Job 15:8

15:8 Do you listen in on God’s secret council? ¹ 

Do you limit ²  wisdom to yourself?

Job 35:8

35:8 Your wickedness affects only ³  a person like yourself,

and your righteousness only other people. ⁴ 

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¹ tn The meaning of סוֹד (sod) is “confidence.” In the context the implication is “secret counsel” of the Lord God (see Jer 23:18). It is a question of confidence on the part of God, that only wisdom can know (see Prov 8:30,31). Job seemed to them to claim to have access to the mind of God.

² tn In v. 4 the word meant “limit”; here it has a slightly different sense, namely, “to reserve for oneself.”

³ tn The phrase “affects only” is supplied in the translation of this nominal sentence.

sn According to Strahan, “Elihu exalts God’s greatness at the cost of His grace, His transcendence at the expense of His immanence. He sets up a material instead of a spiritual stand of profit and loss. He does not realize that God does gain what He desires most by the goodness of men, and loses what He most loves by their evil.”

⁴ tn Heb “and to [or for] a son of man, your righteousness.”