Ayub 6:14

Disappointing Friends

6:14 “To the one in despair, kindness ¹  should come from his friend ² 

even if ³  he forsakes the fear of the Almighty.

Ayub 7:3

7:3 thus ⁴  I have been made to inherit ⁵ 

months of futility, ⁶ 

and nights of sorrow ⁷ 

have been appointed ⁸  to me.

Ayub 14:22

14:22 Only his flesh has pain for himself, ⁹ 

and he mourns for himself.” ¹⁰ 

Ayub 15:27

15:27 Because he covered his face with fat, ¹¹ 

and made ¹²  his hips bulge with fat, ¹³ 

Ayub 17:13

17:13 If ¹⁴  I hope for the grave to be my home,

if I spread out my bed in darkness,

Ayub 19:11

19:11 Thus ¹⁵  his anger burns against me,

and he considers me among his enemies. ¹⁶ 

Ayub 20:4

20:4 “Surely you know ¹⁷  that it has been from old,

ever since humankind was placed ¹⁸  on the earth,

Ayub 22:3

22:3 Is it of any special benefit ¹⁹  to the Almighty

that you should be righteous,

or is it any gain to him

that you make your ways blameless? ²⁰ 

Ayub 26:7

26:7 He spreads out the northern skies ²¹  over empty space; ²² 

he suspends the earth on nothing. ²³ 

Ayub 28:13

28:13 Mankind does not know its place; ²⁴ 

it cannot be found in the land of the living.

Ayub 30:18

30:18 With great power God ²⁵  grasps my clothing; ²⁶ 

he binds me like the collar ²⁷  of my tunic.

Ayub 31:18

31:18 but from my youth I raised the orphan ²⁸  like a father,

and from my mother’s womb ²⁹ 

I guided the widow! ³⁰ 

Ayub 31:37

31:37 I would give him an accounting of my steps;

like a prince I would approach him.

Ayub 33:17

33:17 to turn a person from his sin, ³¹ 

and to cover a person’s pride. ³² 

Ayub 35:16

35:16 So Job opens his mouth to no purpose; ³³ 

without knowledge he multiplies words.”

[6:14]  ¹ tn In this context חֶסֶד (khesed) could be taken as “loyalty” (“loyalty should be shown by his friend”).

[6:14]  ² tn The Hebrew of this verse is extremely difficult, and while there are many suggestions, none of them has gained a consensus. The first colon simply has “to the despairing // from his friend // kindness.” Several commentators prefer to change the first word לַמָּס (lammas, “to the one in despair”) to some sort of verb; several adopt the reading “the one who withholds/he withholds mercy from his friend forsakes….” The point of the first half of the verse seems to be that one should expect kindness (or loyalty) from a friend in times of suffering.

[6:14]  ³ tn The relationship of the second colon to the first is difficult. The line just reads literally “and the fear of the Almighty he forsakes.” The ו (vav) could be interpreted in several different ways: “else he will forsake…,” “although he forsakes…,” “even the one who forsakes…,” or “even if he forsakes…” – the reading adopted here. If the first colon receives the reading “His friend has scorned compassion,” then this clause would be simply coordinated with “and forsakes the fear of the Almighty.” The sense of the verse seems to say that kindness/loyalty should be shown to the despairing, even to the one who is forsaking the fear of the Lord, meaning, saying outrageous things, like Job has been doing.

[7:3]  ⁴ tn “Thus” indicates a summary of vv. 1 and 2: like the soldier, the mercenary, and the slave, Job has labored through life and looks forward to death.

[7:3]  ⁵ tn The form is the Hophal perfect of נָחַל (nakhal): “I have been made to inherit,” or more simply, “I have inherited.” The form occurs only here. The LXX must have confused the letters or sounds, a ו (vav) for the ן (nun), for it reads “I have endured.” As a passive the form technically has two accusatives (see GKC 388 §121.c). Job’s point is that his sufferings have been laid on him by another, and so he has inherited them.

[7:3]  ⁶ tn The word is שָׁוְא (shav’, “vanity, deception, nothingness, futility”). His whole life – marked here in months to show its brevity – has been futile. E. Dhorme (Job, 98) suggests the meaning “disillusionment,” explaining that it marks the deceptive nature of mortal life. The word describes life as hollow, insubstantial.

[7:3]  ⁷ tn “Sorrow” is עָמָל (’amal), used in 3:10. It denotes anxious toil, labor, troublesome effort. It may be that the verse expresses the idea that the nights are when the pains of his disease are felt the most. The months are completely wasted; the nights are agonizing.

[7:3]  ⁸ tn The verb is literally “they have appointed”; the form with no expressed subject is to be interpreted as a passive (GKC 460 §144.g). It is therefore not necessary to repoint the verb to make it passive. The word means “to number; to count,” and so “to determine; to allocate.”

[14:22]  ⁹ tn The prepositional phrases using עָלָיו (’alayv, “for him[self]”) express the object of the suffering. It is for himself that the dead man “grieves.” So this has to be joined with אַךְ (’akh), yielding “only for himself.” Then, “flesh” and “soul/person” form the parallelism for the subjects of the verbs.

[14:22]  ¹⁰ sn In this verse Job is expressing the common view of life beyond death, namely, that in Sheol there is no contact with the living, only separation, but in Sheol there is a conscious awareness of the dreary existence.

[15:27]  ¹¹ sn This verse tells us that he is not in any condition to fight, because he is bloated and fat from luxurious living.

[15:27]  ¹² tn D. W. Thomas defends a meaning “cover” for the verb עָשָׂה (’asah). See “Translating Hebrew `asah,” BT 17 [1966]: 190-93.

[15:27]  ¹³ tn The term פִּימָה (pimah), a hapax legomenon, is explained by the Arabic fa’ima, “to be fat.” Pope renders this “blubber.” Cf. KJV “and maketh collops of fat on his flanks.”

[17:13]  ¹⁴ tn The clause begins with אִם (’im) which here has more of the sense of “since.” E. Dhorme (Job, 253) takes a rather rare use of the word to get “Can I hope again” (see also GKC 475 §150.f for the caveat).

[19:11]  ¹⁵ tn The verb is a nonpreterite vayyiqtol perhaps employed to indicate that the contents of v. 11 are a logical sequence to the actions described in v. 10.

[19:11]  ¹⁶ tn This second half of the verse is a little difficult. The Hebrew has “and he reckons me for him like his adversaries.” Most would change the last word to a singular in harmony with the versions, “as his adversary.” But some retain the MT pointing and try to explain it variously: Weiser suggests that the plural might have come from a cultic recitation of Yahweh’s deeds against his enemies; Fohrer thinks it refers to the primeval enemies; Gordis takes it as distributive, “as one of his foes.” If the plural is retained, this latter view makes the most sense.

[20:4]  ¹⁷ tn The MT has “Do you not know?” The question can be interpreted as a rhetorical question affirming that Job must know this. The question serves to express the conviction that the contents are well-known to the audience (see GKC 474 §150.e).

[20:4]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “from the putting of man on earth.” The infinitive is the object of the preposition, which is here temporal. If “man” is taken as the subjective genitive, then the verb would be given a passive translation. Here “man” is a generic, referring to “mankind” or “the human race.”

[22:3]  ¹⁹ tn The word חֵפֶץ (khefets) in this passage has the nuance of “special benefit; favor.” It does not just express the desire for something or the interest in it, but the profit one derives from it.

[22:3]  ²⁰ tn The verb תַתֵּם (tattem) is the Hiphil imperfect of תָּמַם (tamam, “be complete, finished”), following the Aramaic form of the geminate verb with a doubling of the first letter.

[26:7]  ²¹ sn The Hebrew word is צָפוֹן (tsafon). Some see here a reference to Mount Zaphon of the Ugaritic texts, the mountain that Baal made his home. The Hebrew writers often equate and contrast Mount Zion with this proud mountain of the north. Of course, the word just means north, and so in addition to any connotations for pagan mythology, it may just represent the northern skies – the stars. Since the parallel line speaks of the earth, that is probably all that was intended in this particular context.

[26:7]  ²² sn There is an allusion to the creation account, for this word is תֹּהוּ (tohu), translated “without form” in Gen 1:2.

[26:7]  ²³ sn Buttenwieser suggests that Job had outgrown the idea of the earth on pillars, and was beginning to see it was suspended in space. But in v. 11 he will still refer to the pillars.

[28:13]  ²⁴ tc The LXX has “its way, apparently reading דַּרְכָה (darkhah) in place of עֶרְכָּהּ (’erkah, “place”). This is adopted by most modern commentators. But R. Gordis (Job, 308) shows that this change is not necessary, for עֶרֶךְ (’erekh) in the Bible means “order; row; disposition,” and here “place.” An alternate meaning would be “worth” (NIV, ESV).

[30:18]  ²⁵ tn Heb “he”; the referent (God) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[30:18]  ²⁶ tc This whole verse is difficult. The first problem is that this verb in the MT means “is disguised [or disfigured],” indicating that Job’s clothes hang loose on him. But many take the view that the verb is a phonetic variant of חָבַשׁ (khavash, “to bind; to seize”) and that the Hitpael form is a conflation of the third and second person because of the interchange between them in the passage (R. Gordis, Job, 335). The commentaries list a number of conjectural emendations, but the image in the verse is probably that God seizes Job by the garment and throws him down.

[30:18]  ²⁷ tn The phrase “like the collar” is difficult, primarily because their tunics did not have collars. A translation of “neck” would suit better. Some change the preposition to בּ (bet), getting a translation “by the neck of my tunic.”

[31:18]  ²⁸ tn Heb “he grew up with me.” Several commentators have decided to change the pronoun to “I,” and make it causative.

[31:18]  ²⁹ tn The expression “from my mother’s womb” is obviously hyperbolic. It is a way of saying “all his life.”

[31:18]  ³⁰ tn Heb “I guided her,” referring to the widow mentioned in v. 16.

[33:17]  ³¹ tc The MT simply has מַעֲשֶׂה (ma’aseh, “deed”). The LXX has “from his iniquity” which would have been מֵעַוְלָה (me’avlah). The two letters may have dropped out by haplography. The MT is workable, but would have to mean “[evil] deeds.”

[33:17]  ³² tc Here too the sense of the MT is difficult to recover. Some translations took it to mean that God hides pride from man. Many commentators changed יְכַסֶּה (yÿkhasseh, “covers”) to יְכַסֵּחַ (yÿkhasseakh, “he cuts away”), or יְכַלֶּה (yÿkhalleh, “he puts an end to”). The various emendations are not all that convincing.

[35:16]  ³³ tn The word הֶבֶל (hevel) means “vanity; futility; to no purpose.”