12:3 I also have understanding 1 as well as you;
I am not inferior to you. 2
Who does not know such things as these? 3
26:14 Indeed, these are but the outer fringes of his ways! 4
How faint is the whisper 5 we hear of him!
But who can understand the thunder of his power?”
29:11 “As soon as the ear heard these things, 6 it blessed me, 7
and when the eye saw them, it bore witness to me,
1 tn The word is literally “heart,” meaning a mind or understanding.
2 tn Because this line is repeated in 13:2, many commentators delete it from this verse (as does the LXX). The Syriac translates נֹפֵל (nofel) as “little,” and the Vulgate “inferior.” Job is saying that he does not fall behind them in understanding.
3 tn Heb “With whom are not such things as these?” The point is that everyone knows the things that these friends have been saying – they are commonplace.
4 tn Heb “the ends of his ways,” meaning “the fringes.”
5 tn Heb “how little is the word.” Here “little” means a “fraction” or an “echo.”
6 tn The words “these things” and “them” in the next colon are not in the Hebrew text, but have been supplied in the translation for clarity.
7 tn The main clause is introduced by the preterite with the vav (ו) consecutive (see GKC 327 §111.h); the clause before it is therefore temporal and circumstantial to the main clause.