7:17 “What is mankind 1 that you make so much of them, 2
and that you pay attention 3 to them?
9:34 who 4 would take his 5 rod 6 away from me
so that his terror 7 would not make me afraid.
11:19 You will lie down with 8 no one to make you afraid,
and many will seek your favor. 9
18:2 “How long until you 10 make an end of words? 11
You must consider, 12 and then 13 we can talk.
20:15 The wealth that he consumed 14 he vomits up,
God will make him throw it out 15 of his stomach.
21:12 They sing 16 to the accompaniment of tambourine and harp,
and make merry to the sound of the flute.
30:22 You pick me up on the wind and make me ride on it; 17
you toss me about 18 in the storm. 19
41:4 Will it make a pact 20 with you,
so you could take it 21 as your slave for life?
1 tn The verse is a rhetorical question; it is intended to mean that man is too little for God to be making so much over him in all this.
2 tn The Piel verb is a factitive meaning “to magnify.” The English word “magnify” might not be the best translation here, for God, according to Job, is focusing inordinately on him. It means to magnify in thought, appreciate, think highly of. God, Job argues, is making too much of mankind by devoting so much bad attention on them.
3 tn The expression “set your heart on” means “concentrate your mind on” or “pay attention to.”
4 tn The verse probably continues the description from the last verse, and so a relative pronoun may be supplied here as well.
5 tn According to some, the reference of this suffix would be to God. The arbiter would remove the rod of God from Job. But others take it as a separate sentence with God removing his rod.
6 sn The “rod” is a symbol of the power of God to decree whatever judgments and afflictions fall upon people.
7 tn “His terror” is metonymical; it refers to the awesome majesty of God that overwhelms Job and causes him to be afraid.
8 tn The clause that reads “and there is no one making you afraid,” is functioning circumstantially here (see 5:4; 10:7).
9 tn Heb “they will stroke your face,” a picture drawn from the domestic scene of a child stroking the face of the parent. The verb is a Piel, meaning “stroke, make soft.” It is used in the Bible of seeking favor from God (supplication); but it may on the human level also mean seeking to sway people by flattery. See further D. R. Ap-Thomas, “Notes on Some Terms Relating to Prayer,” VT 6 (1956): 225-41.
10 tn The verb is plural, and so most commentators make it singular. But it seems from the context that Bildad is addressing all of them, and not just Job.
11 tn The construction is קִנְצֵי לְמִלִּין (qintse lÿmillin), which is often taken to be “end of words,” as if the word was from קֵץ (qets, “end”). But a plural of “end” is not found in the OT. Some will link the word to Arabic qanasa, “to hunt; to give chase,” to get an interpretation of “snares for words.” But E. Dhorme (Job, 257) objects that this does not fit the speech of Bildad (as well as it might Job’s). He finds a cognate qinsu, “fetters, shackles,” and reads “how long will you put shackles on words.” But G. R. Driver had pointed out that this cognate does not exist (“Problems in the Hebrew text of Job,” VTSup 3 [1955]: 72-93). So it would be preferable to take the reading “ends” and explain the ן (nun) as from a Aramaizing by-form. This is supported by 11QtgJob that uses סוֹף (sof, “end”). On the construction, GKC 421 §130.a explains this as a use of the construct in rapid narrative to connect the words; in such cases a preposition is on the following noun.
12 tn The imperfect verb, again plural, would be here taken in the nuance of instruction, or a modal nuance of obligation. So Bildad is telling his listeners to be intelligent. This would be rather cutting in the discourse.
13 tn Heb “afterward.”
14 tn Heb “swallowed.”
15 tn The choice of words is excellent. The verb יָרַשׁ (yarash) means either “to inherit” or “to disinherit; to dispossess.” The context makes the figure clear that God is administering the emetic to make the wicked throw up the wealth (thus, “God will make him throw it out…”); but since wealth is the subject there is a disinheritance meant here.
16 tn The verb is simply “they take up [or lift up],” but the understood object is “their voices,” and so it means “they sing.”
17 sn Here Job changes the metaphor again, to the driving storm. God has sent his storms, and Job is blown away.
18 tn The verb means “to melt.” The imagery would suggest softening the ground with the showers (see Ps 65:10 [11]). The translation “toss…about” comes from the Arabic cognate that is used for the surging of the sea.
19 tc The Qere is תּוּשִׁיָּה (tushiyyah, “counsel”), which makes no sense here. The Kethib is a variant orthography for תְּשֻׁאָה (tÿshu’ah, “storm”).
20 tn Heb “will he cut a covenant.”
21 tn The imperfect verb serves to express what the covenant pact would cover, namely, “that you take.”