Ayub 5:1

5:1 “Call now! ¹  Is there anyone who will answer you? ² 

To which of the holy ones ³  will you turn? ⁴ 

Ayub 6:8

A Cry for Death

6:8 “Oh that ⁵  my request would be realized, ⁶ 

and that God would grant me what I long for! ⁷ 

Ayub 6:24

No Sin Discovered

6:24 “Teach ⁸  me and I, for my part, ⁹  will be silent;

explain to me ¹⁰  how I have been mistaken. ¹¹ 

Ayub 8:10

8:10 Will they not ¹²  instruct you and ¹³  speak to you,

and bring forth words ¹⁴ 

from their understanding? ¹⁵ 

Ayub 12:11

12:11 Does not the ear test words,

as ¹⁶  the tongue ¹⁷  tastes food? ¹⁸ 

Ayub 18:20

18:20 People of the west ¹⁹  are appalled at his fate; ²⁰ 

people of the east are seized with horror, ²¹  saying, ²² 

Ayub 23:4

23:4 I would lay out my case ²³  before him

and fill my mouth with arguments.

Ayub 28:27

28:27 then he looked at wisdom ²⁴  and assessed its value; ²⁵ 

he established ²⁶  it and examined it closely. ²⁷ 

Ayub 29:23

29:23 They waited for me as people wait ²⁸  for the rain,

and they opened their mouths ²⁹ 

as for ³⁰  the spring rains.

Ayub 30:7

30:7 They brayed ³¹  like animals among the bushes

and were huddled together ³²  under the nettles.

Ayub 30:31

30:31 My harp is used for ³³  mourning

and my flute for the sound of weeping.

Ayub 31:13

31:13 “If I have disregarded the right of my male servants

or my female servants

when they disputed ³⁴  with me,

Ayub 32:12

32:12 Now I was paying you close attention, ³⁵ 

yet ³⁶  there was no one proving Job wrong, ³⁷ 

not one of you was answering his statements!

Ayub 33:16

33:16 Then he gives a revelation ³⁸  to people,

and terrifies them with warnings, ³⁹ 

Ayub 33:32

33:32 If you have any words, ⁴⁰  reply to me;

speak, for I want to justify you. ⁴¹ 

Ayub 36:10

36:10 And he reveals ⁴²  this ⁴³  for correction,

and says that they must turn ⁴⁴  from evil.

Ayub 39:20

39:20 Do you make it leap ⁴⁵  like a locust?

Its proud neighing ⁴⁶  is terrifying!

[5:1]  ¹ tn Some commentators transpose this verse with the following paragraph, placing it after v. 7 (see E. Dhorme, Job, 62). But the reasons for this are based on the perceived development of the argument and are not that compelling.

[5:1]  sn The imperative is here a challenge for Job. If he makes his appeal against God, who is there who will listen? The rhetorical questions are intended to indicate that no one will respond, not even the angels. Job would do better to realize that he is guilty and his only hope is in God.

[5:1]  ² tn The participle with the suffix could be given a more immediate translation to accompany the imperative: “Call now! Is anyone listening to you?”

[5:1]  ³ tn The LXX has rendered “holy ones” as “holy angels” (cf. TEV, CEV, NLT). The LXX has interpreted the verb in the colon too freely: “if you will see.”

[5:1]  ⁴ sn The point being made is that the angels do not represent the cries of people to God as if mediating for them. But if Job appealed to any of them to take his case against God, there would be no response whatsoever for that.

[6:8]  ⁵ tn The Hebrew expresses the desire (desiderative clause) with “who will give?” (see GKC 477 §151.d).

[6:8]  ⁶ tn The verb בּוֹא (bo’, “go”) has the sense of “to be realized; to come to pass; to be fulfilled.” The optative “Who will give [that] my request be realized?” is “O that my request would be realized.”

[6:8]  ⁷ tn The text has תִקְוָתִי (tiqvati, “hope”). There is no reason to change the text to “my desire” (as Driver and others do) if the word is interpreted metonymically – it means “what I hope for.” What Job hopes for and asks for is death.

[6:8]  sn See further W. Riggans, “Job 6:8-10: Short Comments,” ExpTim 99 (1987): 45-46.

[6:24]  ⁸ tn The verb “teach” or “instruct” is the Hiphil הוֹרוּנִי (horuni), from the verb יָרָה (yarah); the basic idea of “point, direct” lies behind this meaning. The verb is cognate to the noun תּוֹרָה (torah, “instruction, teaching, law”).

[6:24]  ⁹ tn The independent personal pronoun makes the subject of the verb emphatic: “and I will be silent.”

[6:24]  ¹⁰ tn The verb is הָבִינוּ (havinu, “to cause someone to understand”); with the ל (lamed) following, it has the sense of “explain to me.”

[6:24]  ¹¹ tn The verb שָׁגָה (shagah) has the sense of “wandering, getting lost, being mistaken.”

[8:10]  ¹² tn The sentence begins emphatically: “Is it not they.”

[8:10]  ¹³ tn The “and” is not present in the line. The second clause seems to be in apposition to the first, explaining it more thoroughly: “Is it not they [who] will instruct you, [who] will speak to you.”

[8:10]  ¹⁴ tn The noun may have been left indeterminate for the sake of emphasis (GKC 401-2 §125.c), meaning “important words.”

[8:10]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “from their heart.”

[12:11]  ¹⁶ tn The ו (vav) introduces the comparison here (see 5:7; 11:12); see GKC 499 §161.a.

[12:11]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “the palate.”

[12:11]  ¹⁸ tn The final preposition with its suffix is to be understood as a pleonastic dativus ethicus and not translated (see GKC 439 §135.i).

[12:11]  sn In the rest of the chapter Job turns his attention away from creation to the wisdom of ancient men. In Job 13:1 when Job looks back to this part, he refers to both the eye and the ear. In vv. 13-25 Job refers to many catastrophes which he could not have seen, but must have heard about.

[18:20]  ¹⁹ tn The word אַחֲרֹנִים (’akharonim) means “those [men] coming after.” And the next word, קַדְמֹנִים (qadmonim), means “those [men] coming before.” Some commentators have tried to see here references to people who lived before and people who lived after, but that does not explain their being appalled at the fate of the wicked. So the normal way this is taken is in connection to the geography, notably the seas – “the hinder sea” refers to the Mediterranean, the West, and “the front sea” refers to the Dead Sea (Zech 14:8), namely, the East. The versions understood this as temporal: “the last groaned for him, and wonder seized the first” (LXX).

[18:20]  ²⁰ tn Heb “his day.”

[18:20]  ²¹ tn The expression has “they seize horror.” The RSV renders this “horror seizes them.” The same idiom is found in Job 21:6: “laid hold on shuddering.” The idiom would solve the grammatical problem, and not change the meaning greatly; but it would change the parallelism.

[18:20]  ²² tn The word “saying” is supplied in the translation to mark and introduce the following as a quotation of these people who are seized with horror. The alternative is to take v. 21 as Bildad’s own summary statement (cf. G. R. Driver and G. B. Gray, Job [ICC], 2:162; J. E. Hartley, Job [NICOT], 280).

[23:4]  ²³ tn The word מִשְׁפָּט (mishpat) is normally “judgment; decision.” But in these contexts it refers to the legal case that Job will bring before God. With the verb עָרַךְ (’arakh, “to set in order; to lay out”) the whole image of drawing up a lawsuit is complete.

[28:27]  ²⁴ tn Heb “it”; the referent (wisdom) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[28:27]  ²⁵ tn The verb סָפַר (safar) in the Piel basically means “to tell; to declare; to show” or “to count; to number.” Many commentators offer different suggestions for the translation. “Declared” (as in the RSV, NASB, and NRSV) would be the simplest – but to whom did God declare it? Besides “appraised” which is the view of Pope, Dhorme and others (cf. NAB, NIV), J. Reider has suggested “probed” (“Etymological studies in biblical Hebrew,” VT 2 [1952]: 127), Strahan has “studied,” and Kissane has “reckoned.” The difficulty is that the line has a series of verbs, which seem to build to a climax; but without more details it is hard to know how to translate them when they have such a range of meaning.

[28:27]  ²⁶ tc The verb כּוּן (kun) means “to establish; to prepare” in this stem. There are several mss that have the form from בִּין (bin, “discern”), giving “he discerned it,” making more of a parallel with the first colon. But the weight of the evidence supports the traditional MT reading.

[28:27]  ²⁷ tn The verb חָקַר (khaqar) means “to examine; to search out.” Some of the language used here is anthropomorphic, for the sovereign Lord did not have to research or investigate wisdom. The point is that it is as if he did this human activity, meaning that as in the results of such a search God knows everything about wisdom.

[29:23]  ²⁸ tn The phrase “people wait for” is not in the Hebrew text, but has been supplied in the translation.

[29:23]  ²⁹ sn The analogy is that they received his words eagerly as the dry ground opens to receive the rains.

[29:23]  ³⁰ tn The כּ (kaf) preposition is to be supplied by analogy with the preceding phrase. This leaves a double proposition, “as for” (but see Job 29:2).

[30:7]  ³¹ tn The verb נָהַק (nahaq) means “to bray.” It has cognates in Arabic, Aramaic, and Ugaritic, so there is no need for emendation here. It is the sign of an animal’s hunger. In the translation the words “like animals” are supplied to clarify the metaphor for the modern reader.

[30:7]  ³² tn The Pual of the verb סָפַח (safakh, “to join”) also brings out the passivity of these people – “they were huddled together” (E. Dhorme, Job, 434).

[30:31]  ³³ tn The verb הָיָה (hayah, “to be”) followed by the preposition ל (lamed) means “to serve the purpose of” (see Gen 1:14ff., 17:7, etc.).

[31:13]  ³⁴ tn This construction is an adverbial clause using the temporal preposition, the infinitive from רִיב (riv, “contend”), and the suffix which is the subjective genitive.

[32:12]  ³⁵ tn The verb again is from בִּין (bin, “to perceive; to understand”); in this stem it means to “to pay close attention.”

[32:12]  ³⁶ tn The particle הִנֵּה (hinneh, “behold”) has a deictic force here, calling attention to the thought that is now presented.

[32:12]  ³⁷ tn The participle מוֹכִיחַ (mokhiakh) is from the verb יָכַח (yakhakh) that has been used frequently in the book of Job. It means “to argue; to contend; to debate; to prove; to dispute.” The usage of the verb shows that it can focus on the beginning of an argument, the debating itself, or the resolution of the conflict. Here the latter is obviously meant, for they did argue and contend and criticize – but could not prove Job wrong.

[33:16]  ³⁸ tn The idiom is “he uncovers the ear of men.” This expression means “inform” in Ruth 4:4; 1 Sam 20:2, etc. But when God is the subject it means “make a revelation” (see 1 Sam 9:15; 2 Sam 7:27).

[33:16]  ³⁹ tc Heb “and seals their bonds.” The form of the present translation, “and terrifies them with warnings,” is derived only by emending the text. Aquila, the Vulgate, Syriac, and Targum Job have “their correction” for “their bond,” which is what the KJV used. But the LXX, Aquila, and the Syriac have “terrifies” for the verb. This involves a change in pointing from יָחְתֹּם (yakhtom) to יְחִתֵּם (yÿkhittem). The LXX has “appearances of fear” instead of “bonds.” The point of the verse seems to be that by terrifying dreams God makes people aware of their ways.

[33:32]  ⁴⁰ tn Heb “if there are words.”

[33:32]  ⁴¹ tn The infinitive construct serves as the complement or object of “I desire.” It could be rendered “to justify you” or “your justification, “namely, “that you be justified.”

[36:10]  ⁴² tn The idiom once again is “he uncovers their ear.”

[36:10]  ⁴³ tn The revelation is in the preceding verse, and so a pronoun must be added to make the reference clear.

[36:10]  ⁴⁴ tn The verb שׁוּב (shuv, “to turn; to return”) is one of the two major words in the OT for “repent” – to return from evil. Here the imperfect should be obligatory – they must do it.

[39:20]  ⁴⁵ sn The same ideas are found in Joel 2:4. The leaping motion is compared to the galloping of the horse.

[39:20]  ⁴⁶ tn The word could mean “snorting” as well (see Jer 8:16). It comes from the root “to blow.” If the horse is running and breathing hard, this could be the sense here.