3:14 with kings and counselors of the earth
who built for themselves places now desolate, 1
4:7 Call to mind now: 2
Who, 3 being innocent, ever perished? 4
And where were upright people 5 ever destroyed? 6
4:12 “Now a word was secretly 7 brought 8 to me,
and my ear caught 9 a whisper 10 of it.
8:8 “For inquire now of the former 11 generation,
and pay attention 12 to the findings 13
of their ancestors; 14
10:8 “Your hands have shaped 15 me and made me,
but 16 now you destroy me completely. 17
13:6 “Listen now to my argument, 18
and be attentive to my lips’ contentions. 19
13:18 See now, 20 I have prepared 21 my 22 case; 23
I know that I am right. 24
14:16 “Surely now you count my steps; 26
then you would not mark 27 my sin. 28
16:7 Surely now he 29 has worn me out,
you have devastated my entire household.
16:19 Even now my witness 30 is in heaven;
my advocate 31 is on high.
30:9 “And now I have become their taunt song;
I have become a byword 32 among them.
30:16 “And now my soul pours itself out within me; 33
days of suffering take hold of me.
33:1 “But now, O Job, listen to my words,
and hear 36 everything I have to say! 37
33:2 See now, I have opened 38 my mouth;
my tongue in my mouth has spoken. 39
1 tn The difficult term חֳרָבוֹת (khoravot) is translated “desolate [places]”. The LXX confused the word and translated it “who gloried in their swords.” One would expect a word for monuments, or tombs (T. K. Cheyne emended it to “everlasting tombs” [“More Critical Gleanings in Job,” ExpTim 10 (1898/99): 380-83]). But this difficult word is of uncertain etymology and therefore cannot simply be made to mean “royal tombs.” The verb means “be desolate, solitary.” In Isa 48:21 there is the clear sense of a desert. That is the meaning of Assyrian huribtu. It may be that like the pyramids of Egypt these tombs would have been built in the desert regions. Or it may describe how they rebuilt ruins for themselves. He would be saying then that instead of lying here in pain and shame if he had died he would be with the great ones of the earth. Otherwise, the word could be interpreted as a metonymy of effect, indicating that the once glorious tomb now is desolate. But this does not fit the context – the verse is talking about the state of the great ones after their death.
2 sn Eliphaz will put his thesis forward first negatively and then positively (vv. 8ff). He will argue that the suffering of the righteous is disciplinary and not for their destruction. He next will argue that it is the wicked who deserve judgment.
3 tn The use of the independent personal pronoun is emphatic, almost as an enclitic to emphasize interrogatives: “who indeed….” (GKC 442 §136.c).
4 tn The perfect verb in this line has the nuance of the past tense to express the unique past – the uniqueness of the action is expressed with “ever” (“who has ever perished”).
5 tn The adjective is used here substantivally. Without the article the word stresses the meaning of “uprightness.” Job will use “innocent” and “upright” together in 17:8.
6 tn The Niphal means “to be hidden” (see the Piel in 6:10; 15:18; and 27:11); the connotation here is “destroyed” or “annihilated.”
7 tn The LXX of this verse offers special problems. It reads, “But if there had been any truth in your words, none of these evils would have fallen upon you; shall not my ear receive excellent [information] from him?” The major error involves a dittography from the word for “secret,” yielding “truth.”
8 tn The verb גָּנַב (ganav) means “to steal.” The Pual form in this verse is probably to be taken as a preterite since it requires a past tense translation: “it was stolen for me” meaning it was brought to me stealthily (see 2 Sam 19:3).
9 tn Heb “received.”
10 tn The word שֵׁמֶץ (shemets, “whisper”) is found only here and in Job 26:14. A cognate form שִׁמְצָה (shimtsah) is found in Exod 32:25 with the sense of “a whisper.” In postbiblical Hebrew the word comes to mean “a little.” The point is that Eliphaz caught just a bit, just a whisper of it, and will recount it to Job.
11 sn Bildad is not calling for Job to trace through the learning of antiquity, but of the most recent former generation. Hebrews were fond of recalling what the “fathers” had taught, for each generation recalled what their fathers had taught.
12 tn The verb כוֹנֵן (khonen, from כּוּן, kun) normally would indicate “prepare yourself” or “fix” one’s heart on something, i.e., give attention to it. The verb with the ל (lamed) preposition after it does mean “to think on” or “to meditate” (Isa 51:13). But some commentators wish to change the כּ (kaf) to a בּ (bet) in the verb to get “to consider” (from בִּין, bin). However, M. Dahood shows a connection between כּנן (knn) and שׁאל (sh’l) in Ugaritic (“Hebrew-Ugaritic Lexicography,” Bib 46 [1965]: 329).
13 tn The Hebrew has “the search of their fathers,” but the word is probably intended to mean what that observation or search yielded (so “search” is a metonymy of cause).
14 tn Heb “fathers.”
15 tn The root עָצַב (’atsav) is linked by some to an Arabic word meaning “to cut out, hew.” The derived word עֲצַבִּים (’atsabbim) means “idols.” Whatever the precise meaning, the idea is that God formed or gave shape to mankind in creation.
16 tn The verb in this part is a preterite with the vav (ו) consecutive. However, here it has merely an external connection with the preceding perfects, so that in reality it presents an antithesis (see GKC 327 §111.e).
17 tn Heb “together round about and you destroy me.” The second half of this verse is very difficult. Most commentators follow the LXX and connect the first two words with the second colon as the MT accents indicate (NJPS, “then destroyed every part of me”), rather than with the first colon (“and made me complete,” J. E. Hartley, Job [NICOT], 185). Instead of “together” some read “after.” Others see in סָבִיב (saviv) not so much an adjectival use but a verbal or adverbial use: “you turn and destroy” or “you destroy utterly (all around).” This makes more sense than “turn.” In addition, the verb form in the line is the preterite with vav consecutive; this may be another example of the transposition of the copula (see 4:6). For yet another option (“You have engulfed me about altogether”), see R. Fuller, “Exodus 21:22: The Miscarriage Interpretation and the Personhood of the Fetus,” JETS 37 (1994): 178.
18 sn Job first will argue with his friends. His cause that he will plead with God begins in v. 13. The same root יָכַח (yakhakh, “argue, plead”) is used here as in v. 3b (see note). Synonymous parallelism between the two halves of this verse supports this translation.
19 tn The Hebrew word רִבוֹת (rivot, “disputes, contentions”) continues the imagery of presenting a legal case. The term is used of legal disputations and litigation. See, also, v. 19a.
20 tn The particle הִנֵּה (hinneh) functions almost as an imperative here, calling attention to what follows: “look” (archaic: behold).
21 tn The verb עָרַךְ (’arakh) means “to set in order, set in array [as a battle], prepare” in the sense here of arrange and organize a lawsuit.
22 tn The pronoun is added because this is what the verse means.
23 tn The word מִשְׁפָּט (mishpat) usually means “judgment; decision.” Here it means “lawsuit” (and so a metonymy of effect gave rise to this usage; see Num 27:5; 2 Sam 15:4).
24 tn The pronoun is emphatic before the verb: “I know that it is I who am right.” The verb means “to be right; to be righteous.” Some have translated it “vindicated,” looking at the outcome of the suit.
25 sn The hope for life after death is supported now by a description of the severity with which God deals with people in this life.
26 tn If v. 16a continues the previous series, the translation here would be “then” (as in RSV). Others take it as a new beginning to express God’s present watch over Job, and interpret the second half of the verse as a question, or emend it to say God does not pass over his sins.
27 sn Compare Ps 130:3-4, which says, “If you should mark iniquity O
28 tn The second colon of the verse can be contrasted with the first, the first being the present reality and the second the hope looked for in the future. This seems to fit the context well without making any changes at all.
29 tn In poetic discourse there is often an abrupt change from person to another. See GKC 462 §144.p. Some take the subject of this verb to be God, others the pain (“surely now it has worn me out”).
30 sn The witness in heaven must be God, to whom the cries and prayers come. Job’s dilemma is serious, but common to the human experience: the hostility of God toward him is baffling, but he is conscious of his innocence and can call on God to be his witness.
31 tn The parallelism now uses the Aramaic word “my advocate” – the one who testifies on my behalf. The word again appears in Gen 31:47 for Laban’s naming of the “heap of witness” in Aramaic – “Sahadutha.”
32 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.”
33 tn This line can either mean that Job is wasting away (i.e., his life is being poured out), or it can mean that he is grieving. The second half of the verse gives the subordinate clause of condition for this.
34 tc This reading requires repointing the word בִּדְבָרִים (bidbarim, “with words”) to בְּדָבְּרָם (bÿdabbÿram, “while they spoke [with Job]”). If the MT is retained, it would mean “he waited for Job with words,” which while understandable is awkward.
35 tn Heb “they”; the referent (the other friends) has been specified in the translation for clarity.
36 tn Heb “give ear,” the Hiphil denominative verb from “ear.”
37 tn Heb “hear all my words.”
38 tn The perfect verbs in this verse should be classified as perfects of resolve: “I have decided to open…speak.”
39 sn H. H. Rowley (Job [NCBC], 210) says, “The self-importance of Elihu is boundless, and he is the master of banality.” He adds that whoever wrote these speeches this way clearly intended to expose the character rather than exalt him.