Ayub 3:24

3:24 For my sighing comes in place of ¹  my food, ² 

and my groanings ³  flow forth like water. ⁴ 

Ayub 11:16

11:16 For you ⁵  will forget your trouble; ⁶ 

you will remember it

like water that ⁷  has flowed away.

Ayub 15:16

15:16 how much less man, who is abominable and corrupt, ⁸ 

who drinks in evil like water! ⁹ 

[3:24]  ¹ tn For the prepositional לִפְנֵי (lifne), the temporal meaning “before” (“my sighing comes before I eat”) makes very little sense here (as the versions have it). The meaning “in place of, for” fits better (see 1 Sam 1:16, “count not your handmaid for a daughter of Belial”).

[3:24]  ² sn The line means that Job’s sighing, which results from the suffering (metonymy of effect) is his constant, daily food. Parallels like Ps 42:3 which says “my tears have been my bread/food” shows a similar figure.

[3:24]  ³ tn The word normally describes the “roaring” of a lion (Job 4:10); but it is used for the loud groaning or cries of those in distress (Pss 22:1; 32:3).

[3:24]  ⁴ tn This second colon is paraphrased in the LXX to say, “I weep being beset with terror.” The idea of “pouring forth water” while groaning can be represented by “I weep.” The word “fear, terror” anticipates the next verse.

[11:16]  ⁵ tn For a second time (see v. 13) Zophar employs the emphatic personal pronoun. Could he be providing a gentle reminder that Job might have forgotten the sin that has brought this trouble? After all, there will come a time when Job will not remember this time of trial.

[11:16]  ⁶ sn It is interesting to note in the book that the resolution of Job’s trouble did not come in the way that Zophar prescribed it.

[11:16]  ⁷ tn The perfect verb forms an abbreviated relative clause (without the pronoun) modifying “water.”

[15:16]  ⁸ tn The two descriptions here used are “abominable,” meaning “disgusting” (a Niphal participle with the value of a Latin participle [see GKC 356-57 §116.e]), and “corrupt” (a Niphal participle which occurs only in Pss 14:3 and 53:4), always in a moral sense. On the significance of the first description, see P. Humbert, “Le substantif toáe„ba„ et le verbe táb dans l’Ancien Testament,” ZAW 72 [1960]: 217ff.). On the second word, G. R. Driver suggests from Arabic, “debauched with luxury, corrupt” (“Some Hebrew Words,” JTS 29 [1927/28]: 390-96).

[15:16]  ⁹ sn Man commits evil with the same ease and facility as he drinks in water – freely and in large quantities.