Ayub 10:21

10:21 before I depart, never to return, ¹ 

to the land of darkness

and the deepest shadow, ² 

Ayub 31:32

31:32 But ³  no stranger had to spend the night outside,

for I opened my doors to the traveler ⁴  –

[10:21]  ¹ sn The verbs are simple, “I go” and “I return”; but Job clearly means before he dies. A translation of “depart” comes closer to communicating this. The second verb may be given a potential imperfect translation to capture the point. The NIV offered more of an interpretive paraphrase: “before I go to the place of no return.”

[10:21]  ² tn See Job 3:5.

[31:32]  ³ tn This verse forms another parenthesis. Job stops almost at every point now in the conditional clauses to affirm his purity and integrity.

[31:32]  ⁴ tn The word in the MT, אֹרחַ (’orakh, “way”), is a contraction from אֹרֵחַ (’oreakh, “wayfarer”); thus, “traveler.” The same parallelism is found in Jer 14:8. The reading here “on/to the road” is meaningless otherwise.