1:13 Now the day 2 came when Job’s 3 sons and daughters were eating and drinking wine in their oldest brother’s house,
1:18 While this one was still speaking another messenger arrived and said, “Your sons and your daughters were eating and drinking wine in their oldest brother’s house,
8:15 He leans against his house but it does not hold up, 4
he takes hold 5 of it but it does not stand.
21:28 For you say,
‘Where now is the nobleman’s house, 6
and where are the tents in which the wicked lived?’ 7
27:18 The house he builds is as fragile as a moth’s cocoon, 8
like a hut 9 that a watchman has made.
1 sn The series of catastrophes and the piety of Job is displayed now in comprehensive terms. Everything that can go wrong goes wrong, and yet Job, the pious servant of Yahweh, continues to worship him in the midst of the rubble. This section, and the next, will lay the foundation for the great dialogues in the book.
2 tn The Targum to Job clarifies that it was the first day of the week. The fact that it was in the house of the firstborn is the reason.
3 tn Heb “his”; the referent (Job) has been specified in the translation for clarity.
4 tn The verb עָמַד (’amad, “to stand”) is almost synonymous with the parallel קוּם (qum, “to rise; to stand”). The distinction is that the former means “to remain standing” (so it is translated here “hold up”), and the latter “rise, stand up.”
5 sn The idea is that he grabs hold of the house, not to hold it up, but to hold himself up or support himself. But it cannot support him. This idea applies to both the spider’s web and the false security of the pagan.
6 sn The question implies the answer will be “vanished” or “gone.”
7 tn Heb “And where is the tent, the dwellings of the wicked.” The word “dwellings of the wicked” is in apposition to “tent.” A relative pronoun must be supplied in the translation.
8 tn Heb כָעָשׁ (kha’ash, “like a moth”), but this leaves room for clarification. Some commentators wanted to change it to “bird’s nest” or just “nest” (cf. NRSV) to make the parallelism; see Job 4:14. But the word is not found. The LXX has a double expression, “as moths, as a spider.” So several take it as the spider’s web, which is certainly unsubstantial (cf. NAB, NASB, NLT; see Job 8:14).
9 tn The Hebrew word is the word for “booth,” as in the Feast of Booths. The word describes something that is flimsy; it is not substantial at all.