---
title: Job 12:10
url: https://jw-apologetics.app/verses/job-12-10/
markdown: https://jw-apologetics.app/verses/job-12-10.md
type: verse
perspective: Protestant (historic Nicene) response to Jehovah's Witness teaching
reference: Job 12:10
testament: OT
section: Poetry
index: https://jw-apologetics.app/llms.txt
---

# Job 12:10

## Text (Berean Standard Bible)

> The life of every living thing is in His hand, as well as the breath of all mankind.

## NWT Wording of the Key Phrase

- NWT (2013 revision): "In his hand is the life of every living thing And the spirit of every human."

## JW Usage

Cited for Jehovah as the source and sustainer of all life, which supports the Watchtower's teaching that life is a gift from God and belongs to him — an argument used in discussions about the sanctity of life and about blood.

## Protestant Usage

The verse is about the scope of God's holding: the life of every living thing, and the spirit of every human. Nothing alive falls outside it. That has a bearing on the question of whether Jesus is Creator or creature, though it takes a step to see. If every living thing is sustained in God's hand, and Colossians 1:17 says that in Christ all things hold together, then the sustaining that Job attributes to God is attributed by Paul to the Son. It also bears on the "firstborn" question. Witnesses read Colossians 1:15 as making Jesus the first created thing, but the Bible uses firstborn as a title of rank rather than of birth order. Esau was born first and sold his position to Jacob for a bowl of stew; Genesis 27:36 has him complaining that Jacob took his birthright. David was Jesse's youngest son, and God says at Psalm 89:27 "I will appoint him as my firstborn, the highest of the kings of the earth." Firstborn is a rank. Compare Genesis 25:29, Genesis 27:36, Psalms 36:6.

## Arguments Using This Verse

- [Colossians 1 — Inserted 'Other'](https://jw-apologetics.app/arguments/colossians1-other.md) — The NWT adds a word that changes everything [NWT Translation]