Ayub 8:19

8:19 Indeed, this is the joy of his way, ¹ 

and out of the earth ²  others spring up. ³ 

Ayub 8:2

8:2 “How long will you speak these things, ⁴ 

seeing ⁵  that the words of your mouth

are like a great ⁶  wind? ⁷ 

1 Raja-raja 19:1

Elijah Runs for His Life

19:1 Ahab told Jezebel all that Elijah had done, including a detailed account of how he killed all the prophets with the sword.

Ayub 18:16

18:16 Below his roots dry up,

and his branches wither above.

Ayub 20:5

20:5 that the elation of the wicked is brief, ⁸ 

the joy of the godless ⁹  lasts but a moment. ¹⁰ 

Mazmur 90:5-6

90:5 You bring their lives to an end and they “fall asleep.” ¹¹ 

In the morning they are like the grass that sprouts up;

90:6 in the morning it glistens ¹²  and sprouts up;

at evening time it withers ¹³  and dries up.

Mazmur 102:12

102:12 But you, O Lord, rule forever, ¹⁴ 

and your reputation endures. ¹⁵ 

Yesaya 34:4

34:4 All the stars in the sky will fade away, ¹⁶ 

the sky will roll up like a scroll;

all its stars will wither,

like a leaf withers and falls from a vine

or a fig withers and falls from a tree. ¹⁷ 

Yesaya 40:7

40:7 The grass dries up,

the flowers wither,

when the wind sent by the Lord ¹⁸  blows on them.

Surely humanity ¹⁹  is like grass.

Yesaya 40:24

40:24 Indeed, they are barely planted;

yes, they are barely sown;

yes, they barely take root in the earth,

and then he blows on them, causing them to dry up,

and the wind carries them away like straw.

[8:19]  ¹ tn This line is difficult. If the MT stands as it is, the expression must be ironic. It would be saying that the joy (all the security and prosperity) of its way (its life) is short-lived – that is the way its joy goes. Most commentators are not satisfied with this. Dhorme, for one, changes מְשׂוֹשׂ (mÿsos, “joy”) to מְסוֹס (mÿsos, “rotting”), and gets “behold him lie rotting on the path.” The sibilants can interchange this way. But Dhorme thinks the MT was written the way it was because the word was thought to be “joy,” when it should have been the other way. The word “way” then becomes an accusative of place. The suggestion is rather compelling and would certainly fit the context. The difficulty is that a root סוּס (sus, “to rot”) has to be proposed. E. Dhorme does this by drawing on Arabic sas, “to be eaten by moths or worms,” thus “worm-eaten; decaying; rotting.” Cf. NIV “its life withers away”; also NAB “there he lies rotting beside the road.”

[8:19]  ² tn Heb “dust.”

[8:19]  ³ sn As with the tree, so with the godless man – his place will soon be taken by another.

[8:2]  ⁴ sn “These things” refers to all of Job’s speech, the general drift of which seems to Bildad to question the justice of God.

[8:2]  ⁵ tn The second colon of the verse simply says “and a strong wind the words of your mouth.” The simplest way to treat this is to make it an independent nominal sentence: “the words of your mouth are a strong wind.” Some have made it parallel to the first by apposition, understanding “how long” to do double duty. The line beginning with the ו (vav) can also be subordinated as a circumstantial clause, as here.

[8:2]  ⁶ tn The word כַּבִּיר (kabbir, “great”) implies both abundance and greatness. Here the word modifies “wind”; the point of the analogy is that Job’s words are full of sound but without solid content.

[8:2]  ⁷ tn See, however, G. R. Driver’s translation, “the breath of one who is mighty are the words of your mouth” (“Hebrew Studies,” JRAS 1948: 170).

[20:5]  ⁸ tn The expression in the text is “quite near.” This indicates that it is easily attained, and that its end is near.

[20:5]  ⁹ tn For the discussion of חָנֵף (khanef, “godless”) see Job 8:13.

[20:5]  ¹⁰ tn The phrase is “until a moment,” meaning it is short-lived. But see J. Barr, “Hebrew ’ad, especially at Job 1:18 and Neh 7:3,” JSS 27 (1982): 177-88.

[90:5]  ¹¹ tn Heb “you bring them to an end [with] sleep.” The Hebrew verb זָרַם (zaram) has traditionally been taken to mean “flood” or “overwhelm” (note the Polel form of a root זרם in Ps 77:17, where the verb is used of the clouds pouring down rain). However, the verb form here is Qal, not Polel, and is better understood as a homonym meaning “to make an end [of life].” The term שֵׁנָה (shenah, “sleep”) can be taken as an adverbial accusative; it is a euphemism here for death (see Ps 76:5-6).

[90:6]  ¹² tn Or “flourishes.” The verb is used of a crown shining in Ps 132:18. Perhaps here in Ps 90:6 it refers to the glistening of the grass in the morning dew.

[90:6]  ¹³ tn The Polel form of this verb occurs only here. Perhaps the form should be emended to a Qal (which necessitates eliminating the final lamed [ל] as dittographic). See Ps 37:2.

[102:12]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “sit” (i.e., sit enthroned, see Ps 9:7). The imperfect verbal form highlights the generalization.

[102:12]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “and your remembrance [is] for a generation and a generation.”

[34:4]  ¹⁶ tc Heb “and all the host of heaven will rot.” The Qumran scroll 1QIsa^a inserts “and the valleys will be split open,” but this reading may be influenced by Mic 1:4. On the other hand, the statement, if original, could have been omitted by homoioarcton, a scribe’s eye jumping from the conjunction prefixed to “the valleys” to the conjunction prefixed to the verb “rot.”

[34:4]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “like the withering of a leaf from a vine, and like the withering from a fig tree.”

[40:7]  ¹⁸ tn The Hebrew text has רוּחַ יְהוָה (ruakh yehvah), which in this context probably does not refer to the Lord’s personal Spirit. The phrase is better translated “the breath of the Lord,” or “the wind of [i.e., sent by] the Lord.” The Lord’s sovereign control over nature, including the hot desert winds that dry up vegetation, is in view here (cf. Ps 147:18; Isa 59:19).

[40:7]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “the people” (so KJV, ASV, NAB, NASB, NIV, NRSV).