Discovery BoxJob 2:3 
Context2:3 Then the Lord said to Satan, “Have you considered my servant Job? For there is no one like him on the earth, a pure and upright man, one who fears God and turns away from evil. And he still holds firmly 1 to his integrity, 2 so that 3 you stirred me up to destroy him 4 without reason.” 5
Job 2:11
Context2:11 When Job’s three friends heard about all this calamity that had happened to him, each of them came from his own country 7 – Eliphaz the Temanite, Bildad the Shuhite, and Zophar the Naamathite. 8 They met together 9 to come to show sympathy 10 for him and to console 11 him.
1 tn The form is the Hiphil participle, “make strong, seize, hold fast.” It is the verbal use here; joined with עֹדֶנּוּ (’odennu, “yet he”) it emphasizes that “he is still holding firmly.” The testing has simply strengthened Job in his integrity.
2 tn This is the same word used to describe Job as “blameless, pure.” Here it carries the idea of “integrity”; Job remained blameless, perfect.
3 tn The vav (ו) with the preterite is used here to express the logical conclusion or consequence of what was stated previously. God is saying that Job has maintained his integrity, so that now it is clear that Satan moved against him groundlessly (GKC 328 §111.l).
4 tn The verb literally means “to swallow”; it forms an implied comparison in the line, indicating the desire of Satan to ruin him completely. See A Guillaume, “A Note on the Root bala`,” JTS 13 (1962): 320-23; and N. M. Sarna, “Epic Substratum in the Prose of Job,”JBL 76 (1957): 13-25, for a discussion of the Ugaritic deity Mot swallowing up the enemy.
5 sn Once again the adverb חִנָּם (khinnam, “gratis”) is used. It means “graciously, gratis, free, without cause, for no reason.” Here the sense has to be gratuitously, for no reason.” The point of the verb חָנַן (khanan, “to be gracious”) and its derivatives is that the action is undeserved. In fact, they would deserve the opposite. Sinners seeking grace deserve punishment. Here, Job deserves reward, not suffering.
6 sn See N. C. Habel, “‘Only the Jackal is My Friend,’ On Friends and Redeemers in Job,” Int 31 (1977): 227-36.
7 tn Heb “a man from his place”; this is the distributive use, meaning “each man came from his place.”
8 sn Commentators have tried to analyze the meanings of the names of the friends and their locations. Not only has this proven to be difficult (Teman is the only place that is known), it is not necessary for the study of the book. The names are probably not symbolic of the things they say.
9 tn The verb can mean that they “agreed together”; but it also (and more likely) means that they came together at a meeting point to go visit Job together.
10 tn The verb “to show grief” is נוּד (nud), and literally signifies “to shake the head.” It may be that his friends came to show the proper sympathy and express the appropriate feelings. They were not ready for what they found.
11 tn The second infinitive is from נָחָם (nakham, “to comfort, console” in the Piel). This word may be derived from a word with a meaning of sighing deeply.
