12:12 Is not wisdom found among the aged? 1
Does not long life bring understanding?
15:19 to whom alone the land was given
when no foreigner passed among them. 2
19:11 Thus 3 his anger burns against me,
and he considers me among his enemies. 4
30:7 They brayed 5 like animals among the bushes
and were huddled together 6 under the nettles.
30:9 “And now I have become their taunt song;
I have become a byword 7 among them.
36:14 They die 8 in their youth,
and their life ends among the male cultic prostitutes. 9
41:6 Will partners 10 bargain 11 for it?
Will they divide it up 12 among the merchants?
1 tn The statement in the Hebrew Bible simply has “among the aged – wisdom.” Since this seems to be more the idea of the friends than of Job, scholars have variously tried to rearrange it. Some have proposed that Job is citing his friends: “With the old men, you say, is wisdom” (Budde, Gray, Hitzig). Others have simply made it a question (Weiser). But others take לֹא (lo’) from the previous verse and make it the negative here, to say, “wisdom is not….” But Job will draw on the wisdom of the aged, only with discernment, for ultimately all wisdom is with God.
2 sn Eliphaz probably thinks that Edom was the proverbial home of wisdom, and so the reference here would be to his own people. If, as many interpret, the biblical writer is using these accounts to put Yahwistic ideas into the discussion, then the reference would be to Canaan at the time of the fathers. At any rate, the tradition of wisdom to Eliphaz has not been polluted by foreigners, but has retained its pure and moral nature from antiquity.
3 tn The verb is a nonpreterite vayyiqtol perhaps employed to indicate that the contents of v. 11 are a logical sequence to the actions described in v. 10.
4 tn This second half of the verse is a little difficult. The Hebrew has “and he reckons me for him like his adversaries.” Most would change the last word to a singular in harmony with the versions, “as his adversary.” But some retain the MT pointing and try to explain it variously: Weiser suggests that the plural might have come from a cultic recitation of Yahweh’s deeds against his enemies; Fohrer thinks it refers to the primeval enemies; Gordis takes it as distributive, “as one of his foes.” If the plural is retained, this latter view makes the most sense.
5 tn The verb נָהַק (nahaq) means “to bray.” It has cognates in Arabic, Aramaic, and Ugaritic, so there is no need for emendation here. It is the sign of an animal’s hunger. In the translation the words “like animals” are supplied to clarify the metaphor for the modern reader.
6 tn The Pual of the verb סָפַח (safakh, “to join”) also brings out the passivity of these people – “they were huddled together” (E. Dhorme, Job, 434).
7 tn The idea is that Job has become proverbial, people think of misfortune and sin when they think of him. The statement uses the ordinary word for “word” (מִלָּה, millah), but in this context it means more: “proverb; byword.”
8 tn The text expresses this with “their soul dies.”
9 tn Heb “among the male prostitutes” who were at the temple – the “holy ones,” with “holy” being used in that sense of “separated to that form of temple service.” So uncleanness and shame are some of the connotations of the reference. Some modern translations give the general sense only: “their life ends in shame” (NRSV); “and perish among the reprobate” (NAB); “die…after wasting their lives in immoral living” (NLT).
10 tn The word חָבַּר (khabbar) is a hapax legomenon, but the meaning is “to associate” since it is etymologically related to the verb “to join together.” The idea is that fishermen usually work in companies or groups, and then divide up the catch when they come ashore – which involves bargaining.
11 tn The word כָּרַה (karah) means “to sell.” With the preposition עַל (’al, “upon”) it has the sense “to bargain over something.”
12 tn The verb means “to cut up; to divide up” in the sense of selling the dead body (see Exod 21:35). This will be between them and the merchants (כְּנַעֲנִים, kÿna’anim).