5:3 I myself 1 have seen the fool 2 taking root,
but suddenly I cursed his place of residence. 3
13:1 “Indeed, my eyes have seen all this, 5
my ears have heard and understood it.
15:17 “I will explain to you;
listen to me,
and what 6 I have seen, I will declare, 7
33:21 His flesh wastes away from sight,
and his bones, which were not seen,
are easily visible. 8
36:25 All humanity has seen it;
people gaze on it from afar.
38:22 Have you entered the storehouse 9 of the snow,
or seen the armory 10 of the hail,
1 tn The use of the pronoun here adds emphasis to the subject of the sentence (see GKC 437 §135.a).
2 tn This word is אֱוִיל (’evil), the same word for the “senseless man” in the preceding verse. Eliphaz is citing an example of his principle just given – he saw such a fool for a brief while appearing to prosper (i.e., taking root).
3 tn A. B. Davidson argues that the verse does not mean that Eliphaz cursed his place during his prosperity. This line is metonymical (giving the effect). God judged the fool and his place was ruined; consequently, Eliphaz pronounced it accursed of God (see A. B. Davidson, Job, 36). Many emend the verb slightly to read “and it was suddenly cursed” (וַיֻּכַב [vayyukhav] instead of וָאֶקּוֹב [va’eqqov]; see H. H. Rowley, Job [NCBC], 51).
4 sn Chapter 13 records Job’s charges against his friends for the way they used their knowledge (1-5), his warning that God would find out their insincerity (6-12), and his pleading of his cause to God in which he begs for God to remove his hand from him and that he would not terrify him with his majesty and that he would reveal the sins that caused such great suffering (13-28).
5 tn Hebrew has כֹּל (kol, “all”); there is no reason to add anything to the text to gain a meaning “all this.”
6 tn The demonstrative pronoun is used here as a nominative, to introduce an independent relative clause (see GKC 447 §138.h).
7 tn Here the vav (ו) apodosis follows with the cohortative (see GKC 458 §143.d).
8 tc Heb “are laid bare.” This is the Qere reading; the Kethib means “bare height.” Gordis reverses the word order: “his bones are bare [i.e., crushed] so that they cannot be looked upon.” But the sense of that is not clear.
9 sn Snow and ice are thought of as being in store, brought out by God for specific purposes, such as times of battle (see Josh 10:11; Exod 9:2ff.; Isa 28:17; Isa 30:30; and Ps 18:12 [13]).
10 tn The same Hebrew term (אוֹצָר, ’otsar), has been translated “storehouse” in the first line and “armory” in the second. This has been done for stylistic variation, but also because “hail,” as one of God’s “weapons” (cf. the following verse) suggests military imagery; in this context the word refers to God’s “ammunition dump” where he stockpiles hail.