Ayub 15:28

15:28 he lived in ruined towns ¹ 

and in houses where ²  no one lives,

where they are ready to crumble into heaps. ³ 

Ayub 22:8

22:8 Although you were a powerful man, ⁴  owning land, ⁵ 

an honored man ⁶  living on it, ⁷ 

Ayub 26:5

A Better Description of God’s Greatness ⁸ 

26:5 “The dead ⁹  tremble ¹⁰  –

those beneath the waters

and all that live in them. ¹¹ 

Ayub 28:5

28:5 The earth, from which food comes,

is overturned below as though by fire; ¹² 

Ayub 28:11

28:11 He has searched ¹³  the sources ¹⁴  of the rivers

and what was hidden he has brought into the light.

[15:28]  ¹ sn K&D 11:266 rightly explains that these are not cities that he, the wicked, has destroyed, but that were destroyed by a judgment on wickedness. Accordingly, Eliphaz is saying that the wicked man is willing to risk such a curse in his confidence in his prosperity (see further H. H. Rowley, Job [NCBC], 113).

[15:28]  ² tn The verbal idea serves here to modify “houses” as a relative clause; so a relative pronoun is added.

[15:28]  ³ tn The Hebrew has simply “they are made ready for heaps.” The LXX translates it, “what they have prepared, let others carry away.” This would involve a complete change of the last word.

[22:8]  ⁴ tn The idiom is “a man of arm” (= “powerful”; see Ps 10:15). This is in comparison to the next line, “man of face” (= “dignity; high rank”; see Isa 3:5).

[22:8]  ⁵ tn Heb “and a man of arm, to whom [was] land.” The line is in contrast to the preceding one, and so the vav here introduces a concessive clause.

[22:8]  ⁶ tn The expression is unusual: “the one lifted up of face.” This is the “honored one,” the one to whom the dignity will be given.

[22:8]  ⁷ tn Many commentators simply delete the verse or move it elsewhere. Most take it as a general reference to Job, perhaps in apposition to the preceding verse.

[26:5]  ⁸ sn This is the section, Job 26:5-14, that many conclude makes better sense coming from the friend. But if it is attributed to Job, then he is showing he can surpass them in his treatise of the greatness of God.

[26:5]  ⁹ tn The text has הָרְפָאִים (harÿfa’im, “the shades”), referring to the “dead,” or the elite among the dead (see Isa 14:9; 26:14; Ps 88:10 [11]). For further discussion, start with A. R. Johnson, The Vitality of the Individual, 88ff.

[26:5]  ¹⁰ tn The verb is a Polal from חִיל (khil) which means “to tremble.” It shows that even these spirits cannot escape the terror.

[26:5]  ¹¹ tc Most commentators wish to lengthen the verse and make it more parallel, but nothing is gained by doing this.

[28:5]  ¹² sn The verse has been properly understood, on the whole, as comparing the earth above and all its produce with the upheaval down below.

[28:11]  ¹³ tc The translation “searched” follows the LXX and Vulgate; the MT reads “binds up” or “dams up.” This latter translation might refer to the damming of water that might seep into a mine (HALOT 289 s.v. חבשׁ; cf. ESV, NJPS, NASB, REB, NLT).

[28:11]  ¹⁴ tc The older translations had “he binds the streams from weeping,” i.e., from trickling (מִבְּכִי, mibbÿkhi). But the Ugaritic parallel has changed the understanding, reading “toward the spring of the rivers” (`m mbk nhrm). Earlier than that discovery, the versions had taken the word as a noun as well. Some commentators had suggested repointing the Hebrew. Some chose מַבְּכֵי (mabbÿkhe, “sources”). Now there is much Ugaritic support for the reading (see G. M. Landes, BASOR 144 [1956]: 32f.; and H. L. Ginsberg, “The Ugaritic texts and textual criticism,” JBL 62 [1943]: 111).