugged channel of the once flowing water answers to the outstretched corpse ("lieth down," Job 14:12) of the once living man.”

“As the waters fail from the sea - As the waters evaporate wholly, and leave the bottom wholly dry, so it is with man, who passes entirely away, and leaves nothing. But to what fact Job refers here, is not known. The sea or ocean has never been dried up, so as to furnish a ground for this comparison. Noyes renders it, “the lake.” Dr. Good, without the slightest authority, renders it, “as the billows pass away with the tides.” Herder supposes it to mean that until the waters fail from the sea man will not rise again, but the Hebrew will not bear this interpretation. Probably the true interpretation is, that which makes the word rendered sea (ים yâm) refer to a lake, or a stagnant pool; see…”

“As - So it is with man. Or thus, as when the waters fail from the sea, when the sea forsakes the place into which it used to flow, the river which was fed by it, decayeth and drieth up without all hopes of recovery. Job 14:12”

“the flood: Job 6:15-18; Jer 15:18 Job 14:12”