Ayub 16:2-3

16:2 “I have heard many things like these before.

What miserable comforters ¹  are you all!

16:3 Will ²  there be an end to your ³  windy words? ⁴ 

Or what provokes ⁵  you that you answer? ⁶ 

[16:2]  ¹ tn The expression uses the Piel participle in construct: מְנַחֲמֵי עָמָל (mÿnahame ’amal, “comforters of trouble”), i.e., comforters who increase trouble instead of relieving it. D. W. Thomas translates this “breathers out of trouble” (“A Note on the Hebrew Root naham,” ExpTim 44 [1932/33]: 192).

[16:3]  ² tn Disjunctive questions are introduced with the sign of the interrogative; the second part is introduced with אוֹ (’o, see GKC 475 §150.g).

[16:3]  ³ tn In v. 3 the second person singular is employed rather than the plural as in vv. 2 and 4. The singular might be an indication that the words of v. 3 were directed at Eliphaz specifically.

[16:3]  ⁴ tn Heb “words of wind.”

[16:3]  ⁵ tn The Hiphil of מָרַץ (marats) does not occur anywhere else. The word means “to compel; to force” (see 6:25).

[16:3]  ⁶ tn The LXX seems to have gone a different way: “What, is there any reason in vain words, or what will hinder you from answering?”