Job 18:13

It eats away parts of his skin; ¹  the most terrible death ²  devours his limbs.

It eats away parts of his skin; death’s firstborn devours his limbs.

"His skin is devoured by disease, The firstborn of death devours his limbs.

Disease eats their skin; death devours their limbs.

To lay them out for a gourmet meal, a treat for ravenous Death.

His skin is wasted by disease, and his body is food for the worst of diseases.

By disease their skin is consumed, the firstborn of Death consumes their limbs.

It devours patches of his skin; The firstborn of death devours his limbs.

It eats away parts of his skin; ¹  the most terrible death ²  devours his limbs.

¹ tn The expression “the limbs of his skin” makes no sense, unless a poetic meaning of “parts” (or perhaps “layers”) is taken. The parallelism has “his skin” in the first colon, and “his limbs” in the second. One plausible suggestion is to take בַּדֵּי (badde, “limbs of”) in the first part to be בִּדְוָי (bidvay, “by a disease”; Dhorme, Wright, RSV). The verb has to be made passive, however. The versions have different things: The LXX has “let the branches of his feet be eaten”; the Syriac has “his cities will be swallowed up by force”; the Vulgate reads “let it devour the beauty of his skin”; and Targum Job has “it will devour the linen garments that cover his skin.”

² tn The “firstborn of death” is the strongest child of death (Gen 49:3), or the deadliest death (like the “firstborn of the poor, the poorest). The phrase means the most terrible death (A. B. Davidson, Job, 134).