Discovery BoxJob 13:24 
Context13:24 Why do you hide your face 1
and regard me as your enemy?
Job 27:7
Context27:7 “May my enemy be like the wicked, 2
my adversary 3 like the unrighteous. 4
Job 31:29
Context31:29 If 5 I have rejoiced over the misfortune of my enemy 6
or exulted 7 because calamity 8 found him –
Job 33:10
Context33:10 9 Yet God 10 finds occasions 11 with me;
he regards me as his enemy!
1 sn The anthropomorphism of “hide the face” indicates a withdrawal of favor and an outpouring of wrath (see Ps 30:7 [8]; Isa 54:8; Ps 27:9). Sometimes God “hides his face” to make himself invisible or aloof (see 34:29). In either case, if God covers his face it is because he considers Job an enemy – at least this is what Job thinks.
2 sn Of course, he means like his enemy when he is judged, not when he is thriving in prosperity and luxury.
3 tn The form is the Hitpolel participle from קוּם (qum): “those who are rising up against me,” or “my adversary.”
4 tc The LXX made a free paraphrase: “No, but let my enemies be as the overthrow of the ungodly, and they that rise up against me as the destruction of transgressors.”
5 tn The problem with taking this as “if,” introducing a conditional clause, is finding the apodosis, if there is one. It may be that the apodosis is understood, or summed up at the end. This is the view taken here. But R. Gordis (Job, 352) wishes to take this word as the indication of the interrogative, forming the rhetorical question to affirm he has never done this. However, in that case the parenthetical verses inserted become redundant.
6 sn The law required people to help their enemies if they could (Exod 23:4; also Prov 20:22). But often in the difficulties that ensued, they did exult over their enemies’ misfortune (Pss 54:7; 59:10 [11], etc.). But Job lived on a level of purity that few ever reach. Duhm said, “If chapter 31 is the crown of all ethical developments of the O.T., verse 29 is the jewel in that crown.”
7 tn The Hitpael of עוּר (’ur) has the idea of “exult.”
8 tn The word is רָע (ra’, “evil”) in the sense of anything that harms, interrupts, or destroys life.
9 sn See Job 10:13ff.; 19:6ff.; and 13:24.
10 tn Heb “he”; the referent (God) has been specified in the translation for clarity.
11 tn The Hebrew means “frustrations” or “oppositions.” The RSV has “displeasure,” NIV “faults,” and NRSV “occasions.” Rashi chose the word found in Judg 14:4 – with metathesis – meaning “pretexts” (תֹּאֲנוֹת, to’anot); this is followed by NAB, NASB.
